ASTENE ten years and the future

At the Southampton Conference in 2007 ASTENE celebrated ten years since its formal coming into being, although its gestation was somewhat longer (perhaps 178 years). At the Conference Dinner in Winchester, Neil Cooke gave a spirited and amusing talk about the genesis of ASTENE: Neil has kindly written-up a version of this talk, which follows. The talk, and the conference, were good times to reflect on what ASTENE has achieved over the ten years – but now is the time to consider where we might be going in the next ten years. We hope that Neil’s reminiscences will help to stimulate your own thoughts about your interests, involvement, and the future aims and directions of the Association.

The membership of ASTENE is diverse: history, archaeologists, Egyptologists (a breed-apart), art historians, architects, literature specialists, those with family connections to travellers, and those who are ‘just’ interested in the region. This diversity is our strength. Equally the region in which we are all interested – essentially the lands of the ‘Ottoman Empire’ (or the Eastern Roman Empire) – is diverse, historically, archaeologically and culturally. Some members have interests across the region, other are more closely defined. We are interested in your views on how the association should develop.

A FEW THOUGHTS AND A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY

Looking around the room, who could have imagined that so many people are interested in Travellers to Egypt and the Near East. But we are interested, and attend our Conferences because we hope to learn more about people we already know or are writing about, but also, to hear about new people, or new facts that will help our minds to create the image of a person, a place, or an event that is of interest to us.

I recently found this description of Mohammed Ali at his palace in Alexandria.

‘He sat at the upper end, near the corner of the chamber and I suppose cross-legged. His large cloth cloak however concealed or covered his legs and feet. He wore a large beautiful variegated camel’s hair turban, had a long beard and mustachios rather gray. He appeared about 50 years or more and was smoking an immense pipe at least seven and a half feet long. The pipe was indeed a curiosity adorned with silk having two large tassels hanging from the top part a foot below the mouthpiece and run down almost to about two feet from the bowl which is highly gilt. The stem appeared to be set around with two or three rows of diamonds and the bowl was resting on a silver saucer about six to eight inches in diameter on the floor.’

That description of his pipe is wonderful. It shows Mohammed Ali in a new light, perhaps as a ‘fashionista’ to use an up-to-date word.

Now consider Orlando Felix. He was wounded at the Battle of Waterloo and later he travelled in Egypt with Lord Prudhoe. The other day I found this ‘Captain Orlando Felix … was short and slight, and rather an exquisite, who went in for doing the correct thing.’ Somebody else wrote ‘he spoke with a stutter.’ Another wrote ‘he sent letters full of solace and cheerfulness.’ Bring these facts together and you can begin to picture this small, neatly-dressed man sitting beside the river Nile having a friendly chat with Champollion.

Travellers were not the dull academics we imagine. Not every day was devoted to crawling over mummies, digging up antiquities or copying hieroglyphics. Many had a sense of humour. Lately I have been reading in letters and journals of an ostrich; a joke present delivered to each new arrival on the Nile, who then had to look after it until a new person arrived on the scene and it could be passed on.

The problem is, when you can picture a different Mohammed Ali, a different Orlando Felix, or find another reference to that ostrich, you want to search for more. And, however hard you try to ignore them, travellers will and do take over your life. Hence this conference in Southampton where we celebrate ASTENE’s 10th birthday.

Although ASTENE started in 1999 at the Cambridge conference – before that, we met at Oxford in 1997 – where the vote was taken to create our Association – and is how you work out that ASTENE is 10 years old. But some will say we are 12 years old.

In 1995, some people here attended a conference at Durham – which although intended as a ‘one-off’, might be considered a ‘dry run’ for what would later become ASTENE. Durham demonstrated there were sufficient numbers of people interested in the lives of travellers to make a regular conference a viable proposition – although I have to say some of us were amused by two attendees who only came to Durham because it was something for him and his wife to do while his office was being re-decorated.

Before that, however – at Kingston Lacey, Harry James organised a Bankes Symposium. Here, the real lives of a few travellers were given a first airing – William Bankes, Henry Salt, John Gardner Wilkinson and James Burton. The Bankes Symposium might be viewed as a ‘test run’ for the ‘dry run’ two weeks later in Durham.

To this day, I still have no idea how Harry James found out I was researching the life of James Burton, but then that is how many of us have come to know each other. One person knows somebody else, who may be able to help another person, or to suggest a new direction for their research. And I like to think that all of us here today have in this way helped one or more members in the last 10 or 12 years because sharing research was one of the simple ideas behind ASTENE. Hence the Research Resources part of the web-site.

Mentioning help, we must not overlook the work of Warren Dawson. His book ‘Who Was Who in Egyptology’ was first published in 1951 by the Egypt Exploration Society (revised by Eric Uphill in 1969 and expanded by Morris Bierbrier in 1995). This book is often the first place many of us look to find details of a traveller.

Yet ‘Who Was Who in Egyptology’ contains only that part of the iceberg above the water. Mass travel is not a recent phenomenon and many people have over the centuries wandered from country to country. But what is now obvious to us is that there were several hundred, even thousands of people, in Egypt and the Near East and elsewhere. People who were there not as archaeologists but who were there for business or as tourists. And yet their lives and stories are as interesting, if not more so, and much of the information they recorded is kept on shelves and in archive boxes in libraries all over the world. While the lives of so many travellers are largely forgotten, what they wrote down is of value; descriptions of countries, people, animals, industries, events, and monuments, with many observations unlikely to have been recorded elsewhere.

By ASTENE members blowing the dust off these diaries and journals there is the great opportunity for retrieving information that will benefit present day and future historians of Egypt and other countries in the Near East. That is part of ASTENE’s purpose.

ASTENE also hoped such research would be of benefit in another way. How often do you see a label in a museum display saying an artefact has an ‘unknown provenance?’ Because early archaeologists often only committed to paper a tiny part of the story behind each find. If you can combine into one big database the facts recorded in diaries and journals by different people, you might solve the mystery of where these artefacts were found. Well, that’s the theory, and I do believe ASTENE members have provided information to narrow down a possible provenance or two by proving a person had never visited the particular place where an artefact was believed to have come from.

This raises an interesting thought. Does everyone here know the real provenance of ASTENE? I suspect not. In the preface to our first published book ‘Travellers in Egypt’, John Ruffle provided a clue:

‘The idea of a conference on Travellers in Egypt was first broached many years ago in the course of correspondence between myself and Neil Cooke, Michel Azim and Jason Thompson as we struggled to correlate conflicting data in the various letters and diaries on which we were engaged.

Conference was rather a grand word for what seemed likely to be the four of us meeting round a kitchen table but in the event it was easily justified as over 80 people finally arrived at the Oriental Museum [in Durham] for 3 days of papers, discussion and what might be best described as ‘other conference activities.’

