'The "Perfyt Scyens" of the Map; a Study of the Meaning and Interpretation of Local Maps in Early Tudor England 1509-1547'
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'The "Perfyt Scyens" of the Map; a Study of the Meaning and Interpretation of Local Maps in Early Tudor England 1509-1547' Lewis John Kaye Roberts Queen Mary, University of London 70,056 words (excluding bibliography) This work was supported by the AHRC (BGP award reference: 0673) A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, University of London 1 Statement of Originality. I, Lewis Roberts, confirm that the research included within this thesis is my own work or that where it has been carried out in collaboration with, or supported by others, that this is duly acknowledged below and my contribution indicated. Previously published material is also acknowledged below. I attest that I have exercised reasonable care to ensure that the work is original, and does not to the best of my knowledge break any UK law, infringe any third party’s copyright or other Intellectual Property Right, or contain any confidential material. I accept that the College has the right to use plagiarism detection software to check the electronic version of the thesis. I confirm that this thesis has not been previously submitted for the award of a degree by this or any other university. The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without the prior written consent of the author. Signature: Date: 16th January 2014 2 Abstract. This thesis begins by examining an unexplored contextual background for sixteenth century local maps. It argues that the architectural drawing techniques developed by master masons in the late twelfth century continued to be taught to the King’s masons well into the sixteenth, and that these drawing techniques lie behind the innovations in sixteenth century topographical mapping. Having provided a history of the craft skills that were adapted to make sixteenth century local maps this thesis moves on to consider why masons adapted craft skills traditionally used in full scale drawings on stone and plaster surfaces to make small, paper maps in the sixteenth century. It examines the way in which sixteenth century local maps were used and argues that the changing demands of patrons put pressure on master masons to alter the way in which local maps portrayed their subjects. The surviving archival evidence suggests that Henry VIII was the principle patron of local maps and my research examines the influence of the king over the shifting form of the map. It uses the letters and drawings sent between Henry VIII and his craftsmen to examine the decisive changes that Henry VIII made to the nature of the relationship between patron and builder, and the consequent effects of these changes over the forms of the image used to communicate between them. My argument suggests that Henry employs and promotes the craftsmen whose drawings allow him the greatest level of design control over the works he finances and that through this system maps and plans rapidly advance to include the technical drawing techniques which had, during the Middle Ages, been used exclusively among masons as on-site, working drawings. This thesis focuses attention on the technical aspects of map making, examining the material skills used to construct Henrician local maps and arguing that sixteenth centry local maps need to be related back to the craft skills of an older tradition of masonic drawing. It also suggests that map historians needs to look more closely at the correspondence sent between the king and his craftsmen and it argues this archival evidence provides a new contextual background with which to understand the changing forms of the Henrican local map. 3 Contents Statement of Originality. 2 Abstract. 3 List of illustrations. 6 Introduction 8 i. Definitions. 8 ii. Critical review and Methodological Approach. 14 iii. Chapter Summary 20 Chapter One. The Influence of Medieval Architectural Drawing over the Plats of the Sixteenth Century. 26 i. A Study of the Techniques used to Construct the Scale Drawings of 1541. 27 ii. The History of Architectural Drawing in the Middle Ages. 36 iii. Finding the Origins of Sixteenth Century Mapping Techniques in Medieval Architectural Drawing. 48 iv. Why was Scale Drawing Not Used in the Middle Ages? 71 Chapter Two. Drawings for patrons 1450-1529 76 i. How Might Masons Have Learnt to Draw Pictorially? 77 ii. The Use of Written contracts and Pictoral Drawings in the Work Made for Patrons before 1530. 81 Chapter Three. Henry’s patronage 1509-1539. 97 i. The Documentary Evidence of Henry’s Architectural Involvement During the 1530s 103 ii. The Drawings Made for Henry between 1529 and 1539. 