Perspectives on the Past The Rare Books collection is an important depository of material on all aspects of Wiltshire’s long history, including antiquarian surveys of the county’s Neolithic monuments, learned tomes on architectural heritage, and scientific and archaeological analyses of barrows, ditches, mounds and stones.
There are also 18th-century tourist guides to Avebury and Stonehenge, and even poetical responses to the Romantic craze for the ‘British druids’. The pen-and-wash paintings of Stonehenge shown here were executed by one of Wiltshire’s greatest antiquarians, Sir Richard Colt Hoare of Stourhead (1758– 1838). Heir to the banking fortune of Charles Hoare & Co., Hoare was able to devote himself to historical and archaeological projects, undertaking extensive surveys and digs across Salisbury Plain and the Wiltshire Downs. His excavations
at Stonehenge (1798 and 1810), Silbury Hill (1812) and Avebury (1815) followed work upon almost 400 barrows throughout the county. His monochrome paintings served as the originals for the engraved plates made for the first volume of his monumental The History of Ancient North and South Wiltshire (1812–21). In addition to suggesting the tonal values the printmaker should follow, the paintings carry instructions on the reverse noting where the plates should appear. These valuable paintings came into the College’s keeping in 1883 when Stourhead estate short-sightedly auctioned off part of its library.