John Ruffle is correct. It was many years ago, and I dare to suggest our birthday cake needs not 10 or 12 but 178 candles, taking us back to Wednesday 5th August 1829. On that hot day, somewhere beside the river Nile, Joseph Bonomi put onto a scrap of paper a letter to James Burton. “I feel myself into the bargain unwell – from sitting up extremely late – with the two Englishmen – and Champollion – who showed us his drawings last night.” Bonomi folded the paper, applied his wax seal, and handed it to a runner with instructions as to where he might find Burton. Bonomi and Burton regularly exchanged letters wherever they were. In them they moaned about everything and everyone – including Mr Sham, as they nicknamed Champollion.

Now this is where the correspondence mentioned by John Ruffle began, with a letter sent to me by Michel Azim who asked if I could identify for him the two Englishmen referred to in Bonomi’s letter. One source suggested they were Lord Prudhoe and Orlando Felix, who were then in Egypt on a ‘political mission’ whatever that means.

I wrote to John to ask whether the diaries of Lord Prudhoe could help. Yes, he wrote back, Lord Prudhoe and Orlando Felix were the two Englishmen. But, the diary did not mention Bonomi being there, or anyone being shown drawings until early in the morning.

After a lot of research, it became clear Bonomi was not there. We now know Champollion’s collection of drawings were shown to him by Gaetano Rosellini several days later, and that soon afterwards Bonomi made a very poor job explaining this in letters he sent to everyone he knew, to the extent many imagined Bonomi really had been shown drawings by Champollion. And this error became fact for 170 years until it was proved to be otherwise.

To figure out what happened on that one day in history, Michel Azim, John Ruffle, Jason Thompson and I exchanged 28 long letters as the facts were batted back and forth like a game of tennis. But it is in the very last letter written by John Ruffle is where you find the reason I have been telling you this. John proposed that if the four of us had met at his house and brought our research material, it would have taken one weekend to find the answer to that single, but important question. Instead it took a year.

And, John also suggested we could have enjoyed some delicious food and drink, as was so often the outcome of the serendipitous meetings of our travellers, for nearly every night of the week it appears to have been ‘party time’ somewhere along the banks of the river Nile.

Which brings me back to ASTENE. Tonight it is our ‘party time’ as we celebrate our 10th or 12th, or as I like to believe, our 178th Birthday.

And for that we have to thank Joseph Bonomi, James Burton, Lord Prudhoe, Orlando Felix, Jean François Champollion, Gaetano Rossellini, and all our other travellers who, unknown to them, are the true creators of ASTENE.

Neil Cooke 08

Le Nil. Egypte et Nubie. Maxime Du Camp. Critical edition, with preface, notes and bibliography by Véronique Magri-Mourgues, Les éditions Palimpseste. 388 pp.; price: 22 Euros.
http://www.editions-palimpseste.com

A reprint of the 1852 classic, with critical notes etc. Maxime Du Camp, aged 27 and Gustave Flaubert, aged 28, left Paris on 29th October 1849 for Egypt where they spent eight months before continuing through the Near East Greece and Italy, returning to France in 1851. Maxime Du Camp had an official mission from the Académie des Inscriptions et belles-lettres: to take photographs of the sites and landscape (168 photographs are conserved at the BNF). His notes are a series of letters written to Théophile Gautier. As well as accounts of monuments Du Camp recounts various discomforts of the travels in a mixture of journalistic reportage and romantic sensibility.

08

The Magnificent Flora Graeca, How the Mediterranean Came to the English Garden. Stephen Harris. 200 pages, Illustrations Hardback, RRP £35.00, Bodleian Library/University of Oxford 13 Digit ISBN 9781851243068

“The Flora Graeca” is one of the most extraordinary botanical publications of all time. The spectacular quality of the botanical illustrations, the size of the publication (10 double folio volumes), its cost on publication (over GBP 620 in 1830) and the lengths to which people went to see it all added to the Flora’s reputation. Indeed, there were so few copies of the first printing – just 25 – that some people were sceptical that the book existed! This book summarizes the story of the Flora Graeca enterprise, profiling the leading characters, John Sibthorp and his celebrated illustrator Ferdinand Bauer, and charting their eastern Mediterranean adventures; the scientific and artistic aspects of the publication and its printing history. It also looks at the horticultural legacy of Sibthorp’s voyages and the plants he brought back to England, such as Crocus flavus ssp. flavus collected in Turkey, now popular in its own right as one of the parents of a popular garden hybrid, 'Golden Yellow', and Cyclamen persicum collected in Cyprus, now one of the most widely grown autumn-flowering species and the parent of many of the garden cyclamens. Heavily illustrated, the book brings together images of Sibthorp’s specimens (looking remarkably fresh after 180 years) and illustrations from the original watercolours and the engravings preserved in Oxford.

08

The Egypt Exploration Society - the early years. Edited by Patricia Spencer. London: Egypt Exploration Society, Occasional Publication 16. 2007 Price £22 (EES members: £18). ISBN 0 85698 169 9.

A volume issued to celebrate the 125th Anniversary of the EES, based on the extensive archive held by the Society. Many of the illustrations (altogether around 200) have not been published previously. They include watercolours by Howard Carter as well as photographs. The text is by a range of authors, some of whom work on sites, or in areas, that were excavated by the Society in its early years. The years covered by this volume are 1883 to 1915, a period dominated by Flinders Petrie, Eduard Naville, Howard Carter, and Norman de Garis Davies. The work discussed is both excavation and epigraphy.

Janet Rady Jan 08

Julie Hankey, A Passion for Egypt. Arthur Weigall, Tutankhamun and the ‘Curse of the Pharaohs.’ I.B.Tauris 2007.

Julie Hankey’s biography of her grandfather, the Egyptologist, journalist and playwright, Arthur Weigall, is now available in paperback.

08

TRAVEL BOOK FAIRS

There are PBFA monthly Book Fairs at the Holiday Inn Coram Street, London WC1N 1HT: Sunday 13th April; Sunday 11th May;
Sunday 13th July; Sunday 10th August; Sunday 14th September. On Sunday 1st June the Fair is at the Hotel Russell, Russell Square WC1B 5BE. All fairs are open from Noon – 6pm, entry free. Both locations are close to Russell Square Underground Station. www.pbfa.org

08

RECENT SALE: THE WAYNMAN DIXON ARCHIVE

Patricia Usick drew my attention to the sale of an archive at the auctioneers Hampton and Littlewood in Exeter on 30th January 2008. Thanks to the auctioneers I was able to have a close inspection of the archive before it was dispersed. Clearly for ASTENE members archives such as this are a vital research tool. Their sale and dispersal is inevitable, and not all can enter public collections of archives, but at least a notice of what they contained is valuable.

