0:00:02 > 0:00:05'Here's a question for you. When was Britain at its most elegant
0:00:05 > 0:00:08'and most decadent,
0:00:08 > 0:00:11'its most stylish and most radical?'
0:00:11 > 0:00:13ORCHESTRAL DANCE MUSIC
0:00:14 > 0:00:17'I'd argue for the decade of the Regency,
0:00:17 > 0:00:19'between 1811 and 1820.
0:00:19 > 0:00:22'It was a time when people could feel their world
0:00:22 > 0:00:24'being totally transformed.'
0:00:24 > 0:00:27It was one of those rare moments, a bit like the 1960s,
0:00:27 > 0:00:30when there were really big changes in culture and society,
0:00:30 > 0:00:33all coming together in a great burst of energy.
0:00:36 > 0:00:39The Battle of Waterloo was won.
0:00:39 > 0:00:41London was redesigned.
0:00:41 > 0:00:43Turner and Constable were painting,
0:00:43 > 0:00:46and the waltz was introduced.
0:00:46 > 0:00:50In this series I'll be exploring this fabulous decade
0:00:50 > 0:00:53through painting, writing, architecture, fashion.
0:00:59 > 0:01:03And at the heart of the Regency is the puzzle that is George,
0:01:03 > 0:01:05the naughty Prince Regent himself.
0:01:05 > 0:01:07He loved garish excess,
0:01:07 > 0:01:10yet he presided over an age of elegance.
0:01:10 > 0:01:14'He only ever fought his wife, and never set foot on a battlefield,
0:01:14 > 0:01:18'yet he beat Napoleon! People called him a fat old fool,
0:01:18 > 0:01:22'so how did he end up giving his name to an era and a style
0:01:22 > 0:01:25'that stand as the high point of British sophistication?'
0:01:25 > 0:01:29There's a lot more to the Regency than just Mr Darcy, you know.
0:01:35 > 0:01:37CANNONS BOOMING
0:01:37 > 0:01:40TRUMPET PLAYING MARTIAL FANFARE
0:01:49 > 0:01:51'My name is Lucy Worsley,
0:01:51 > 0:01:53'and I'm a historian.'
0:01:53 > 0:01:57'I have rather an exciting job as chief curator
0:01:57 > 0:01:59'at Historic Royal Palaces.'
0:01:59 > 0:02:03- Hello, Kew Palace people. - Hello.- Hello, hello, hello.
0:02:04 > 0:02:07'Today I'm catching up with our new team at Kew Palace,
0:02:07 > 0:02:11'and yes, they do wear these Regency outfits on duty.
0:02:11 > 0:02:14'This place has close connections to the Prince Regent
0:02:14 > 0:02:16'and his family.'
0:02:16 > 0:02:20What do visitors know or think about George, the Prince Regent, then?
0:02:20 > 0:02:22It's generally negative, I'd say.
0:02:22 > 0:02:25This little girl came in. She said,
0:02:25 > 0:02:29- "Sad, bad, mad and fat." - THEY LAUGH
0:02:34 > 0:02:37'It's here that the Regency story begins.'
0:02:38 > 0:02:42If you want to understand the colourful and flamboyant age
0:02:42 > 0:02:46of the Regency, then, you need to look at the Prince Regent himself.
0:02:46 > 0:02:49George really set the tone of the age,
0:02:49 > 0:02:53and he was a notoriously extravagant character.
0:02:53 > 0:02:56George was hugely self-indulgent.
0:02:56 > 0:02:59He had a limitless appetite for food, clothes,
0:02:59 > 0:03:01shopping and women.
0:03:01 > 0:03:05Now, I think this was in response to his childhood,
0:03:05 > 0:03:07which was very simple, very frugal,
0:03:07 > 0:03:11and he spent it partly here at Kew Palace.
0:03:11 > 0:03:16# Shall I tell you about my life?
0:03:17 > 0:03:21# They say I'm a man of the world...
0:03:22 > 0:03:27'The current furnishings reflect the tastes of George's modest parents,
0:03:27 > 0:03:29'for whom this house was a favourite residence.'
0:03:29 > 0:03:32# I've seen lots of pretty girls #
0:03:32 > 0:03:34'Little George's father, King George III,
0:03:34 > 0:03:37'preferred plain boiled eggs to lavish banquets,
0:03:37 > 0:03:40'and he tried to drum the same sense of moderation
0:03:40 > 0:03:42'into his eldest son.'
0:03:42 > 0:03:46This is a set of tiny little stays. It's like a corset for a baby.
0:03:46 > 0:03:49And George was put into these so he would grow up
0:03:49 > 0:03:51with a straight figure.
0:03:51 > 0:03:54His father knew that fatness ran in the family,
0:03:54 > 0:03:57and he wanted George to grow up healthy and strong.
0:03:57 > 0:04:00It was part of the discipline of the nursery.
0:04:00 > 0:04:03George had a restricted diet. There were days without meat.
0:04:03 > 0:04:06Sometimes George was served a fruit tart,
0:04:06 > 0:04:09but he was only allowed to eat the boring fruit in the middle,
0:04:09 > 0:04:12not the tasty crust around the edge.
0:04:15 > 0:04:18Even George's games had an educational purpose.
0:04:18 > 0:04:22You see this jigsaw, made for him to play with?
0:04:22 > 0:04:25At the same time, he was supposed to learn the geography of Ireland.
0:04:25 > 0:04:28He had a very strict timetable of lessons.
0:04:28 > 0:04:31They went on till 8:00 or 8:30 in the evening,
0:04:31 > 0:04:35and although he was quite clever, his great problem was laziness,
0:04:35 > 0:04:37and his tutors tried to beat it out of him
0:04:37 > 0:04:40using a long and snaky whip.
0:04:40 > 0:04:43But this harsh regime had the opposite effect
0:04:43 > 0:04:47of what was intended. George just grew increasingly wayward
0:04:47 > 0:04:50and resentful. By the time he was 15,
0:04:50 > 0:04:53one of his tutors said one of two things might happen -
0:04:53 > 0:04:56either he would become "the most polished gentleman",
0:04:56 > 0:05:01or he'd become "the most accomplished blackguard in Europe".
