---
title: Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/
description: A hand-coloured etching in five scenes shows ragged, red-capped sans-culottes forcing loaves down the throats of John Bull at centre and of Holland…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[![Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793.jpg)

# Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)

A hand-coloured etching in five scenes shows ragged, red-capped sans-culottes forcing loaves down the throats of John Bull at centre and of Holland, Savoy, Germany and Prussia, and Italy, in some scenes while robbing them. The tell is the staging: the offered 'Bread of Liberty' arrives at bayonet and pistol point, casting French revolutionary liberty as coerced conquest and Britain as the next to be fed.

- **Date:** January 12, 1793
- **Period:** [Pre-1914](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=pre-1914)
- **Made by:** James Gillray (artist), published by Hannah Humphrey, London
- **Region:** [Western and Central Europe](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=western-central-europe)
- **Country:** [Kingdom of Great Britain](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=kingdom-of-great-britain)
- **Medium:** [Print](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=print)
- **Issuer type:** [Individual](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=individual)
- **Regime:** [Pitt Government](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=pitt-government)
- **Leader:** [William Pitt the Younger](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=william-pitt-the-younger)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Persuade or win support](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=persuade-support)
- **Themes:** [War and the military](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=war-military), [Elections and party politics](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=elections-party-politics)
- **Event:** [French Revolutionary Wars](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=french-revolutionary-wars)
- **Techniques:** [Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/) [Name-calling](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/name-calling/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Rijksmuseum](https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/nl/collectie/object/RP-P-1908-5715--54a95ff0ff12513f8f5ffbf93d6aa3bf), retrieved September 29, 2026
- **Rights:** Public domain (published 1793, before 1931; Rijksmuseum marks the image Public Domain Mark 1.0, metadata CC0) Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, object RP-P-1908-5715 (James Gillray, 1793)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
Holland.
River Scheldt
Savoy.
Vive la Liberta [on a banner]
Germany & Prussia
John Bull
Italy.

Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty
Pubd Jan.y 12th 1793 by H. Humphrey No 18 Old Bond Street
```

The imprint line is small and partly abbreviated; the reading 'Pubd Jan.y 12th 1793' follows the Rijksmuseum transcription 'Pub. Jan 12 1793 by H. Humphrey No. 18 Old Bond Street'. Small inscriptions on the loaves and the letter S on the strongbox in the Savoy scene were not read.

[← Marche du Dom Quichotte moderne pour la deffence du Moulin des Abus (March of the Modern Don Quixote in Defence of the Mill of Abuses)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dom-quichotte-moulin-des-abus-1791/) [Exit Liberté a la Francois! or Buonaparte closing the Farce of Egalité, at St. Cloud (James Gillray) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/exit-liberte-buonaparte-gillray-1799/)

## Using the same techniques

- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [豬叫取胎圖 (Picture of the Pig Sect Extracting a Foetus), from Reverently Obeying the Sacred Edict: A Complete Picture Gallery to Repel Heterodoxy](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/pig-cry-taking-foetus-hunan-1891/) (1891 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Colour woodblock caricature depicting foreign Christians as members of a 'pig' sect and showing them cutting a foetus from a woman; violence against a woman and derision of Christianity.
- [The Radical Programme, No. 4: Dismemberment of the Empire (Gladstone & Co. auction India), St Stephen's Review Presentation Cartoon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/radical-programme-selling-india-st-stephens-review-1891/) (Oct 31, 1891 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating)
- [En posesión de su presa (In Possession of Its Prey)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/en-posesion-de-su-presa-el-diablo-1894/) (Jun 2, 1894 · Fear appeal)
- [劉永福懸賞抓拿日本奸細告示 (Liu Yongfu's notice offering rewards for capturing Japanese spies), Taiwan](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/liu-yongfu-reward-notice-japanese-spies-1895/) (1895 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Sífilis: Curación absoluta y radical en el Sanatorio para sifilíticos (Syphilis: Absolute and Radical Cure at the Sanatorium for Syphilitics)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sifilis-sanatorio-abreu-1900/) (1900 · Fear appeal)
- [時局圖 (The Situation in the Far East / Map of the Present Situation), newer version with English labels](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/situation-in-far-east-tse-tsan-tai-1900/) (1900 · Fear appeal)