What did Benjamin Franklin's famous 1754 cartoon say?

Join, or Die is a well-known political cartoon, drawn by Benjamin Franklin. It was first published in the Pennsylvania Gazette on May 9, 1754.

The 1754 printed cartoon shows a snake cut into eight pieces, each labeled with the name of one of the colonies. The position of each colony in the snake corresponds to the geographic position of the colonies along the American coast, with the snake's tail pointing south and the head pointing north. The colonies, from tail to head (south to north), are: South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and New England (New England referred to the colonies of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Hampshire). The caption reads, "JOIN, or DIE."

The cartoon appeared along with Franklin's editorial about the "disunited state" of the colonies. It helped make his point about the importance of colonial unity. At the time, there was a superstition that a snake which had been cut into pieces would come back to life if the pieces were put together before sunset. Many people at the time hoped that the colonies would someday soon come together and fight for freedom.