0:05:04 > 0:05:07As soon as he could escape his controlling parents,
0:05:07 > 0:05:09the young George went wild.
0:05:09 > 0:05:13There were numerous discarded mistresses.
0:05:13 > 0:05:16George wasn't above using the threat of suicide
0:05:16 > 0:05:19to get a girl to give in to his demands.
0:05:19 > 0:05:23There was even an illegal marriage to a Mrs Fitzherbert -
0:05:23 > 0:05:25a Catholic, no less.
0:05:25 > 0:05:29The prince set up home and a rival court at Carlton House,
0:05:29 > 0:05:31but he ran up debts of over half a million pounds.
0:05:31 > 0:05:36In order to pay them off, he agreed to marry Caroline of Brunswick.
0:05:36 > 0:05:38They hated each other.
0:05:38 > 0:05:41George was revolted by her very relaxed attitude to personal hygiene
0:05:41 > 0:05:45and Caroline eventually won herself a racy reputation
0:05:45 > 0:05:47that rivalled her husband's.
0:05:50 > 0:05:52On the top floor at Kew Palace are the rooms
0:05:52 > 0:05:55that once belonged to George's younger sisters.
0:05:55 > 0:05:58They've been left untouched since the time of the Regency.
0:06:03 > 0:06:08George's brothers escaped, into the army and into the arms of mistresses.
0:06:08 > 0:06:12But his sisters were kept close to their father.
0:06:13 > 0:06:17'This is the bedroom of the youngest, Princess Amelia.'
0:06:19 > 0:06:21The medieval fireplace is a typical choice
0:06:21 > 0:06:25for a girl who was fond of fantasy and fairies.
0:06:27 > 0:06:30Amelia was the favourite of her father, George III.
0:06:30 > 0:06:34'Like him, she'd had long battles with illness -
0:06:34 > 0:06:36'in her case, tuberculosis.
0:06:36 > 0:06:39'In a bizarre way, it was this sickly girl
0:06:39 > 0:06:42'who was responsible for the birth of the Regency.'
0:06:44 > 0:06:48In November 1810, poor Princess Amelia died,
0:06:48 > 0:06:51and this was a terrible blow to her father, George III.
0:06:51 > 0:06:55For many years he'd been suffering from these recurrent bouts
0:06:55 > 0:06:57of what his contemporaries thought of as madness.
0:06:57 > 0:07:00Today we know it was the physical illness, porphyria.
0:07:00 > 0:07:04And his grief at Amelia's death sent him over the edge.
0:07:04 > 0:07:09The next day he had to be restrained in his straitjacket.
0:07:11 > 0:07:15So Parliament passed a bill appointing his son George,
0:07:15 > 0:07:19Prince of Wales, as Prince Regent, or acting king,
0:07:19 > 0:07:21on his father's behalf.
0:07:21 > 0:07:25George was sworn in as regent on the 6th of February 1811,
0:07:26 > 0:07:29and the Regency officially began.
0:07:36 > 0:07:40Although the term "Regency" is often used to cover the period
0:07:40 > 0:07:43from the late 18th century right up to the Victorians,
0:07:43 > 0:07:46George's actual regency lasted just nine years,
0:07:46 > 0:07:48from 1811 to 1820.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51As regent, George was not quite a king.
0:07:51 > 0:07:55'There was no coronation, and his office would disappear
0:07:55 > 0:07:59'the moment his father recovered. As for George's personal life,
0:07:59 > 0:08:01'it would have been tragic if it wasn't so funny.'
0:08:01 > 0:08:05'People called him "the Grand Entertainment".'
0:08:05 > 0:08:08George had the misfortune to live through the golden age
0:08:08 > 0:08:10of British satirical caricatures.
0:08:10 > 0:08:13Practically as events unfolded, artists sketched them,
0:08:13 > 0:08:17made cheap prints, and these images went viral.
0:08:17 > 0:08:21He was brilliant fodder for artists like Gillray and Cruikshank,
0:08:21 > 0:08:24because of his weight, because of his difficult wife,
0:08:24 > 0:08:28and because of his endless procession of matronly mistresses.
0:08:32 > 0:08:36During the Regency, you could catch up on the Prince Regent's latest antics
0:08:36 > 0:08:38just by looking in a print-shop window.
0:08:38 > 0:08:41'Sometimes George even bribed cartoonists
0:08:41 > 0:08:45'not to publish images that he found particularly hurtful.'
0:08:48 > 0:08:51This one's pretty straightforward.
0:08:51 > 0:08:52The Prince of Wales is shown as a whale,
0:08:52 > 0:08:57and he appears to have seduced this mermaid. They're exchanging glances.
0:08:58 > 0:09:01Being regent must have been like wearing a "kick me" sign.
0:09:01 > 0:09:04The real king was still alive,
0:09:04 > 0:09:07meaning George lacked the full props and dignity of monarchy.
0:09:07 > 0:09:09There's no crown in these caricatures.
0:09:09 > 0:09:13A red field marshal's jacket identifies George
0:09:13 > 0:09:16as the pratfalling fat man.
0:09:16 > 0:09:19This is the scene outside the prince's mansion,
0:09:19 > 0:09:23Carlton House, just after the huge party he held in 1811
0:09:23 > 0:09:26to commemorate the start of the Regency.
0:09:26 > 0:09:28Afterwards the grounds were opened up,
0:09:28 > 0:09:32and it's said that 30,000 people turned up and tried to get in.
0:09:32 > 0:09:35There was such a crush that one lady broke her leg.
0:09:35 > 0:09:37Here's a lady being trampled upon,
0:09:37 > 0:09:40and some other ladies accidentally lost their clothes.
0:09:40 > 0:09:42Here we've got a group of ordinary people
0:09:42 > 0:09:45who did make it inside Carlton House,
0:09:45 > 0:09:49and they've been confronted with the prince's amazing dining table,
0:09:49 > 0:09:51laid out for the feast with this dinner service
0:09:51 > 0:09:53that cost £60,000.
0:09:53 > 0:09:57This character is saying, "Oh, Sue,
0:09:57 > 0:09:59I don't think I'd like that dry champagne,
0:09:59 > 0:10:03but if I could have a bit of beer in that there gilded gold thing,
0:10:03 > 0:10:06that would be dreadfully nice indeed."
