(1654 - 1737), historian and diplomat, s. of Rev. Alexander Cunningham, minister of Ettrick, Selkirk; Leiden U.; res. Venice 1715 - 19.
[1697 Padua (Jan./Feb.; Brown 1007)
1698 Padua (Oct.; Brown 1061)
1700 Rome]
1701 - 2 Rome (Dec. 1701 - Apr. 1702 - ), Padua (19 Jul.)
1710 - 12 [The Hague, Jun.] Padua (25 Nov. 1710), Verona, Venice (27 Nov. 1710 - 21 Mar. 1711), Rome (Apr.), Naples (Apr. - May), Rome (Jun. - Sep.), Florence, Milan (6 Oct.), Genoa (by 13 Nov.), Turin (Dec. 1711), Venice (by 13 - by 18 Mar. 1712) [England by Jul.]
1715 - 19 Padua (3 Dec. 1715), Venice (4 Dec. 1715 - 5 Nov. 1719) [London by Jan./Feb. 1720]
In the 1690s Alexander Cunningham had travelled with John, Marquess of Kintyre and Lorne, and other charges. He was in Rome in 1700 before being sent to Paris as a military observer for William III (DNB).
He returned to Italy in 1701 with Nicholas Leake and William Moncrief. In Rome Robert Sharpe observed that he would 'prove that atheists arguments conclude against themselves';1 he was still in Rome in April 1702.2 By July he was back in Padua (for his third visit) with Leake and Moncrief.3
In 1710 he accompanied Viscount Lonsdale ('One of the hopefullest young gentlemen I have ever known') around Europe for two years.4 They passed through Holland and Berlin, and entered Italy after spending fourteen days quarantine in the lazzaretto near Verona because of the plague then prevalent in Germany.5 From Padua6 they went to Venice (via Verona),5 leaving after the Carnival on 21 March for Rome. From Rome they intended visiting Naples in April and May. Back in Rome between June and August Lord Lonsdale was frequently with John Bellings.7 In September 1711 they turned north, visiting Florence and Milan (being 'the only men of the British nation at that time in those parts'). Charles Baldwyn noticed Lonsdale in Genoa on 13 November,8 and they were proposing to stay in Turin 'till Christmas'.9 Cunningham and Lonsdale had returned by 13 March 1712 to Venice, where they met Cunningham's former charge Lord Lorne, now Duke of Argyll; they had left Venice by 18 March.(10) By 30 April they were in The Hague, intending to be in England in June.(11)
In 1715 Cunningham was appointed 'Resident for King George to the most Sereen Republique of Venice'.(12) He arrived in Venice via Padua13 on 4 December. He was to contest his recall in June 1719, but he eventually left Venice on 5 November, overlapping for a few weeks with his successor Elizeus Burges.14
1. Sharpe jnl.MSS (21 Dec. 1701). 2. AVR SA, S.Lorenzo in Lucina 1702. Shrewsbury Jnl. (20 Apr. 1702). 3. Brown 1186. 4. See H. Owen, Lowther Family, 221 - 2. 5. SP 99/58, f.282 (Cole, 28 Nov. 1710). 6. Brown 1373 - 4. 7. Waters jnl.MSS. 8. Baldwyn Letters, 368. 9. HMC Portland, 5:99. 10. SP 99/59, f.363. HMC Portland, 5:146. 11. HMC Portland, 5:169. 12. Horn, 1:84. 13. Brown 1488. 14. See SP 99/61, 99/62.