Robert Wood (engraver)
Encyclopedia
In 1750-1751 Wood travelled around the Levant with two wealthy young Oxford scholars James Dawkins and John Bouverie
John Bouverie
John Bouverie was a British antiquarian and art collector. He was the originator of a collection of drawings now known as the "Bouverie collection", which passed to the his spinster sister Elizabeth and from her to Sir Charles Middleton, then to Middleton's son-in-law Sir Gerald Noel, father of...
(who died of a fever early in their expedition) and an Italian draftsman Giovanni Battista Borra
Giovanni Battista Borra
Giovanni Battista Borra was an Italian architect, engineer and architectural draughtsman.-Life:...
. Their primary goal was to explore the Troad and locate the key sites mentioned by Homer
Homer
In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...
. Moving south into Syria, they then took careful measurements and drawings of the ancient Roman ruins of Palmyra
Palmyra
Palmyra was an ancient city in Syria. In the age of antiquity, it was an important city of central Syria, located in an oasis 215 km northeast of Damascus and 180 km southwest of the Euphrates at Deir ez-Zor. It had long been a vital caravan city for travellers crossing the Syrian desert...
and Baalbek
Baalbek
Baalbek is a town in the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon, altitude , situated east of the Litani River. It is famous for its exquisitely detailed yet monumentally scaled temple ruins of the Roman period, when Baalbek, then known as Heliopolis, was one of the largest sanctuaries in the Empire...
. The results of these were published in 1753 and 1757 in both English and French editions and were among the first systematic publications of ancient buildings. Both works were of great influence on neoclassical architecture in Britain, Continental Europe and America.
From 1753 to 1756, Wood was the tutor and travelling-companion (or Bear-leader
Bear-leader
A bear-leader was formerly a man who led bears about the country. In the Middle Ages and Tudor times these animals were chiefly used in the brutal sport of bear-baiting and were led from village to village...
as such men were known at the time) of the young Duke of Bridgewater
Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater
Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater , known as Lord Francis Egerton until 1748, was a British nobleman, the younger son of the 1st Duke...
, the richest peer in England, in making the Grand Tour
Grand Tour
The Grand Tour was the traditional trip of Europe undertaken by mainly upper-class European young men of means. The custom flourished from about 1660 until the advent of large-scale rail transit in the 1840s, and was associated with a standard itinerary. It served as an educational rite of passage...
. In 1756 he was appointed Under Secretary to the Secretary of State for the Southern Department
Secretary of State for the Southern Department
The Secretary of State for the Southern Department was a position in the cabinet of the government of Kingdom of Great Britain up to 1782.Before 1782, the responsibilities of the two British Secretaries of State were divided not based on the principles of modern ministerial divisions, but...
, who was initially Pitt the Elder
William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham
William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham PC was a British Whig statesman who led Britain during the Seven Years' War...
. It was to Wood that Granville
John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville
John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville, 7th Seigneur of Sark, KG, PC , commonly known by his earlier title as Lord Carteret, was a British statesman and Lord President of the Council from 1751 to 1763.-Family:...
famously quoted an appropriate passage from Homer's Iliad
Iliad
The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...
as he signed the Treaty of Paris
Treaty of Paris (1763)
The Treaty of Paris, often called the Peace of Paris, or the Treaty of 1763, was signed on 10 February 1763, by the kingdoms of Great Britain, France and Spain, with Portugal in agreement. It ended the French and Indian War/Seven Years' War...
on his deathbed in 1763 (Wood published an essay on Homer in 1765, which stated that true knowledge can come only after one has had an opportunity to evaluate one's own society in relation to others). In 1764, following the instructions of Secretary of State Halifax
George Montagu-Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax
George Montagu-Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax, KG, PC was a British statesman of the Georgian era.-Early life:...
, Wood acted under a general warrant to seize the papers of John Wilkes
John Wilkes
John Wilkes was an English radical, journalist and politician.He was first elected Member of Parliament in 1757. In the Middlesex election dispute, he fought for the right of voters—rather than the House of Commons—to determine their representatives...
, who subsequently won damages of £1000 from him for trespass.
In 1761 Wood was elected Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Bridgewater's pocket borough of Brackley
Brackley (UK Parliament constituency)
Brackley was a parliamentary borough in Northamptonshire, which elected two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons from 1547 until 1832, when the constituency was abolished by the Great Reform Act.-History:...
in Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...
, which he continued to represent until his death. He was also Master of the Revels
Master of the Revels
The Master of the Revels was a position within the English, and later the British, royal household heading the "Revels Office" or "Office of the Revels" that originally had responsibilities for overseeing royal festivities, known as revels, and later also became responsible for stage censorship,...
in Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
, and at one point it was rumoured that he would be appointed Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, but the Lord Lieutenant objected to Wood's "public and private character" as well as his "mean birth", and the appointment was never made.
After his death on September 9th 1771, Wood was buried near his home in Putney
Putney
Putney is a district in south-west London, England, located in the London Borough of Wandsworth. It is situated south-west of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London....
, in a white marble sarcophagus engraved with an epitaph written by Horace Walpole.
Writings
- Les ruines de Palmyre, autrement dite Tedmor, au desert. London (1753).
- The ruins of Palmyra; otherwise Tedmor in the desart. London (1753).
- Les Ruines de Balbec, autrement dite Heliopolis dans la Coelosyrie. London (1757).
- The ruins of Balbec, otherwise Heliopolis in Coelosyria. London (1757).
- An essay on the original genius of Homer. London (1769)