‘To Abandon the Old Mansion’: The Making and Meaning of a Tudor Ruin at Gorhambury in the Late Eighteenth Century

ABSTRACT In 1773, James Bucknall Grimston inherited the title of Viscount Grimston and the seat of Gorhambury, the renowned Elizabethan house of Sir Nicholas Bacon and Sir Francis Bacon. Little more than a decade later, the Elizabethan house lay in partial ruin and the family were living in a new Palladian villa, one of Robert Taylor’s final major country house commissions. By analysing the connection between the construction and demolition projects, this article contends that the two buildings had intertwined and mutually reinforced meanings. The ruin was visible from the new house and its deliberate retention can be readily understood through the frame of the picturesque and landscape gardens in the latter part of the eighteenth century. However, drawing on a wide range of material including letters, diaries, printed travel accounts and hitherto unpublished drawings reveals more nuanced motivations in both creation and destruction. This article uses these sources to piece together the appearance and condition of the Gorhambury estate over a few decades at the end of the eighteenth century and to situate Grimston’s patronage within contemporary thought and his personal experiences. The article centres domestic tourism as a key cultural influence, moving away from the dominance of the Grand Tour in previous narratives on Gorhambury, and considers the significance of Grimston’s involvement in the Society of Antiquaries. Gorhambury is then situated in contemporary thought about ruins and their relationship to history and, in particular, attitudes towards sixteenthcentury architecture. By uncovering these influences, this survey of Gorhambury elucidates how late eighteenth-century individuals considered and handled Elizabethan architecture.