0:10:08 > 0:10:10But there was another side to George.
0:10:10 > 0:10:14Inside Carlton House, he was building up an immense hoard
0:10:14 > 0:10:17of art and furnishings, a collection that I believe
0:10:17 > 0:10:19was the great passion of his life.
0:10:21 > 0:10:23'Carlton House no longer exists,
0:10:23 > 0:10:26'and its treasures are long dispersed,
0:10:26 > 0:10:29'but in the Queen's Gallery, part of his collection has been reunited
0:10:29 > 0:10:31'for an exhibition.'
0:10:31 > 0:10:34It gives us an idea of what those revellers
0:10:34 > 0:10:36at the Carlton House fete might have seen.
0:10:43 > 0:10:46'Kathryn Jones, a curator at the Royal Collection,
0:10:46 > 0:10:48'showed me some of George's treasures.'
0:10:50 > 0:10:52These are some of my favourite objects.
0:10:52 > 0:10:55They're designed for cooling wine glasses,
0:10:55 > 0:10:57so they would have been filled with ice,
0:10:57 > 0:11:00and you could rinse your glass between different wines.
0:11:00 > 0:11:03- That's brilliant! I need one. - They're fantastic.
0:11:03 > 0:11:06Sadly they've fallen out of fashion. If I put my gloves on,
0:11:06 > 0:11:10- I can show you the salt-cellar. It's in the form of a...- A merman.
0:11:10 > 0:11:13..a mer-man carrying a shell, and if you take out the spoon,
0:11:13 > 0:11:15that's also in the shape of a shell,
0:11:15 > 0:11:18and then at the end you have Neptune's trident,
0:11:18 > 0:11:22- so very appropriate for sea salt. - Would these pieces have been used
0:11:22 > 0:11:24at the giant party at Carlton House
0:11:24 > 0:11:27- to celebrate the start of the Regency?- That's right.
0:11:27 > 0:11:30The first delivery was made in 1811, and all these pieces
0:11:30 > 0:11:32would have been used at that amazing dinner.
0:11:32 > 0:11:34So it was an extraordinary service,
0:11:34 > 0:11:37and it's still used by the queen today.
0:11:37 > 0:11:40That's brilliant. It looks gold, but it isn't, is it?
0:11:40 > 0:11:43No, that's right. It's silver gilt, and some of the pieces,
0:11:43 > 0:11:46when they first came into the collection, were plain silver,
0:11:46 > 0:11:50and gradually during the Regency more and more pieces were gilded,
0:11:50 > 0:11:52and I think this was partly an aesthetic thing.
0:11:52 > 0:11:54There were so many disparate elements,
0:11:54 > 0:11:56he wanted to join them together.
0:11:56 > 0:11:59But it's also in direct rivalry with Napoleon.
0:12:01 > 0:12:05Funnily enough, at Napoleon's imperial court across the Channel,
0:12:05 > 0:12:08the emperor had just bought a silver-gilt dining service.
0:12:08 > 0:12:12George was setting himself up as a rival ruler and connoisseur.
0:12:12 > 0:12:16He was waging his own personal war through interior decoration.
0:12:18 > 0:12:21Carlton House was filled with 18th-century Sevres porcelain.
0:12:21 > 0:12:24This was another "up yours" to Boney -
0:12:24 > 0:12:28the firm who made it had been owned by the fallen French royal family.
0:12:28 > 0:12:32George also collected paintings of the court at Versailles,
0:12:32 > 0:12:36and portraits of Cardinal Richelieu, and also of Louis XIII.
0:12:36 > 0:12:39'But his taste wasn't just restricted to this French bling.'
0:12:39 > 0:12:41So, tell me about this one.
0:12:41 > 0:12:44This is really the jewel in George IV's collection.
0:12:44 > 0:12:47It's obviously a Rembrandt.
0:12:47 > 0:12:50It's known as The Shipbuilder And His Wife,
0:12:50 > 0:12:53and it was the most expensive painting George ever bought.
0:12:53 > 0:12:55It cost 5,000 guineas in 1811.
0:12:55 > 0:12:58Do we know where this would have been in Carlton House?
0:12:58 > 0:13:00Yes, we do. We have a visual record of it, in fact.
0:13:00 > 0:13:03It's in one of the watercolours of 1816 of the Blue Velvet Room,
0:13:03 > 0:13:09and he displayed it with specific Sevres vases of this blue colour.
0:13:09 > 0:13:11Do you think this taste for Dutch paintings
0:13:11 > 0:13:14meant that he was a man who genuinely loved art?
0:13:14 > 0:13:18- Cos they're not showy, are they? - No. It's not really what you expect,
0:13:18 > 0:13:20and to have something like this in his collection
0:13:20 > 0:13:25shows that this was the pinnacle of things that were on the market at that time.
0:13:27 > 0:13:31'The Regency was an age in which art and culture mattered,
0:13:31 > 0:13:34'and this agenda was set by the man at the top.
0:13:34 > 0:13:38'But there was a practical side to being an art-loving royal patron.
0:13:38 > 0:13:40'In your portraits, you could spin an image
0:13:40 > 0:13:43'to counterbalance those cruel caricaturists,
0:13:43 > 0:13:45'and George's chief flatterer
0:13:45 > 0:13:48'was one of the greatest English portraitists,
0:13:48 > 0:13:51'Thomas Lawrence.'
0:13:51 > 0:13:55When Lawrence painted George in his red field marshal's uniform,
0:13:55 > 0:13:58critics sneered at the way the painter
0:13:58 > 0:14:01had transformed an overweight, balding 50-something
0:14:01 > 0:14:03into a well fleshed Adonis.
0:14:03 > 0:14:06Jonathan Yeo paints the rich and powerful
0:14:06 > 0:14:08of the 21st century.
0:14:12 > 0:14:15'I showed him one of Lawrence's unfinished portraits of George,
0:14:15 > 0:14:19'to learn how the idealised images of the regent were created.'
0:14:19 > 0:14:23I've always thought of this as a really flattering image.
0:14:23 > 0:14:27- Is that how you see it? - Er, it is quite flattering.
0:14:27 > 0:14:31It looks like it's been done for a coin or something like that.