Waynman Dixon (1844-1930) was a Civil Engineer who played a significant role in the transport of Cleopatra’s Needle from Alexandria to London in 1877. He receives a short entry in Who Was Who in Egyptology (3rd edn, ed., Morris Bierbrier 1995: 125-6) for this, and his earlier investigations of the Great Pyramid at Giza. In September 1872, the renowned Charles Piazzi Smyth, Astronomer Royal of Scotland and arch-pyramidiot, asked Dixon to undertake some casual exploration inside the Great Pyramid (some years before Flinders Petrie). As a result, Dixon along with a friend, Dr. Grant and his carpenter ‘man-of-all-work’, Bill Grundy, discovered the openings of the two shafts on the south and north walls of the Queen’s Chamber. In the horizontal section of the shafts that leads into the chamber, Dixon found three small artefacts that, via his brother John Dixon, came back to England, and eventually (through John’s great-granddaughter) found their way into the British Museum collections in 1970.

The archive up for sale was divided into twenty separate lots, including groups of photographs, watercolours, letters and a journal, with a couple of canopic jar heads and some other material. Most of the photographs are by well-documented professionals, and some are represented in the collections of, for example, the Griffith Institute and The Egypt Exploration Society. Those in the Dixon auction included a couple of sets of A. Borgiotti’s official photographs of Cleopatra’s Needle and the preparations for its voyage, encased in the well-known cigar-shaped tube. A number of these photographs include Dixon himself and his brother John. As a complement to these, were 12 albumen photographs with the photographer’s stamp of Auguste Xuereff, Alexandria, showing the Obelisk that was transported to New York two years later.

Two further collections of photographs were sets of studio portraits or arranged images of ‘ethnic types’ and scenes of ‘Arab life’ typical of the period (the 1870ies). The ‘Types Et Paysages D’Algerie: Scènes De La Vie Arabe’ by Eugene Michel show people at prayer, rug makers, a cemetery, working in the villages and fields, and preparing the bride. A similar group (studio portraits) was taken by O. Schoefft in Cairo.

A large collection of loose photographs, some carrying the name of the well-known photographer, Beato, show views of Egypt, the Nile, Suez, the pyramids: of particular interest I noted a view of the West Bank at Luxor from Medinet Habu towards the Ramesseum, taken during the inundation.

Three Lots were watercolours by Dixon himself, some showing his camp at Berbereh (1877), with various views of Egypt, and others from various holidays in Norway, England and elsewhere. It has to be said that his abilities were rather modest, although he was quite good at camels.

Amongst the most important items was the collection of twenty-seven letters from Waynman Dixon while in Egypt between 1872 and 1876 back home to his family in England. The correspondence traces the young engineer’s life and work in Egypt over a period four years, and is written from various addresses such as Gizeh Bridge Works (he was employed to build a Nile bridge), Shepheard’s Hotel Cairo, on board the dahabeeyah ‘Griffin’, Hotel Abbot Alexandria, and Kom-Ed-Dikkeh Alexandria.

Letters to his ‘dear Mama’ detail Dixon’s most important activities from the Egyptological perspective: his work in the Great Pyramid at Giza. He writes ‘giving account of my discovery in the Great Pyramid from which you will see my labours have not been in vain for I have found two new passages leading I don’t know where as yet, but by doing so and no more have 9 made great advance in Pyramid Science and immortalised my name in this everlasting stone mystery.’ Dixon appears to have been of religious persuasion and pyramidiot inclination (or the other way around).

The letters were edited by Dixon later: there are plenty of blue-pencillings – so were presumably being prepared for publication. In one case that I noted, he deleted the personal name (Mr Morrit) of someone he met at Aswan, inserting ‘gentleman’ in its place: an reminder of how archives can supplement edited and published accounts.

Another Lot belonged to later in Dixon’s career, after his return to England. Most of these letters relate to his work with St John’s Ambulance. They constitute a weird miscellany, largely letters in appalling scrawl from various Bishops and Lord and Lady Zetland responding to invitations to lecture. One Bishop refused because ‘I am consecrating a church on that evening’ – which has to be one of the best excuses for turning down an invitation; alas, one we cannot all use. By far the most extraordinary is a copy of a letter from General Gordon at Khartoum refusing, in the weariest way, a request from Dixon to acquire a fish. He states that he has already sent one to someone else, and people don’t realise the effort and inconvenience it involves him in! This is bizarre by any standards, a classic case of entering someone else’s correspondence without knowing what on earth is going on; but I would dearly love to know what sort of fish could cause such desire and anguish.

There were also two very detailed plans of the pyramid passages (not the air shafts) ink, heightened with watercolour, signed and dated Cairo 21/6/73. They had been folded for many years and are now rather fragile. The plans are of the first ascending passage, showing the West and East wall in elevation with roof and floor in sections.

‘The Great Pyramid – its history, construction and purpose’ by Waynman Dixon, dated January 1879, is a manuscript account, written on 22 folio sheets. It is the text and notes for a series of lectures given to various scientific and literary institutes in the North East of England in 1879. This contains his account of the discoveries in the Great Pyramid ..... 'I pitched my camp on the Nile, within sight and one might almost say under the shadow of the Great Pyramid..... Researches which were rewarded by discovery of many new features and the revealing of secrets of its construction, which had remained unknown for the four thousand or more years since its erection.’

This manuscript begins with ancient sources such as Herodotus, then moves to Piazzi Smyth, and then on to his own work. The earlier part is quite detailed and narrative, the later part is rather more ‘notes’: it gives the impression of a prepared lecture (perhaps with lantern slides) that was written with the sources detailed and simpler prompts for his own work.

‘Cleopatra’s Needle’ – a four-page manuscript account in pencil by Waynman Dixon recalling his involvement as resident engineer in preparing and shipping Cleoptra’s Needle to England; together with a four-page manuscript letter, describing and illustrating the American method of removing the sister obelisk. This formed one Lot together with ‘By Camel to the New Petrified Forest’, an eight-page manuscript account of an expedition undertaken by Dixon with Dr. Grant, dated Nov 29th 1872. With these, three manuscript letters concern the removal and restoration of antiquities from Egypt 1872-73: one from the Museum of Science and Art, Edinburgh states ‘You will be glad to hear that we have so completely restored all the busts that no evidence is left of the injuries. I found on examination that the terribly mutilated Osiris and two of the others were made of plaster ....’ Oh dear!

Robert Morkot 08

WHERE ARE THEY BURIED?

We welcome information for this section of the Bulletin from members. It would be especially interesting to have information about graves in countries across the world - particularly those in the ASTENE area itself. Please send your contribution to the Bulletin Editor.

