Hutton Collection

Edward Hutton, a prolific writer on Italy, was one of the founders of the British Institute of Florence. Hutton was known for his writing on Italian subjects and as the author of travel-books covering nearly the whole of the peninsula as well as Sicily. The collection, given by his son, contains manuscript copies of Hutton's published work and over 350 letters, including some from his friend and fellow Italophile, Norman Douglas.

 

Edward Hutton Collection

Reference code: HUT

Date(s) of creation: 1890s to 1960s

Name of creator: Edward Hutton

Extent: 26 boxes

 

Administrative information

Acquisition number: A7

 

Source of acquisition

Edward Hutton's son, Peter Hutton, gave the collection to the Library of the British Institute. The bulk of the material was given in 1977 and was followed by a smaller proportion of material in the 1980s and in 1996. Edward Hutton had kept the collection until his death in 1969.

 

Biography: 

Edward Hutton is known for his writing on Italian subjects and as the author of travel books covering nearly the whole of the peninsula as well as Sicily. He also wrote about Greece and Spain, and produced three of the volumes in the Highways and Byways series (Somerset, Gloucesteshire and Wiltshire). In 1917 the Italian government made him a Cavaliere dell'Ordine della Corona d'Italia in recognition of his wartime services to Anglo-Italian co-operation and in 1959 a Commendatore dell'Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana. In 1924 the British Academy gave him its gold medal for his work in the field of Italian studies.

Born in 1875, Edward Hutton first went to Italy when he was twenty-one. In the spring of 1901 Hutton and his wife rented the Casa di Boccaccio at Ponte a Mensola, east of Florence, not far from I Tatti into which the Berensons had moved at around the same time, and from Janet Ross at Poggio Gherardo. Here Hutton began to write the travel books that were to become famous, e.g. The Cities of Umbria (London, 1905), Florence and Northern Tuscany (London, 1907), Siena and Southern Tuscany (London, 1910), Venice and Venetia (London, 1911) Rome (London, 1912), Naples and Southern Italy (London, 1915). At least one of his research journeys to Greece was done in the company of Norman Douglas (1868-1952, writer).

At the same time Hutton edited new editions of James Dennistoun's Dukes of Urbino (London and New York, 1909), and Crowe and Cavalcaselle's History of Painting in Italy (London, 1909). He wrote a book on Sigismondo Malatesta (London, 1906), and an outstanding critical biography of Boccaccio (London, 1910) that continues to be recommended today. Janet Ross inspired his writing of Country Walks about Florence (1908), and with her he edited Poesie Volgari di Lorenzo de' Medici (1912).

During the First World War, Hutton was sent to Italy on a special mission by the then permanent under-secretary for Foreign Affairs, Sir Eyre Crowe (1864-1925). He was kept there for nearly two years, at the end of which time he was lent to the Italian authorities to work for the Italian Foreign Action Bureau under Filippo de Filippi in England. In 1918 Hutton founded the Anglo-Italian Review. Two articles written by Hutton in the Review prompted Arthur Serena (d. 1922, a shipbroker and son of the Venetain patriot Leone Serena) to come to him for advice on how he might further the cause of Italian studies in Britain. Hutton suggested that Serena should found Italian professorships at Oxford and Cambridge and made the necessary proposals to their vice-chancellors. Serena provided half the cost of the new chairs and the Universities found the rest.

In 1917 Edward Hutton was one of the founders of the British Institute in Florence. In 1928 he converted to Catholicism and dedicated much of his time to Catholic issues. In 1943 Hutton was called on by the Political Department of the Foreign Office to write detailed descriptions of the various Italian provinces, nineteen volumes in all, and to each of these he appended, on his own initiative, a list of works of art which should be protected. These lists were later officially recognised by Eisenhower.
Hutton owned no fewer than eleven examples of the work of Simone Martini at one time or another. As an admirer of Cosmati work, Hutton designed and had laid Cosmatesque pavements in Westminster Cathedral and in Buckfast Abbey. He demonstrated his authority on the subject in The Cosmati (London, 1951).

