Abstract

When the caricature came up in the late 16th century, the notion meant an overloaded or exaggerated – and humorous – kind of portrait. Since then its meaning has changed considerably. Today caricature is understood as a visual equivalent of literary satire. This modern understanding has its origin in the bourgeois culture of the Enlightenment. In my contribution I examine the change in the concept of caricature in Western history. The focus is on the connection between this change in meaning and the constitution of caricature as an image genre. When did caricature acquire the status of a legitimate form of invectivity? Besides caricature, special attention is also paid to parody, because both types of invective communication often overlap.