Lawrence of Arabia.
Elisabeth Woodthorpe writes:
T.E. Lawrence (1888-1935) is buried in the village cemetery at Moreton in Dorset near his home at Clouds Hill, Wareham. It is a simple grave, well-signposted. Whilst there, be sure to look in on the village church of St Nicholas just up the road and glory in the beautiful engraved glass windows which are the work of Laurence Whistler. Personally I enjoy them most in the morning light, but whatever the time of day do visit.

Clouds Hill, Wareham, Dorset BH20 7NQ is now managed by the National Trust. This year it is open 20 Mar-26 Oct Thursday-Sunday 12-5. Closes at dusk if earlier; no electric light. Open Bank Holiday Mondays.

The National Trust Book says: ‘This tiny isolated brick and tile cottage in the heart of Dorset was the peaceful retreat of Lawrence. The austere rooms are much as he left them and reflect his complex personality and close links with the Middle East, as detailed in a fascinating exhibition. 2008 – New trail through the rhododendrons to picnic spot on top of the hill.’

08

Captain Henry Foskett
Foskett, who left many graffiti (see article on p.16), and is mentioned by John Fuller, whom he met and travelled with (along with Pearce) in Nubia in 1819, was buried in Bunhill Fields Cemetery in London 15th December 1853.

Bunhill Fields was favoured by dissenters (John Bunyan for example). Today, it is a rather pleasant oasis shaded by tall trees and popular as a lunching spot. It lies between Bunhill Row and City Road, parallel roads that both run up to Old Street (which is the nearest Underground station). The splendid parish church of St Luke’s Old Street is not far off (and the Society of Genealogists is also nearby). There are many graves, although these are in railed sectors; access to see specific tombs is possible by appointment. Foskett’s family lived close by, in Finsbury Square. The family vault of Foskett’s Nubian travelling companion, John Fuller (also of dissenting background) was also in Bunhill Fields.

ARTICLES

WHAT THE GUIDEBOOKS DON’T TELL YOU: LEECHES IN HEZEKIAH’S TUNNEL
I think that Hezekiah’s tunnel in Jerusalem is now closed to visitors. But on the 9th of March 1967 I waded the length of it from the Gihon Spring to the Pool of Siloam with the then Bishop of Bath (appropriately). It took 40 minutes and when we found that the steel exit grill was locked I became quite claustrophobic at the thought of re-entering the tunnel with our candles and wading back for another 40 minutes.

Moreover I was sure I’d seen in the gloom a leech on the wall and could feel them around my bare legs as we waited to leave. I did not mention them to the others in the group lest it caused a panic.

At that time, just before the unexpected 6-day war, the tunnel was wholly within the Kingdom of Jordan. The conduit had been hacked through the rock from each end to join in the middle, according to a contemporary Hebrew inscription (now in Istanbul). It was a remarkable feat of engineering at the time when Sennacherib’s Assyrian army were pressing on Jerusalem in 701 BC (see 2 Kings 20:20 & 2 Chronicles 32:30) and Hezekiah needed to ensure a water supply for the city which was about to be besieged. I entered this high, wide tunnel, but as we neared the middle the height lowered so much that I had to lean forward and the width narrowed to less that 2 feet. Evidently the workers speeded their progress by reducing their work as the Sennacherib advanced towards Jerusalem.

After the much later 6-day war, east Jerusalem was occupied by Israeli forces and was soon incorporated into the State of Israel. Thirty one years later, on 31 March 1998, I returned to the Pool of Siloam by walking down the path past Kathleen Kenyon’s excavations and Warren’s shaft. Surprisingly, nobody was at the pool and the water was as clear as crystal in which numerous large leeches were visible. Vindication at last! No guidebook I’ve read mentions leeches. Has anyone else come across them in life or in literature on Hezekiah’s tunnel? (You may wonder whether we escaped from the tunnel in 1967. Thankfully someone found the key to the gate at the Pool of Siloam).

F. Nigel Hepper

SOME 18TH CENTURY TRAVELLERS IN EGYPT AND THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE: AARON HILL AND JAMES CAULFIELD, LORD CHARLEMONT
The following letter (published without the name of the author) appeared in The Salisbury And Winchester Journal and General Advertiser of Wilts, Hants, Dorset, and Somerset. Printed by and for Benjamin Charles Collins, on the Canal, Salisbury on Monday, February 28th, 1785.

‘To the PRINTER, &c.
‘Sir: The following anecdote may be serviceable to travellers, who are very curious in inspecting the curiosities in barbarous nations, – The Celebrated Aaron Hill, when in Egypt, had the curiosity to examine a catacomb; he was accompanied in his expedition by two other gentlemen, and conducted by a guide (one of the natives of the country). They at length arrived at the spot, and without taking notice of some fellows who were sauntering about the place, they descended, by ropes, into the vault. No sooner were they let down, than they were presented with a spectacle which struck them with horror; two gentlemen, apparently starved to death, lay before them. One of these unhappy victims had a tablet in his hand, on which was written, in pathetic language, the story of their lamentable fate; it seems they were brothers, of rank and family in Venice, and having, in the course of their travels, entrusted themselves with one of the natives, for the purpose of visiting the inside of the catacomb, the perfidious villain had left them there to perish. The danger to which Mr. Hill and his friends were exposed, instantly alarmed them: they had scarce read the shocking tale, when, looking up, they beheld their inhuman guide, assisted by two others, whom they had seen near the spot, closing the entrance into the vault. They were now reduced to the utmost distress; however, they drew their swords, and were determined to make some desperate effort, to rescue themselves from a scene so truly dreadful. With this resolution, they were groping about at random in the dark, when they were startled at the groans of some one seemingly in the agonies of death; they attended to the dismal sound, and at length, by means of a glimmering light from the top of the catacomb, they saw a man just murdered; and a little beyond they discovered his inhuman murderers, flying with the utmost precipitation. They pursued them immediately, and though they were not able to come up with them, they however had the good fortune to reach the opening, through which these wretches escaped out of the cavern, before they had time to roll the stone on the top of it. -Thus, Mr. Hill, and his friends, were, by a miracle saved.’

The incident is an abbreviated version of the narrative of a visit to the ‘catacombs’ 15 miles ‘south of Memphis’ recounted by Aaron Hill in A full and just account of the present state of the Ottoman empire in all its branches: with the government, and policy, religion, customs, and way of living of the Turks, in general. ... By Aaron Hill, ... London, 1709 which was reprinted 1710, 1733 and 1740. Hill actually identifies the murdered Italians, not as Venetian, but as Lorenzo and Ferdinando Bonavoglia of Pisa, and their date of death as June 18th 1701. The full text of Aaron Hill’s book (in all editions) is available through Eighteenth Century Collections Online. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/ECCO

Aaron Hill (1685-1750) was a dramatist, poet and theatrical impresario who worked with Handel, amongst others. He does not figure in Who was who in Egyptology and I find no one claiming interest in him on the ASTENE research pages. There is a recent biography of Hill by Christine Gerrard: Aaron Hill : the muses’ projector, 1685-1750. Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2003.

