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A University of Sussex DPhil thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details The Representation of the Country House in Individual Books and Guides 1720-1845 Paula Riddy Thesis submitted for the degree of DPhil University of Sussex December 2014 ii I hereby declare that this thesis has not been and will not be, submitted in whole or part to another University for the award of any other degree. Signature..................................... Paula Riddy iii Acknowledgements Firstly, I owe huge thanks to my supervisor, Professor Maurice Howard, for being a constant source of inspiration and support. I am grateful for access to the following archives: Bodleian Library, British Library, Canadian Centre for Architecture Montreal, Cotehele House archives, National Art Library, Society of Antiquaries, Quaker Library London, Minet Library Lambeth and the Royal Institute of British Architects’ Library. Access to the Woburn Abbey archives was by kind permission of the Duke of Bedford and the Trustees of the Bedford Estate. With thanks also to Alex Bagnall and Mole Valley Council for information on the Deepdene and the regeneration of the gardens. I am also grateful to Teresa O’Toole of the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, for confirming the provenance and Thomas Hope’s ownership of Jacob van Ruisdael’s Landscape with Bridge, Cattle, and Figures (c. 1660). Finally, many thanks to my husband Gerson, for his technological expertise and everlasting support and encouragement. iv UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX PAULA RIDDY THESIS FOR DEGREE OF DPHIL THE REPRESENTATION OF THE COUNTRY HOUSE IN INDIVIDUAL BOOKS AND GUIDES 1720-1845 SUMMARY During the eighteenth century a trend began for the publication of books devoted to the description of single country house; an early stage in the development of the country house guidebook. A survey of this largely unanalysed genre found it to be a much larger phenomenon than had previously been thought, with a peak in new publications later than has been suggested. The issue of the commission, details of production and uses and distribution of the guidebook are all previously neglected aspects of research. Analysis of these has given a greater insight into the context of production, and has shown the direct involvement of the house owner in many cases. In the secondary literature which does exist on this genre, the bias towards considering the contents of guidebook from the perspective of the tourists’ reception, or as an objective document, neglects the huge potential for analysis of the sub-agendas which were involved in these publications. These less overt potential messages included a justification of the country estate in general, as well as more individual markers which related to the house owner himself. This thesis has begun to rectify the lack of research into the guidebook, and to highlight this fruitful source of material on the eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. It has begun the innovative task of looking beyond guidebooks as merely a factual account of the estate, and to acknowledge that their objectivity is in question; the books were often nuanced towards given a particular impression and motivated by specific agendas. The house was represented both as an object of admiration in its own right but also used as a vehicle for the projection and display of the individual qualities and identity of the owner. v Abbreviations BL British Library BLOU Bodleian Library, Oxford University CCA Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montreal COT Cotehele House archives CRO Cornwall Records Office LA Lacock Abbey Collection Fox Talbot Museum, Lacock ODNB Oxford Dictionary of National Biography RIBA Royal Institute of British Architects vi Table of Contents Acknowledgements iii Summary iv List of Abbreviations v Contents vi Introduction The country house 1 The country house guidebook 4 National heritage and political symbol 7 Contents of guidebooks 11 County guides and views of seats 12 Overview 14 Chapter 1: The Country House Guidebook 1720-1845 Introduction 16 Country house guides: the research data 17 The book as a physical object 18 The guidebook: date content and form 22 Distribution of houses with guides across the country 25 The networks of influence between country house owners 27 The authorship of the guidebook 30 Owner-authors: a gentlemanly distraction 34 Owner-authors: the Duke of Devonshire and Chatsworth 37 Owner-authors: Thomas Lister Parker and Browsholme 40 Owner-authors: Francis Charles Fox and Brislington House 43 Country houses in individual guides and in more general publications: a comparison 49 Woburn Abbey, Cotehele, the Deepdene