106 iii. Why Might Master Masons Have Chosen to Draw in the Technical Mode in the 1530s? 115 iv. Conclusion 117 Chapter Four. Henry’s patronage 1539-1546 121 i. The King’s Works on The Manor House and Fortifications at Hull. 127 ii. The Works at Boulogne. 131 iii. The Works at Ambleteuse. 138 iv. The Negotiations around the Treaty of Camp. 142 v. Conclusion. 148 Conclusion. 150 Illustrations 158 4 5 List of illustrations. 1. Plat of the walls of Guines as they stood in 1539. 2. Plat of the proposed works for Guines, made in 1540/1 but never completed. 3. Da Vinci’s drawing of the Walls around Cesara. 4. Copy of figure two with the gold scale boundary emphasised in black. 5. Copy of Figure one, showing the points at which Rogers could have measured. 6. Copy of Figure one, showing the three points plotted as a starting guide. 7. Copy of Figure one, showing multiple points plotted within the scale boundary. 8. A photograph of modern templates. 9. A painting of a master mason with sixteenth century templates in the background. 10. John Bilson’s drawing of the slab of tracing floor from Byland Abbey. 11. Drawing showing placement of central roundel within a reconstruted image of the rose window at Byland Abbey. 12. Image of the the drawing of the central roundel on the wall below the rose window. 13. Photograph of the drawing of the central roundel incised into the wall (emphasised in chalk). 14. Photograph of a surviving piece of the roundel which matches one sixth of the drawing photographed in figure 13. 15. Plat of the waterways around Hull (emphasising the area magnified in fig 16 and 17). 16. My own reproduction of the curves of the waterways around Cottingham. 17. My own reproduction of the springs in the plat of the Hull waterways. 18. Photogrammetric reproduction of the York tracing floor. 19.Photogrammetric reproduction of a window at St Mary’s Church in Ashwell, Hertfordshire. 20. Photograph of the lines incised into the tracing floor at Wells. 21. Photogrammetric reproduction of a drawing of window tracery on the tracing floor at Wells. 22. Copy of figure 21 with a reproduction of an actual window at Wells superimposed over the image on the tracing floor. 23. Complete drawing of a window at Wells superimposed over a simplified version of the tracing floor drawing. 24. Reproduction of the lines on the tracing floor overlaid with a combined image of roof vault and window tracery. 25. Simplified plan view of the roof vault. 26. Photograph of the fragment of a drawing of Window tracery found at St John’s Cambridge. 27. Photogrammetric reproduction of the group of drawings on a wall at Ely Cathedral. 28. Detail of one of the drawings portrayed in fig. 27. A small sketch of window tracery. 29. Photograph of a drawing of a template in the Peyps sketchbook. 30. Reproduction of drawing of window tracery incised with a dry point scorer into the Peyps sketchbook. 31. Projection of how fig. 30 would look if complete. 32. Photograph of the doorway at St Stephens Church, Bristol. 33. Modern diagram showing the profile of the doorway photographed in fig. 32. 34. Photograph of the drawing of the door at St Stephens made in William Worcestre’s notebook. 6 35. Photograph showing the placement of Roger’s carvings within the great hall. 36. Photograph of the restored becketts. 37. Photograph of the only surviving Becket to the King’s chamber, probably carved by Rogers. 38. Photograph of the Beckett at the entry way to the hall, less eroded and showing the quality of the relief likely to have been carved into the becket shown in fig. 37. 39. Photograph of the drawing of the timber house shown in elevation 40. Photograph of the drawing of the timber house shown in cross section. 41. Modern reproduction of the drawing of the cross section of the house photographed in fig. 40. 42. Drawing of a bay of Bishop Fox’s chantry in Winchester Cathedral. 43. Drawing of a pedestal for sculpture. 44. A proposal for a sepulchral monument to Henry VI. 45. Drawing of ‘the castle in the downes” either Walmer or Sandown. (identical designs) 46. Drawing of Deal Castle 47. 1725 plan view of Walmer castle. 48. 1539 plan view of Deal castle. 49. Modern reproduction of fig. 50, a groundplan of the exchequer. 50a. Photography of the groundplan of the exchequer building in Calais 50b. Key to fig. 50a. Figures 51a, 51b, 51c. Fig 51a. Groundplan of the ground floor of the manor house at Hull. Fig. 51b. Groundplan of the first floor of Hull Manor. Fig 51c. Revised groundplan of the first floor at Hull Manor. Figures 52a, 52b, 52c. Fig. 52a. Drawing of the fortifications at Hull Fig. 52b. Detail taken from fig. 52a. 53. Drawings of the fortification at Ambleteuse. Figures 53a, 53b, 53c. Fig 53a. A landscape survey of the inlet at Ambleteuse.