Bust of Pope in the Will of William Seward

The Will of William Seward.

10 February 1799.

The will of William Seward shows clearly that the bust of Pope was given to him by Mrs Martha Vandewall, mother of Thomas Neate, who was married to Seward's sister Charlotte. 

Sometime after 1762 the Vandewall family lived at what was once the Pope family home at Binfield Lodge, Binfield, Berkshire.

Much more on the Vandewall Family to follow.

Jany. 30. 1799. William Seward Esquire

I leave to Mary Crossing Twenty pounds a

Year to be paid to her quarterly with the Thirty pounds

a year left to her by my Father. I leave to Richard

Strantham Twenty pounds a year to be paid half

yearly I give to Elizabeth Kenrick as much money

as will purchase at my deceace Four thousand

pounds Stock in the three per Cents to be paid her

upon the day of Marriage or when she comes of age

and desire Mr. Morland, Mr. Neate and Mr.

Kenrick to be her Trustees. The remainder of what

I die possess’d of I leave to be equally divided between

my two sisters Dorothy Kenrick and Charlotte Neate

I leave the Rev. Jarvis Kenrick and Thomas Neate Esqr.

and William Morland, Esqr. Fifty Guineas each and

appoint them Executors to my will I leave Mr.

Morland my Bust of pope given to me by Mrs.

Vandewall I leave & bequeath my Library to my

Nephews William Kenrick, Jarvis Kenrick & Thomas

Neate and Le Fever Neate to be equally divided

amongst them. Wm. Seward January 30.1799.

I Desire that my Executors will present Dr. Carmichael Smith with One hundred pounds at my decease & that my old & true Friend Sir George Baker will accept of my Fourth Translation of Pliny in twelve Volumes Quarto & my Edition of Swift Octavo

W. Seward 10 February 1799.

Note 1, Sir George Baker M.D. F.R.C.P.(1722 -1809) of St Pauls Churchyard was Physician to George III and the Queen, he owned the terra cotta bust of Hogarth by Roubiliac now in the national Portrait Gallery, London, (engraved by Cooke in 1810 as frontispiece to Vol II 0f Nichols and Stevens Hogarth ) now at N.P.G. see Esdaile p. 50.

A Few Notes about William Seward.

William Seward by George Dance.

National Portrait Gallery

_________________________________

William Seward by Robert Edge Pine (still with family).

Seward was the only son of William Seward, a partner in the major London brewery Calvert & Seward. He was born in London in January 1747. Having started school near Cripplegate, he moved in 1757 to Harrow School, but also attended Charterhouse School for a while before matriculating at Oriel College, Oxford in 1764.

After university, Seward travelled widely in Italy and elsewhere in Europe. He had considerable wealth, but no taste for business, and sold his interest in the brewery when his father died. However, his cultivation and conversational talents soon gained him a place in London literary circles, notably that of the Thrales in Streatham, also a brewing family. There he met Samuel Johnson. The two became intimate and Seward became a member of the Essex Head Club that Johnson had founded. Johnson also provided him with a recommendation to James Boswell when he visited Edinburgh and the Highlands in 1777. He made a western tour of England in August 1781, indulging his hypochondria liberally by consulting "a doctor, apothecary or chemist" in every town where he stopped, according to Fanny Burney.^[1] Two years later he was in Paris, and then in Flanders studying the pictures of Claude Lorrain. Meanwhile he had been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1779.


When Johnson died in 1784, Seward helped the classical scholar Samuel Parr to compose his epitaph.In 1788, Seward was thought to be suffering from mental illness and was confined to a straitjacket for a time. Four years earlier, Mrs Thrale had recorded being "plagued… with a Visit from Seward, who I think is going out of his Senses by the oddity of his Behaviour. She also recorded a proposal of marriage from him after she was widowed in 1781.

