Advertising and Print Culture in the Eighteenth Century

Abstract

Following the death of her husband in 1749, Elizabeth Griffin became proprietor of a print shop on Fleet Street1 and updated the business’s shop bill to include her name.2 In contrast to text-dominated newspaper advertisements and handbills, Griffin’s elaborate trade card did not merely disseminate information on the store’s new owner, location and stock. It offered a visual display designed to instruct and entertain while shaping ideas about consumption and graphic print in the eighteenth century.