(1740 - 1804), antiquary and bibliophile, e. s. of 2nd D. of Roxburghe [S]; sty. M. of Bowmont - 1755, when suc. fa. as 3rd D.; educ. Eton; Dilettanti 1765; KT 1768; FSA 1797; KG 1801; unm.
1760 - 2 Venice (by 4 Nov. 1760), Turin, Florence (by 1 Aug. - Nov. 1761), Rome ( - by 21 Nov.), Naples (by 1 Dec. 1761), Rome (by 13 Feb. 1762 - May), Venice (5 May - 16 Jun.)
On 4 November 1760 the young Duke of Roxburghe was among the 'concourse of people of fashion' in Venice.1 On 12 August 1761 Dutens in Turin was sending Roxburghe his compliments, assuming he had by then reached Florence.2 Roxburghe had delivered the third and fourth volumes of Tristram Shandy to Horace Mann in Florence by 1 August 1761.3 There his cherubic face appealed to Patch who painted him three times: a full-length caricature (NPG), with Tabitha Mendes (priv. coll.), and in The Punch Party of 1761 (Chatsworth), in which there also appears on the wall a caricature of Roxburghe (shown as a monkey) proposing to Miss Mendes; it was alleged that he had intended proposing to her, but was dissuaded by her ugliness.4 He had left Florence for Rome and Naples by 21 November,5 bearing an introduction from Mann for himself and 'his friend Mr Smith a Scotch gentleman' (dated 8 November).6
On 1 December he delivered a letter from Mann to Sir James Gray in Naples.7 He was back in Rome by 13 February 1762, when Cardinal Albani acknowledged Mann's letter of introduction.6 In March he visited the Vatican Library with the 3rd Duke of Grafton, Lord Tavistock and Richard Lyttelton, testing John Needham's theory concerning the origin of Egyptian characters.8 They all signed an attestation on Needham's behalf on 25 March 1762 which was forwarded to the Society of Antiquaries (this letter was also signed by 'R. Smith').9 'Sig.Duca Roxborroe' and 'Monsieur Smitt Magr. Domo' were staying near the Piazza di Spagna at Easter 1762; the Duke was noticed in Rome on 31 March,10 and was said to be staying until May.8 It was probably at this time that Winckelmann acted as his cicerone and described him as more stupid than a young girl11 (an extraordinary judgment on a man whose library and antiquarian interests were to be commemorated by the founding of The Roxburghe Club in 1812). In Rome Roxburghe also sat to Batoni (Floors Castle; Clark/Bowron 239); although the portrait is dated 1761 it must have been painted principally in 1762 according to his itinerary. On 5 May Roxburghe and Smith were in Venice,12 and on 16 June Roxburghe and 'Haeber Smith' left Venice.(13)
1. Robinson letters MSS, vr12330 (4 Nov. 1760). 2. SP 105/313, f.573. 3. Wal.Corr., 21:520 - 1. 4. See Patch 1940, 34. 5. Wal.Corr., 21:550. 6. SP 105/313, f.672. 7. SP 105/313,
f.691 (Gray, 1 Dec. 1761). 8. Lyttelton letters MSS (20 Mar. 1762). 9. S. Rowland Pierce, Antiquaries Jnl., 45[1965]: 213 - 14. 10. AVR sa, S.Lorenzo in Lucina. Hinchliffe letters MSS (31 Mar. 1762). 11. Winckelmann 1898, 3:35. 12. Hinchliffe letters MSS (5 May 1762). 13. ASV is 758.