0:14:31 > 0:14:35He's facing this way, but the perspective is slightly skewed
0:14:35 > 0:14:38and he's very side-on. If you cut that out and do it in profile,
0:14:38 > 0:14:42that's one way of avoiding showing if someone's overweight.
0:14:42 > 0:14:46You see this skin here? That's the whitest part of the skin.
0:14:46 > 0:14:48Has he highlighted that because that's smooth,
0:14:48 > 0:14:51and so these wrinkles are more sort of hidden
0:14:51 > 0:14:53in the eye-socket and in the shadow there?
0:14:53 > 0:14:58Ah, it's a flattering angle. It's sort of Hollywood lighting.
0:14:58 > 0:15:01- Yeah.- All the Hollywood movie stars would look around
0:15:01 > 0:15:05to find where the light was in front of you and above,
0:15:05 > 0:15:09because it gets rid of wrinkles whichever angle it's coming from.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11The hair looks quite artfully arranged.
0:15:11 > 0:15:15- It's quite a contemporary look. - It looks like Justin Bieber.
0:15:15 > 0:15:17It does a bit. The lips are very red,
0:15:17 > 0:15:22- and it almost looks like he's wearing makeup in it.- He was known to.- Ah!
0:15:22 > 0:15:26Nowadays we have photography. We know what people actually look like,
0:15:26 > 0:15:29so people tend not to lean on you to make them look fantastic.
0:15:29 > 0:15:33In those days, if the painter was the only person to record how you looked,
0:15:33 > 0:15:36there was nothing to stop you rewriting history.
0:15:40 > 0:15:44In fairness to the regent, looking like a leader was really important.
0:15:44 > 0:15:46'As the Regency was getting started,
0:15:46 > 0:15:48'Napoleon was at the height of his powers,
0:15:48 > 0:15:51'and we'd been slogging away against France, our old enemy,
0:15:51 > 0:15:54'almost continuously for a generation.'
0:15:56 > 0:15:59We'd been fighting the French for the best part of 20 years,
0:15:59 > 0:16:03and they were winning. The English Channel was just the thin blue line
0:16:03 > 0:16:06protecting us from Boney's evil empire.
0:16:06 > 0:16:09Napoleon basically controlled the whole of Europe,
0:16:09 > 0:16:13through puppet governments, direct rule and favourable alliances,
0:16:13 > 0:16:16and he'd set up a trade blockade against the British
0:16:16 > 0:16:18that went all the way from Spain in the west
0:16:18 > 0:16:20to Russia in the east.
0:16:21 > 0:16:25A side effect of the war was that travel and trade with Europe
0:16:25 > 0:16:27became impossibly restricted.
0:16:27 > 0:16:31The heyday of the Grand Tour was long gone.
0:16:31 > 0:16:34'Before, we'd looked up to French and Italian culture,
0:16:34 > 0:16:36'but now it was out of bounds.'
0:16:38 > 0:16:41So we couldn't trade with the continent,
0:16:41 > 0:16:43and you couldn't visit it either,
0:16:43 > 0:16:46unless you were going to take your chances as a soldier.
0:16:46 > 0:16:49Instead we looked inwards, into our own little island,
0:16:49 > 0:16:52to feed our imaginations.
0:16:56 > 0:16:59Britain's enforced stay-cation was made tolerable, though,
0:16:59 > 0:17:01by the cult of the picturesque.
0:17:01 > 0:17:04It won legions of followers from the end of the 18th century.
0:17:04 > 0:17:08Regency types could be found with their sketchbooks out
0:17:08 > 0:17:11at every ruined abbey and beautiful vista.
0:17:15 > 0:17:20Locals complained that England had become the country house of London.
0:17:22 > 0:17:25Getting back to nature wasn't everybody's cup of tea.
0:17:25 > 0:17:28This is a very amusing spoof of the picturesque
0:17:28 > 0:17:32which came out in 1812. It's called The Tour Of Dr Syntax
0:17:32 > 0:17:34In Search Of The Picturesque.
0:17:34 > 0:17:36It was so popular, it went through five editions
0:17:36 > 0:17:39in the first year.
0:17:39 > 0:17:42Dr Syntax's adventures are told through verse
0:17:42 > 0:17:45and beautiful illustrations by Thomas Rowlandson.
0:17:45 > 0:17:48Syntax is a schoolmaster, and also a bit of a bore.
0:17:48 > 0:17:51With his horse Grizzle, he endures many of the perils
0:17:51 > 0:17:54facing the Regency picturesque-hunter.
0:17:56 > 0:17:59The story is that Dr Syntax wants to make some extra money
0:17:59 > 0:18:02in the summer holidays, so he decides to make a tour
0:18:02 > 0:18:05of the Lake District, and write an illustrated book about it
0:18:05 > 0:18:09to sell to armchair travellers. He thinks he can make a lot of money.
0:18:09 > 0:18:14As he puts it, "I'll ride and write, and sketch and print,
0:18:14 > 0:18:17And thus create a real mint."
0:18:17 > 0:18:19"I'll prose it here, I'll verse it there,
0:18:19 > 0:18:22And picturesque it ev'ry where."
0:18:22 > 0:18:25In this picture, he's been sketching a ruined castle,
0:18:25 > 0:18:29but he's slipped over and he's falling back into the lake,
0:18:29 > 0:18:31and I think his horse is laughing at him.
0:18:31 > 0:18:36He often seems to be being laughed at by animals.
0:18:36 > 0:18:39In this one, he's been tied to a tree
0:18:39 > 0:18:41by some highwaymen,
0:18:41 > 0:18:45and he's having to be rescued by some ladies.
0:18:45 > 0:18:49So it's just one disaster after another for Dr Syntax,
0:18:49 > 0:18:51but he takes it all terribly seriously,
0:18:51 > 0:18:54and in this picture he's telling everybody about his tour,
0:18:54 > 0:18:57and everybody has fallen asleep,
0:18:57 > 0:19:00except for one couple who are squeezing each other and having a good time.
0:19:00 > 0:19:03Silly old Dr Syntax! What a twit.
0:19:08 > 0:19:12The artists and amateur sketchers longing for the continent
0:19:12 > 0:19:14found the flavour of Southern France and Italy
0:19:14 > 0:19:17in one particular corner of England.