Edward Hutton died in 1969, in the same year that he was made a Patron of the British Institute of Florence. 

 

Scope and content

The collection consists of letters (over 500), hand-written and typed manuscripts (over 60), cuttings, working notebooks and published work. Edward Hutton's son, Peter, packed up the collection after his father's death. The majority of the letters were in alphabetical order by author. Peter Hutton had also selected and put together letters that concern Norman Douglas. The manuscripts were packed individually in newspaper, card and string. The cuttings are either in volumes kept by Hutton, or loose in files given by Peter Hutton.
Edward Hutton had a wide correspondence but the surviving letters often amount to only one or two by a particular writer. Their interest may lie more as groups of letters surrounding a particular issue, e.g. the founding of the Anglo-Italian Review, Catholic controversies in England, or the response to unfavourable comments in the press about Norman Douglas after his death. Correspondents include: Harold Acton (1904-1994, author), James Barrie (1860-1937, author), Max Beerbohm, (1872-1956, author), Arnold Bennett (1867-1931, author), Bernard Berenson (1865-1959, art historian), Robert Bridges (1844-1930, poet), Kenneth Clark (1903-1983, author, Director of the National Gallery, London), Sir Sidney Cockerell (1867-1962, publisher and typographer), Edward Gordon Craig (1872-1966, stage designer), M.C. D'Arcy (1888-1976, Jesuit priest and author), Norman Douglas (1868-1952, author), J.L. Garvin (1868-1947, editor of The Observer from 1908-1914), Eric Gill (1882-1940, artist), Graham Greene (author, 1904-1991), Maurice Henry Hewlett (1861-1923, author), W.H. Hudson (1841-1922, author), Christopher Isherwood, (1904-1986, author), John Lane (1854-1925, publisher), David Lloyd George (1863-1945, politician and Prime Minister 1916-1922), Harold Macmillan (1894-1986, publisher, politician and Prime Minister 1957-1963), F.T. Marinetti (1876-1944, Futurist), C.C. Martindale (1879-1963, Jesuit priest), Alice Meynell (1847-1922, poet and critic) and Wilfred Meynell (1852-1948, author and journalist), Raymond Mortimer (1895-1978, critic), Aldo Palazzeschi (1885-1974, poet), Pino Orioli (1884-1942, bookseller), Janet Ross (1842-1927, author), Giles Gilbert Scott (1880-1960, architect), Montague Summers (1880-1948, author on restoration drama and witchcraft, 33 letters between 1928 and 1948), Arthur Symons (1865-1945, poet), Edward Thomas (1878-1917, poet), G.M. Trevelyan (1876-1962, historian), Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966, author), Rebecca West (1892-1983, author), Sir Mortimer Wheeler (1890-1976, archaeologist).
The manuscripts are those of Hutton's published works and articles. They include the beginnings of an Autobiography. The scrapbooks surround particular issues. In combination with the published works held by the Harold Acton Library, this is the fundamental archive for any research into the person and writings of Edward Hutton.

Terms of use

 

Access:

The collection is open for consultation.

 

Copyright:

The Library will assist where possible with identifying copyright owners, but responsibility for ensuring copyright clearance rests with the user of the material. 

 

Reproduction: 

This depends upon the condition of the material.

 

Finding aids:

Peter Hutton provided a hand-written list of the authors of letters: the list is not complete and does not indicate the related number of letters or their contents. On an envelope containing a number of selected letters Peter Hutton listed the authors: the selection consists of letters relating to Norman Douglas.

A catalogue of the collection now exists. There is also a comprehensive list of correspondents. 

 

Related material in the same repository:

Peter Hutton also gave a collection of Edward Hutton's printed works to the Library. The following list includes these.