Seward had been responsible in 1776 for introducing the music scholar Charles Burney and his family to the Thrales, which led to an intimacy between Hester Thrale and Fanny Burney that lasted until the former's remarriage in 1784. Fanny Burney's copious letters and diaries contain many affectionate references to Seward. In March 1777, for instance, she describes him in a letter to another Burney family friend, Samuel Crisp, as "a very polite, agreeable young man. On 15 January 1782, her 17-year-old sister Charlotte Ann Burney noted that on her arrival at Mrs Thrale's, "Mr Seward came up to me immediately as he commonly does when I meet him to do the honours to me in his odd way;- lugging a chair into the middle of the room for me, and upon my saying I could not sit there by myself, "oh," he cried, "I'll stand by you, and amuse you. In May 1792 he was amusing Fanny: "When I came in... I was accosted by Mr. Seward, & he entered into a gay conversation, upon all sorts of subjects, which detained me, agreeably enough, in a pleasant station by one of the windows."


Other well-known people whom he knew and helped included the classical scholar Richard Porson, the radical Thomas Paine and the poet Anna Seward (no relation).

Fanny Burney also provided in a letter of 2 May 1799 a vivid account of Seward just before he died: "Poor Mr Seward!- I am indeed exceedingly concerned - nay, grieved for his loss to us - to us I trust I may say, for I believe he was so substantially good a Creature, that he has left no fear or regret merely for himself. He fully expected his end was quickly approaching... he spent almost a whole morning with me in chatting of other times, as he called it - for we travelled back to Streatham, Dr Johnson and the Thrales."

Seward had become very fat, and died of dropsy at his lodgings in Dean Street, Soho on 24 April 1799. He was buried in the family vault at Finchley on 1 May.


Many articles, including a series of ‘Reminiscentia,’ were supplied by Seward to the Whitehall Evening Post, and he contributed anecdotes and literary discoveries to Thomas Cadell's Repository and the European Magazine. His papers of ‘Drossiana’ in the European Magazine from October 1789 formed the basis of his anonymous Anecdotes of some Distinguished Persons (1795–7), 5 vols (a fifth edition in four volumes in 1804). This was followed in 1799 by two volumes of Biographiana, for which the Gentleman's Magazine praised him for "felicity... in hitting off the leading features of his subject."^[10] Thomas James Mathias in his long poem The Pursuits of Literature ^[11] speaks of Seward as a "publick bagman for scraps", but describes the volumes as entertaining and their author as the best compiler of anecdotes after Horace Walpole

Information above from Wikipedia.

Much more on Seward and the Vandewall / Neate Families to follow in  future postings to this blog.

1 . The Marble Bust of Alexander Pope owned by William Seward.

1.The William Seward Bust of Alexander Pope.

by Louis Francois Roubiliac, Circa 1737 - 38.

A Marble Bust of Pope; almost certainly the unfinished? bust left in the Roubiliac Studio in St Martin's Lane and sold on the fourth day of the sale of the contents, Sat. 15 May 1762, lot 75. 

Note. see sale catalogue - only existing copy in the Finberg Collection, The British Museum.

 

    
 The William Seward bust of Alexander Pope by Louis Francois Roubiliac, circa 1737/38.

                          Size 15.75 ins. tall, socle 4.5 ins tall, eyes uncut. Bust Type 1.

See Wimsatt. The Portraits of Alexander Pope, page 265, for an illustration of the 1788 print of this bust, and page 266 for the text and also Wimsatt supplement p.147, and plate 13.

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Stipple Engraving of the bust in the possession of William Seward of Alexander Pope by Roubiliac dated 1788, drawn by John Brown and engraved by Marino Bovi. 

Published by Mrs Brown at Mr Middleton's, 162 Strand. Feb 1788.

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_Q-1-126

The Bust here misattributed to Rysbrack. (He got the R and ac nearly right).

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This section updated 2 June 2023.

HOMER and POPE.