0:19:19 > 0:19:21During the Napoleonic Wars,
0:19:21 > 0:19:24British artists felt that the Southwest
0:19:24 > 0:19:26was the next best thing to the Mediterranean.
0:19:26 > 0:19:29Down here, they felt that the colours were warmer
0:19:29 > 0:19:32and the light was more intense.
0:19:37 > 0:19:43One man who certainly agreed was Joseph Mallord William Turner.
0:19:48 > 0:19:51'In 1811, a firm of engravers commissioned him
0:19:51 > 0:19:53'to paint a tour of the south coast,
0:19:53 > 0:19:55'to feed the market for picturesque prints.
0:19:55 > 0:19:59'So Turner spent that summer journeying around the Southwest.
0:20:04 > 0:20:06'At Ivybridge in Devon,
0:20:06 > 0:20:10'Turner captured a languid late-summer afternoon.'
0:20:11 > 0:20:14We often think of him as a kind of early Impressionist,
0:20:14 > 0:20:17but he also documented everyday life.
0:20:17 > 0:20:20The Regency Turner liked his landscapes inhabited,
0:20:20 > 0:20:22with lots of dirty detail.
0:20:22 > 0:20:25His own coach would have changed its horses here at Ivybridge,
0:20:25 > 0:20:28just like the one in the picture.
0:20:31 > 0:20:33Here's the mail coach about to leave.
0:20:33 > 0:20:36It's yellow. It's got the red wheels.
0:20:36 > 0:20:37Everybody's getting on board.
0:20:37 > 0:20:41But this figure here, he's going, "Wait for me!"
0:20:41 > 0:20:43He's about to miss it. Now, was he an artist
0:20:43 > 0:20:45who'd been sketching for too long,
0:20:45 > 0:20:49or had he spent too long with this mysterious female figure
0:20:49 > 0:20:51off in the woods? We just don't know.
0:21:01 > 0:21:03Hang on! Wait for me!
0:21:03 > 0:21:06This image, like the others from Turner's tour,
0:21:06 > 0:21:09was eventually engraved, and filled up the libraries
0:21:09 > 0:21:11of the Regency middle class.
0:21:13 > 0:21:16'Using the original sketches and watercolour,
0:21:16 > 0:21:21'Professor Sam Smiles took me through Turner's artistic process.'
0:21:21 > 0:21:25Now, I can hardly believe that these scribbles here
0:21:25 > 0:21:29resulted in that beautiful completed, finished work of art.
0:21:29 > 0:21:34And that's because neither you nor I have his acute visual memory.
0:21:34 > 0:21:38What Turner had managed to produce, over years of training,
0:21:38 > 0:21:42was a graphic system, a way of drawing,
0:21:42 > 0:21:45which allowed him to capture the essence of a scene
0:21:45 > 0:21:50with marks that meant a lot to him, but to you and me, looking at them, perhaps meant considerably less.
0:21:50 > 0:21:52I'm particularly struck by this Christmas tree.
0:21:52 > 0:21:56It looks like a pictogram, yet here it is, a beautiful-looking thing.
0:21:56 > 0:22:00Absolutely - things he observes that nobody else bothered to record.
0:22:00 > 0:22:04I mean, the picture we're looking at looks like peaceful England,
0:22:04 > 0:22:09an absolute idyll of tranquillity and relaxation.
0:22:09 > 0:22:12But as he moved along the coastal strip,
0:22:12 > 0:22:15he found the ports with Men of War in them,
0:22:15 > 0:22:19marines and sailors, the army making preparations...
0:22:19 > 0:22:22This was a country readying for war.
0:22:22 > 0:22:25Even though Trafalgar was a few years in the past,
0:22:25 > 0:22:27Napoleon still represented a major threat.
0:22:27 > 0:22:32- There was still a real danger of invasion, wasn't there?- Absolutely.
0:22:39 > 0:22:41'Forts like this one protecting Plymouth
0:22:41 > 0:22:45'guarded many of the settlements that Turner visited in 1811.
0:22:46 > 0:22:49'And the paintings that came out of his south-coast journeys
0:22:49 > 0:22:52'are shot through with the sense of a country at war.'
0:22:54 > 0:22:57At St Mawes in Cornwall,
0:22:57 > 0:23:00Turner saw at first hand the effect of the war
0:23:00 > 0:23:03on the pilchard industry. With the continent closed for trade,
0:23:03 > 0:23:06much of the industry's market was inaccessible.
0:23:06 > 0:23:09Instead, the pilchards are left to rot on the beach,
0:23:09 > 0:23:11to be sold as manure.
0:23:16 > 0:23:19Even this innocuous watercolour of the Dorset coast
0:23:19 > 0:23:21has a sinister undertone.
0:23:21 > 0:23:25Is it me, or does that wagon look a bit like a field gun?
0:23:29 > 0:23:32'The landscape around Plymouth impressed Turner so much
0:23:32 > 0:23:36'that he returned several times in the early years of the Regency.
0:23:36 > 0:23:41'He thought that it hardly seemed to belong to this island.
0:23:41 > 0:23:44'And a favourite location was the popular picnic spot
0:23:44 > 0:23:46'of Mount Edgecombe.'
0:23:47 > 0:23:50Turner did the sketch which this watercolour was based on
0:23:50 > 0:23:55somewhere pretty near to here. You can recognise the River Tamar.
0:23:55 > 0:23:58Here are a great load of ships from the navy.
0:23:58 > 0:24:01We've still got ships down there, but the really special thing
0:24:01 > 0:24:04he's shown us is this party of sailors,
0:24:04 > 0:24:07who are going back at the end of a day's shore leave.
0:24:07 > 0:24:11They've obviously had a great time. They've met up with some ladies.
0:24:11 > 0:24:14This gentleman with the wooden leg is playing his violin,
0:24:14 > 0:24:17and now they're going home, except for this couple,
0:24:17 > 0:24:20who are going off into the woods to do who knows what.
0:24:20 > 0:24:22So as well as giving us topography and landscape,
0:24:22 > 0:24:25Turner's given us a record of an afternoon of enjoyment
0:24:25 > 0:24:27200 years ago.
0:24:31 > 0:24:34The sailors had every right to enjoy their afternoon off.