and Grove Hill 57 Conclusion 60 vii Chapter 2 Woburn Abbey: A Grand Seat Represented Introduction 62 Woburn Abbey publications 63 The guides: authors and patrons 65 Contents as ‘virtue’ and memorial 69 The sculpture galleries 71 Reviews of the publications 74 Qualities of the owner as represented in the country estate 75 The country estate as an expression of taste 78 The surrounding area and approach to the house 80 Routes around the house 82 Illustrations: West front 84 Illustrations: sculpture 88 Public and private space 90 Chapter 3 Cotehele House: Representation of a Seat from the ‘Olden Time’ Introduction 92 The authorship and commission of the Cotehele guidebook 94 Representing Cotehele House and the writing of history 98 Views of a way of life: hierarchy 102 Views of the past: telling tales 106 Cotehele on the Banks of the Tamar in context: a comparison with other books 109 The periodization of Cotehele 114 Cotehele House and Haddon Hall 115 The evocation of the ‘Olden Time’ 118 Cotehele in county guides 120 viii Conclusion 121 Chapter 4 The Deepdene: the guidebook and the picturesque Introduction 123 The Deepdene guidebooks 125 Thomas Hope and the Deepdene books 127 The Union of the Picturesque in Scenery and Architecture with Domestic Beauties 131 Interior illustrations: reflecting the scene, framing the view and varying the perspective 132 Exterior illustrations: illuminating the scene, varying the view and firing the imagination 136 The interaction of nature and architecture 141 ‘Re’-presenting the view: a comparison between John Britton’s History of Hope’s Deepdene and J.P. Neale’s Account of the Deepdene 144 A comparison with depictions of the Deepdene in county guides 146 End of an era: a later description of the Deepdene 147 Conclusion 148 Chapter 5 ‘This Terrestrial Paradise Designed’: the country house description as a statement of personal identity Introduction 150 Grove Hill and John Coakley Lettsom 151 The Grove Hill descriptions in the context of the existing guidebook genre 152 The guides to Grove Hill: authorship and use 153 Illustrations: South View of Grove Hill 158 A later edition of Grove Hill 169 ix A Godly and learned man 170 The telegraph and a modern spectacle 175 A comparison between the guidebooks and other representations of Grove Hill 177 Conclusion 178 Final Conclusion 180 Bibliography 185 List of illustrations 208 Illustrations 219 Appendix 333 1 Introduction The Country House Each of these houses may be said to reflect honour on its architect, as well as on the character of the English nobleman.1 The English country house has been and remains a potent yet evolving cultural and social symbol. Its value today lies more in the modern conception of heritage than as a marker of the ruling elite, and yet the development and relationship of these two elements in the national psyche is complex. As John Britton wrote in 1840 in the quotation above, there was scope for the potential of a country seat to have a resonance which reflected on the characters involved with it. There are a variety of ways in which the country house has been theorised in modern times, and current approaches have gone beyond the conception of the country house purely in terms of architectural style, towards a broader understanding which contextualises the house in social and cultural history. The representation of the country house in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries both informs the debate about the meaning of the country house and adds to it. The biography of the architect is one way in which the country house has been examined and classified. A property such as Saltram House in Devon might be cited as a typical Robert Adam house because of the Palladian casing which he gave it in the 1740s, for example.2 Alnwick Castle, by contrast, received a Gothic-style makeover which was not typical of Adam’s usual neo-classical work.3 Although informative, there are obvious limitations to this approach which is potentially reductive, and which circumvents other aspects of the property. Firstly, a house might be the product of several architects’ work over many decades, and at Saltram this can be seen in the entrance porch and library added by architect John Foulston in 1819.4 Secondly the approach is limited to those elements of the house which are linked to the architect’s life and career, and restricts the enquiry to architectural elements. 1 J. Britton, Graphic illustrations, with historical and descriptive accounts of Toddington, (London, 1840), pp. iii-iv. For all references to and details of guidebooks in the research sample, see the appendix. 2 Natioal Tust, Salta House’, at Natioal Tust esite at: http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/saltram/ [accessed 28.05.14].