 

AR 235.2 HUT	Studies in the lives of the saints
AR 271.3 HUT	The Franciscans in England : 1224-1538
AR 274.505 ENG	Saint Francis of Assisi
AR 450.9 HUT	Why Italian? : a lecture delivered at the Italian conference summoned by the Italian Committee of the Modern Language Association at Bedford College, London, on July 22, 1934.
AR 709.45 VEN	A short history of Italian art
AR 736.2 HUT	The Cosmati : the Roman marble workers of the XIIth and XIIIth centuries
AR 750.945 HUT	The life of Christ in the old Italian masters
AR 757 CRI	The essentials of the figure art
AR 759.5 PER	Perugino
AR 759.55 HUT	The Sienese school in the National Gallery
AR 820.01 HUT	A book of English love poems : chosen out of poets from Wyatt to Arnold
AR 820.01 PAL	Palgrave's golden treasury of the best songs and lyrics
AR 820.3 MAR	Hero and Leander : a poem
AR 820.4 CRA	The English poems of Richard Crashaw
AR 820.9 HUT	Dalliance : a book of essays
AR 820.9 HUT	Frederic Uvedale : a romance
AR 820.9 HUT	In the Triforium : a Christmas vision of Westminster Abbey
AR 820.9 HUT	My lady's sonnets
AR 820.9 HUT	Poems
AR 820.9382 HUT	Catholicism and English literature
AR 827 HUT	The children's Christmas treasury of things new and old.
AR 850 ARE	Pietro Aretino : the scourge of princes
AR 850 BOC	The Decameron
AR 850 BOC	Giovanni Boccaccio : a biographical study
AR 850 BOC	Some aspects of the genius of Giovanni Boccaccio
AR 850 MED	Poesie volgari
AR 880 THE	Theocritos : the complete poems
AR 913.8 HUT	A glimpse of Greece
AR 914.2 HUT	A book of the Wye
AR 914.22 HUT	Highways and byways in Wiltshire
AR 914.23 HUT	Highways and byways in Gloucestershire
AR 914.238 HUT	Highways and byways in Somerset
AR 914.53 HUT	Venice and Venetia
AR 914.55 HUT	In unknown Tuscany
AR 914.55 HUT	The valley of Arno : a study of its geography, history & works of art
AR 914.55 HUT	Country walks about Florence
AR 914.55 HUT	Siena and southern Tuscany
AR 914.55 HUT	Florence and northern Tuscany with Genoa
AR 914.551 HUT	Florence
AR 914.563 HUT	Rome
AR 914.565 HUT	The cities of Umbria
AR 914.5651 HUT	Assisi and Umbria revisited
AR 914.57 HUT	Naples and Campania revisited
AR 914.58 HUT	Cities of Sicily
AR 914.6 HUT	The cities of Spain
AR 937.09 ATT	Attila and the Huns
AR 945 HUT	Italy and the Italians
AR 945.31 HUT	The pageant of Venice
AR 945.06 DEN	Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino, illustrating the arms, arts & literature of Italy, 1440-1630: Volume One
AR 945.06 DEN	Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino, illustrating the arms, arts & literature of Italy, 1440-1630: Volume Two
AR 945.06 DEN	Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino, illustrating the arms, arts & literature of Italy, 1440-1630: Volume Three
AR 945.31 HUT	The pageant of Venice
AR 945.48 MAL	Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta, Lord of Rimini : a study of a XV century Italian despot
AR 945.48 MAL	The mastiff of Rimini : chronicles of the house of Malatesta
C 700 CAR	The novels and plays of Gabriele D'Annunzio(part of The Castello of Milan)
C 700 CAR	Walter Pater(part of The Castello of Milan)
C 759.2 HOG	William Hogarth
820.4 VAU	The poems of Henry Vaughan
850 BOC	Amorous Fiammetta
914.2 HUT	England of my heart : Spring
914.52 HUT	Milan and Lombardy
914.52 HUT	The cities of Lombardy
914.54 HUT	The cities of Romagna and the Marches
914.55 HUT	A wayfarer in unknown Tuscany
914.551 DON	Florence : Florenz
914.57 HUT	Naples and southern Italy
945 SFO	Italy and Italians
945.47 HUT	Ravenna : a study

 

 

The Library also holds the bibliographical work by Dennis Rhodes, The Writings of Edward Hutton, published in 1955.

Also in the holdings is an almost complete run of the Anglo-Italian Review, edited by EH. The review ran from May 1918 to May 1921, with the commercial supplement continuing to April 1922.