Quite why anyone should have sent this dire warning to a provincial newspaper in 1785 is a mystery; any suggestions welcome!

The above newspaper entry turned up – as things so frequently do – whilst searching for something totally unrelated. Another act of serendipity (idling in the Library, rather than in my office) drew me to another traveller who does not appear in Who was who in Egyptology or on the ASTENE research pages, James Caulfield, Lord Charlemont. I was familiar with Charlemont through his Italian travels, and the splendid portrait by Batoni, and also vaguely aware of his Ottoman journey, but had never investigated further. This was changed by finding The Travels of Lord Charlemont in Greece and Turkey, 1749, edited by W.B. Stanford and E.J. Finopoulos, published by Trigraph, London for the A.G. Leventis Foundation, 1984. The young Irish peer, James Caulfield, 4th Viscount Charlemont (1728-99) set out on the Grand Tour in 1746 aged 18, accompanied by his tutor, Edward Murphy. Whilst at The Hague he met the notorious 4th Earl of Sandwich, who had visited the east some eight years previously, and at Turin (in 1748, speed was not important to him) he got to know the philosopher David Hume.

Following six months in Rome and Naples, Charlemont prepared to sail to the eastern Mediterranean in April 1749, chartering a French frigate that had been captured by the British. Two more Irishmen joined Charlemont for the expedition: Francis Pierpoint Burton (later Baron Conyngham) and his friend Alexander Scott. They also met – but did join up with – the Robert Wood, also traveling to the east.

These ‘travellers for curiosity’ sailed from Livorno in April, acquiring the artist Richard Dalton (1715-91) at Malta. They visited many of the Aegean islands, parts of mainland Greece (before Athenian Stuart and Revett), Istanbul and Egypt. Dalton made drawings of the sculptures of the Mausoleum at Bodrum (Halicarnassus) and of monuments in Athens. Although not of the highest quality these are of great interest and significance and some were published in editions between 1752 and 1791 (Antiquities and Views in Greece and Egypt with Manners and Customs of the Inhabitants from Drawings made on the Spot, AD 1749: London 1791).

Charlemont’s journal, which he later edited and added to was never published. Although there are references to Egypt and his time there, the journal covering the visit does not seem to survive.

Charlemont returned to Italy and spent more time Rome where he was splendidly portrayed by Pompeo Batoni as a slightly plump, saturnine, young man, with the Colosseum in the background. Travelling back through France (1754) he eventually arrived back in Dublin in 1755 where he took his seat in the Irish House of Lords, and an active role in politics. He was elected a member of the Society of Dilettanti in 1756. ‘The most public-spirited, and at the same time the best-natured and best-bred man in Ireland’, as Edmund Burke described him, was instrumental in the foundation of the Royal Irish Academy, becoming its first President in 1785. His Viscountcy (which he had inherited as a child) was elevated to an Earldom in 1763. He gave a couple of papers on classical subjects, but although he appears to have intended to publish his journals, never did. Samuel Johnson observed that Charlemont only once talked about the experiences and sights of his youthful travels ‘and that was of a large serpent in one of the pyramids of Egypt.’

Although Charlemont was classically educated, and makes many observations on the monuments he saw, the published journals are most interesting for their accounts of costume and society, and the relationship between Greeks and Turks. Charlemont is not typical of his time in his attitudes towards the Turks contrary to that of many of his contemporaries.

Brian Taylor reminded me of the study by Cynthia O’Connor, The Pleasing Hours: the Grand Tour of James Caulfield, 1st Earl of Charlemont, Cork, Collins Press, 1999.

Robert Morkot

CAPTAIN HENRY FOSKETT

On Sunday 7th March 1819 John Fuller and his travelling companion, William Jowett arrived in Aswan. Fuller planned to continue upstream into Nubia. Nathaniel Pearce, who had until then travelled on Jowett’s boat, was to accompany him, whilst Jowett was to remain in Aswan, to wait for Henry Salt coming from Nubia. Fuller was told that it was impossible to take his own boat south through the Cataract, so left it at Aswan. Forced to travel by camel, Fuller and Pearce left Aswan on 9th March and met Henry Salt on the evening of 10th March at Kalabsha.1 They then continued to Derr, where, on the 16th, they were able to hire a small boat and resume their voyage south, visiting Qasr Ibrim on the 17th.

On 19th March their progress was very slow, but Fuller saw an eight-oared cangia come into sight and then overtake them: he was suitably annoyed, but clearly amused at having been conned. Fuller tells us that this cangia belonged to ‘Captain Foskett’ and had passed the Cataract four days after he had been told it was impossible. Foskett towed Fuller’s boat and at evening they arrived at Ipsambul (Abu Simbel). They continued south and on the 21st met near Wadi Elfi (Halfa) with the little flotilla of boats belonging to Bankes, Beechey and Hyde who were just returning from their failed attempt to reach Dongola.2 They spent time around the Second Cataract including a visit to Feraz (Faras), where Fuller and Foskett left their names, and returned to Abu Simbel on the 24th March. Fuller, Foskett and Pearce continued the return journey together leaving graffiti at many sites, some dated. Roger De Keersmaecker gives a full list of Foskett’s graffiti.3 The names of the three travellers appear both independently and together in the graffiti, and some must have been carved on the outward journey, others on the return: so the Maharraqa inscription4 has all three names together.

These graffiti, allied with Fuller’s narrative, give the route as: Abu Simbel;5 Derr6; Amada (26th March,)7; Seboua; Maharraqa8; Dakka; Gerf Hussein9; Dendur10; Beit el-Wali; Kalabsha11; Tafa; Qertassi (30th March)12; Dabod; Philae (31st March-5th April)13 Kom Ombo and Edfu (6th April)14; El-Kab (8th April)15; to Thebes (10th April) where they spent several days and visited Deir el Medina16, Medinet Habu17, and Luxor18. Fuller does not tell us whether he and Foskett travelled back to Cairo together. Foskett also left a graffito at Dendera19 which, as it is undated, could belong to either the outward or the return voyage. Michel Dewachter20 notes that the group must have encountered J.-N. Huyot between Aswan and Kalabsha (he was there between the 6th and 31st March).

Louis Christophe (1967) suggested that Foskett was ‘le capitaine anglais’ seen by Gau at Gerf Husein in March 1819: in the space of ten minutes he descended from his boat, measured the façade of the temple, carved his name and left.21 Dewachter,22 however, notes that Gau was at Gerf Hussein at the beginning of March.

