grand tour

grand tour. A standard part of the education of the English aristocracy between the Restoration and the outbreak of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars in 1789, though since it could take two or three years, it was extremely expensive and only a few could afford it. It therefore tended to be limited to elder sons. It had several objectives—to broaden the mind, to introduce the tourist to classical civilization, to encourage social grace, to improve the command of languages, to establish useful personal and diplomatic links, and to enable wild oats to be sown at a discreet distance. It was usually undertaken between the ages of 17 and 22, under the supervision as ‘bear-leader’ of a prudent clergyman, if one could be found. The tourist was frequently required to write long letters home reporting progress, and often resorted to copying from guide books to eke out inspiration: a stream of advice, exhortation, and often reproach flowed in the opposite direction. The basic tour was to Paris and on to Rome, though many variations were possible, and Holland, Germany, and the Habsburg dominions were often included. Greece and Spain were much less popular and only a few intrepid souls penetrated to Stockholm, St Petersburg, and the Ottoman empire. Many commentators, such as Smollett, Johnson, and Gibbon, disapproved, arguing that the tour encouraged habits of dissipation and that the noblemen were too young to have much appreciation of what they saw. Others were concerned that tourists might come to admire Roman catholicism, but Anglican clergy were at hand to point out superstition, and bugs and brigandage were sufficiently common to impress most travellers with the delights of home. The English ‘milord’, tutor in tow, was a well-known sight on the continent and was not popular, save among innkeepers, since he was often arrogant and complaining. ‘I find everything here so extremely inferior’, wrote J. C. Villiers from France in 1778, ‘that I glow with pride and rapture when I think that I am an Englishman.’ Some tourists came to grief. George Damer's sexual proclivities got him into a scrape in Rome in which a coachman was killed and money had to be distributed to get him off: Viscount Morpeth caught venereal disease and died at the age of 22. The advent of railways in the early 19th cent. meant that the journeys could be made in a few weeks and the tour did not survive in its traditional form.

J. A. Cannon