East entrance, Tudor tower with central oriel windows and flattened Gothic arch

Knyff's painting in the south east corner of the Upper Cloisters

Isaac de Caus's Plan for Wilton's Garden circa 1632, as found by Colvin

The famous south facade

Title page of VITRUVIUS BRITANNICUS, The British Architect, issued 1715

The Palladian Bridge, viewed from the north bank of the river Nadder

William Kent

Wilton's Palladian Bridge from the south bank of the river, with the house's south facade behind

Lancelot 'Capability' Brown

Sir William Chamber's Triumphal Arch of 1750, originally sited on the south ridge, resited 1801 as the North Gateway

Susanna		Diana
	The Gardens
Venus & Cupid		Cleopatra

The Front Hall.

Coypel's Judgement of Soloman - 'Solomonic' Columns on each side of Soloman's throne, allegorically ascending to the 'grace' above.

The Little Smoking Room.

Within this room is a delightful & rare suite of walnut furniture. It consists of a pair of candle stands supported on tripod base & barley twist supports. The champhered twelve-sided top is inlaid in a floral marquetry pattern. It has a central yellow exotic bird, painted Ivory & inlaid wood veneers. These are matched & accompanied by a writing table with similar inlaid marquetry top, frieze drawer below, barley twist supports and a shaped stretcher of the style known as William & Mary. The Table has ball feet. The last item is a matching mirror.

The twelve-sided champhered top of one of the candle stands showing the Walnut inlaid with painted Ivory & veneers

The suite is purported to have been made around 1670, during the reign of Charles II, the Carolean or Late Stuart period. However, the style & method of design & construction suggests a Dutch or Flemish persuasion & consideration can also be given to the Huguenot influence [11] that subsequently accompanied William & Mary to England in 1689.

The Upper Cloisters

Some more significant structural alterations, in the house, were undertaken in the early 19thC. when James Wyatt created the new North entrance & commenced his Gothick Cloisters. Their primary function was to act as a two storey covered corridor that serviced the rooms of the house, being built round the inner courtyard on all four sides. These Cloisters have the central feature of a vaulted ceiling and now display the Pembroke collections of classical sculpture & statuary, furniture and other works of art. Richard Westmacott & Sir Jeffrey Wyatville completed them in 1815 after Wyatt & his patron fell into serious dispute. It has been regretted that Wyatt did not undertake his mastered neo-classical style, but Gothicised Wilton instead. He is also accredited to have modernised the hall, staircase & chapel & it was he who moved the 'Holbein' porch to the garden.

The Classical Sculptures.

The front hall & cloisters effectively display many copies of classical sculptures & busts, many coming from three great collections obtained by the eighth Earl, including acquisitions from Cardinal Mazarin of France. The marble statue of Herakles fighting Triton is inspiring and many marble busts of Roman Emperors & others complement the tasteful displays. They include Hadrian, Antonios,Tiberius & Alexander.

The central dominant figure in the hall however, is William Shakespeare, a copy in 1743 by Scheemakers of William Kent's study in Westminster Abbey. It has a verse from Macbeth inscribed on the scroll in Shakespeare's left hand. To the right can be seen the Apollo Belvedere, a copy from the original found in Rome in 1504 & subject of much debate. To the left, is the Venus di Medici, original housed Uffitzi Museum in Florence.

The Front Hall

The Florence study of the Venus di Medici is of course an attribution to the Greek Goddess Aphrodite & also has been the subject of much speculation by art historians as to its true originality & age. A preference however was surprisingly emanated by the great Victorian John Ruskin in 1840 when he declared "..it is pure and a most elevated incarnation of woman." The copy at Wilton certainly exudes the qualities that Ruskin observed & is true, in its interpretation to the softness of the original in Italy. Its virtues to some observers outshining the Venus de Milo in Paris.

The Front Hall	Venus di Medici

This room is certainly dominated by the majestic Chippendale [12]Violin bookcase & its two accompanying matching pair of bookcases, which are possibly the most important pieces of furniture within Wilton. In one of the very earliest editions of the BBC's "Going for a Song" on television, Arthur Negus had spotted the pieces and featured them centrally in the programme.

Items like this are just about unique & priceless and therefore would be valued very highly, but if they were ever to come to market for imaginary catalogue purposes they may possibly come to be described as follows:

THE PROPERTY OF A TITLED GENTLEMAN

Suite of Three Chippendale Library bookcases

An Important & Significant George III, suite of Library Bookcases, attributed to Thomas Chippendale, circa 1750, lately in situ in the Large Smoking Room at Wilton House, near Salisbury, Wiltshire.

