Editing Portland Vase (section)

===1778 to present===
Between 1778 and 1780, [[William Hamilton (diplomat)|Sir William Hamilton]], British ambassador in Naples, bought the vase from [[James Byres]], a Scottish art dealer, who had acquired it after it was sold by [[Cornelia Barberini-Colonna]], Princess of [[Palestrina]]. She had inherited the vase from the Barberini family. Hamilton brought it to England on his next leave, after the death of his first wife, Catherine. In 1784, with the assistance of his niece, Mary, he arranged a private sale of the vase to [[Margaret Cavendish-Harley]], Dowager Duchess of Portland.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.harleygallery.co.uk/event.php?pg_id=3&range=0|title=art gallery and crafts centre in Welbeck, Worksop, Nottinghamshire|publisher=The Harley Gallery|access-date=16 December 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111115114025/http://www.harleygallery.co.uk/event.php?pg_id=3|archive-date=15 November 2011}}</ref> It was sold at auction in 1786 and passed into the possession of the duchess's son, [[William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland]].{{Citation needed|date=January 2021}}

The 3rd duke lent the original vase to [[Josiah Wedgwood]] and then to the British Museum for safe-keeping, by which point it was known as the "Portland Vase". It was deposited there permanently by [[William Bentinck, 4th Duke of Portland|the fourth duke]] in 1810, after a friend of his broke its base. It has remained in the British Museum ever since 1810, apart from 1929 to 1932, when the [[William Cavendish-Bentinck, 6th Duke of Portland|6th duke]] put it up for sale at [[Christie's]] (where it failed to reach its reserve). It was finally purchased by the museum from the [[William Cavendish-Bentinck, 7th Duke of Portland|7th duke]] in 1945 with the aid of a bequest from James Rose Vallentin.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=466190&partId=1|title=The Portland Vase|website=British Museum|language=en-GB|access-date=24 February 2018}}</ref>

====Copies====
[[Image:Portland Vase V&A.jpg|thumb|left|Replica of Portland Vase, about 1790, Josiah Wedgwood and Sons; V&A Museum no. 2418-1901]]
Wedgwood had already had it described to him by the sculptor [[John Flaxman]] as "the finest production of Art that has been brought to England and seems to be the very apex of perfection to which you are endeavoring" and devoted four years of painstaking trials at duplicating the vase – not in glass but in black and white [[jasperware]]. He had problems with his copies ranging from cracking and blistering (clearly visible on the example at the [[Victoria and Albert Museum]]) to the [[Sprigging (pottery)|sprigged]] reliefs 'lifting' during the firing, and in 1786 he feared that he could never apply the Jasper relief thinly enough to match the glass original's subtlety and delicacy. He finally managed to perfect it in 1790, with the issue of the "first-edition" of copies (with some of this edition, including the V&A one, copying the cameo's delicacy by a combination of undercutting and shading the reliefs in grey), and it marks his last major achievement.{{citation needed|date=August 2017}}

Wedgwood put the first edition on private show between April and May 1790, with that exhibition proving so popular that visitor numbers had to be restricted by only printing 1,900 tickets, before going on show in his public London showrooms. (One ticket to the private exhibition, illustrated by Samuel Alkin and printed with "Admission to see Mr Wedgwood's copy of The Portland Vase, Greek Street, Soho, between 12 o'clock and 5", was bound into the Wedgwood catalogue on view in the Victoria and Albert Museum's British Galleries.) As well as the V&A copy (said to have come from the collection of Wedgwood's grandson, the naturalist [[Charles Darwin]]),<ref>{{cite book|editor=Jackson, Anna|title= V&A: A Hundred Highlights|publisher=V&A Publications|year=2001}}</ref> others are held at the [[Fitzwilliam Museum]] (this is the copy sent by Wedgwood to [[Erasmus Darwin]] which his descendants lent to the Museum in 1963 and later sold to them); the Department of Britain, Europe and Prehistory at the [[British Museum]],<ref>{{cite web|url= https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_1802-0312-1 |title=vase, museum number 1802,0312.1; The British Museum |publisher= britishmuseum.org |access-date= 29 December 2024}}</ref> and the [[Indianapolis Museum of Art]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.imamuseum.org/art/collections/artwork/vase-copy-portland-vase-josiah-wedgwood-and-sons-ltd |title=vase (copy of Portland vase) &#124; Indianapolis Museum of Art |publisher= Imamuseum.org |access-date=16 December 2011}}</ref> The Auckland War Memorial Museum has a 19th-century jasperware [https://www.aucklandmuseum.com/collections-research/collections/record/am_humanhistory-object-11491?k=portland%20vase&dept=Applied%20Arts%20and%20Design&ordinal=0 facsimile] in their collections. The soap magnate William Hesketh Lever, who has one of the finest collections of Wedgwood Jasperware in existence today, purchased two of Wedgwood's Portland vases. One of them is on display in the Wedgwood rooms of the [[Lady Lever Art Gallery]] in Port Sunlight