0:24:34 > 0:24:37'For years they'd been fighting Napoleon,
0:24:37 > 0:24:40'one of history's most formidable warriors.'
0:24:42 > 0:24:45The same can't be said of the Prince Regent.
0:24:45 > 0:24:48George had absolutely zero battlefield experience,
0:24:48 > 0:24:51but he still thought of himself as Boney's opposite number.
0:24:52 > 0:24:56For years, George had begged his father to be allowed to go and fight
0:24:56 > 0:25:00without success. Now he was too old to be of any use,
0:25:00 > 0:25:02apart from ceremonial duties.
0:25:02 > 0:25:05If he couldn't face Boney in battle,
0:25:05 > 0:25:07George could at least try to outdo him
0:25:07 > 0:25:11with flashy military outfits. This regimental jacket of his
0:25:11 > 0:25:13shows that he loved to look like a soldier,
0:25:13 > 0:25:15if only an ornamental one.
0:25:15 > 0:25:18George was helped by London's best tailors,
0:25:18 > 0:25:21including Jonathan Meyer, who founded Meyer & Mortimer.
0:25:21 > 0:25:23'200 years on, this firm is still going,
0:25:23 > 0:25:26'and they're going to let me have a peek
0:25:26 > 0:25:28'at their Regency account books.'
0:25:31 > 0:25:34- Hi, Brian.- Hello, there. - Can I have a look at your ledger?
0:25:34 > 0:25:36- Yes, of course.- Thank you.
0:25:38 > 0:25:41- Here we are.- Thank you very much.
0:25:42 > 0:25:45- There we go.- Beautiful!
0:25:45 > 0:25:48This is a pretty extraordinary book,
0:25:48 > 0:25:51and this page here lists all the items
0:25:51 > 0:25:53which have been bought by the Prince of Wales,
0:25:53 > 0:25:55and they just fit in with what you expect
0:25:55 > 0:25:58of his extravagant, over-the-top character.
0:25:58 > 0:26:02He is buying quite a lot of rich gold royal cord,
0:26:02 > 0:26:05I imagine to decorate a uniform, something like that.
0:26:05 > 0:26:09And here we have... He's bought 54 rich gold fringed tassels
0:26:09 > 0:26:12to swing off things.
0:26:12 > 0:26:15Over on this page... This is really interesting.
0:26:15 > 0:26:18Here you can see clothes being altered
0:26:18 > 0:26:21to suit his body-size and shape.
0:26:21 > 0:26:24Here we have the altering of a yellow waistcoat,
0:26:24 > 0:26:27"made higher in the neck and adding lace".
0:26:27 > 0:26:30Now, that sounds to me like to disguise the double chins.
0:26:30 > 0:26:34And here we've got "enlarging a regimental jacket in the breast".
0:26:34 > 0:26:37It wouldn't do up! And this is a theme.
0:26:37 > 0:26:40Throughout the accounts, things are being enlarged,
0:26:40 > 0:26:44being lengthened, being made bigger, to fit his rather plump body.
0:26:44 > 0:26:47As you flick through the pages,
0:26:47 > 0:26:50what strikes you is the huge number of things
0:26:50 > 0:26:52that George is buying. Clearly he's a shopaholic.
0:26:52 > 0:26:56And when I say buying, he's not necessarily paying for them.
0:26:56 > 0:26:58The debt mounts up.
0:26:58 > 0:27:01It's £156 at the bottom of this page.
0:27:01 > 0:27:04It's not paid off. It's carried forwards.
0:27:04 > 0:27:06£300 over here.
0:27:06 > 0:27:08Then, flicking through the book,
0:27:08 > 0:27:13we get a grand total of £490 that he owes to the tailors.
0:27:13 > 0:27:18That's a hefty tab - the best part of £30,000 in today's money.
0:27:18 > 0:27:20I feel a bit sorry for Mr Meyer.
0:27:23 > 0:27:26The prince liked to think of himself as a man of style,
0:27:26 > 0:27:29a leader of military fashion.
0:27:31 > 0:27:34But for civilian wear, he could be found squeezing himself
0:27:34 > 0:27:38into the look set by his friend Beau Brummell...
0:27:39 > 0:27:42..the famous dandy.
0:27:42 > 0:27:45Brummell's opinion mattered so much
0:27:45 > 0:27:48that once, when he criticised the cut of George's coat,
0:27:48 > 0:27:51the poor old prince burst into tears.
0:27:53 > 0:27:55Brummell is credited with inventing the suit,
0:27:55 > 0:27:59and with it the dashing tailored look of the English gentleman.
0:28:01 > 0:28:04'I wanted to know what it was about Brummell
0:28:04 > 0:28:07'that made people spend several hours a day
0:28:07 > 0:28:09'watching him get dressed.
0:28:09 > 0:28:12'So I asked his biographer, Ian Kelly.'
0:28:12 > 0:28:15I'm sorry, but to spend three hours a day preening yourself
0:28:15 > 0:28:18- seems really effeminate to me. - How dare you?
0:28:18 > 0:28:22Um, yeah. Well, in theory, the clothes are meant to express
0:28:22 > 0:28:26a sort of uber-masculinity, a more stated masculinity.
0:28:26 > 0:28:31To be "a dandy" was much nearer the modern American coinage
0:28:31 > 0:28:33of being "a dude". It was about a new way
0:28:33 > 0:28:36of being a British gentleman,
0:28:36 > 0:28:38which was to do with reserve
0:28:38 > 0:28:42and sang-froid, stiff upper lip, all that sort of thing.
0:28:42 > 0:28:45Well, I don't care if it's supposed to be just for men,
0:28:45 > 0:28:49because I want to experience a Brummell-type suit for myself.
0:28:49 > 0:28:53I'm super-keen to channel a bit of butch Regency style.
0:28:53 > 0:28:57So, it's supposed to make me feel cool and masculine?
0:28:57 > 0:29:00Obviously, as a gentleman, I can't possibly watch a lady dress,
0:29:00 > 0:29:05even if you're dressing as a man. I'll go practise with my canes.
0:29:05 > 0:29:07You fiddle with your canes.
0:29:07 > 0:29:11'For a Regency dandy, getting dressed was a performance art.
0:29:12 > 0:29:16'But I'm pretty sure it's not going to take me half a day to get ready.'