The first magnificent example of Chippendale's craftsmanship, a three section Mahogany breakfront & glazed bookcase with central scrolled broken swan neck pediment. The top coving with ebony dentil decoration, the stepped sides with pierced fiddle-back galleried top & the corners surmounted by Greek pedestal urn finials, drape decoration.

The side astragal glazed panels with hexagonal moulding; whilst the central glazed section is decorated with large oval carved moulding of C scrolls & floral design. This is surmounted by an intricate ribbon, woodwind Instruments & central Violin carving of exquisite detail.

Below the flank end glazed sections, the bottom cupboard doors have central inlaid compass point motif. The single central frieze drawer has gadrooned decoration & below a central semi-circular recess. The doorframes, each decorated at the corner angle junction with tiny asterisk inlay are crossbanded in fine Spanish Mahogany. The whole is decorated with applied ebony mouldings & raised on a shaped plinth & platform base.

Dimensions: 99in. (251cm.) high; 79in. (199.5cm.) wide; 24.5in. (62.5cm.) deep.
(See Illustration)

Accompanied by a pair of matching breakfront mahogany bookcases. Swan neck scrolled pediments, central glazed doors & flank side doors with arched glazing. The bases each with four graduated long drawers & compass point inlay, matching the Violin Bookcase.

PROVENANCE

q Henry Herbert, 17th. Earl of Pembroke, Wilton House, Nr. Salisbury, Wilts.

q The Bookcase designs feature in the Thomas Chippendale's publication:

q The Gentleman and Cabinet-maker's Director of 1754, 1755 & 1762

q Archive material Trowbridge, Wiltshire & Wilton Estate Management Office.

(œ990,000- œ1,200,000)

The Colonnade Room.

In this room there are several examples of Boulle work. The Six drawer 'William & Mary' style writing table, attributed to Gerreit Jensen the fashionable English maker, is an example of this work and is known as the 'Bureau Mazarin'. It has three drawers each side & a central frieze drawer. The distinguishing feature is the crossed curvilinear pair of two stretchers adjoining the four supports either side of the desk. This design feature alone attributes the piece to one of the 'William & Mary' style.

The William & Mary style writing table known as the 'Bureau Mazarin'

Boulle was originally delicate marquetry of tortoiseshell inlaid with brass. Thin sheets of the materials were glued then cut together with a fretsaw to compose exactly interlacing patterns. Using arrangements of typically Arabesque or Grotesque ornament. It is termed counter-boulle when brass was inset with the pattern of tortoiseshell. The brass was sometimes engraved & the tortoiseshell laid over foil.

Intervening areas were often veneered with ebony & the edges protected with ormolu mounts. This design idea originally was a medieval Italian craft practised & popularised by Andre Charles Boulle (1642-1732). Because of his skill & prolific production his name became synonymous with the method. He was the principal 'Ebeniste' of the Louis XIV style in France. It was more prolifically practised in London from about 1815, by which time its striking appearance had been enhanced by placing tortoiseshell over tinted metal foil or by adding inlays of pewter, mother of pearl or horn stained in bright colour.

Amongst all the important paintings at Wilton, there is naturally to be found a diversity of subjects & styles from some of the greatest Master Painters of the world. It is possibly interesting to compare & contrast just two in the following locations:

In the Great Ante Room

It is believed to have been painted in 1629 and is by the Circle of Rembrandt, not signed or dated, but purchased by the eighth Earl whilst visiting Holland around 1685. Although not conclusively by the master's hand in entirety, artists always had a workshop or studio of accomplished artists & apprentices to assist in the commissions & other works. It is certainly in the style of Rembrandt & although only 23 years of age when executed, it is known that he even had younger apprentices in his charge at this time. Rembrandt's was born in 1606 in Leiden, Holland, and the son of a Miller, a Protestant family of modest income. He is regarded by some as the greatest Dutch Master of the 17thC.

His interpretation is unmistakably straightforward & truthful in depicting this real life emotional genre scene. With stillness & contemplation his mother reads her volume by the illumination of an unseen light source that reflects from the pages & onto her face. He had an interest in creating deep shadow & light to generate atmosphere & reality. He was also known for his so called 'rough manner' which in some respects again adds to the reality of the study. On an occasion when a prospective purchaser was inspecting work at his workshops in Amsterdam, he had tugged them away when they peered too closely & he is quoted as having said " Look from back here, the smell of the paint would bother you."