The vase also inspired a 19th-century competition to duplicate its cameo-work in glass, with Benjamin Richardson offering a £1,000 prize to anyone who could achieve that feat. Taking three years, glass maker Philip Pargeter made a copy and John Northwood engraved it, to win the prize. This copy is in the [[Corning Museum of Glass]] in Corning, New York.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.cmog.org/video/replica-portland-vase|title=All About Glass {{!}} Corning Museum of Glass|website=www.cmog.org|date=22 September 2011 |language=en|access-date=24 February 2018}}</ref>

The [[Wedgwood Museum]] collection is now branded the V&A Wedgwood Collection.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.worldofwedgwood.com/content/about-va-wedgwood-collection |title=About The V&A Wedgwood Collection |website=worldofwedgwood.com|language=en|access-date=29 December 2024}}</ref> Displays at Barlaston, near Stoke-on-Trent, are now branded World of Wedgwoo, described on its website as “Home to Stoke-on-Trent's most prestigious brand, Wedgwood”, and include the galleries of the V&A Wedgwood Collection.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.worldofwedgwood.com |title=Welcome to a World of Experiences |website=worldofwedgwood.com|language=en|access-date=29 December 2024}}</ref>

====Vandalism and reconstruction====
[[File:Thomas H. Shepherd - The Portland Vase fragments.jpg|thumb|The Portland Vase fragments – watercolour by [[Thomas H. Shepherd]] (1845)]]

At 3:45&nbsp;p.m. on 7 February 1845, the vase was shattered by William Lloyd,{{sfn|Brooks|2004|pp=16–18}}{{sfn|Painter|Whitehouse|1990|p=62}} who, after drinking all the previous week, threw a nearby sculpture on top of the case, smashing both it and the vase. He was arrested and charged with the crime of willful damage. When his lawyer said that an error in the wording of the act seemed to limit its application to the destruction of objects worth no more than £5, he was convicted instead of the destruction of the glass case in which the vase had sat. He was sentenced to either pay a fine of £3 (approximately £350 equivalent in 2017<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/inflation/inflation-calculator|title=Inflation calculator|website=www.bankofengland.co.uk|language=en|access-date=31 December 2018}}</ref>) or spend two months in prison. He remained in prison until an anonymous benefactor paid the fine by mail.{{sfn|Brooks|2004|pp=16–18}} The name William Lloyd is thought to be a pseudonym. Investigators hired by the British Museum concluded that he was actually William Mulcahy, a student who had gone missing from [[Trinity College Dublin]].<ref>{{cite news |last1=McNally |first1=Frank |title=Portland stoned – An Irishman's Diary about the Dubliner who broke one of the world's most famous vases |url=https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/portland-stoned-an-irishman-s-diary-about-the-dubliner-who-broke-one-of-the-world-s-most-famous-vases-1.3382500 |access-date=6 March 2024 |newspaper=[[The Irish Times]] |date=7 February 2018}}</ref> Detectives reported that the Mulcahy family was impoverished. The owner of the vase declined to bring a civil action against William Mulcahy because he did not want his family to suffer for "an act of folly or madness which they could not control".{{sfn|Brooks|2004|pp=16–18}}

[[File:Portland Vase BM Gem4036 n8.jpg|thumb|Detail]]

