Revett, Nicholas

Revett, Nicholas (1720–1804). English architect and painter, and a leading figure in the dissemination of knowledge of Ancient Greek architecture. With James Stuart he measured all the principal monuments of Athens (1751–3), and was responsible for the architectural parts of the drawings from which the plates of The Antiquities of Athens, Measured and Delineated by James Stuart, F.R.S. and F.S.A., and Nicholas Revett, Painters and Architects were made (the first volume appeared in 1762). This was one of the key publications leading to the Greek Revival. Stuart bought out Revett's interest even before the first volume appeared, but Revett went on to measure antiquities in Asia Minor (1764–6) under the aegis of The Society of Dilettanti, and under his editorship The Antiquities of Ionia appeared (1769–97).

Revett was sufficiently well-off not to have to earn his living, but he turned his hand to architecture on occasion. Among his works are the Ionic portico (based on the Temple of Bacchus at Teos) of West Wycombe Park, Bucks. (1771), and Ayot St Lawrence Church, Herts. (1778–9), with a Doric Order based on the Temple of Apollo at Delos. He seems also to have designed a portico in the garden at Brandeston, Suffolk, which, if Greek in style, must have been one of the earliest examples of the Greek Revival anywhere (1757).

Bibliography

Colvin (1995);
Crook (1972a);
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004);
S&R (1762–1816);
Wiebenson (1969)