Karl Mayer Rothschild "The Smuggler" – Poster No. 43 from the “Museum of Horrors” series – Dreyfus Affair

Karl Mayer Rothschild "The Smuggler" – Poster No. 43 from the “Museum of Horrors” series – Dreyfus Affair

Karl Mayer the Smuggler – Poster No. 43 from the series Musée des Horreurs (“Museum of Horrors”). Paris, [1899–1900]. In French. 

A hand-colored lithographic print depicting Karl Mayer von Rothschild disguised as a cat, pushing packages marked with the Rothschild family emblem (five arrows representing the five branches of the family) across the border between France and Germany. Baron Karl Mayer von Rothschild, born Kalman Mayer Rothschild in Frankfurt on April 24, 1788, and died March 10, 1855, was a German-born banker of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and the founder of the Rothschild branch in Naples. His image is used here in connection with the Dreyfus Affair to suggest that the “treason” of Alfred Dreyfus had deep roots in his Jewish ancestry, implying that Jews had long betrayed French national interests. Signed in print by V. Lenepveu.

Published in August/September 1900.

The series "Musée des Horreurs" (“The Monsters’ Exhibition”) was published during the Dreyfus Affair under a pseudonym. It consisted of 51 large posters featuring anti-Dreyfusard, antisemitic, and anti-Masonic caricatures. The series was issued in France over the course of about a year, from October 1899 to December 1900. The original plan was to publish 200 posters, but only 51 were ultimately released. The first posters in the series were widely distributed, with over 300,000 copies sold. In October 1899, the French police arrested several street vendors selling posters from the series, under orders from Police Commissioner Louis Lépine. According to some reports, Lépine acted following an appeal from Baron de Rothschild, who argued that the damage caused by the posters' circulation was irreversible.