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

Apollo, April, 2003 by Tim Knox

It was only in 1799 that Thomas Hope (?1770-1831), who had sat at the feet of old Cardinal Albani and had been in Egypt two years before, set about creating in this country the first wholly Egyptian setting for such antiquities in his Duchess Street home. (62) As he put it,

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Happening to possess several Egyptian antiquities, wrought in variously coloured materials, such as granite, serpentine, porphyry, and basalt, of which neither the hue nor the workmanship would have well accorded with my Greek statues, chiefly executed in white marble alone, I thought it best to segregate these former, and to place them in a separate room, of which the decoration should, in its character, bear some analogy to that of its contents. (63)

By the time the room was completed in 1804, Nelson's victory at the Battle of the Nile had precipitated a torrent of Egyptian antiquities into Britain, notably the important items confiscated from the French that were presented to the British Museum in 1802. (64) The subsequent mania for all things Egyptian, and the scholarly attention to which these artefacts were subjected, is epitomised by Thomas Rowlandson's amusing caricature, The antiquarians of 1805. (65)

This article derives from a paper given at the National Trust study day, Aspects of The Vyne, 16 October 2000. Thanks are due to Rosemary Baird, Joanna Bennett, Morris Bierbrier, Helen Dorey, Alastair Laing, Cathal Moore, Charles O'Brien, and Giles Worsley, for their help, information and suggestions. Kevin Rogers has been especially helpful with details of his researches amongst the Chute papers.

(1) T.G.H. James 'A Schist Statuette of Ramesses IV', British Museum Quarterly, vol. XXII, 1960, pp. 75-77. The statue is no. BM EA1816.

(2) Basingstoke, Hampshire Record Office (hereafter HRO), Chute papers, 31 M57/645.

(3) It is recorded in the 1776 inventory as in the 'lobby staircase' (Staircase Hall), and in 1842 inventory as in the Stone Hall (Stone Gallery). HRO, Chute papers, 31 M57/657 and 31 M57/649.

(4) The photograph is in the Chute Collection at The Vyne, and is reproduced in C.W. Chute, A History of The Vyne in Hampshire, Winchester, 1888, p. 160.

(5) "Wiggett Chute (1800-78) added many treasures to the collections at The Vyne. These include four mid-eighteenth-century Italian marble busts of Roman emperors, which reputedly once belonged to Manuel de Godoy, Chief Minister of Charles IV of Spain. The statue is described in ibid., p. 160, as 'Rameses IV., an ancient Egyptian statue in basalt'.

(6) The Vyne, National Trust guidebook, London, 1998, p. 54. Alastair Laing has, however, observed that the vicar of nearby Bramley was the Reverend Thomas Shaw (1694-1751), the noted Algerine, Levantine and Egyptian traveller. Since he died three years before its appearance in the 1754 Inventory, it is tempting to wonder if the statue have come from his collection. However, Shaw's collection of naturalia and artificialia was bequeathed to Oxford University, so it seems unlikely that a large and valuable Egyptian statue would have been excepted.