made up of horizontally aligned planks and measuring 129 3 180 cm,
was commissioned by Elizabeth I and presented to her ambassador to
France ( Jackson-Stops 1985:82–83).
The arrival first of Daniel Mytens, and then of Rubens and Van
Dyck at the invitation of Charles I, precipitated a renewed interest in
painting and collecting. With the purchase of most of the collection of
the dukes of Mantua between 1625 and 1628, Charles amassed the most
spectacular collection in Europe, reflecting his passion for Titian and Van
Dyck (Millar 1977:42–49). Painters came to England to satisfy the demand
for commissions, predominantly portraits. Peter Lely settled in England
around 1643 and found little competition to prevent his establishing a
large and flourishing portrait studio. Talley has described the large num-
ber ofpainting treatises published in the seventeenth century, some of
which contain advice on the conservation of paintings (Talley 1981:14–18).
While this development undoubtedly reflects an increased interest in
painting, it also occurs at a time when many old masters on canvas would
be reaching the age when they would require lining for the first time
(Percival-Prescott 1974). Many of De Mayerne’s experiments in conserva-
tion in the first half of the seventeenth century were directed toward
obtaining a more stable priming that resisted flaking, treating flaking with
glue impregnation, strengthening unlined canvases with glue, and sealing
the backs against dampness. The purpose of the passages on conservation
in Robert Salmon’s Polygraphice,published in 1695, is not clear. It is pos-
sible the instructions were enough to interest the public without providing
practical instruction. The passage on panel paintings reads, “If your paint-
ing be wainscotting, or any other Joynery or Carpentary Work, you may
take the Wood-ashes... and mixing them somewhat thick with Water,
rub them over the Painting with a stiffBristle Brush, as a Shoo Brush, and
so scour, wash and dry it, as aforesaid, and then varnish it with common
Varnish.” A more gentle though abrasive treatment is suggested using
water and smalt, in cases in which “the Painting be more curious, as
Figures of Men, Beasts, Landscips, Flowers, Fruits etc.” (Salmon 1695:
addenda to chap. 3, secs. 4, 5).
Eighty years later Robert Dossie in his Handmaid to the Arts,pub-
lished in 1764, has as the only section on panel treatment a set of instruc-
tions for the transfer of a panel to canvas, with a warning to practice “with
some old pictures of little value” (Dossie 1764: addenda, 422–23). In his
preface Dossie dismissed Salmon’s Polygraphice,as the relevant parts are
“confounded with such a heap of absurd stuffand falsities,” but it is hard
to imagine “the lover of the polite arts” finding Dossie’s advice of any
practical use either.
After the seventeenth century, panel supports (apart from those
used for sketches) do not appear to have been used again extensively until
the nineteenth century, with the manufacture of mahogany panels by
artists’ suppliers.^3 These panels are often extremely stable, having been
primed on both sides. A panel of a triptych (otherwise on canvas) prepared
in this manner, commissioned by Queen Victoria from her limner, Sir
Joseph Noel Paton, survived years of neglect in a damp church without
warping, although the paint and ground layer developed a marked craque-
lure (Fig. 3). Large panels, less well prepared, were also used in the nine-
teenth century by, for example, Sir William Allan (1782–1850), as an
archaizing element in romanticized scenes from Scottish history.HeroismH S C P P G B 239Figure 3
Joseph Noel Paton, The Good Shepherd
(right wing of a triptych), 1877. Oil on
panel,106.7 3 55.5 cm. Royal Collection,
Sandringham.