Temple of Sun
Elizabeth Ratcliffe (Chester c.1735 - Liverpool c.1810)
Category
Models
Date
1773
Materials
Giltwood, mother-of-pearl, stone and glass
Measurements
1620 mm (H); 890 mm (W); 610 mm (D)
Place of origin
England
Order this imageCollection
Erddig, Wrexham
NT 1147092.1
Caption
In the State Bedroom at Erddig a delicate bunch of roses, pinks, carnations and violas has drawn admiration for almost 250 years, in spite of the caterpillar crawling up one of the stems. It is just one of many remarkable creations by Elizabeth (Betty) Ratcliffe, lady’s maid. Ratcliffe occupied an unusual and privileged position, as her employers encouraged (and benefited from) her creativity. Her work was cherished and valued by the Yorke family – specially commissioned stands display and protect her wonderful models of a pagoda and the Ruins of the Temple of the Sun at Palmyra. Ratcliffe had access to high-quality materials and, perhaps most importantly, the time granted to her to create work. When requested to draw a copy of a print for the writer and antiquarian Thomas Pennant, she was able to ask Philip Yorke, head of her household, for a necessary ‘sheet of the finest grain’d white Vellum’. A letter suggests the commission was negotiated through Yorke’s wife, Dorothy, after Pennant had ‘beg’d of Mamma’ to let Ratcliffe undertake the work. This blurring of social and hierarchical boundaries was not without tension. In a letter of 1768, the year after Ratcliffe completed her pagoda, Dorothy wrote to Philip, her son, expressing her concern that Ratcliffe ‘is at work for you: but pray my dear do not employ her in that way again for one year at least as all her improvements sink in drawing & then I shall have no service from her’. The model of the temple, glittering with mother-of-pearl, is particularly ambitious. It was inspired by Robert Wood’s 1753 publication of engravings of the Roman ruins in Syria, although it is far from a slavish recreation. Ratcliffe has taken key recognisable architectural elements and placed them in a wild, silvery landscape, with vegetation trailing across the doorway and pillars. It is possibly the work Ratcliffe mentions in her 1770 letter to Philip Yorke, ‘I yesterday received the honour of your letter and will do the utmost of my power and endeavour to execute, what you are pleas’d to request instead of Comand, as I shall ever think it my Duty, to a Family, I am so particularly oblig’d to.’ Given her imagination and skill, what would Ratcliffe have created had she been able to do so purely on her own terms?
Summary
Model; Temple of Sun - An 18th century model of the ruins of the Temple of Sun at Palmyra, in mother-of-pearl, by Elizabeth Ratcliffe; contained in a contemporary carved, gilt and glazed case on a carved and gilt stand in the full neo-classical tradition. The fluted frieze is punctuated by stiff acanthus leaves and an oval patera; the square tapering legs truncated at the tops, with acanthus 'capitals', applied with carved paterae, ribbons and husk garlands. The stand perhaps by Thomas Fentham. Fragment of label on the underside 'Ruins of the Temple of the Sun at Palymra E.R. 1773'.
Provenance
Probably based on plate in Robert Wood's 'The Ruins'. Given by Phillip Yorke III (1905-1978) along with the estate, house and contents to the National Trust in 1973.
Marks and inscriptions
On the underside.: Ruins of the Temple of the Sun at Palymra E.R. 1773
Makers and roles
Elizabeth Ratcliffe (Chester c.1735 - Liverpool c.1810), maker
References
Conroy, Rachel, Women Artists and Designers at the National Trust, 2025, pp. 74-77