Tynemouth Castle, Northumberland

In November 1726 Samuel Buck announced a plan to systematically record ruins throughout England. Distressed that castles, religious foundations, and other antique remains were crumbling away, he proposed to "rescue the mangled remains of these aged & venerable edifices from the inexorable jaws of time." Working with his brother Nathaniel, the artist would eventually produce over four hundred prints recording ruins. The present precisely drawn sheet relates to a print published in "Buck's Antiquities; Or Venerable Remains of Above Four Hundred Castles, Monasteries, Palaces, &c. &c. in England and Wales: With Near One Hundred Views of Cities and Chief Towns" (1726–42). Drawn on the spot, the image offers evidence for the emergence of an antiquarian sensibility in Britain, part of an historical impulse to accurately research and record the past rather than a romantic response to decay.