The Great Affair is to Move: Travel and Topography at the Signet Library

The WS Society Annual exhibition 2021

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Room 1: Prints and Photographs

It used to be said that whereas the British upper classes decorated their homes with paintings in oils, the middle classes decorated their homes with prints. The thriving trade in posters and postcards at Scotland’s museums and galleries represents the last hurrah of an industry that once saw busy print shops on every street. Prints were sold in a wide variety of forms - colour, as well as black and white; engravings as bound collections or as single sheets; engravings published within books but also published as stand-alone items; prints as collectible series published by organisations to fund their travel and research or to fulfil an ambition to bring fine art to the masses. The Signet Library collection of prints contains examples of all of these and amounts to many hundreds of examples. Our selection here ranges from the work of the great French travel artists of the Napoleonic period through the early work of a man who would stamp his name on photographic history to travel photography and the graphic work of a superb but neglected female artist.

a Napoleonic artist in the middle east

Abord de la Ville D’Alexandrette. Costumes des gardes postes sur la rivage de la mer. Navires abrites dans le golfe. (A guardsman standing on the dock in the gulf of Alexandretta, smoking a long-stemmed pipe.) Paris: Imprimerie de la République, 1799

Saida [Sidon] Paris: Imprimerie de la République, 1799

Louis-François Cassas (1756-1827): French painter, sculptor, architect, archeologist and antiquary

Cassas became an apprentice draughtsman aged fifteen at his father’s office. He went on to study painting, sculpture and architecture in Europe before travelling to Constantinople and later the Middle East. During his travels he visited many ancient sites which he would interpret from a historical perspective in his drawings. On his return to Paris, he published ‘Voyage pittoresque de la Syrie, de la Phénicie, de la Palestine, et de la basse Égypte’, which featured 180 plates, from which these engravings are taken. Cassas was invested with the Légion d'honneur in May 1821.

david octavius hill and the scottish railway age

Views of the Opening of the Glasgow and Garnkirk Railway; Also, An Account of that and other Railways in Lanarkshire. Edinburgh: Alexander Hill, 1832

David Octavius Hill (1802 – 1870), Scottish painter and pioneering photographer; George Buchanan, Civil engineer and fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh

The Glasgow and Garnkirk Railway was originally built to transport coal into a rapidly industrialising Glasgow. In 1831 a passenger service was opened and this collection of prints commemorates the very first departures. These engravings are the result of an early commission by David Octavius Hill who went on to establish a pioneering photography studio and business with Robert Adamson. A notable feature of these engravings is the combination of pictorial elements familiar to C18 scenes alongside the shockingly new chimneys and fast moving engines.

Newte’s Prospects and observations 1791

Prospects and Observations on a tour in England and Scotland: natural, Economical, and Literary. London: G.G.J. & J. Robinson. 1791

William Thomson L.L.D. (1746–1817) / Thomas Newte (1752 – 1817) Scottish minister, historian and writer

Thomson had been forced to resign his post as minister of Monivaird in 1778, and went on to make his living writing history, military and travel books as ‘Captain Thomas Newte. Elected to the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1793 (his proposers included Dugald Stewart, Sir James Hall, and John Playfair), ‘Thomas Newte’ also claimed to be a landowner in Devonshire and the owner of ships run by the East India Company.

middiman’s select views 1812

Select Views in Great Britain, Engraved by S. Middiman, from Pictures and Engravings by the most eminent artists. With Descriptions. London: John and Josiah Boydell 1812

John Boydell revolutionised the fortunes of the English engraving publishing trade. Having trained as an artist and engraver, he had a passionate desire to further the cause of English engravers at the time, and succeeded in establishing a market for the artists and craftsmen in France. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1760. Sadly Boydell died in poverty but the business was taken over by his nephew Josiah.

The first view here, of Monk’s Rock, Tenby, Pembrokeshire (engraved by Middiman from a painting by J. J. Ibbetson) shows early bathing machines, featuring the ‘modesty hood’, which allowed people to bathe naked.

susanna Drury’s giant’s causeway

Prospect of the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland, from The General History of Europe, and Entertaining Traveller: Comprising an Historical and Geographical Account of All the Empires, Kingdoms, &c. in Europe, [etc.], from Their First Establishment to the End of the Present Year. London: W. and J. Stratford, 1790

Thomas Prattent (1780-1810) British Printmaker and publisher after Susanna Drury (1698 – 1770) Irish landscape painter

The volcanic basalt rocks of the Giant’s Causeway in County Antrimare part of the same geological structure found at Staffa and Fingal’s Cave. The unusually large columns are thanks to the molten rocks having cooled very slowly. The site gained public recognition in 1693 after a presentation to the Royal Society by Sir Richard Bulkeley of Trinity College, and was first painted by Dublin artist Susanna Drury in 1739, whose original gouaches are represented here in this Thomas Prattent print.

