Editing John Vanbrugh (section)

==Early life and background==
Born in London and baptised on 24 January 1664,{{sfn|Seccombe|1911}} Vanbrugh was the fourth child (of 19), and eldest surviving son,<ref>page 16, Sir John Vanbrugh A Biography, Kerry Downes, 1987, Sidgwick and Jackson, {{ISBN|0-283-99497-5}}</ref> of Giles Vanbrugh, a London cloth-merchant of Flemish descent<ref>{{cite book |last1=Downes |first1=Kerry |title=Oxford Art Online |chapter=Vanbrugh, Sir John |year=2003 |chapter-url=https://www.oxfordartonline.com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7000087787 |publisher=Oxford Art Online |doi=10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.T087787 |isbn=978-1-884446-05-4 |access-date=8 November 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Stevens |first1=James |last2=Wilson |first2=Susan |author-link1=James Stevens Curl|title=The Oxford Dictionary of Architecture |date=2015 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780199674985 |page=797 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4Lu6BwAAQBAJ |access-date=8 November 2021}}</ref> (as evident in the name, contracted from "Van Brugh") and Protestant background,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne |title=Proceedings |date=1923 |publisher=Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne |page=124 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oHA_AQAAMAAJ |access-date=8 November 2021}}</ref> and his wife Elizabeth,<ref name="Beard-12">Beard, p. 12.</ref> widow of Thomas Barker (by whom Vanbrugh's mother had the first of her twenty children, Vanbrugh's elder half-sister, Elizabeth), and daughter of [[Dudley Carleton (diplomat)|Sir Dudley Carleton]], of [[Thames Ditton#Pre-1800|Imber Court]], [[Thames Ditton]], Surrey. He grew up in [[Chester]], where his family had been driven by either the major outbreak of the [[Great Plague of London|plague in London]] in 1665, or the [[Great Fire of London|Great Fire]] of 1666.<ref name="Beard-12" />{{efn|Vanbrugh's family background and youth have been relayed down the centuries as hearsay and anecdote. [[Kerry Downes]] has shown in his well-researched modern biography (1987) that even the ''[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]'' and the ''[[Dictionary of National Biography]]'' repeat 18th- and 19th-century traditions which were originally offered as guesses but have since hardened into "fact". This accounts for several discrepancies between the entries in these encyclopædias and the following narrative, which is based on the findings of Downes (1987) and McCormick (1991).}} It is possible that he attended [[The King's School, Chester|The King's School]] in Chester, though no records of his being a scholar there survive. Another candidate would have been the school at [[Ashby-de-la-Zouch]], founded by [[Henry Hastings, 3rd Earl of Huntingdon]]. It was also not uncommon for boys to be sent to study at school away from home, or with a tutor.{{sfn|Seccombe|1911}}<ref name="Downes">Downes</ref>
{{John Vanbrugh timeline}}

Architectural historian [[Kerry Downes]] is sceptical of earlier historians' claims of a lower [[middle class|middle-class]] background, and writes that a 19th-century suggestion that Giles Vanbrugh was a sugar-baker has been misunderstood. "[[Sugar-baker]]" implies wealth, as the term refers not to a [[confectionery|maker of sweets]] but to the owner of a sugar house, a factory for the refining of raw sugar from [[Barbados]].<ref name="Beard-12" /> Sugar refining would normally have been combined with sugar trading, which was a lucrative business. Downes' example of one sugar baker's house in [[Liverpool]], estimated to bring in [[Pound sterling|£]]40,000 a year in trade from Barbados, throws a new light on Vanbrugh's social background, one rather different from the picture of a backstreet Chester sweetshop as painted by [[James Henry Leigh Hunt|Leigh Hunt]] in 1840 and reflected in many later accounts.<ref>Downes, pp. 32–33.</ref>

To dispel the myth of Vanbrugh's humble origins, Downes took pains to explore Vanbrugh's background, closely examining the family and connexions of each of his four grandparents: Vanbrugh, Jacobs or Jacobson, Carleton, and Croft, summing up the characteristics of each line and concluding that, far from being of lower middle class origins, Vanbrugh was descended from Anglo-Flemish or Netherlandish Protestant merchants who settled in London in the 16th and 17th centuries, minor courtiers, and country gentry. The complex web of kinship Downes' research shows that Vanbrugh had ties to many of England's leading mercantile, gentry, and noble families. These ties reveal the decidedly Protestant and sometimes radical milieu out of which Vanbrugh's own political opinions came. They also gave him a very wide social network that would play a role in all sections of his career: architectural, ceremonial, dramatic, military, political, and social.{{citation needed|date=December 2022}}

