The Wasp — August 23, 1879 — page 8: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# "The Royal Hottentots": A Satirical Burlesque This is a theatrical script for a one-act farce mocking Victorian attitudes toward African peoples. The cast includes caricatured "Black Hottentots" and "White Hottentots" (the latter suggesting satirical reversal). The dialogue ridicules both colonial pretensions and scientific racism. Characters discuss "monsters" with anatomically exaggerated features, apparently mocking pseudo-scientific accounts of African people that were popular in Victorian society. The humor relies on absurdist descriptions and the incongruity of treating colonial subjects as exotic curiosities. The accompanying illustrations show grotesque figures, reinforcing the satire's crude caricature style. The piece appears designed to mock Victorian sensationalism about non-European peoples while simultaneously perpetuating the same racist stereotypes it ostensibly critiques—typical of 19th-century "satirical" comedy that punched down rather than up.