Lively Effigies

Abstract

This article will explore the function of printed “effigies” in the second half of the seventeenth century. The title is taken from Samuel Clarke’s frequently reprinted and enlarged compendium, The Marrow of Ecclesiastical Historie, conteined in the Lives of the Fathers, and other Learned Men, and Famous Divines, . . . Together with the Livelie Effigies of most of the Eminentest of them cut in Copper. The term “effigy” is a Janus word, meaning both a representation of a specific deceased individual as a celebratory memorial marker, and as a hated figure intended to be destroyed, such as Guy Fawkes. The article will examine what ways effigial images found in broadsides and books lay claim to the reader or viewer’s attention, and explore how are they used to communicate complex meanings about memory and erasure, even in inexpensive ephemeral publications.