The Parade Macaroni

Date1772

Maker M. Darly

Publisher Mary Darly 1760 - 1781

Publisher Matthew Darly ca. 1720 - 1780

OriginEngland, London

MediumHand-colored etching with line engraving

DimensionsOverall: 8 5/8 × 5 9/16in. (21.9 × 14.1cm)
Other: 7 × 4 3/4in. (17.8 × 12.1cm)

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1955-62,41

DescriptionUpper right corner reads: "15"
Lower margin reads: "THE PARADE MACARONI. / Pub.d by MDarly Feb 25.th 1772 according to Act 39 Strand"Label TextThe print is plate 15 from volume II of six volumes of Mary and Matthew Darly's "24 Caricatures by Several Ladies Gentleman Artists &c." According to the British Museum's Catalogue of Prints and Drawings (volume 4): "This figure is a full-length portrait of a very tall young military officer standing, as if on parade, with a halberd in one hand, or "trailing his pike'. As he wears a red and white tartan scarf, it may be understood that he belongs to a Scotch regiment or is a member of a Scottish family. His hair is looped back in an exaggerated club, and he wears a blue laced coat with yellow trim, a beige waistcoat and breeches and white gaiters. This is believed to be a caricature of the Honorable Richard Fitzpatrick, born Jan. 30, 1747, son of John, first Earl of Upper Ossory and brother of the Second Earl-who married Walpole's correspondent, Anne, the divorced Duchess of Grafton- and who was one of the leaders of society at the time, and eminent among the gambling macaroni. He was often mentioned by Walpole as a man of wit and pleasure, familiar with the fashionable world...General Fitzpatrick served with his regiment in America. His letters from New York, Philadelphia and in camp to the Countess of Upper Ossory are printed in "The Letters of H. Walpole", 1858, vii, pp. 1-5."

The Darly's were a husband-and-wife team capitalized on the craze for caricatures, the practice of making a likeness with exaggerated mannerisms or features to create a comic effect, a form that was brought back by aristocratic Britons who visited Italy on the Grand Tour. The Darly’s catered to this audience by publishing a prolific assortment of caricature prints during the 1770s. Many of the Darly's satirized the manners and fashions of the macaroni, a term used to describe a sub-culture of fashionably dressed men during the period, and subsequently, regardless of subject, the Darly's prints were known as "macaroni prints."

Their most famous work was their encyclopedic "Caricatures" which included prints of macaroni’s as well as other interesting characters, such as macaronis, all based on their own drawings and those submitted to them by amateur artists lambasting their friends, artists, and other figures in London life. The front page of Volume I describes them as “…a Series of Drol[l] Prints consisting of Heads, Figures, Conversations and Satires upon the follies of the Age…” These prints were published in groups of 24, in six volumes that were published between 1771 and 1773. Colonial Williamsburg owns volumes 1-4.ProvenanceBefore 1955, the Old Print Shop (New York, NY); 1955-present, purchased by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (Williamsburg, VA).