Proposals for engraving busts of Homer and Pope (?1787)

TITLE: PROPOSALS  FOR  PUBLISHING BY SUBSCRIPTION,  TWO SEVERAL

ENGRAVINGS  OF THE  BUSTS  OF HOMER,  AND OF HIS TRANSLATOR

ALEXANDER POPE.

The Drawings are already finished by Mr. BRO, No. 162, in the Strand. That of HOMER, from the Original Bust, dug up near Baiae in the  Year 1780, and now in the possession of Charles Townly, Esq. │ 

That of ALEXANDER POPE, from the fine Original Bust by Rysbrack,  in the possession of William Seward, Esq. │ 

One of the Engravings, the HOMER, will be executed by  F. BARTOLOZZI, ESQ. R.A.  The other of

POPE, by Mr. BOVI, Pupil to Bartolozzi. 

 The Price to Subscribers will be TEN and SIXPENCE.

The Prints to be delivered on or before the 30th of January 1788, and in the order they are

subscribed for.

SUBSCRIPTIONS taken in by Mr. ALDERMAN BOYDEL[L]; 

Mess. WHITE and SON, Fleet Street; Mr. RICHARDSON, Strand; 

Mess. ROBSON and Co. New Bond Street; 

Mess.PAYNE, Mews-Gate; Mr. CADELL, Strand; 

Mr. TORRE, Print Seller, Pall-Mall; 

Mr. EDWARDS, Bookseller, Pall-Mall; 

and at Mr. BROWN’S at Mr. MIDDLETON’S,  No. 162, Strand [?1797].

LOCATION: Bodley.

info from - https://downloads.utorontopress.com/pdf/The_Edwardses_of_Halifax-Appendices_as_revised.pdf

The Bust of Homer drawn by John Brown.

Pub Mrs Brown at Middletons 

 

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I suspect that either the numbering in the Strand changed or perhaps The Somerset Coffee House relocated here.

Note - 162, The Strand was in 1805 the location of the famous Somerset Coffee House, later described as an hotel. On the East corner of the entrance to Kings College.

1805/Valentine Saunders, Somerset Coffee house & Hotel, 162 Strand/../../Holdens Directory

 1822/S R Saunders, Somerset Coffee house, 162 Strand/../../London Directory

 1829/S R Saunders, Somerset Coffee house, 162 Strand/../../Robsons Directory

 1833-34/Samuel Robert Saunders, Somerset Hotel, 162 Strand/../../Pigots Directory

 1836/Alexander Stewart, Somerset Hotel, 162 Strand/../../Pigots Directory

From Tallis Street Views - 1838 - 40. with Stewart the proprietor.

 - https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/ptid=mdp.39015051808932&view=1up&seq=113&size=125

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162 Strand.

Two labels from the interior of a brass bound writing box

http://www.puckeringsantiques.com/229921/grand-antique-mahogany-captains-writing-slope-lap-desk-by-nicholas-middleton-c1810/

Middletons, 162 Strand. London

1788 - 1791 (at least) possibly until 1810.

1788 through 1791 Nicholas Middleton, Pencil and Toymaker listed in London Directories at 162 Strand, London.

Dec 1788.  John Miers the Silhouettist / profilist was at Mr Middletons in 1791 he moved to 111 The Strand.

(Morning Post, 2 September 1789 -

That in proportion as the Profiles are reduced, they invariably acquire increasing spirit and animation, a circumstance directly opposite to every other previous invention. These miniatures are therefore particularly adapted for wearing in rings, pins, lockets, bracelets, faux montres, &c. Specimens of a number of the most distinguished Characters may be seen at his apartments, Mr. Middleton's Pencil Manufactory, No. 162, near the New Church, Strand, where he attends from Twelve in the morning till Four in the afternoon.

 Time of sitting — two minutes.

Each Likeness is given elegantly framed, or reduced upon ivory, to set in Rings, Lockets, &c. &c.

