gazebo (antedating 1749)

Joel S. Berson Berson at ATT.NET
Thu Jan 20 15:37:12 UTC 2011


At 1/20/2011 10:15 AM, Garson O'Toole wrote:
>Wikipedia has an entry for "gazebo" that claims there is a 1750 work
>by William Halfpenny that uses the word gazebo. Here is an excerpt
>from Wikipedia:
>
>The word gazebo was used by British architects John and William
>Halfpenny in their book Rural Architecture in the Chinese Taste
>(1750). Plate 55 of the book "Elevation of a Chinese Gazebo" shows "a
>Chinese Tower or Gazebo, situated on a Rock, and raised to a
>considerable Height, and a Gallery round it to render the Prospect
>more complete".
>
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gazebo
>
>Google Books has a Third edition of "Rural architecture in the Chinese
>taste" with a date of 1755:

ESTC lists a 2nd edition of this dated [1752], with the following:
General note   Part 1 by William Halfpenny, parts II-IV the joint
work of William and John Halfpenny.
         Each part with separate titlepage, (part I dated Dec.1.
1750, part II Feb.1. 1751, part III May 1st, 1751, part IV January, 1752).

Which part of the garden the gazebo is in I do not know.  Plate 55
sounds late for Part 1.  Perhaps Wikipedia incorrectly took its date
from the Part 1 title page.

Joel

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