0:29:17 > 0:29:20- Dah-daah!- Hey!
0:29:20 > 0:29:23I couldn't do myself up at the back. Can you give me a hand, valet?
0:29:23 > 0:29:26- Let me be your man. - Thank you, Jeeves.
0:29:26 > 0:29:28OK...
0:29:29 > 0:29:33Now, tell me when you can't breathe any more,
0:29:33 > 0:29:35- or don't.- Mm-hm. That's not too bad.
0:29:35 > 0:29:38Tell me about these trousers that I'm wearing.
0:29:38 > 0:29:41- These are rather interesting.- It's a footnote in the history of fashion,
0:29:41 > 0:29:45but a rather important claim to fame of Brummell and the Regency.
0:29:45 > 0:29:47Brummell is the man who invents trousers,
0:29:47 > 0:29:50as gentlemen wore breeches and stockings before this period,
0:29:50 > 0:29:55He imported these from the Hussars. You've got understraps to keep the trouser tight.
0:29:55 > 0:29:56And these look like girls' shoes,
0:29:56 > 0:29:59but they're Regency men's dancing pumps.
0:29:59 > 0:30:02Yeah! They're a very butch item.
0:30:02 > 0:30:05- What's next? Is it cravats? - It has to be the cravat.
0:30:05 > 0:30:08This is the key item. Chin up! Very important.
0:30:08 > 0:30:12A beautifully tied cravat was the most important part
0:30:12 > 0:30:15of the dandy's uniform. It had to be scrupulously spotless.
0:30:15 > 0:30:18Brummell sent his to the country to be washed,
0:30:18 > 0:30:22so that his laundry wouldn't be tainted by London soot.
0:30:23 > 0:30:27The trick is to keep it as tight and as high
0:30:27 > 0:30:30as you can possibly bear,
0:30:30 > 0:30:32so, when your face begins to turn blue,
0:30:32 > 0:30:35then we know we've got it too tight.
0:30:35 > 0:30:38But I'm relatively pleased and proud of that.
0:30:38 > 0:30:43It's meant to look like a perfect cylinder of white. There we go.
0:30:43 > 0:30:45We're allowed one declension, as it was known.
0:30:45 > 0:30:49The valet places his finger here, and you lower your chin.
0:30:49 > 0:30:51And that, in theory, stays in place
0:30:51 > 0:30:55until we tie the next cravat or the next dressing.
0:31:00 > 0:31:01SHE LAUGHS
0:31:05 > 0:31:08It looks better than it feels. It's pretty uncomfortable.
0:31:08 > 0:31:12On the positive note, though, you're obliged to hold yourself better.
0:31:12 > 0:31:15Built-in hauteur. I feel like my nose is in the air.
0:31:15 > 0:31:17That, too. It's one of the supposed origins
0:31:17 > 0:31:20of "toff" and "toffee-nosed", because this obliges you
0:31:20 > 0:31:24to keep your nose in the air, but especially if you're in any danger
0:31:24 > 0:31:27of dribbling anything brown from snuff-taking,
0:31:27 > 0:31:30- which is a pretty disgusting thought. - That's really disgusting.
0:31:30 > 0:31:33So the toffee-nose is brown snot from snuff-taking,
0:31:33 > 0:31:37and you've got to keep your nose up so it doesn't spoil your cravat.
0:31:37 > 0:31:39So much for the age of elegance.
0:31:39 > 0:31:42SONG: "Dandy" by the Kinks
0:31:43 > 0:31:45# Dandy, Dandy
0:31:45 > 0:31:48# Where you gonna go now?
0:31:48 > 0:31:50# Who you gonna run to?
0:31:50 > 0:31:52# All your little life
0:31:52 > 0:31:55# You're chasing all the girls
0:31:55 > 0:31:58# They can't resist your smile
0:31:58 > 0:32:02# Oh, oh, they long for Dandy #
0:32:02 > 0:32:04London's St James's was Dandy Central.
0:32:04 > 0:32:06Previous generations of young men
0:32:06 > 0:32:09had been able to explore Europe on a Grand Tour,
0:32:09 > 0:32:12but gentlemen of leisure, in the early years of the Regency,
0:32:12 > 0:32:15spent much of their lives within a quarter of a mile
0:32:15 > 0:32:18of St James's Palace.
0:32:19 > 0:32:23White's is a club where, it's said, people have died from exclusion,
0:32:23 > 0:32:26and Brummell used to inspect the promenading dandies
0:32:26 > 0:32:29from its bow window. A stone's throw away,
0:32:29 > 0:32:32there was Gentleman Jackson's boxing gym,
0:32:32 > 0:32:34where a bit of man-on-man action
0:32:34 > 0:32:37could while away the long idle hours.
0:32:37 > 0:32:40Brooks's, which counted the regent as a member,
0:32:40 > 0:32:43was famous for its gambling, with fortunes won and lost
0:32:43 > 0:32:46at its gaming tables.
0:32:46 > 0:32:48And this rather forgettable modern building
0:32:48 > 0:32:51stands on the site of the most exclusive night spot
0:32:51 > 0:32:53in the whole of St James's.
0:32:53 > 0:32:57Right here is the site of Almack's club.
0:32:57 > 0:33:01This is the holy of holies. This is the most exclusive club
0:33:01 > 0:33:05in Regency London. It's where Beau Brummell insisted
0:33:05 > 0:33:08that men were dressed in a strict uniform
0:33:08 > 0:33:11of white and black, or white and sometimes blue-black,
0:33:11 > 0:33:13but certainly a strict monochrome.
0:33:13 > 0:33:16There's an image here from a contemporary novel
0:33:16 > 0:33:19of what it would have looked like in those days, a ball at Almack's.
0:33:19 > 0:33:22They're having a dance, and unlike some of the other clubs,
0:33:22 > 0:33:24at this one, the ladies were in charge.
0:33:24 > 0:33:27Absolutely. It was a series of terrifying dragons,
0:33:27 > 0:33:31royal and aristocratic ladies, who decided who was allowed in
0:33:31 > 0:33:34and who wasn't, who was suitable for their daughters or not.
0:33:34 > 0:33:39And, yes, there's a lot of cartoons and ditties
0:33:39 > 0:33:42- on exactly that terrifying issue. - Aha! I know one.
