Volume 2 Article Abstracts

The Roman Pharos at Dover Castle
Kevin Booth

The Roman lighthouse at Dover, one of only three in the world to survive, was described by William Stukeley in 1722 and Sir Mortimer Wheeler in 1929. In the course of a metric survey undertaken by the author in 1999, access was gained to above-ground levels which earlier authorities had not been able to examine. The article reveals the evidence for the internal frame of the pharos, and concludes that the building’s profile was conical, as Stukeley suggested, rather than set back in stages, as Wheeler concluded. The author also reconsiders Wheeler’s evidence for the relationship of the pharos to the other Roman lighthouses at Dover and Boulogne, now lost.

A Plan for Kenilworth Castle at Longleat
Richard K Morris

Recent investigation of a 16th-century plan in the archive at Longleat has revealed it to show an ambitious proposal for a lodging range across the entrance to the inner court of Kenilworth Castle was. The plan makes a considerable addition to the very small number of English architectural drawings of that early date. This article identifies its function and its architectural character – that of the contemporary French court. It dates it from patronal circumstances to about 1566 to 1568, and attributes it by stylistic and graphic analysis to the Office-of-Works architect Henry Hawthorne, architect of the great house at Theobalds for Elizabeth I’s chief minister, William Cecil, Lord Burghley.

The Earl of Leicester’s Inventory of Kenilworth Castle, c.1578
Elizabeth Goldring

An inventory of about 1578, purchased in 1995 by the British Library, describes the contents of one of the greatest medieval and Elizabethan houses, then the principal seat of Elizabeth I’s favourite, Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester, and the setting of the best-known and most ambitious of the revels which were staged on her famous progresses. Made within three years of this event, it offers an unusually rich insight into the material culture of the Elizabethan elite. It specifies weights, dimensions, materials, colour, decorative motifs and subject matter, in particular of about 50 paintings and more than 20 maps. It casts light on four major portraits of the queen and the earl of Leicester, including two (now lost) by the Italian mannerist Federico Zuccaro.

Compton Scarsdale or Sutton Verney?
Andor Gomme

In 1981 the author of this article published four drawings by the architect Francis Smith of Warwick, which are now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, but had come from Compton Verney House, Warwickshire. The drawings do not illustrate what was built at Compton Verney (whose architect is not documented), but correspond so closely to what Francis Smith designed at Sutton Scarsdale House, Derbyshire, that the author concluded that they are proposals for that house. The present article revises that conclusion and argues that the drawings are rejected proposals for the three subsidiary elevations of Compton Verney. In the course of his argument he produces comparative evidence which suggests that the principal elevation of Compton Verney may have been designed by the Oxford architect William Townesend.

The Statues of Inigo Jones and Palladio at Chiswick House
Richard Hewlings

The statues of Palladio and Inigo Jones which stand either side of the entrance to Chiswick House have been attributed to Michael Rysbrack since 1922, although they are neither signed, dated, nor documented. However, the author has discovered a bill and receipt from Giovanni-Battista Guelfi for two busts of Inigo Jones and Palladio which were owned by the third earl of Burlington, the owner of Chiswick house. As the busts are almost identical to the upper parts of the statues it is possible that the latter are also the work of Guelfi, who has not enjoyed such critical acclaim as Rysbrack.

The Palladian Palace at Apethorpe
Pete Smith

The seventh earl of Westmorland commissioned an ambitious proposal for rebuilding his family seat, Apethorpe Hall, of which only a small part was realized in about 1742. The full proposal is known from copies of the architect’s drawings, which have been tentatively attributed by Roger Morris. This article describes the proposal drawings and the realized buildings, and, by detailed comparison with Morris’s known work, shows that the attribution need not be tentative. Two of the realized buildings, now attributed to Morris for the first time, are the estate dovecote and Woodnewton Manor House, an eye-catcher in a nearby village, which had previously been attributed to an earlier generation of architects.

The Paul Saunders Tapestries at Audley End House
Gareth Hughes

A set of tapestries, in store at Audley End House since 1979, has recently been returned to the lobby in which they were hung from about 1825. They were made in 1767, but not hung until 1786 in the State Dressing Room on the first floor of the south wing. Too small to cover the newly formed room, they were extended by the addition of linen panels painted by the artist Biagio Rebecca. When the State Dressing Room was rebuilt as a library in 1825 the tapestries were re-hung in the lobby beside the dining room, cut to fit around a cupboard. The author has elucidated their history from the surviving documents and from the evidence of alteration to the tapestries themselves.

The ‘Spanish Gift’ at Apsley House
Susan Jenkins

The nucleus of the collection at Apsley House is 83 paintings from the Spanish royal collection, looted by Joseph Bonaparte, and captured by Wellington in 1813. Wellington sent them to his brother, who had a list drawn up by William Seguier, surveyor of the king’s pictures and Benjamin West, president of the Royal Academy; it was only then that their great value was appreciated. Wellington offered to return them, but King Ferdinand VII asked him to keep them. Seguier’s catalogue was published by the duchess of Wellington in 1901 and C M Kauffmann identified the 83 paintings in 1982. This article identifies more of them, chronicles Wellington’s negotiations and publishes the full correspondence of Wellington and his brothers on the subject.

Dover Citadel, 1779–1900
Paul Pattison

This article describes the development of one of the three forts on the Western Heights of Dover, the Citadel. Field fortifications were begun during the War of American Independence, and work began on the Citadel in 1782 to the design of Lt Thomas Hyde Page. Renewed fear of invasion resulted in a more ambitious plan in 1804, designed by Lt Col William Twiss and Captain William Ford, with three forts linked by Lines. It was completed by 1813, but extensively improved in 1853–5. Developing armament design required an outwork to the west, designed by Major W Jervois between 1858 and 1867. Further batteries were added in the 1870s and 1880s, but changing tactics led to armament reduction after 1887, while improving facilities for the garrison.