Although the eighteenth century is traditionally seen as the age of the Grand Tour, it was in fact the continental travel of Jacobean noblemen which really constituted the beginning of the Tour as an institutionalized phenomenon. James I's peace treaty with Spain in 1604 rendered travel to Catholic Europe both safer and more respectable than it had been under the Tudors and opened up the continent to a new generation of aristocratic explorers, enquirers and adventurers. This book examines the political and cultural significance of the encounters that resulted, focusing in particular on two of England's greatest, and newly united, families: the Cecils and the Howards. It also considers the ways in which Protestants and Catholics experienced the aesthetic and intellectual stimulus of European travel and how the cultural experiences of the travellers formed the essential ingredients in what became the Grand Tour.

Edward Chaney is Professor of Fine and Decorative Arts and Chair of the History of Collecting Research Centre at Southampton Solent University. Timothy Wilks is Professor of Cultural History at Southampton Solent University.

'The Face of an Angel'
'A Travayler of No Note'
Paris and Preparations
Into Aquitania
In Search of Gallia Narbonensis
Pont du Gard to Pontius Pilate
'An Iching Humor to Retourne'
On The Way Unto Venice
'A Great Fault To Say Too Little'
Padua
Out of Italy
Commodities by Ship
Postscript to a Portrait