In comparing Rembrandt's genre depiction at Wilton, you can draw comparison of style & execution of his work from similar studies seen here. He has made use of light & shade and the natural-ness of expression captured in the subject. This of course can be assumed to derive from his search for realism to sell on the open market rather than to patrons who commissioned the artists. Rembrandt was one of the first Dutch artists to do this. The naturalness of the subject is dominant to the idea that will be presented to the viewer. Whatever the opinion of the execution & skill of the artist, the reality of the work is unmistakeably human & which the observer can see in reality, in themselves & in others. The natural emotions are as realistic today as they were when depicted in the everyday life of Rembrandt's subjects in 16thC. Holland. This pragmatism of everyday life is what has attracted Art historians, critics & collectors alike.

The study on the left is 'The Scholar' & shows a similarity in the use of light, of realism in the facial expression, as if in that moment he has been disturbed. The right portrait is 'Lady with Ostrich feather' and shows an unmistakable pragmatic natural smile.

In the Double Cube Room

Commissioned group of the 4th Earl of Pembroke his family

This commissioned portrait group is attributed to Sir Anthony van Dyck, who was born in Antwerp in 1599, the son of a 'well to do' Catholic Silk Merchant. His formative years of training were spent with the Flemish school of Rubens, but by the age of 21,the was in England at the Court of King James. He, unlike Rembrandt, was to seek patrons who commissioned portraiture in the grand manner. Van Dyck had travelled & studied in Italy & was influenced predominantly by the Venetian style & Titian in particular. He also saw himself as a Historical painter & utilised allegorical attitudes & mythological disguises in his work. He returned to England where he became Court Artist to Charles I in 1632.

Duke & Countess of Arundel painted in 1639	Countess of Arundel, Sir Dudley Carleton & their dwarf painted in 1620

For comparative purposes all the above works are group portraiture of the Aristocracy, & prolific Patrons of the Arts who required the medium of painting to display the grandeur of themselves & their families. The sitters are in formulated & composed gestures rather than natural-ness.

Particularly in the Wilton work, the false poses are stage managed with allegory being used in the form of symbolic fictional cherubs or putti looking down, figuratively speaking upon 'Gods chosen children'.

The Continence of Scipio

In this purely allegorical study, it is purported that the Duke of Buckingham & his new wife were contemplating the ideals of Skipio. Entitled 'The Continence of Scipio' & painted by Van Dyck in 1620, it portrays a style quite diverse from that formerly seen in Rembrandts paintings. A different style from artists of quite different backgrounds with Rembrandt exploring human emotions & fallibility rather than the proclaimed infallibility and high ideals in Van Dyck's work.

Interestingly, the Van Dyck painting is the largest ever recorded by the artist at 17 feet by 11 feet. Alan Bush of Bush & Berry in Bristol restored it in 1987. He not only cleaned it, but also reconstructed the black dress of the seated Duchess from the knees downward, as the detail had been lost. It is understood that at the time of the painting, the Earl & his wife were estranged & whilst he was painted with the family, she was painted in the North of England & later inserted into the work.

The Double Cube Room.

This rooms impression has been expressed by observers as the finest existing mid seventeenth century room in England today. Together with the Single Cube Room they elevate the house to almost palatial magnitude. The single Cube room is a perfect 30 feet cube and the Double Cube is 60 feet long by 30 feet high by 30 feet wide- but is it? Due to redesigning & slight reduction in size from the original conception of Inigo Jones, it is not perfectly symmetrical. After the fire, it was decided that it should hold the family & royal portraits by Sir Anthony van Dyck . To visually overcome the reduction in size of the room, cleverly the coving decoration by Edward Pierce was elongated. On one side above the fireplace & mantle, he stretched the urn vases & therefore maintained the perceived symmetry of the room.

Architects & Designers.

Many of the greatest Architects & Designers of nearly five centuries have been associated with Wilton House & grounds, but it is fascinating that particularly Jones & Kent used features of their designs in other major projects they were undertaking.

One only has to observe the south front of Holkham Hall, Norfolk for instance & immediately the Wilton pyramidal apex roofs are not only seen on the corner towers but the whole symmetrical form reminds you in parts of Wilton's south facade.

Holkham took twenty-five years to construct between 1734-1759 & interestingly, although not used at Wilton by de Caus, the grand portico with its tri-angulated pediment supported by six Corinthian columns is the main entrance here. Originally it was seen in his plan of nearly a century before. So is the use of symmetrical windows with pediments over them, all in the Palladian idea of Architecture that swept English Country House designs of the 'second era' in the 18thC.

Conclusion.

Wilton House is a remarkable reminder principally of the two Palladian periods of Architecture. Its Setting and Interiors too are nostalgic reminders of the great grandeur that abounded in quarters & shires of rural England.

All Rights Reserved.
Mike W. Bucknole,

January, 2001.

For Acknowledgements
see Bibliography.

Thanks to Scott Anderson, Senior Lecturer, Southampton Institute, for inspiration.