The World Turned Upside Down, or The Comical Metamorphoses. London: E. Ryland, ca. 1770 (Cotsen 360). The boys crown their teacher with a dunce cap and horse him in preparation for a beating.

School boys in classrooms

A fish angling on a river bank

The World Turned Upside-Down Illustrated in 16 Wonderful Pictures. London: W. Darton, ca. 1830. (Cotsen 3883)

Hard working sheep and bears

Die verkehrte Welt in Bildern und Reimen. plate 2. Stuttgart: Hoffmann’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1850. (Cotsen)

A girl or a nutcracker in the nursery

The Taylors of Ongar, Signor Topsy-Turvy’s Wonderful Magic Lantern. London: Printed for Tabart & Co. at the Juvenile and School library, 1810. (Cotsen 7411). This savage little poem was also the work of Ann Taylor Gilbert.”

A hare, a turkey, and a tortoise in the kitchen

Committing sedition instead of being nutrition,

THEY CAN ALL TURN THE WORLD UPSIDE DOWN!

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s showstopping number,  “Yorktown: The World Turned Upside Down,”  uses examples that resonate deeply with a contemporary audience instead of  the symbols of subversion from below that circulated  in popular prints (and even earlier in the margins of medieval manuscripts).  Just a few of the traditional role reversals are featured above, so here are two “World Turned Upside Down” prints to show more of them.