The expence from 7s. 6d. to One Guinea.

N.B. Mr. Miers pledges himself to accept of no gratuity, unless his performances meet the entire approbation of his employers.TRAVELLING CASES for Pens, Ink, Paper, &c. Gentlemen who make Summer excursions, are often prevented from committing their observations to paper, by the difficulty of procuring proper apparatus.

Middleton, Nicholas, 162 Strand, London, pocket book and pencil maker, cm and dealer in cutlery and hardware (1801– 10). Took out Sun Insurance policies on 5 October 1804 for £1,000, of which £820 accounted for utensils and stock; and on 29 December 1806 for £2,500. [GL, Sun MS vol. 431, ref. 767264; vol. 437, ref. 798272] In July 1801, N. Middleton supplied the Royal Household with ‘a Case for Box seat to the Nabob’, costing £1 16s; and on 27 December 1810, a writing box costing £5 4s 10d, recorded in the accounts on 22 January 1812. [Windsor Royal Archives, 88916, 89031] Regency brass-bound mahogany portable desk recorded, hinged to reveal two baise-lined sloping flaps enclosing fitted and open wells, a glass sander and secret drawers; bearing trade label which reads: ‘N. Middleton, 162 Strand, Manufacturary of … writing and dressing desks…’. [Sotheby's, 14 November 1969, lot 78; 13 February 1970, lot 130] A good quality brass-bound writing box is recorded, bearing label with Royal Arms, which reads: ‘N. MIDDLETON, 162 STRAND, OPPOSITE NEWCASTLE STREET, THE CORNER OF STRAND LANE, POCKET BOOK & PENCIL MAKER TO THE KING & PRINCE OF WALES, MANUFACTURER OF COPYING MACHINES, WRITING & DRESSING DESKS & ALL KINDS OF PORTABLE CASES FOR TRAVELLING, STATIONARY OF ALL KINDS, COPPER PLATE ENGRAVING & PRINTING, IMPROVED CRAYON PENCILS FOR DRAWING IN COLOURS. WARRENTED RAZORS & ALL KINDS OF FINE CUTLERY.’ [Bonham's, 10 June 1982, lot 14] Label also recorded on a small satinwood desk.

https://www.british-history.ac.uk/no-series/dict-english-furniture-makers/m

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Carved from white statuary marble with associated original square tapered Convent Sienna marble socle. It retains its original unpolished surface. The individual locks of hair have been sculpted but the finer details of the curls and eyebrows remain unfinished.

The William Seward Bust of Pope - The Socle has been turned around - it is flat on the back as in the engraving.

The conformation of the curls is exactly the same as in the first signed and dated version of 1738, now at Temple Newsam, but not as in the later Milton / Fitzwilliam or Barber Institute Type busts.

The Seward bust appears to be an earlier slightly more upright and younger looking version of the signed and dated version at Temple Newsam of 1738. (These busts have been photographed together for comparison.)

The Seward bust is unfinished. The locks of hair have been cut but the hairs have not received the final chiselling. The cutting of the back of the bust and the socle would suggest that it was created for a specific site but never finished and installed.

It would seem that workshop practice at the time was to finish the surface of the marble with a fine abrasive probably pumice, before the final cutting of the hair, eyebrows and then the beeswax polish was applied. This process was never completed with the Seward bust.

The back of the bust is roughly finished with a claw chisel and is very similar to the unsigned bust of Isaac Ware now in the National Portrait Gallery, London. Whilst the later busts of Roubiliac all have finished backs the backs of the early busts by Roubiliac seem to follow no set pattern particularly the various versions of the Pope bust and the early bust of Isaac Ware.

Although left unfinished this bust would appear to be the earliest version of Roubiliac's busts of Alexander Pope. He appears idealised - younger, healthier and perhaps more classically handsome than in any of the other later busts by Roubiliac.

