The Vyne Ramesses: 'Egyptian Monstrosities' in British country house collections

Apollo, April, 2003 by Tim Knox

By far the most important early country house collection of Egyptian sculptures was that assembled by Thomas Herbert, 8th Earl of Pembroke (1656-1733), at Wilton House, Wiltshire between 1690 and 1730, where it formed but part of a much greater collection of Greek and Roman antiquities. Pembroke's Greco-Roman sculpture was mainly bought in Italy, but in the early 1700s he also acquired items in Paris from the famous collection of Cardinal Mazarin. These included Egyptian pieces, amongst them 'Two Statues in black Marble, out of the ruins of the Palace in Egypt, in which the Viceroys of Persia lived many years after Cambyses returned to Persia, from the conquest of Egypt', set in niches outside the house. (24) Inside, the 'White Marble Table Room' contained a statue of Isis with 'Osiris, her husband, in a Coffin open ... with a great Multitude of Hieroglyphicks quite round the bottom and behind the statue'. (25) Elsewhere in the house were displayed, alongside many Roman pieces, 'Cleopatra with Caesarion, her son by Julius Caesar, sucking on her lap', and a 'Sesostris, the head is of red Egyptian Granite; the bust part is of the White Egyptian Granite; the head is adorned with a tiara, after the Egyptian form, and has a peculiar liveliness; it was found amongst the pyramids'. (26)

But the Egyptian sculptures at Wilton were unusual, and most contemporary collectors of Greco-Roman marbles would have considered such works barbarous and unpleasing. John Woodward, in his 'Of the wisdom of the ancient Egyptians', which was written at some time before his death in 1728, summed up the prevailing view of Egyptian sculpture: 'They really aimed at something that was hideous, deformed and monstrous; a beast, or a fowl, with the head or face of a man; the head of a dog, or some other brute, of an hawk, or the like, upon a human figure ... They seem to have affected what was ugly and irregular, as much as the Greeks, the Romans, and others, who had something of spirit and genteel fancy, did what was handsome, well-proportioned, beautiful, and like nature'. (27) Mummies were even more revolting: Woodward warned 'I myself saw here a mummy, brought formerly out of Egypt, that, after it had been for some time in our more humid air, began to corrupt and grow mouldy, emitted a foetid and cadaverous scent, and in conclusion putrified and fell to pieces.' (28)

Despite these dangers, an Egyptian mummy became 'the highest form of currency amongst collectors' of curiosities--if not among aesthetes. (29) One of the most famous was that in the possession of Colonel William Lethieullier, who obtained it in Egypt in 1721. It is known from an engraving by George Vertue, (30) and from others by Alexander Gordon (?1692-?1754), the author of a two-part treatise, An Essay towards explaining the Hieroglyphical Figures on the Coffin of the Ancient Mummy belonging to Capt. William Lethieullier ... (London, 1737). He annexed to this work engravings of other Egyptian works of art owned by English collectors--mummy cases, ushabti, scarabs, statuettes and other antiquities--which provides an interesting checklist of who owned what at this time. They include a mummy that had been given to Oxford University in 1683, and another that had been sent from Egypt by Dr. Richard Pococke (1704-65) (31) to the famous Museum of Dr. Richard Mead, the Royal Physician. Sir Edward Coke, Lord Foley and Smart Lethieullier all owned large Egyptian sculptures.