Taken in this context, though he has sometimes been viewed as an odd or unqualified appointee to the College of Arms, it is not surprising, given the social expectations of his day, that by descent his credentials for his offices there were sound. His forebears, both Flemish/Dutch and English, were [[heraldry|armigerous]], and their coats of arms can be traced in three out of four cases, revealing that Vanbrugh was of gentle descent (Jacobson, of Antwerp and London [the family of his paternal grandmother Maria daughter of Peter brother to Philip Jacobson, jeweller and financier to successive English kings, [[James I of England|James I]], and [[Charles I of England|Charles I]], and monied backer of the [[Virginia Company|Second Virginia Company]] and the [[East India Company]]]; [[Dudley Carleton, 1st Viscount Dorchester|Carleton of Imber Court]]; [[Croft Castle|Croft of Croft Castle]]).{{citation needed|date=December 2022}}

After growing up in a large household in Chester (12 children of his mother's second marriage survived infancy), the question of how Vanbrugh spent the years from age 18 to 22 (after he left school) was long unanswered, with the baseless suggestion sometimes made that he had been studying architecture in France (stated as fact in the ''Dictionary of National Biography'').
In 1681 records name a 'John Vanbrugg' working for William Matthews, Giles Vanbrugh's cousin. It was not unusual for a merchant's son to follow in his father's trade and seek similar work in business, making use of family ties and connections.<ref>{{cite book|last=Colvin|first=Howard|title=A biographical dictionary of British architects 1600–1840|year=2007|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven, Conn.|isbn=978-0-300-12508-5|edition=4th }}</ref> However, Robert Williams proved in an article in the ''[[Times Literary Supplement]]'' ("Vanbrugh's Lost Years", 3 September 1999) that Vanbrugh was in India for part of this period, working for the East India Company at their trading post in [[Surat]], Gujarat where his uncle, Edward Pearce, had been Governor.<ref>The English Factories in India, 1655–1660, William Foster, 1921</ref> However, Vanbrugh never mentioned this experience in writing. Scholars debate whether evidence of his exposure to Indian architecture can be detected in any of his architectural designs.

The picture of a well-connected youth is reinforced by the fact that Vanbrugh in January 1686 took up an officer's commission in his distant relative the [[Theophilus Hastings, 7th Earl of Huntingdon|Earl of Huntingdon's]] foot regiment.<ref name="Beard-12" /><ref>Summerson, J. ''Architecture in Britain 1530–1830'' (Yale 1993) p. 252.</ref> Since commissions were in the gift of the commanding officer, Vanbrugh's entry as an officer shows that he did have the kind of family network that was then essential to a young man starting out in life. Even so in August 1686 he left this position when the regiment was ordered to help garrison [[Guernsey]].<ref name="Beard-12" />

In spite of the distant noble relatives and the lucrative [[sugar trade]], Vanbrugh never seemed to possess any capital for business ventures (such as the [[Haymarket Theatre]]), but always had to rely on loans and backers. The fact that Giles Vanbrugh had twelve children to support and set up in life may go some way towards explaining the debts that were to plague John all his life.

===Connections===

Some of Vanbrugh's kinsmen – as he addressed them in his letters:
* [[Richard Butler, 1st Earl of Arran|The Earl of Arran]] (1639–1686). His wife (from 1673) was Vanbrugh's first cousin, Dorothy née Ferrers.
* [[Thomas Howard, 3rd Earl of Berkshire|The 3rd Earl of Berkshire (1619–1706)]]. Frances née Harrison, Countess of Berkshire. Vanbrugh's grandfather's sister, Elizabeth Carleton married John Harrison, uncle of the Countess of Berkshire and in addition the Countess's aunt, Anne Garrard, married Dudley Carleton, Viscount Dorchester, uncle to Vanbrugh's same grandfather. Frances was (half) second cousin to Vanbrugh's mother.<ref>[[Elias Ashmole]] ''The Visitation of Berkshire 1665–66'' Harrison of Hurst, Harrison of Beech Hill.</ref>
* [[Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle|The 3rd Earl of Carlisle]] (1669–1738) of [[Castle Howard]]. Carlisle's grandmother, Lady Anne Howard, Countess of Carlisle, was first cousin to the 3rd Earl of Berkshire.
* [[William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Devonshire|The Duke of Devonshire]] (1640–1707). His Duchess was the Earl of Arran's sister.
* [[Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl of Chesterfield|The 2nd Earl of Chesterfield]] (1634–1714). His Countess was the Earl of Arran's sister. His uncle [[Ferdinando Stanhope]] married Lettice Ferrers, aunt of the Countess of Arran.
* [[Theophilus Hastings, 7th Earl of Huntingdon|The 7th Earl of Huntingdon]] (1650–1701). Vanbrugh's mother was his (half) third cousin.

Vanbrugh's younger brothers, Charles MP and [[Philip VanBrugh|Philip]], Governor of [[Newfoundland Colony]], were naval commanders.

Vanbrugh's own first and second cousins included Sir Humphrey Ferrers (1652–1678), [[Sir Herbert Croft, 1st Baronet|Sir Herbert Croft Bt (1652–1720)]], [[Roger Cave|Sir Roger Cave Bt (1655–1703)]] and Cave's sister, wife of [[Sir Orlando Bridgeman, 1st Baronet, of Ridley|Sir Orlando Bridgeman Bt (1650–1701)]].