DISPOSSESSION SUMMARY

A Splendid Shilling

A Splendid Shilling

An uncirculated 1701 Shilling, minted in the year of John Phillips's short poem, entitled "A Burlesque of Milton"; it was a first of its kind, a poem about owning not a shilling in the world.  Photo courtesy Royal Mint Museum.

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A Lock of Hair

A Lock of Hair

A love token or a mourning ring (depending on how you look at it), crafted from gold, crystal, and diamond.  Nestled at its heart is a small swatch of material braided from human hair. AN1418875001 © Trustees of the British Museum

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A Book of Accounts

A Book of Accounts

A page from Alexander Brodie's New and Easy Method of Book-Keeping (1722), 8, engraved by George Bickham the Elder.  Bickham and his mercurial son specialized in trompe-l'oeil, eye-catching realism, and engravings meant to simulate handwriting.

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Blank Paper (2)

Blank Paper (2)

A sheet of blank paper, sacrificed by Laetitia Pilkington into a poem about dispossession, and included as part of her scandal-memoir.  Pilkington, Memoirs of Mrs. Laetitia Pilkington, 3 vols. (London, 1735), 1.109.

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The Lost Property Office

The Lost Property Office

An artist's fantasy of the interior of the Lost Property Office, a clearing-house for "drop'd," "forgot," "misplaced," or otherwise "lost" property.  “Honest Jonathan in His Repository,” in Life and Glorious Actions . . . of Jonathan Wilde (London, 1725). Courtesy Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

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A Grub-Street Poet

A Grub-Street Poet

William Hogarth, The Distrest Poet (1736).  Hogarth's poet, dwelling in poverty, is writing about riches; he is borrowing scraps and ideas from other people's work.  Photo by Author.  Original at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.

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A Portrait of John Gay

A Portrait of John Gay

John Gay, by George Bickham the Elder.  This so-called "medley print" is a still life of low art composed from pirated bits of poetry and sold by the George Bickhams, father and son.  Image Courtesy National Portrait Gallery, NPG d9490.

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Jonathan Wild

Jonathan Wild

An articulated male skeleton, age forty, believed to be of Jonathan Wild. RCSHM/Osteo. 336. Courtesy Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons, England.

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