This bust, I believe to be lot 75, described as a bust of Pope, in the only remaining Roubiliac sale catalogue now in the Finberg Collection at the British Museum, and is one of the two marble busts left in the Roubiliac studio at the time of his death and subsequently sold by Langfords of Covent Garden on the fourth day of the sale of the contents of the studio on 15 May 1762.

The following bust no. 2 in this list, The Roger Warner / Philip Mould bust, I believe to be Lot 76 in the sale and described as a head of Pope in the catalogue of the sale.

                                     

 A profile view of the Seward bust by Roubiliac.

The Seward Bust has the same detailing, particularly in the locks of hair, as the first signed and dated bust of 1738 now at Temple Newsam, the detail of the locks of hair on the later 1740 Milton and the 1741 later Barber type busts is quite different. This would suggest that the Temple Newsam and Seward busts are near contemporary with each other.

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                             The Temple Newsam bust of Alexander Pope by Roubiliac, 1738.

                                  Compare the cutting of the hair with the Seward bust.

The Temple Newsam version is truncated. The detail of the lower folds of the chemise visible on the Seward bust and the later Barber type busts is not visible on the Temple Newsam version. It therefore follows that the Seward bust could not be a copy by another sculptor because of the relationship of the detailing on the early and the later busts.

These details would point to the fact that the Seward bust is the earliest version of the Roubiliac Pope busts, probably based on a missing clay or terracotta.

________________________________

    The Stipple Engraving of the Seward Bust of Pope of 1788.

 The Seward bust of Pope is illustrated, but wrongly attributed to Micheal Rysbrack in a 1788 stipple engraving, which is inscribed - 

Drawn by J. Brown and engraved by Marino Bovi, a pupil of F. Bartolozzi R.A.

Entitled - Alexander Pope from the fine Original Bust by Rysbrack, in the Possession of Wm. Seward Esqr. London, Published by Mrs. Brown, at Mr. Middltons, No. 162 Strand, Feby. 1788.

The print was published posthumously by Mrs Brown. John Brown 1749 - 87 was a Scottish artist, pupil of Alexander Runciman and was a close acquaintance of Henry Fuseli whom he met in Rome, whilst he was employed by William Townley and Sir William Young from 1769 - 1780.William Seward was in Rome at this time.

See Dictionary of Scottish Art and Architecture, Antique Collectors Club, 1994.

This is the first positively identifiable bust of Pope by Roubiliac illustrated in the Eighteenth Century.

See O’Donoghue. Catalogue of Engraved British Portraits ....1912.

Here is another version of this print in the British Museum -  it is missing the title - probably a proof copy before publishing.

___________________________

 A few notes relating to William Seward. F.R.S; F.S.A. (1747 - 99).

Gentleman writer, biographer, and hypochondriac. Friend of Sir Robert Walpole, the Thrales, the Burneys, William Chambers, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Samuel Johnson. Educated Charterhouse (Malone) and at Oriel College, Oxford. Visited Italy on the Grand Tour.

A member of the Eumelian Club formed by Dr Ash M.D. F.R.C.P.(1723 -1798), Dr. Samuel Johnson was also a prominent member.

See entry for Seward - Dictionary of National Biography.

Note. The Eumelian club. A Club in London, founded by the learned and ingenious physician, Dr. Ash, in honour of whose name it was called Eumelian, from the Greek [Greek: Eumelias]; though it was warmly contended, and even put to a vote, that it should have the more obvious appellation of Fraxinean, from the Latin. BOSWELL. This club, founded in 1788, met at the Blenheim Tavern, Bond-street. Reynolds, Boswell, Dr Burney, Sir George Baker F.R.S. John Heaviside and Windham were members. Rose's Biog. Dict. ii. 240.

[Greek: Eummeliaes] means _armed with good ashen spear.

For the best account of the Eumelian Club see: The life of Sir Martin Archer Shee, President of the Royal Academy by his son Martin Archer Shee, Longmans 1860.

