Help us dear Saint Anthony!
Comic sketches, from Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro to João Abel Manta

Saint Anthony, a popular and easily recognisable figure, used to appear in comic strips published in newspapers, especially during the month of June.
A notable sketch by Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro (1846-1905) is particularly significant, in which the iconic character of Zé Povinho appears during the 1875 Lisbon festival in honour of the saint. The coincidence of the first name of the monarchist head of government, António M. Fontes Pereira de Melo, was the reason behind Rafael Bordalo’s choice, and he repeated it on innumerable occasions.
The “throne” and the alms begging, the basil bush and the carnation with a poem - drawn by Rafael Bordalo in 1881 - the bonfire spitting and burning the artichoke, were all driving forces of caricature and cartoon. The rope around the neck and offerings of money to the saint in his drawings are cult forms that resulted in typical bordalian humour. In 1895, for the 7th centenary of Saint Anthony, the pages of the satire were extended, with the collaboration of Bordalo’s son, Manuel Gustavo Bordalo Pinheiro (1867-1920). At the beginning of the 20th century, the modern cartoons of Celso Hermínio (1871-1904) joined them in criticising the Lisbon June traditions. The temptations and miracles of the saint would also be used as metaphors for political and social criticism, especially the broken jug and the sermon to the fish, in the comic sketches of artists such as the bordalian Francisco Valença (1882-1963), the modern and very popular Stuart Carvalhais (1887-1961), Sir Fuas (a pseudonym for Luís de Carvalho Cunha 1889-194?) and the graphic columnist Carlos Botelho (1899 -1982), who would retell the “news of the week”.
The years under the republican dictator António Salazar were recorded in the cutting humour of João Abel Manta (1928), through emblematic thrones…

Pedro Bebiano Braga