No narrative or journal of Foskett’s travels is known to survive. Fuller gives him the title ‘Captain’, and the graffiti give the initial ‘H.’ Captain could be either army of navy, but no H. Foskett appears in contemporary navy lists.

Foskett, fortunately for researchers, is not a particularly common name (unlike John Fuller) and the Army List of 1810, names only one: Henry Foskett of the 15th (King’s) Regt Light Dragoons, Lieutenant 8 Nov 1798 and Captain 17 Mar 1803. This would suggest a birth date around 1778/80. A suspicion that this is not Fuller’s Captain Foskett is raised by this Henry Foskett’s disappearance from the Army List after 1810; however, an entry in the Gentleman’s Magazine of Jan 1854, repeated Feb 1854, must be the same man: Henry Foskett d aet 75, Alpha Road, Regent’s Park, December 1853, formerly of Tunbridge Wells, Capt 15th Hussars. This again indicates a date of birth around 1778.

To be very cautious, I should note that we cannot absolutely confirm that the traveller in Egypt and Nubia is the Captain Henry Foskett of the 15th Hussars without further evidence: but a general lack of Captain H Fosketts makes, I think, the identification pretty certain.

The Census for 1841 (in which ages were not precise) gives the residents of Ephraim House, London Road Tunbridge Wells, Kent as:

Henry FOSKETT aet 60 (b ca 1781) Independent means
Maria FOSKETT aet 40 (b ca 1801)
Maria FOSKETT aet15 (b ca 1826)
Jane FOSKETT aet14 (b ca 1827)
Sophia FOSKETT aet 12 (b ca 1829)
Eliza FOSKETT aet 9 (b ca 1832)
Emma FOSKETT aet 5 (b ca 1836)

At the time of the Census of 1851, which is more detailed, the family was living at Lyttelton House, Great Malvern:

Henry FOSKETT aet 72 (b ca 1779) Gentleman b London Middx
Maria M.G. FOSKETT wife aet ‘59’ (but must be 49) (b ca 1792/1802) b Glanton, Northumberland
Maria Jane FOSKETT unmarried dau aet 26 (b ca 1825) b Exeter, Devon
Emma Bowles FOSKETT unmarried dau aet 15 (b ca 1836) b Milton, Kent

The will of Henry Foskett, dated 29th August 1853, describes him as ‘late of Tunbridge Wells’ now of Weston Super Mare. It names his wife as Maria Martin Gowan Foskett.

We can be reasonably confident that it is this Henry Foskett’s marriage that is noted in the Gentleman’s Magazine 1823, p.177: At Belchester, Berwickshire, Henry FOSKETT, esq. to Maria daughter of the late Rev. J. Young of Legerwood.

In his will, Foskett left items of silver to his daughters which included a teapot and coffee pot that had been given to his parents at the time of their marriage ‘some ninety years since’ ie around 1760 (actually 11th Dec 1759 at St Luke’s Old Street: registers). The will names his daughters as Maria Jane, Jane Elizabeth, Sophia Ann, Eliza, and Emma Bowles; none of them is said to be married. There is no mention of a son, so the absence of a son in the census probably indicates that he had none, rather than that he was away at school. The will also names a sister, Elizabeth Caroline Foskett; also Thomas Moore Foskett, who is described as the ‘uncle and godfather’ of Jane Elizabeth. As Henry was born about 1778/79, and his parents’ married in 1759, it seems likely that he had a number of older siblings.

Thomas Moore Foskett is a distinctive combination of names, and his will (1828; see also notice in Gentleman’s Magazine Nov 1828 p.475, died 1st Nov 1828 at Tunbridge Wells) considerably expands knowledge about the family. Without children of his own, Thomas Moore left bequests to many nephews and nieces. Similar detail and generosity is found in the wills of the two other brothers, William Foskett of Bath (5 Jan 1840) and Joseph Foskett of Reigate ( also notice Gentleman’s Magazine Oct 1840, ‘in his 80th year’), allowing us to sort out the parentage of the younger generation. Henry Foskett is named in all wills, sometimes as executor. The birth of one of his daughters in Exeter is explained by the marriage of Jane Foskett to Samuel Milford, a merchant and Banker of Exeter. The Milfords were Quakers.

A simple search on Google for Thomas Moore Foskett leads to an article by Wendy Hefford in The Burlington Magazine 1977, vol 119 (no 897): 840-849, ‘Thomas Moore of Moorfields’. Thomas Moore was born in Dulverton, Somerset about 1700 and d. 21st Jan 1788 aet 88 by which time he had been long established in London. He was buried in his family vault in Bunhill Fields, a cemetery favoured by Dissenters (and where John Fuller’s family was also buried). In his will (written 1786, PCC Prob II 1161) he left money to his home town for a chapel for Dissenting Protestants, and also refers to ‘the Quaking House’.

Thomas Moore was the founder of the family wealth being ‘an opulent hosier and manufacturer of carpets’ (GM 1788, I, p.86). The rise of the business is outlined in the obituary in the GM 1788, I, p.177 (which also gives descriptions of Moore’s physical appearance and character), and detailed further by Wendy Hefford: by 1739 Moore was living in the parish of St Luke’s Old Street where he established a business which manufactured carpets ‘in the Turkey manner’. His success was increased with the employment of workers from the royal French carpet factory. Moore’s business grew slowly, but he eventually acquired considerable property around Chiswell Street and built new premises on the corner of Chiswell Street and Finsbury Square designed by a former neighbour, the architect George Dance. Carpets were supplied to numerous significant patrons, and can be seen at Syon House and Osterley Park.

Thomas Moore had only one child, a daughter, Jane, who married Joseph Foskett. The couple had seven children, all of whom received bequests in their grandfather’s will. The business continued under William Foskett and Thomas Moore Foskett who supplied the Prince of Wales with carpets costing £3,800 for Carlton House, including ‘a fine Persia carpet’ (at £400) for the throne room (this is now at Buckingham Palace). However, they did not retain the business for long, selling it, and aspiring, like so many other businessmen, to become Gentlemen.

