Drawings and papers relating to the Batalha Monastery
Reference code
MSS/0260
Title
Drawings and papers relating to the Batalha Monastery
Date
1789
Level of description
series
Extent and format
Paper; ff. xiii + 79.
Folio.
Half leather binding, brown, with marbled boards.
Folio.
Half leather binding, brown, with marbled boards.
Scope and content
Original drawings (Fols. 2-79) of the Dominican monastery at Batalha, Portugal, by James Cavanah Murphy, architect, made for the Hon. William Burton Conyngham. Mostly pen, a few pen and wash. The drawings include general views, plans, sections, elevations, tombs in the royal chapel, and sketches of details. With copies of three reports by Murphy to Conyngham (fols. vii-xii), March-Aug. 1789, describing his work and travels in Portugal. Note, French, of the establishment and revenues of the monastery, fol. 1 (published in Plans (see below), 58-60). Drawing of a transverse section of the nave of Batalha, with a male figure inscribed in a circle (Vitruvian man; Plans, after pl. 4), fol. xiii. James Murphy published his drawings, together with an account of Batalha (mainly translated from Father Luis de Sousa Coutinho, who is mentioned in the first of Murphy's reports to Conyngham) in Plans Elevations Sections and Views of the Church of Batalha (1795), with a dedication to Conyngham dated London, 3 May 1792.
A typescript catalogue of the drawings, prepared by M McCarthy FSA in 2009, is available.
A typescript catalogue of the drawings, prepared by M McCarthy FSA in 2009, is available.
Creator
Murphy, James Cavanah (1760-1814), architect and antiquary
Previous reference number(s)
SAL/MS/260
MS 260
MS 260