The vase was pieced together with fair success in 1845 by British Museum restorer [[John Doubleday (restorer)|John Doubleday]]. At the time, the restoration was termed "masterly"<ref>{{cite news | ref = Morning Post | title = The British Museum | newspaper = The Morning Post | location = London | department = Fine Arts | page = 6 | date = 11 July 1845 | url = https://newspaperarchive.com/anonymous-other-articles-clipping-jul-11-1845-610031}}</ref> and Doubleday was lauded by ''[[The Gentleman's Magazine]]'' for demonstrating "skilful ingenuity" and "cleverness ... sufficient to establish his immortality as the prince of restorers".<ref>{{cite journal | ref = {{harvid|''Gentleman's Magazine''|1846a}} | date = January 1846 | title = The Portland Vase and the Sarcophagus in which it was Found | journal = The Gentleman's Magazine | volume = XXV | pages = 41–44 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Hj1DAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA41 }} {{open access}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | ref = {{harvid|''Athenæum''|1856a}} | date = 2 February 1856 | title = Our Weekly Gossip | journal = The Athenæum | issue = 1475 | pages = 139–140 | url = https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=iau.31858029267303;view=1up;seq=154 }} {{open access}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | ref = {{harvid|''Gentleman's Magazine''|1856}} | date = 1856 | title = Obituary: Mr. John Doubleday | journal = The Gentleman's Magazine | volume = XLV | pages = 431–432 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=gEZFAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA431 }} {{open access}}</ref>

However, Doubleday was unable to replace thirty-seven small fragments of the vase, which had been put into a box and apparently forgotten. On 5 October 1948, the keeper [[Bernard Ashmole]] received them in a box from G. A. Croker of Putney, who did not know what they were. After Doubleday's death, a fellow restorer from the British Museum took them to G. H. Gabb, a box maker, who was asked to make a box with thirty seven compartments, one for each fragment. However, the restorer also died and the box was never collected. After Gabb's death, the executor of his estate, Amy Reeves, brought in Croker to assess Gabb's effects. This was how Crocker came to bring them to the museum to ask for help in identifying them.{{sfn|Painter|Whitehouse|1990|p=82}}

By November 1948, the restoration appeared aged and it was decided to restore the vase again. It was dismantled by conservator J. W. R. Axtell in mid-November 1948. The pieces were examined by D. B. Harden and W. A. Thorpe, who confirmed that the circular glass base removed in 1845 was not original. Axtell then carried out a reconstruction, completed by 2 February 1949, in which he was only successful in replacing three of the 37 loose fragments.{{sfn|Painter|Whitehouse|1990|pp=82–84}} He reportedly used "new adhesives" for this restoration, which some thought might be epoxy resins or shellac, but were later discovered to simply be the same type of animal glue that Doubleday used in 1845. He also filled some areas with wax. No documentation of his work was produced.{{Citation needed|date=January 2021}}

By the late 1980s, the adhesive was again yellowing and brittle. Although the vase was shown at the British Museum as part of the ''Glass of the Caesars'' exhibition (November 1987 – March 1988), it was too fragile to travel to other locations afterwards. Instead, another reconstruction was performed between 1 June 1988 and 1 October 1989 by [[Nigel Williams (conservator)|Nigel Williams]] and Sandra Smith.{{sfn|Painter|Whitehouse|1990|p=84}} The pair was overseen by David Akehurst (CCO of Glass and Ceramics) who had assessed the vase's condition during the ''Glass of the Caesars'' exhibition and decided to go ahead with reconstruction and stabilization. The treatment had scholarly attention and press coverage. The vase was photographed and drawn to record the position of fragments before dismantling; the BBC filmed the conservation process. Conservation scientists at the museum tested many adhesives for long-term stability, choosing an epoxy resin with excellent ageing properties. Reassembly revealed some fragments had been filed down during the restorations, complicating the process. All but a few small splinters were integrated. Gaps were filled with blue or white resin.<ref>{{cite magazine | last = White | first = Roland | title = Original Sinclair | magazine = Punch | location = London | page = 45 | issue = 6766 | date = 23 June 1989 | url = http://tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/57jd88 | access-date = 18 August 2017 }} {{closed access}}</ref>{{sfn|Williams|1989|pp=6–21}}

Little sign of the original damage is visible, and, except for light cleaning, it is hoped that the vase should not require major conservation work for at least another century.{{sfn|Williams|1989|p=29}}