French Taylor, Fitting John Bull with a "Jean de Bry"

It should come as no surprise that the French revolution in politics was accompanied by a parallel revolution in fashion. From the rejection of breeches among the sansculottes to the decree that all citizens should wear the tricolor cockade, to the radical simplicity of the Graeco-Roman republican style of women's dresses, the values of the French revolution were consciously and conspicuously expressed through clothing. Who alse but the French would hire one of their greatest painters (Jacques-Louis David) to design a set of ceremonial robes (a la republican Rome) to be worn by their new French legislators, and other public functionaries?

Gillray, of course, was well aware of this. After all, in 1798, he had created an entire series of prints (French Habits) showing Francophile Whigs wearing the formal French costume appropriate to their would-be role in a new post-revolutionary government. And he alludes, in this print, to that same formal wear in the picture hanging on the back wall labeled "Des Habiliments Francois" and in the volume upon which John Bull stands inscribed "Nouveaux Costumes."

But he has greatest fun with the political implications of French vs English fashion in the depiction and dialogue of the scrawny "French Taylor" (with his tri-colour breeches and bonnet rouge) and the stubby and sturdy representative of the average Englishman, "John Bull."

TAYLOR
A ha! - dere my Friend, I fit you to de Life! - dere is Liberté - no tight Aristocrat Sleeve, to keep from you do, vat you like! - aha! begar, dere be only want von leetel National Cockade to make look quite a la mode de Paris!!

JOHN BULL
Liberty! - quoth'a! - why sound I can't move my Arms at all! for all it looks woundy big! - ah! damn your French Alamodes, they give a man the same Liberty as if he was in the Stocks! - give me my Old Coat again, say I, if it is a little out at the Elbows.

The French fashion that Gillray refers to in this instance is the Jean de Bry coat which was all the rage in 1799. A few months earlier, Gillray made major fun of it in "Monstrosities" of 1799. And although it seems to have been around earlier, the style had gained new currency and perhaps a new name because of the French foreign minister who wore a similar coat. De Bry's name had been all over the English newswpapers in April and May of 1799 as a result of an assassination attempt upon his life by a group of Hussars shown in Gillray's The High German Method of Destroying Vermin at Rat-stadt..

Sources and Reading

• Commentary from the British Museum on French Taylor, Fitting John Bull with a "Jean de Bry".
• Draper Hill, The Satirical Etchings of James Gillray, 1976, #68
• "John Bull," Wikipedia
• "Jean Debry," Wikipedia
• Thomas Wright and R.H. Evans, Historical and Descriptive Account of the Caricatures of James Gillray #456.
• Thomas Wright and Joseph Grego, The Works of James Gillray, the Caricaturist; With the History of His Life and Times, p. 265-6.