Fonthill Recovered A Cultural History
Material type: TextLanguage: English Series: Publication details: UCL Press 2018Description: 1 electronic resource (428 p.)Content type:- text
- computer
- online resource
- 111.9781787350458
- 9781787350427
- 9781787350434
- 9781787350441
- 9781787350465
- 9781787350472
- Architecture
- Art & design styles: Baroque
- Art & design styles: Classicism
- Art & design styles: Pre-Raphaelite art
- Art & design styles: Romanticism
- Conservation of buildings & building materials
- Conservation, restoration & care of artworks
- Cultural studies
- History of architecture
- History of art / art & design styles
- History of art & design styles: c 1600 to c 1800
- History of art & design styles: c 1800 to c 1900
- History of art & design styles: from c 1900 -
- Museology & heritage studies
- architecture
- country house
- fonthill abbey
- London
- William Beckford (novelist)
- wiltshire
Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Electronic-Books | OPJGU Sonepat- Campus | E-Books Open Access | Available |
Open Access Unrestricted online access star
Fonthill, in Wiltshire, is traditionally associated with the writer and collector William Beckford who built his Gothic fantasy house called Fonthill Abbey at the end of the eighteenth century. The collapse of the Abbey's tower in 1825 transformed the name Fonthill into a symbol for overarching ambition and folly, a sublime ruin. Fonthill is, however, much more than the story of one man's excesses. Beckford's Abbey is only one of several important houses to be built on the estate since the early sixteenth century, all of them eventually consumed by fire or deliberately demolished, and all of them oddly forgotten by historians. Little now remains: a tower, a stable block, a kitchen range, some dressed stone, an indentation in a field. Fonthill Recovered draws on histories of art and architecture, politics and economics to explore the rich cultural history of this famous Wiltshire estate. The first half of the book traces the occupation of Fonthill from the Bronze Age to the twenty-first century. Some of the owners surpassed Beckford in terms of their wealth, their collections, their political power and even, in one case, their sexual misdemeanours. They include Charles I's Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the richest commoner in the nineteenth century. The second half of the book consists of essays on specific topics, filling out such crucial areas as the complex history of the designed landscape, the sources of the Beckfords' wealth and their collections, and one essay that features the most recent appearance of the Abbey in a video game.
Creative Commons https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ cc
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
English
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