|
||
|
|
|
|
Beautiful little engraving of Whitehall, from the River Thames, by perhaps the greatest visual recorder of 17th-century London, the Czech engraver Wenceslaus Hollar.
Hind (85), comments:
A drawing with a much more distant view of Whitehall in the same aspect, showing considerably more of the buildings on either side and the bend in the river, is in the British Museum.
Whitehall was used as the chief palace of the kings of England from the time of Henry VIII to William III. The palace belonged to Cardinal Wolsey when Archbishop of York, and its name was changed from York House (or York Palace) to Whitehall when handed over to the king by charter on Wolsey's disgrace. Both James I and Charles I intended to rebuild the whole palace, and designs were drawn up by Inigo Jones, but nothing was completed beyond the Banqueting House (1619-1622), the only part of the Palace now remaining. The palace suffered in several fires, and was almost completely destroyed by fire in 1698, when the palace was finally abandoned a site for a royal palace.
![[London / Tower of London ] La tour de Londres](https://storage.googleapis.com/raremaps/img/small/101674.jpg)
