Although political cartoons were a dominant form of visual political media during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, historians have paid little attention to how the contentious tariff debate of the time was reflected in this medium. This article examines the visual strategies used by protectionist agitators, focusing on the cartoons published by the American Protective Tariff League in its weekly newspaper, the American Economist, between 1894 and 1909. Frequently reproduced in other newspapers, these cartoons reached a broad readership. Through an analysis of recurring symbols, metaphors, and visualization patterns, the article shows how protectionists used cartoons to transform the abstract and somewhat esoteric economic issue of tariffs into an attractive political cause that resonated deeply with ordinary Americans. Demonstrating how cartoons served to simplify, dramatize, and emotionalize the tariff issue, the article thus expands our understanding of the cultural forces that underpinned protectionism’s attractiveness as a political ideology around the turn of the century. Overall, the presentation of the tariff issue in these cartoons amounted to a peculiar mix of fearmongering and promise. While the tariff was usually depicted through metaphors of protection and defense against an imminent threat, the abstract concept of protectionism was visually displayed through metaphors evoking a general notion of prosperity as its alleged result.

Wilbrand von Oldenburg was born in the second half of the twelfth century into a noble Germanic family and embarked on an ecclesiastical career while still young, becoming canon of the cathedral chapter of Hildesheim in 1211. Linked to the political circles of the empire’s high officials and the religious circles that supported the emperor, he travelled to the Holy Land from 1211 to 1213 for purposes of diplomacy and pilgrimage. The Itinerarium Terrae Sanctae is a significant source of information about the political, military and ecclesiastical affairs of the recent Christian kingdom of Lesser Armenia, Cyprus and territories such as Palestine, Lebanon and Syria, characterised by the coexistence of different peoples and religions. Wilbrand also recounts this diversity through the soundscape he encounters. Perhaps the most interesting sound element of the travel account is the description of the music of the kingdom of Cilicia, particularly for the feast of the day of Epiphany, including the procession of the sovereign and clergy. The many musical details in the text testify to ritual practices that can be traced back, in some respects, to Eastern Greek customs and, in others, to Latin ceremonials, particularly the Franco-Ottonian imperial model. Finally, an unexpected account of discantus for the rite of the day of Epiphany in aurora provides an opportunity to reflect on Wilbrand’s terminology in reference to liturgical musical performance for the intonation of the office, the recitation of epistles and gospels, and the rituals of the most solemn ceremonies.

An open question about cartography is whether one and the same functional head may iterate on the functional hierarchy. We demonstrate that the stackability of certain modals from the same semantic class in Mandarin offers clear evidence for such a possibility.

A newly identified musical source (Columbus, Ohio, Private collection, JP.MS.220, here Ohio 220) was publicised on social media in 2019. Recognising the value of the fragment, our research prioritised establishing its contents and provenance. The single parchment folio contains four polyphonic songs for two and three voices that once sat within a larger collection. Although aspects of the notation and repertoire within Ohio 220 resemble Ars Antiqua or early Ars Nova motets from northern Europe – with which one lyric shares a poetic concordance – our examination of the source’s artistic, textual and musical features supports a provenance within central European devotional culture approximately a century later. The polyphonic songs – not motets, but in the tradition of cantiones – draw on material and notational strategies with a long, pan-European heritage. We present an edition of all four pieces, outlining, in broad terms, the original provenance for the fragment and its music.