The Gentleman’s Magazine also helps explain the disappearance of Henry Foskett from the Army List. Amongst the reviews of new publications in the issue of March 1811 (p.259) is The Rights of the Army vindicated in an Appeal to the Publick, on the Case of Captain Foskett. To which is subjoined the whole of Capt F.’s Correspondence with the respective Commanders-in-Chief (His Royal Highness the Duke of York, and Sir David Dundas), and also with the Officers commanding the 15th Light Dragoons. By Henry Foskett, Esq. late Senior Captain in the 15th Light Dragoons. 8vo pp.232, Richardson 1810. Although the review does not detail the issues, they were clearly serious and it comments: ‘we must acknowledge that Capt. Foskett has made out a case which is more seriously deserving the attention of Government than any we have met with, and, taking for granted that what is here asserted is true, more imperiously demanding a remedy.’ Foskett’s volume is largely a collection of letters detailing his complaint against the army and particularly against the Duke of Cumberland who was appointed its commanding officer in 1801. In 1804 Foskett, on what appears to have been a very trivial matter, incurred the hostility of Cumberland, and was, in consequence, consistently overlooked in promotion, even though he was the senior captain. The situation was aggravated further in Dec 1806 when he stood as second for the 19-year old cornet Frederick Ross in a duel with Lieutenant William Wallace, following a dispute over the sale of horses. This incident was reported in the newspapers. Foskett states that he was 28 at the time (the papers appear to have made him older).

In highlighting Cumberland’s failures, Foskett states that in nine years 70 officers quitted the 15th Dragoons and joined other Regiments. His letters to his commanding officers did not further his cause, and eventually the complaint went to the House of Commons. In 1809 there were two opportunities for promotion to a majority, but Foskett was refused leave to apply for them. He was finally, contrary to law, denied appeal to the King, and resigned his commission. The 17 published volume contains letters which shed a little more light on him. One, from ‘Henry Cad. Adams of Ansty Hall, near Coventry’,23 dated 21st Apr 1810, states:

‘Captain Foskett is a young man of moderate fortune, his father died when he was in infancy, leaving a widow and a large family;– Foskett entered the 15th Light Dragons (sic!) when eighteen, and has continued in the same regiment to the present time; he was always considered by his brother officers as a very gentlemanly young man, very steady in the performance of his duty, and, in every respect, a good soldier. The greater part of his fortune is embarked in his profession, as he purchased all his commissions; and if he is still to be refused by his Colonel that promotion in the regiment, which he, in due course, has a right to claim, and also that redress from the Commander-in-Chief which he has so repeatedly solicited in vain, what is to become of him? to leave the service after having passed so much of his time in it, is to step into the jaws of certain ruin, and to remain in it without promotion, and to be continually mortified with having officers introduced from other corps to fill that rank he is fully competent to hold, is too grating for the feelings of an Englishman.’

Foskett’s own lengthy letter of resignation is dated 17th June 1810. He concludes:

‘Having entered the army, not merely with a view to professional advancement, but with the feelings by which every British soldier ought to be animated, – with the fixed purpose of devoting myself to the service of my King and Country; having spent a large part of my life, and a large portion of a moderate fortune, in that service, is not without sensations too acute and galling to be described, that I find myself obliged to forego the prospects in which I had fully anticipated that exquisite satisfaction, which a breast glowing military ardour, impelled by loyalty and patriotism, can alone experience.’

From all of this we can summarise that Henry Foskett was born in London around 1778/79, son of affluent parents, with a Quaker background. He was commissioned into the army, serving in the 15th Dragoons before resigning his commission in 1810. He went to Egypt in 1819 where he met and travelled with John Fuller and Nathaniel Pearce. On his return to England he married in 1823, and lived as a gentleman, primarily in Tunbridge Wells, but with periods in Great Malvern and Weston super Mare, dying in London in December 1853. Given the dissenting Protestant background, London business connections, and place of residence, it is possible that he was already acquainted with the slightly younger John Fuller (b about 1785) before their encounter in Nubia. Finally, a search in the records of the Bunhill Fields Burial Ground (Dr Williams’s Library, Gordon Square, with a transcript at the Society of Genealogists) reveals that Capt Henry Foskett d aet 75 at Alpha Road, Marylebone (as stated in Gentleman’s Magazine), and was buried 15th Dec 1853 in the family vault.

Whilst none of the sources shed any further light on the detail of Foskett’s Egyptian and Nubian travels, they do provide a lot of information on the man and his background. As with so many travellers, it is difficult to assess what effect his travels had on his later life: at present there is no evidence.

A significant number of these sources is available via the internet: The Burlington Magazine is available on JSTOR to those who have access. Wills can be acquired as PDFs directly from the National Archives (£3.50 per file). BIFAO is available (free) directly at ifao.egnet.net/doc/PubEnLigne/BIFAO (or simply google BIFAO).

If any other ASTENE members have found references to Foskett, I would be pleased to here from them.

Bibliography

Christophe, Louis A., 1967, ‘Le Voyage nubien du Colonel Straton.’ BIFAO 65, 1967, 169-175.

De Keersmaecker, Roger, 2001, Travellers’ Graffiti from Egypt and the Sudan I The Kiosk of Qertassi. Graffito Graffiti: Berchem (Antwerp).

De Keersmaecker, Roger, 2005, Travellers’ Graffiti from Egypt and the Sudan IV El Kab The Rock Tombs. Graffito Graffiti: Berchem (Antwerp).

18 De Keersmaecker, Roger, 2005, Travellers’ Graffiti from Egypt and the Sudan V The Temples of Medinet Habu. Graffito Graffiti: Berchem (Antwerp).

Dewachter, Michel, 1971a, ‘Graffiti des voyageurs du XIXe siècle relevés dans le temple d’Amada en Basse-Nubie.’ BIFAO 69: 131-169.

Dewachter, Michel, 1971b, ‘Nubie – Notes diverses : Quatre visiteurs d’Amada en Mars 1819: Le Révérend William Jowett, J. Fuller, H. Foskett et Nathaniel Pearce.’ BIFAO 70: 114- 117.

Foskett, Henry, 1810, The Rights of the Army vindicated in an Appeal to the Publick, on the Case of Captain Foskett. To which is subjoined the whole of Capt F.’s Correspondence with the respective Commanders-in-Chief (His Royal Highness the Duke of York, and Sir David Dundas), and also with the Officers commanding the 15th Light Dragoons. By Henry Foskett, Esq. late Senior Captain in the 15th Light Dragoons. 8vo pp.232, Richardson.

Fuller, John, 1829, Narrative of a tour through some parts of the Turkish Empire. London: [John Murray]

Gau, F.C., 1822, Antiquités de la Nubie, ou Monuments inédits des bords du Nil, situés entre la première et la seconde Cataracte. Paris.

Hallof, Jochen, 1996, ‘Besucherinschiften in den Tempeln von Dendera.’ BIFAO 96: 229-244.

Manley, Deborah and Peta Rée, 2001, Henry Salt: Artist, Traveller, Diplomat, Egyptologist. London: Libri.

Usick, Patricia, 2002, Adventures in Egypt and Nubia. The Travels of William John Bankes (1786-1855). London: The British Museum Press.

