Not-for-profit project dedicated to exploring curious and compelling works from the history of art, literature, and ideas — focusing on works now fallen into the public domain.
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Last Notes npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Scottish-born inventor Alexander Graham Bell — who died #onthisday in 1922 — goes to kiss his wife Mabel while she stands in one of his spectacular tetrahedral kites. See more of these wonderful creations (and the kiss realised) in our post here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/alexander-graham-bell-s-tetrahedral-kites-1903-9 #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review The earliest known depiction of a crop circle is in The Mowing-Devil (1678), a 5-page pamphlet which recounts a labor dispute ending with an unwitting deal with the devil, and a field mown in way “that no Mortal Man was able to do the like”: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-mowing-devil #cropcircles npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Guess the letter. From a 17th-century German book on the art of writing. A great range of different styles are represented seemingly increasing in complexity, and also illegibility, as the book goes on: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-proper-art-of-writing-1655 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy #MayDay and #InternationalWorkersDay! This poster by Dutch artist Jan Toorop was for the Hague's 1898 National Woman’s Labour Exhibition, which had the goal to improve women's wages and working conditions. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review From 1903 to 1907 Augustus Jansson produced more than 30 striking adverts for the Queen City Printing Ink Company, including the wonderful Ink Beasts Parade series, with its "Magenta Ponies" and "Orange-Yellow Ibexiaticus". More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/augustus-janssons-queen-city-ink-adverts-1903-1907 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review For #InternationalDanceDay — pages from a 1700 dance manual depicting a revolutionary dance notation system invented at the court of Louis XIV. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review These aerial renderings, based off an 1860s land survey and executed in watercolour for the Index of American Design (1936), depict a lost 19th-century Manhattan of grand country estates and vast private gardens: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/manhattans-last-arcadia npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Total Eclipse of the Sun, 1882. Chromolithograph after a pastel drawing by astronomer, artist, and amateur entomologist Étienne Léopold Trouvelot, who died on this day in 1895. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review The first person to discover a link between increased levels of CO2 and #globalwarming was a New Yorker named Eunice Newton Foote. Read her 1856 paper, and how she went unacknowledged for more than a century, here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/first-paper-to-link-co2-and-global-warming-by-eunice-foote-1856 #earthday #climatechange npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Illustrations from Albert Robida’s La vie électrique (1890). While the flying cars have not (yet) come to pass, Robida's imagining of life 60 years in the future includes many prescient visions, such as a proto Zoom, Netflix, hyperloop + smart doorbell: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/albert-robida-la-vie-electrique npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Mark Twain died #onthisday in 1910. The best known of his books is Huckleberry Finn, not so well known is Jap Herron which, according to a woman named Emily Grant Hutchings, he dictated from beyond the grave via a ouija board... https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/jap-herron-a-novel-written-from-the-ouija-board-1917 #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review The Parakeet — one of several polychrome woodblock copies made in ca. 1900 from works by Itō Jakuchū (1716–1800), a Japanese painter of the mid-Edo period notable for his striking modern aesthetic. More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/polychrome-woodblocks-of-ito-jakuchu-birds npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review #OnThisDay in 1561, as the sun rose over Nuremberg, the residents described seeing an aerial battle take place in its glare — the erratic dance of orbs, crosses, cylinders and a crash-landing beyond the city. An early sighting of alien #UFO? https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/celestial-phenomenon-over-nuremberg-april-14th-1561 #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review “Leaving the Opera in the Year 2000”, a circa 1902 illustration by French illustrator, etcher, lithographer, caricaturist, novelist, and all around futurologist, Albert Robida. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review “Pull up this small rod to enable the 'used' oil to run out of the base-chamber”. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Total Eclipse of the Sun, 1882. Chromolithograph after a pastel drawing by astronomer, artist, and amateur entomologist Étienne Léopold Trouvelot. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Dream Vision; A Nightmare (1525), by Albrecht Dürer, who died #onthisday in 1528. The watercolour and accompanying text describe an apocalyptic dream he had on the night of 7-8th June 1525. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review This image details the aesthetic requirements for achieving the “Ideal English Rabbit”, the benchmark of perfect (yet seemingly impossible) markings for a particular breed of rabbit first developed in the middle of the 19th century: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/in-search-of-the-impossible-the-perfect-english-rabbit npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review “Human Statue of Liberty” comprised of 18,000 officers and men at Camp Dodge, Des Moines, ca. 1917/18. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review In the early 16th century Albrecht Durer produced 6 woodcuts of knot patterns, likely inspired by Mamluk decorative metalwork. Each knot is a group of intricately entwined infinity loops made up of repeating patterns that follow circular paths: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/durer-knots/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, fell for one of the greatest hoaxes of the 20th century when he became convinced that the "fairy photographs" taken by two girls from Yorkshire in the 1920s were real. Mary Losure explores: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/sir-arthur-and-the-fairies #AprilFools npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Before the haystacks and water lilies, the teenage caricatures of Claude Monet: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/claude-monet-caricatures/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Punctuation Personified (1824) introduces, with Mr. Stops as our guide, a cast of literal “characters”, including Counsellor Comma, Ensign Semicolon, and a surprisingly mournful Exclamation Point... https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/punctuation-personified npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review This frontispiece etching, printed by Jan Luyken for Cornelis van Dyk’s Osteologia (1680), seems to speak to the consequences of Adam’s naming as imagined by Hegel: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/luyken-osteologia npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Bernard Sleigh’s Anciente Mappe of Fairyland, originally published in 1917, is a stunning six-foot-long map that depicts the worlds of various myths, fairytales, and folklore on one single landscape: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/an-anciente-mappe-of-fairyland/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review X-Ray images of women wearing corsets from French doctor Ludovic O'Followell's Le Corset (1908). Although keen to show the damaging impact of corsets, he did not actually want the corset to be abolished, but simply redesigned: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-corset-x-rays-of-dr-ludovic-o-followell-1908 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review #OnThisDay in 1849, an enslaved man named Henry Brown made his bid for freedom, by shipping himself in a box to the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society in downtown Philadelphia. Read his story here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-narrative-of-henry-box-brown-1849 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Michalina Janoszanka, Wiosna (Spring), ca. 1920s. One of several paintings made directly on glass by the Polish artist. More of her work in our post: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/michalina-janoszanka/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy #WorldWaterDay! Fetch yourself a big glass of the good stuff and take a look at the watery wonder which is Hamonshu (1903), a Japanese book of wave and ripple designs: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/hamonshu-a-japanese-book-of-wave-and-ripple-designs-1903 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Yokohama-e (literally “Yokohama pictures”) are a type of Japanese woodblock print depicting the foreigners who flooded through Yokohama during the 1860s and 70s, in particular North Americans: https://buff.ly/2eSwcac npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy #WorldPoetryDay! Explore our essays on poetry themes, including pieces on John Milton, Walt Whitman, G.M. Hopkins, A.C. Swinburne, Lewis Carroll, and Phillis Wheatley: https://publicdomainreview.org/essays/category/poetry npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Isaac Newton died #onthisday in 1726. Not just a scientist, he also wrote on apocalyptic prophecy and believed the world could "end" in 2060 AD. More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/sir-isaac-newton-s-daniel-and-the-apocalypse-1733?utm_content=bufferb98da&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer #OTD #apocalypse npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review NEW ESSAY — “Fear and Fragility: The Glass Delusion and Its History” — In early modern Europe, patients started appearing in medical records with a particular ailment: a firm belief that they were made of glass. Tamara Sanderson explores: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/fear-and-fragility-the-glass-delusion-and-its-history/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review A few of the many inventions (including proto-e-reader) in Agostino Ramelli’s 1588 illustrated masterpiece Le diverse et artificiose machine (Diverse and artificial machines). More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/agostino-ramelli-theatre-of-machines npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Amida on the Lotus, from Athanasius Kircher's China Illustrata, 1665. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Celebrate #WorldBookDay with a look at some of the most beautiful and unusual examples from the first 100 years of the “modern” book cover, since the rise of publishers' bindings circa 1820: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-art-of-book-covers-1820-1914 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review A few of the 53 "potted landscapes" made for each of the stations of the Tōkaidō road, the most important route in Edo-period Japan. After they were made the artist had a relatively obscure ukiyo-e artist named Utagawa Yoshishige to illustrate them: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/53-stations-of-the-tokaido-as-potted-landscapes-1848 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Seed sowing time — entry for #March in the Labors of the Months section of the Très Riches Heures, probably the most important illuminated manuscript of the 15th century: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/labors-of-the-months-from-the-tres-riches-heures npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Beautiful diagrams from a circa 17th-century copy of Muslim polymath Ismail al-Jazarī’s *Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices*, originally published in 1206: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/arabic-machine-manuscript npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review To create convincing facsimiles of drawings in the early modern era required a challenging technical feat: translating drawings into print. Our latest post explores the 18th-century aquatints of Maria Catharina Prestel: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/maria-catharina-prestel/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy #InternationalPolarBearDay! Read Michael Engelhard's essay "Darwin's Polar Bear" looking at the often overlooked role they played in the development of evolutionary theory: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/darwin-s-polar-bear #polarbears npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Northern Lights in Zenith, by Harald Moltke, 1900. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review One of the first English recipes for “currey the Indian way”, to be served with rice “pellow”, from the 1751 edition of Hannah Glasse's Art of Cookery. More in our latest books post: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-art-of-cookery/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review One of the many wonderful illustrations featured in Omega: The Last Days of the Earth (1894), a #sciencefiction novel by 19th-century French astronomer and writer Camille Flammarion, who was born #onthisday in1842. More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/omega-the-last-days-of-the-world-1894 #OTD #scifi npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review T. S. Eliot’s admiration of P. G. Wodehouse was said to be “just this side of idolatry”, Douglas Adams named him a “great genius” who “writes pure word music”. Read Wodehouse's Leave it to Psmith (1923) here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collections/leave-it-to-psmith-1923/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review “The great south sea caterpillar, transform’d into a Bath butterfly” (1795), James Gillray's caricature of English naturalist, botanist and patron of the natural sciences Joseph Banks, born #onthisday in 1743. More on the iconography of Banks here https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/joseph-banks-portraits-of-a-placid-elephant #otd npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Poseidon taking chocolate from Mexico to Europe, a detail from the frontispiece to Chocolata Inda by Antonio Colmenero de Ledesma, 1644. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review #SundayReads: Jennifer Manoukian recovers the cunning exploits of a forgotten 19th-century conman, whose initially honorable intentions quickly escalated into all-out fraud: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/a-princely-ploy npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review In his Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables Explained, both published in 1883, Henry Lee narrates accounts of sea beasts to disprove them, but the pamphlets also unintentionally serve as a wonderful compendia of maritime folklore on aquatic cryptids: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/sea-monsters-sea-fables npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Abolitionist leader Frederick Douglass died #onthisday in 1895, aged 77. Read his only published work of fiction "The Heroic Slave", first featured in Autographs for Freedom, an anthology of anti-slavery literature published in 1853: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/autographs-for-freedom-1853?utm_content=buffer1de80&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer #otd npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review In Pennsylvania and beyond (ca. 1790–1830) official documents such as baptismal records, land deeds, and birth registries were lettered in German fraktur script, and decorated with the hearts, vines, and tulips that came to characterise fraktur folk art: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/fraktur-folk-art npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Chart of the Hand.⠀ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy un-un-birthday Lewis Carroll, born #onthisday in 1832. Pictured here: the frontispiece to The Rectory Umbrella, a magazine produced by Carroll and his 10 siblings, when he was around 17 years old. More in Jenny Woolf's essay here: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-mystery-of-lewis-carroll #otd npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Born #onthisday in 1756, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Read an account of him at just 8 years old. As well as dazzling the narrator with his musical genius Mozart “would also sometimes run about the room with a stick between his legs by way of horse” — https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/account-of-a-very-remarkable-young-musician-1769 #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Beautiful illustrations of iron interacting with rocks, from the publication of a paper, "On the Disposition of Iron in Variegated Strata", delivered by the botanist and geologist George Maw to the Geological Society on April 22nd 1868: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/on-the-disposition-of-iron-in-variegated-strata-1868?utm_content=buffer0b175&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review One of a great series of drawings depicting balloonfish and pufferfish made during the United States Exploring Expedition, 1838-1842. More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/drawings-of-tetradons-and-diodons-ca-1838-42?utm_content=buffera80a0&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer #fishfriday npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Earliest known photograph of a snowman, ca. 1854, taken by Mary Dillwyn (most likely in Wales). npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Lepus leaping. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review France in 2000, as envisaged in 1899. Some tech is wonderfully prescient: we've versions of Zoom, a vacuum cleaner, drone deliveries. Other visions less so, particularly those anticipating a life beneath the waves, of underwater croquet + whale buses... https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/a-19th-century-vision-of-the-year-2000/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Pages from Master of Claude de France’s Book of Flower Studies (ca. 1510–1515), including some delightful play with scale. From the @metmuseum. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Embroidered front and back covers of a 1791 edition of Robinson Crusoe — featured in our essay "Pens and Needles", on the Victorian revival of embroidered book covers: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/pens-and-needles-reviving-book-embroidery-in-victorian-england npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Died #onthisday in 1834, Giovanni Aldini, the Italian "galvanist" whose experiments in animating the muscles of the dead with electricity inspired Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Read more in our essay by Sharon Ruston: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-science-of-life-and-death-in-mary-shelleys-frankenstein npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Chromolithographic plates from Owen Jones’ Examples of Chinese Ornament (1867) which reproduces ornamentation from painted vases, incense burners, lacquer boxes, and many more objects in the @V_and_A. More here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/examples-of-chinese-ornament-1867/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review A collaboration with time: beautifully decayed and damaged daguerreotypes from the studio of one of the most celebrated 19th-century photographers Mathew Brady, who died #onthisday in 1896: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/decayed-daguerreotypes npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review A look at some of the most beautiful and unusual examples from the first 100 years of the "modern" book cover, since the rise of publishers' bindings circa 1820: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-art-of-book-covers-1820-1914 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Jenny Woolf explores the joys and struggles of Lewis Carroll, who died #onthisday in 1898 — a brilliant, secretive, and complex man, and creator of one of the world's best-loved stories: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-mystery-of-lewis-carroll #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Susan Schulten explores the pioneering work of Emma Willard (1787–1870), a leading feminist educator whose innovative maps of time laid the groundwork for the charts and infographics of today: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/emma-willard-maps-of-time npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Paschal Beverly Randolph was a 19th-century occult thinker and activist who believed that his multiracial identity afforded him “peculiar mental power and marvelous versatility”. More in @LaraLangerCohen's essay — https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-emancipatory-visions-of-a-sex-magician npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Chemistry of Combustion and Illumination, a diagram from Edward Livingston Youmans' Chemical Atlas; or, The Chemistry of Familiar Objects (1856). ⠀ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Wonderful sketch of “teeth painlessly extracted by steam power” adorning an envelope addressed to a certain Dr J. Chapman of Totton, Southampton, and dated 1894. Was it sent in the mail like this? https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/steam-powered-tooth-extraction-on-an-envelope-1894?utm_content=bufferf9c3c&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Highlights from @BPLBoston's collection of "fore-edge" paintings, illustrations adorning the open edges of books, only revealed when the stack of pages are fanned — https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/fore-edge-book-paintings-from-the-boston-public-library npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Optimistic opening to the first issue of The Pioneer (1912), journal for the "Simplified Speling Soesiety”. More here: https://buff.ly/3GeURMA npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review As many embark boldly (and perhaps temporarily) on brand new gym memberships, here's a look at where it all started: the workout machines of the 19th century: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/zander-gym npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review An automaton fuelled by tomes of newly available knowledge sweeps away the old society. No, not a self-portrait by ChatGPT in the style of a Georgian satirical print, but one of several “March of Intellect” cartoons published ca. 1828: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/march-of-the-intellect npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review In at number 1 in our top 10 of this year’s most read pieces — Kathryn Hughes’ essay “The Cat’s Meat Man: Feeding Felines in Victorian London”: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-cats-meat-man/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy New Year's Eve! Europe has been marking the change of year with pyrotechnics since at least the 16th century. @simon_werrett looks at how artists have represented fireworks displays through the centuries: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/picturing-pyrotechnics #Fireworks #NewYearsEve npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Top 10 of this year's most read pieces — no.7: our post on the playful, radical photos by the couple Marie Høeg and Bolette Berg — subversive visions of gender and sexuality in early 1900s Norway: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/berg-and-hoeg/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Entering the US public domain in 2026: Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Top 10 of this year's most read pieces — no.9: our post on a 1678 pamphlet, The Mowing-Devil, which includes the earliest known depiction of a crop circle: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/the-mowing-devil/ npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review J. M. Barrie's My Lady Nicotine (1896) — A genre-defying work by the creator of Peter Pan about the pleasures of smoking: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/my-lady-nicotine npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Invent Monopoly, do not collect $200... npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio (1880) — 1st English translation of Pu Songling's collection of classical Chinese stories, including magical pear trees, thimble-sized babies, ghostly cities, and mean spirited daughters-in-law being turned into pigs: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/strange-stories-from-a-chinese-studio-1880 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review A whale and three fish sitting down to a formal dinner of Russian sailors, in a propaganda cartoon created by Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915), during the Russo-Japanese war (1904-5). View more from this superb series of prints here: https://buff.ly/2w0DK1S npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review #OnThisDay in 1791 “father of the computer” Charles Babbage was born. On his death 80 yrs later, as he himself requested, his brain was donated to science. See pictures of the "wetware" behind the "hardware" and read a detailed description here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/a-description-of-the-brain-of-mr-charles-babbage-1909 #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Santa snoozing... npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review A Christmas Sermon by Robert Louis Stevenson — a meditation on the questions of death, morality + the main task in life: “To be honest, to be kind — to earn a little and to spend a little less, to make upon the whole a family happier for his presence” https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/a-christmas-sermon-by-robert-louis-stevenson-1900 npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Adalbert Stifter's Rock Crystal, a Christmas tale about 2 children who get lost in the blinding snow, loved by WG Sebald, Hannah Arendt, Thomas Mann + WH Auden (who called it a "beautiful parable about the relation of people to places, of man to nature") https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/rock-crystal-adalbert-stifter npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Entering the US public domain in 2026: Stella Benson's The Far-Away Bride. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review #OnThisDay in 1931, Wilson "Snowflake" Bentley died from pneumonia contracted after walking home in a snowstorm. In 1885, the self-educated farmer from Vermont, using a homemade camera, became the first person to photograph a snow crystal: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-snowflake-man-of-vermont #otd npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Entering the US public domain in 2026: Sigmund Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Cuckoo and Pine, by Utagawa Hiroshige, 1840. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Reading for this winter solstice night: the remarkable diary of Frederick A. Cook, one of the first people to spend winter on Antarctica, including a night which lasted more than two months: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/through-the-first-antarctic-night-1900 #Solstice #WinterSolstice #winter #LongestNight #shortestday npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Happy first day of winter to all north of the equator! In need of some "backward change of edge" this season? Here's Swedish figure skating champion Bror Myer turning some circles on the ice circa 1921... https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/skating-with-bror-myer-1921/ #winter #WinterSolstice npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Published by the National Woman Suffrage Publishing Company in 1917, this little book's pages are entirely blank. More on it here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/why-women-should-not-vote npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Born #onthisday in 1838, theologian and schoolmaster Edwin Abbott Abbott, who in 1884 published the remarkable Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, perhaps the first ever example of “mathematical fiction”. More on the book here: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/aspiring-to-a-higher-plane #OTD npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Entering the US public domain in 2026: Agatha Christie's The Murder at the Vicarage. npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review An 18th-century treatise by coffee enthusiast Benjamin Moseley, arguing for the drink's multitude of benefits when it was still relatively new to Europe: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/moseley-coffee npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review At the end of the 17th century a mysterious kayak-paddling “Finnman” was first seen in Orkney waters. @JonWestaway explores what the subsequent explanations tell us about early modern science's fascination with the "out of place": https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-orkney-finnmen-legends npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review Geographical Fun (1868), a series of fantastic anthropomorphic maps of European countries, drawn by an unnamed 15-year-old girl who had the idea for the novel maps "when seeking to amuse a brother confined to his bed by illness": https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/geographical-fun-being-humourous-outlines-of-various-countries-1868?utm_content=bufferdbc71&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer npub1rffrvsgvxedv40zejrdmp9gxydrmlud6urggfey4ejgle3j9vsasvylx65 The Public Domain Review This is not a painting. It is made entirely of wood, its surface flat. A detail from the 15th-century "Studiolo Gubbio", one of the finest examples of intarsia, the masterful art of fitting together pieces of wood to make images: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/exquisite-rot-spalted-wood-and-the-lost-art-of-intarsia
