Antique Print of the Original Natives of Northwest America, ca.1840

About this piece

Bewohner von Nordwest Amerika, an original antique lithograph of two inhabitants of northwest America, published around 1840. The sheet is printed from stone in color, with the caption lettered in German, Hungarian and French beneath the figures, including "Habitans de Nord-ouest Amerique."

Two portraits are stacked on the sheet. The upper figure is a man in a conical, decorated hat in yellow and brown, a tawny cloak fastened at the neck and red ornaments at his ears. Below him is a younger man with long black hair, a red patterned band across his forehead, a ring through the nose and strings of beads in blue, red and yellow hanging at his shoulder. The faces and costume are drawn and colored in warm browns and yellows against a plain ground.

Prints of this type circulated in European illustrated books of the early nineteenth century and show the way peoples of the American northwest coast were pictured at a time when they were known to Europeans chiefly through explorers' accounts. The artist is anonymous and the source book has not been identified.