Das Buch der Abstammung, 1874.

[Anonymous.] Das Buch der Abstammung: Illustrationen zur Darwin’schen Descendenztheorie, gesammelt und fein koloriert von einem Antiaffen. 1874.

A curious, creative Anti-Darwinian foldout, by an anonymous German artist, who used different media to create an effective, if somewhat simplistic critique of Darwin’s theory of human descent. He or she combines original, hand-colored ink drawings with cartoons and illustrtations clipped from newspapers and then mounted on the page. An alternative title appears on the foldout: “Die Darwin’sche Abstammungslehre durch Bilder veranschaulicht” (Darwin’s Theory of Descent illustrated by Pictures). The pamphlet goes from the egg in the primordial mud (“Urschlamm”; not displayed) to colorful lizards to birds in full human dress, wandering around with the intention of “der Bibel zum Trotz das Alter der Welt festzustellen” (to determine, against the Bible, the age of the world).

The final sequence features Darwin next to an ape (characterized by a small caption as the freethinking Voltaire), and another ape, characterized as “the wild man of the woods” (“Waldmensch”). According to a note above the pictures, these animals are deliberating whom to elect as their next leader. The not-so-subtle message is that, by arguing that humans have descended from ape-like progenitors, Darwin himself (rather than the rest of humankind) has affirmed his own animal origins. You get what you deserve.