In Irish and Scottish legend the Irish hero Fionn mac Cumhaill was challenged to a fight by the Scottish giant Benandonner. Between them, they built the causeway in order to meet. The outcome of their encounter varies according to the source.

fittler’s scotia depicta 1804

Scotia Depicta: or, the Antiquities, Castles, Public Buildings, Noblemen and Gentlemen’s Seats, Cities, Towns, and Picturesque Scenery of Scotland. London: W. Miller; J.C. Nattes; J.Fittler; Longman and Rees. Edinburgh: Manners and Miller, and Hill 1804

James Fittler A.R.A. (1758 – 1835) Marine engraver to George III; John Claude Nattes (1765–1839) Watercolourist and topographical draughtsman.

James Fittler achieved notable success as an engraver of portraits and landscapes, and as a book illustrator. He studied at The Royal Academy and was later appointed Marine Engraver to George III. The engravings in this book are based on watercolours by John Claude Nattes. This collection highlights destinations of interest to the well heeled tourists of the day, including ‘The Needle’s Eye of Troup’, an unusual rock formation leading by way of a tidal tunnel to a vast cave known as ‘The Devil’s Dining Room’. There are stories of smugglers using this cave, no doubt adding to the location’s appeal.

early proof prints by grose and eastgate 1786

Proofs (with offsetting) intended for The Antiquities of England and Wales Displayed..London : Printed for Alexander Hogg, 1786

Henry Boswell (pseudonym) “English author” i.e. Francis Grose (1731-1791) English antiquary, draughtsman, and lexicographer; Alexander Hogg (1778-1819) publisher and bookseller; John Eastgate (active 1793-1811) author and illustrator.

Depicted: Freswick Castle in Caithness-shire; Urquhart Castle in Mearnshire; Fingal’s Cave in Staffa; St Samson’s Castle in Guernsey.

These are engravings intended for the book The Antiquities of England and Wales Displayed.. showing various locations of interest to tourists and travellers. The English engravings in the book were all taken from ‘Grose’s Antiquities’ (1785) and the Scottish scenes were published by Francis Grose in 1797. It is believed that Francis Grose and Henry Boswell are one and the same. St Samson’s Castle is now known as Vale Castle, originally constructed in the eleventh century as a bulwark against pirates and enjoying a strategic military position until the Second World War. This view from the 1780’s shows a ruined castle and gallows. In 1799 hundreds of Russian soldiers were buried here, having perished by disease while stationed nearby.

mary webster’s sketches of scotland 1855

A sketcher's notes to illustrate a view of the old church of Dun; containing some incidents in the life of John Erskine, of Dun, superintendent of Angus and Mernes. London, 1855.

A sketcher’s notes to illustrate a view of the ruins of Dunfermline Abbey; containing some incidents in the life of Elizabeth Stuary, Queen of Bohemia. London 1857

Mary Webster (nineteenth-century artist who published anonymously).

A pair of books written to augment the artist’s drawings, these has been credited to Mary Webster for the first time since their arrival and separation at the Signet Library in 1912. These volumes previously belonged to George Stirling Home Drymmond of Blair-Drymmond and Ardoch.

james logan mack’s photographs of Iceland 1911

A Trip to Iceland. Edinburgh, privately printed, 1911

James Logan Mack. Solicitor and author of The Border Line: Solway Firth to the North Sea

This volume is the product of early-twentieth century amateur photography and publishing, and documents the Icelandic travels of James Logan Mack, an Edinburgh solicitor, with photographs by his brother-in-law Charles Alfred Stitt and travel companion Hermann Sthyr. One of only twenty-five copies made, this one came to the library as part of a substantial and valuable bequest by Writer to the Signet Thomas Yule in the late 1940s. Mack comments on the language, the history of the towns and people, fellow travellers’ accounts, and events as the upcoming prohibition of alcohol in 1915, in advance of which alcohol was being bought in bulk and ‘drunkness was not unknown’.

an edwardian Album: photographs by james valentine & sons

Bonnie Scotland: Portfolio of Scottish Scenery. Dundee and London: John Leng & Co, Ltd 1907

James Valentine & Sons fl. 1851-1963, Scottish printers and postcard publishers; John Leng (1828-1906) newspaper and book publisher in Scotland.

This collection was published by the successful and enterprising John Leng & Co of Dundee, who was honoured in 1902 as a Burgess of Dundee, and in 1904 with a Doctorate from St Andrews. The photographs are from the archives of Valentine and Sons, who specialised in portraiture, and later topographical views aimed at the tourist market. Founder James Valentine received the Royal Warrant in 1867 after carrying out his first Royal commission in 1866. The company became well known after photographing the aftermath of the Tay Bridge Disaster in 1879 for the Court of Inquiry. Their archives are now held by the University of St. Andrews.