Some Notes on Burghley House. Part One.

A chance meeting while hosting an Antiques Weekend at The George Hotel in Stamford led to my being witness to and involved in the discovery of the largest documented collection of Oriental porcelain in the Western world.

The first notion of the porcelain’s importance countered all previous advice and learned opinion. In 1957 a probate valuation of the estate and contents of Burghley House in Lincolnshire pronounced the vast array of porcelain to be 19th century. It also decreed that there was little or no furniture of import, equally so silver and that basically the house contained just a great collection of paintings. Thus were the Guide Books written for the enlightenment of the tens of thousands of tourist visitors every year for the next 25 years; understandably so for the valuation was carried out by the leading experts from Christies, London. Therefore it was considered entirely satisfactory for lesser mortals to prepare the 1982 Probate of the Burghley Estate.  The new custodian, Lady Victoria Leatham, 5th daughter of the late Marquis of Exeter had, until her father’s death, worked as head of Sotheby’s Stamford office, so it was quite natural that she should call upon her chums in and outside of the company to help. Among the team from Sothebys was a young and brilliant specialist the late Gordon Lang. It was he who first spotted the erroneous earlier cataloging and in room after room, shelf after shelf, cupboard after cupboard he would proclaim‘17th century’ and ‘16th century’ as he inspected pieces both on view and hidden away, only to be dismissed as fanciful in the face of the established descriptions. Ignoring this, Gordon continued re-ascribing the porcelain, but almost at the point of giving up the unequal struggle, Lady Victoria was sifting through manuscripts in the archive or ‘muniment’ room. Here she came across a parchment covered album, the contents of which caused her to bolt along the underground tunnels to show Gordon.

In the early 1680’s Lord Burghley commissioned Antonio Verrio, the renowned Italian artist, to decorate the ceilings of the great State Rooms at Burghley, his extant work there including his acknowledged masterpiece the Heaven Room. But in preparation for his forthcoming trip on the Grand Tour, in the knowledge that Verrio was a serious rake his Lordship had a complete inventory of everything in the house compiled lest the artist should nick a few little trinkets and flog them in the local hostelry in return for wine.

And here in this parchment volume that Lady Victoria had discovered were precise descriptions of all the porcelain, many of the pieces on the same shelves in the same rooms today as they were in 1688. Gordon Lang was vindicated and heralded. The results were far-reaching; as so many pieces proved to pre-date existing knowledge, museum descriptions worldwide had to be re-written, attributions of paintings had to be re-assessed, catalogues re-printed. To be continued.........