Open Research Online The Open University’s repository of research publications and other research outputs Myth In Reception: Insights From Stourhead Gardens Thesis How to cite: Harrison, John Edward (2018). Myth In Reception: Insights From Stourhead Gardens. PhD thesis The Open University. For guidance on citations see FAQs. c 2017 The Author https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Version: Version of Record Link(s) to article on publisher’s website: http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21954/ou.ro.0000d97e Copyright and Moral Rights for the articles on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. For more information on Open Research Online’s data policy on reuse of materials please consult the policies page. oro.open.ac.uk Myth in reception: Insights from Stourhead gardens John Edward Harrison BSc (Hons) Psychology, University of Hertfordshire, UK Dip CS, Open University, UK PhD Neuroscience, University of London, UK Thesis submitted to The Open University in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) The Open University December 2017 1 Declaration I declare that this thesis represents my own work, except where due acknowledgement is made, and that is has not been previously submitted to the Open University or to any other institution for a degree, diploma or other qualification. 2 Abstract The focus of my thesis is the reception of classical myth in Georgian Britain as exemplified by responses to the garden imagery at Stourhead, Wiltshire. Previous explanations have tended to the view that the gardens were designed to recapitulate Virgil’s Aeneid. However, the garden owner, Henry Hoare II, left no record to substantiate this, or any other theme, and it is not mentioned in the many extant visitor accounts from the eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. My approach to understanding the garden began with the systematic collection of information on the garden’s content and evolution. This endeavour yielded more than 20 further visitor reports, as well as visual and literary sources not considered in previous secondary accounts. This research has shown that the garden included a number of artefacts unknown to previous theorists. It has also shown that the true provenance and acquisition of extant garden elements is often different to that listed in the Stourhead secondary literature. I conclude that visitor reception of the gardens yields highly idiosyncratic interpretation, the emotional and cognitive content of which was largely determined by information obtained from published literature, garden guides and fellow visitors. A strong further influence on the interpretation of the gardens by some visitors was familiarity with the Roman and wider Italian influences on the garden content. I have especially considered visitor experience of the Grand Tour in this context. I propose that visits to Stourhead elicited emotional and cognitive responses from visitors. An effect of encountering the garden edifices and artefacts was to prompt memories, 3 particularly of prior visits to the original Roman or Italian buildings and artefacts, but also of copies encountered in English landscape gardens and elsewhere. Acknowledgments There are so many people to thank, but it is only fitting to begin with my three supervisors, Helen King, Jessica Hughes and Jo Paul. Theirs was a challenging endeavour, to take a life-long scientist and turn him into a classicist. I hope they would say that the journey has been worthwhile and that the arrival satisfactory evidence of at least some success. I would also like to take the opportunity to thank the wider OU and classicist community. I have been shown many kindnesses and very healthy guidance. It is a long list of individuals, but amongst them are Laura Swift, Gill Perry and my fellow PhD students, Stuart McKie, Mair Lloyd and Sophie Raudnitz. Many of the wider classicist, urban historian, and garden historian community gave generously of their time and endeared themselves to me forever by accepting my invitation to speak at the ‘Classical Influences on Georgian Stourhead’ event I organised in November 2015. Special thanks to Michael Symes, Danielle Westerhof, Caroline Barron, Oliver Cox, Richard Wheeler and Roey Sweet. When embarking on this project I wondered whether the many cash-strapped institutions to whom I needed to go cap in hand for favours would be able to help. Helen King offered the view that they would have neither the time nor the money to do so, but that they would have the goodwill. It seems that goodwill triumphs over adversity, as these individuals and institutions have been of huge help to me. I would like to thank therefore the National Trust, English Heritage, the Beinecke Library, 4 the British School of Rome, the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre, the Archivio di Stato di Roma, the Saint John Lateran Archives, and Hoare’s Bank. Individuals from these institutions that I would like to thank by name for their kindness and help are Emily Blanshard, Alan Power, Mike ‘Mac’ MacCormack, Georgina Mead, Pamela Hunter, Emily Utgren and Dudley Dodd, as well as the many guides and NT staff who gave so unselfishly of their time. My efforts across the past six years have been sustained by providers of tea, coffee and ‘supplies’ across numerous cafés, restaurants, canteens, hotel lobbies and airport lounges. Thank you to them all. Final thanks are reserved for my family for their indulgence. My wife Rachel, whom I met whilst completing my first PhD, managed to disguise her astonishment and disbelief when I announced my intention to complete the research in this thesis. Without her support and indulgence, I would never have reached this point. My love and thanks always to her. My children Cordelia and Sebastian have cheerily endured trips to more country houses, museums, ruins and libraries than any child should have to suffer. Hopefully they too have had some fun along the way and perhaps been inspired by their experiences. 5 Table of Contents Myth in reception: Insights from Stourhead gardens .......................................... 1 Declaration ............................................................................................................. 2 Abstract .................................................................................................................. 3 Acknowledgments .................................................................................................. 4 Prior publication .................................................................................................. 10 List of Figures ...................................................................................................... 11 List of Tables ........................................................................................................ 16 Chapter 1 – Roman myth in reception: Insights from Georgian era gardens ... 18 Political influences in the eighteenth-century landscape garden.................................. 27 Roman influence in the English landscape garden ...................................................... 30 The early years of Henry Hoare’s life ........................................................................ 35 The Development of Stourhead gardens..................................................................... 45 Roman elements at Stourhead .................................................................................... 51 Theories of authorial intent for the gardens at Stourhead ............................................ 57 The influence of visual art on the design of Stourhead garden .................................... 73 Conclusions and chapter summary ............................................................................. 75 Chapter 2 – The design, content and evolution of Stourhead gardens 1743-1753 .............................................................................................................................. 77 The Apollo Belvedere and Versailles Diana copies .................................................... 78 The Temple of Ceres ................................................................................................. 85 Transition to the Temple of Flora .............................................................................. 93 The Temple on the Terrace, or Venetian Seat ............................................................ 99 The Temple of the Nymph, also referred to as the Grotto ......................................... 102 The Grotto in an ancient Roman context .................................................................. 112 6 Chapter 3 – The evolution of Stourhead gardens, 1754-1764 .......................... 125 Visitor accounts of the temple ................................................................................. 127 Provenance and iconography of the Temple statues ................................................. 135 Rysbrack’s Hercules ............................................................................................... 137 Rysbrack’s Flora ..................................................................................................... 144 Meleager ................................................................................................................. 147 Saint Susanna.......................................................................................................... 149 Isis .........................................................................................................................