The father of William Seward was a partner in Calvert and Seward of Red Cross Street the largest brewers in London in the Mid Eighteenth Century.

Note: The Thrales of Streatham owned the second largest brewery in London, known as the Anchor Brewery in Southwark which was sold in 1781 to the Quaker bankers David Barclay of Barclay, Bevan (Sylvanus Bevan III) and Bening,

Silvanus Bevan III was the son of Timothy Bevan (1704 -86), brother and partner of Silvanus Bevan II FRS apothecary of Plough Court, Lombard Street. Silvanus Bevan II FRS was married in 1715 to Elizabeth Quare, daughter of Daniel Quare Quaker clockmaker. He leased the premises at 2, Plough Court from Salem Osgood, another wealthy Quaker Linen Draper. Silvanus Bevan II moved in 1715 to Plough Court, Lombard Street, the previous home of the Pope family and where Alexander Pope was born in 1685. It should be noted that Popes father was also a linen draper.

See further references to Quaker Sylvanus Bevan I, apothecary and sculptor in the Vandewall family history to follow.

James Barry (1741 - 1806) the painter, hated Seward for his attachment to the painter Fuseli, (Fuseli illustrated Sewards ‘Anecdotes’). Seward supported Fuseli financially in setting up his grand failure - the Milton Gallery in Pall Mall in May 1799. See Henry Fuseli, Martin Myrone 2001, p.60.

Seward asked the sculptor Nollekins unsuccessfully to give him his ‘Michel Angelos model of Venus.’

Seward lodged at the Golden Ball, 5 Little Maddox Street. See Smith, J.T: Nollekens and his Times for these refs.

Boswell writes to Dr Johnson 15 July 1777 ” I received Mr. Seward as the friend of Mr and Mrs Thrale and as a gentleman recommended by Dr Johnson to my attention. I have introduced him to Lord Kames, Lord Monboddo and Mr. Nairne. He is gone to the highlands with Dr Gregory. When he returns I shall do more for him”.

15 Jan 1790 Seward writes to Samuel Parr from Maddox St and again on 25 May on behalf of himself, Boswell and Sir Joshua Reynolds with ref. to the epitaph for Samuel Johnsons monument in St Pauls Cathedral.

Seward was a close friend of Dr Johnson and is mentioned on numerous occasions in Boswell's - Life of Johnson, and frequently in The Journals and Letters of Fanny Burney and the Diaries of Hester Lynch Thrale.

Much more on Seward to follow.

The Three distinct Types of the Roubiliac busts of Alexander Pope

              The Three Types of Roubiliac Pope Busts.

  

                         Based on a thorough inspection and comparison of the various busts.

1. The Temple Newsam Type, signed and dated ad vivum 1738,

Represented by the William Seward, and Temple Newsam busts. A still young looking Pope. The detail of the curls of hair are different to the later busts.

Bust of Alexander Pope at Temple Newsam, Leeds.

The drawings by Jonathon Richardson of c. 1737 (see Wimsatt) show Pope similar in appearance to this bust particularly in the details of the hair.

2. The Milton Type, the marble at Milton signed and dated ad vivum 1740. undraped, Pope is beginning to look more lined as is the Roger Warner’s bust. Again the hair is different in detail to the draped Barber terra cotta.

The Roger Warner bust of Alexander Pope -

Photographed at the Burford home of Roger Warner, August, 2000.

3. The Barber Institute terra cotta type, the terra cotta is undated, but the marble version now at Yale is signed and dated ad vivum 1741.

The Shipley Art Gallery bust of Alexander Pope

The Shipley/ Garrick marble version is a subtype of the Barber Institute type, it is signed and dated ad vivum 1741. The Shipley is a more truncated version with a significant topknot of curls above the forehead. In these busts Pope appears much more lined and careworn with the skin drawn tighter over the forehead and he has much more pronounced bags under his eyes.