Notes
1 Graffito: De Keersmaecker 200I, 12-13; Manley and Rée 2001, 171.
2 Manley and Rée 2001, 168; Usick 2002, 128, 145.
3 De Keersmaecker 200I, 15-16, pp. 13-14 for Pearce’s.
4 Dewachter 1971a: 166 fig 2.
5 RDK 685 Pearce: De Keersmaecker 2001, 13; RDK 692 De Keersmaecker 2001, 14 Fuller.
6 Christophe 1967 171 n6.
7 J:Fr H:Ftt and N Pearce: Dewachter 1971a pl.XXIII, 7 corrected Dewachter 1971b.
8 Dewachter 1971b, 116 n2.
9 Christophe 1967, 171 n 6; Dewachter 1971b, 116 n 1.
10 Dewachter 1971b, 115 n7
11 RDK 592, 593 De Keersmaecker 2001 14; RDK 862 Fuller De Keersmaecker 2001 15
12 RDK 491: De Keersmaecker 2001, 12.
13 RDK 51 and 368 Trajan’s Kiosk, John Fuller and N Pearse (so) March 31 1819 De Keersmaecker 2004, 23.
14 RDK 68 Pearce, 69 Fuller: De Keersmaecker 2001 13, 15.
15 two graffiti: De Keersmaecker 2005, 33, RDK 430, 435 with Pearce RDK 462; 57 RDK 104.
16 Pearce Fuller and Foskett RDK 128 De Keersmaecker 57.
17 RDK 20, 21 H. Foskett N. Pearce 1819 De Keersmaecker 2006, 17.
18 RDK 810 Foskett.
19 Hallof 1996, 234 n.19.
20 Dewachter 1971b: 115.
21 Gau 1822, 199 cited in Christophe 1967.
22 Dewachter 1971b: 115, n.2
23 Henry Cadwallader Adams 1779-1842, Burke Landed Gentry ‘Adams, of Ansty Hall’.

Robert Morkot

FOOTPRINTS

Some extracts from The Travels of Lord Charlemont in Greece and Turkey, 1749, edited by W.B. Stanford and E.J. Finopoulos, published by Trigraph, London for the A.G. Leventis Foundation, 1984. These give a flavour of the style, and the wide range of subjects covered: from descriptions of the places visited, the antiquities, the political state, to the troubles of travel itself.

Tinos
‘The island of Tino, anciently Tenos … remained under the dominion of Venice long after that republic had lost all the rest of her possessions in the Archipelago… The country is well planted, particularly with mulberry trees on account of the silkworms. The island is beautifully diversified with hills and dales. The dress and manners of the inhabitants bespeak their affluence, and content is visible in every countenance; but that which most forcibly strikes the traveller’s eye, and particularly that of a young traveller, is the wonderful beauty of the women …

‘The silk trade of this island, its principal branch of commerce, is said to be decreased; and yet the Venetian Consul residing here was candid enough to assure us, that, though he did believe that the Tiniotes paid more taxes to the Turk than they formerly had paid to the Venetians, yet that he was convinced they were now richer than ever they had been under the government of his masters. A certain proof of what is generally supposed that the Venetian manner of governing their dependencies is a very bad one, and that the despotism of a republic is by far the worse of all despotisms.’

Rhodes
‘Our voyage was tedious and troublesome, and after struggling for seven long days with calms, hard gales, and contrary winds, on the 30th we at length anchored in the harbour of Rhodes. This port, though small, considering the extensive commerce which was anciently transacted in it, is however excellent, being well protected from every wind, and having water sufficient for ships of great burden to anchor close under the Castle, which is built on the edge of the sea.

‘Here our firman, which in the anarchical state of Egypt had been well nigh useless, came again into credit, being received and read with the utmost respect by the Mazulheim or Deputy Governor …

‘With such a climate every vegetable must necessarily flourish! Extreme hear or cold is never felt here. Snow never falls, except upon one very high mountain towards the centre of the island, which serves as a magazine of this delicacy, so precious in all warm regions. It was now November, yet everything here was fresh and verdant. The orange, the lemon, and the citron still perfumed the air with their perpetual flowers, and joined to the bushy pomegranate, clothed the whole region with green.’

Bodrum
‘Upon our enquiring among the inhabitants of Stanco for old marbles, as was usually our custom, we were informed that, if we crossed over to the continent we should find them in great plenty at a town and castle called Bodroumi, which lay nearly opposite to the island. This intelligence, joined to our knowledge that the situation of the great and ancient city Halicarnassus must be somewhere thereabout, determined us immediately to try the truth of the report …

‘The Castle has formerly belonged to the Knights of Rhodes, as appears from the crosses and coats of arms which are to be seen over all its gates, as well as from its fortifications which are planned and constructed in a manner superior to the usual skill of Turkish engineers. But we had neither leisure nor inclination to dwell long upon the examination of its works , for our eyes were immediately attracted and fixed by several basso relievos set in the inner walls, which at the first glance we perceived to be both for taste and execution by far the finest we had ever beheld. The story represented in them is a battle with the Amazons, and they have probably been the frieze of some noble temple, though our imagination prompted us immediately to suppose that they had made a part of the renowned Mausoleum, which ennobled the city of Halicarnassus, and was ranked among the Wonders of the World, which pleasing supposition was still farther fortified by a more attentive investigation of their astonishing beauty.’

Athens
‘So much has been lately written concerning the City of Athens that it might be deemed a superfluous trouble both to myself and to my readers should I attempt to give a detail of the various wonders which I have observed in that eminent object of a traveller’s curiosity.’

‘I find in my note book the following fantastical flight on my first contemplating the ruins of Athens, which, with the assistance of a little superstition, might be exalted into something prophetic, and therefore only I have copied it: “Is this the renowned Athens? How melancholy would be the reflection should we suppose, what certainly must come to pass, that in a few ages hence, London, the Carthage, the Memphis, the Athens of the present world, shall be reduced to a state like this, and travellers shall come, perhaps from America, to view its ruins.”’

Athens to Corinth
‘… our accommodations were, for the most part, as bad as possible. At Eleusis the only lodging we could procure was an old, waste, uninhabited castle, where we lay upon the ground in a vast room, unfloored, and where of consequence, as it was then winter, we passed the whole night shivering with cold.

‘To make up for this, the next night, at Megara, we were put into a sort of oven with a chimney in it, where a great fire was made, on either side of which Burton laid his bed, and I 20 my cloak, the only bedding I ever made use of. After I was asleep, Burton, the most chilly of mortals, recollecting the cold he had lately suffered, and determined to enjoy for this night at least, the comfort of warmth, by ill luck for me happened to find a long piece of green wood, which he seized with great joy and laid across the fire never reflecting that the end of the log came within a few inches of my face. The billet presently took fire and the end next to me began to spit and to flame, scorching my face to such a degree that I bounced up in the greatest terror I ever in my life experienced.’

08

click on Walton's camel for top of page