It is my contention that Pope sat for Roubiliac at least twice, once in 1737 or early in 1738. (Roubiliac provided a plaster for Lord Marchmont in 1738), and again in 1740 when the Barber terra cotta was created.

note. 10 Feb. 1738/9 Roubiliac supplied plaster versions of busts of Pope and Bollingbroke to the Earl of Marchmont, (Hugh Hume, 3rd Earl of Marchmont, 1708 - 94. ( Victoria & Albert, National Arts Library, Ms 1578 - 1939. The Household Accounts of Hugh Campbell, 3rd Earl of Marchmont 1737- 1746. (Press No. 1737-1746 National Arts Library).

We know Pope visited Roubiliac's studio again in July 1741 on behalf of Ralph Allen of Prior Park, Bath, to report on Roubiliac's works in progress for Allen.

       The Plaster Busts of Alexander Pope by Roubiliac.

 

 

There are also 4 Plaster busts of Pope which also might have come from the Roubiliac studio.

 

The British Museum version which is a softened plaster version of the Barber Terra cotta, which was purchased by Dr Matey at the Roubiliac Sale in 1762, the Felbrigg and Duval versions which are both Shipley types and the Milton/Fitzwilliam Type at Hughendon Manor which appears to be a direct cast from the Milton Marble of this bust although it is very thickly over painted. The inscription Uni Aequus Virtuti Atque ejus Amicus.

can just be made out. See the Roubiliac sale catalogue (B.M.).

 

 

                                      The Hughenden Bust of Pope.

 

Any others busts in Marble or plaster would appear to be copies by Nollekens, Cheere, Flaxman the elder etc.

The Marble Busts of Alexander Pope by Louis Francois Roubiliac

                 

      The Marble Busts of Alexander Pope, 1688 - 1744

                by Louis Francois Roubiliac. 1703 - 1762.

The research herein builds on the groundwork laid down by William Kurtz Wimsatt in his excellent work The Portraits of Alexander Pope. Published by Yale in 1965, and should perhaps be read in conjunction with that work. Mrs Esdailes work - Louis Francois Roubiliac of 1928 should be treated with extreme caution.

As far as can be ascertained there are ten marble busts extant which appear to be directly from the workshop of Roubiliac.

There are three distinct basic types of these Roubiliac Pope busts, which show him ageing quite rapidly over the period of five years from 1737 to 1741.

Pope was a sufferer of Potts disease, a progressive tuberculosis of the bones causing curvature of the spine and slowly crushing the internal organs. In July of 1740 he wrote to Ralph Allan about visiting Bath but pleads ill health “I am in no pain but my case is not curable and must in course of time, as it does not diminish, become painful first then fatal” He suffered a serious infection in his kidneys and urinary tract which was operated upon by the surgeon Cheselden (who also sat to Roubiliac) in August of 1740, which goes a some way to explain the obvious deterioration in the appearance of his physiognomy between 1737 and 1741.

There are the four signed and dated, ad vivum marble busts of Pope considered to be by Roubiliac These are -

The Temple Newsam of 1738,

The Milton of 1740,

The Shipley / Garrick of 1741,

The Roseberry bust now at Yale. (The terra cotta at the Barber Institute, Birmingham would appear to be the prototype of the later two).

The Seward Bust in a private collection and the Roger Warner bust currently with Philip Mould, which were the two sold at the posthumous Roubiliac sale, lots 75 the head and 76 the bust of Pope 4th day, 15 May 1762

There are then a further four unsigned marble busts -The V&A Bust, The Saltwood Bust, the Windsor Castle Bust and the Poulet Bust (originally paired with a bust of Newton and now at Waddesden Manor). All four are based on the Barber Terra cotta type.

The Terra Cotta bust of Alexander Pope in the Barber Institute, Birmingham.

                                                                    Ankor Wat

 

Ankor Wat

                                                             Ankor Wat

                                                            Window at  Ankor Wat