0:33:42 > 0:33:45If to Almack's you belong,
0:33:45 > 0:33:47like a monarch, you can do no wrong.
0:33:47 > 0:33:50But if you're expelled on a Wednesday night,
0:33:50 > 0:33:54- by Jove, you can do nothing right! - HE CHUCKLES
0:33:57 > 0:34:00'An evening's entertainment could be rounded off
0:34:00 > 0:34:03'with a visit to one of the many brothels down the alleys
0:34:03 > 0:34:05'just off St James's Street.'
0:34:07 > 0:34:10But syphilis was rife,
0:34:10 > 0:34:14and would eventually claim Brummell himself.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17Syphilis manifests in all sorts of ways,
0:34:17 > 0:34:19including a sort of bipolar disorder,
0:34:19 > 0:34:22and Brummell gambles away all his money,
0:34:22 > 0:34:25- and publicly insults the Prince of Wales.- He was rude to him?
0:34:25 > 0:34:28Astonishingly, yeah. The Prince Regent turned up at a party,
0:34:28 > 0:34:33appeared to ignore Beau Brummell, cut him, as they said in the Regency,
0:34:33 > 0:34:35and Brummell turned to a mutual friend and said,
0:34:35 > 0:34:38"So, Alvanley, who's your fat friend?"
0:34:38 > 0:34:41- about the Prince Regent. - Meaning the Prince Regent?- Yeah!
0:34:41 > 0:34:43And very soon, all the creditors were on his back.
0:34:43 > 0:34:46He fled to France, spent the last 20 years of his life
0:34:46 > 0:34:49in penury, eventually insane, and in an asylum.
0:34:49 > 0:34:53It's a kind of a Greek arc of a story.
0:34:53 > 0:34:57So the story of Beau Brummell is pride followed by a fall.
0:34:57 > 0:35:00Well, the Victorians liked to think so, certainly.
0:35:00 > 0:35:03Actually, I think it's tailoring followed by syphilis.
0:35:03 > 0:35:05HE LAUGHS
0:35:06 > 0:35:09'Brummell showed that access to the regent's circle
0:35:09 > 0:35:12'could brutally be cut short. But those on the outside
0:35:12 > 0:35:16'sometimes made the best of it, creating an alternative legacy
0:35:16 > 0:35:18'of real value.'
0:35:18 > 0:35:20At the very start of the Regency,
0:35:20 > 0:35:23and just near here on Dulwich Common,
0:35:23 > 0:35:25a dandy fell off his horse.
0:35:25 > 0:35:29His name was Francis Bourgeois, and he was an owner of paintings -
0:35:29 > 0:35:33no less than 370 paintings, and some very, very good ones, too.
0:35:33 > 0:35:36A few weeks later he died of his injuries,
0:35:36 > 0:35:39and his death set in motion a sequence of events
0:35:39 > 0:35:42that would really change the British attitude to art -
0:35:42 > 0:35:45not only how it was looked at,
0:35:45 > 0:35:47but also who could see it.
0:35:49 > 0:35:51'Bourgeois had considered leaving the collection
0:35:51 > 0:35:55'to the British Museum, but he wasn't part of the regent's charmed circle,
0:35:55 > 0:35:58'and he felt the museum was run by snobs.
0:35:58 > 0:36:00In a final two fingers to the Establishment,
0:36:00 > 0:36:03he left his collection to Dulwich College,
0:36:03 > 0:36:06and the architect John Soane built a new picture gallery
0:36:06 > 0:36:08especially to house it.
0:36:11 > 0:36:15'Bourgeois' will insisted that his paintings be available
0:36:15 > 0:36:20'"for the inspection of the public", which makes Dulwich Picture Gallery
0:36:20 > 0:36:24'the first purpose-built public art gallery in Britain.'
0:36:26 > 0:36:28The bulk of the paintings still on the wall,
0:36:28 > 0:36:30including Rembrandts and Raphaels,
0:36:30 > 0:36:34come from Bourgeois' bequest of 1811.
0:36:34 > 0:36:38'To ensure the gallery's visitors don't forget his generosity,
0:36:38 > 0:36:40'Bourgeois is actually buried in the building.
0:36:40 > 0:36:43'He's in a mausoleum next to his business partner -
0:36:43 > 0:36:46'some say partner in every sense - Noel Desenfans.'
0:36:46 > 0:36:50It was difficult for them. People were slightly dismissive.
0:36:50 > 0:36:53They thought Desenfans was pretentious,
0:36:53 > 0:36:56and they thought Bourgeois was a fool,
0:36:56 > 0:36:59which quite clearly he wasn't. He was a dandy, though,
0:36:59 > 0:37:03and people laughed at him for his buckskins
0:37:03 > 0:37:06and his polished boots and his hair, all modelled, of course,
0:37:06 > 0:37:09on the Prince Regent.
0:37:09 > 0:37:12'Ian Dejardin is the current director
0:37:12 > 0:37:13'of Dulwich Picture Gallery.'
0:37:13 > 0:37:16I love the whole idea that this place is a couple of outsiders
0:37:16 > 0:37:19cocking a snook at the Establishment.
0:37:19 > 0:37:22Well, I think that's what it was. I think it's what it was.
0:37:22 > 0:37:26In Francis Bourgeois' will, there is just this little tiny snippet
0:37:26 > 0:37:29of a phrase. He says that the paintings are to be on display
0:37:29 > 0:37:31"for the inspection of the public".
0:37:31 > 0:37:34And you read that, and you think, "Well, obviously."
0:37:34 > 0:37:36But no-one had said that before.
0:37:36 > 0:37:40This is a really big step forwards, that it's a public art gallery.
0:37:40 > 0:37:43It's incredibly significant.
0:37:43 > 0:37:45We're 13, 14 years before the National Gallery,
0:37:45 > 0:37:50so we were it. We were the national gallery
0:37:50 > 0:37:52for many years, really.
0:37:55 > 0:37:57The government had long been under pressure
0:37:57 > 0:38:01to establish a national public-art collection.
0:38:02 > 0:38:05'Dulwich showed what could be done.
0:38:05 > 0:38:08'The official National Gallery was founded in the 1820s,
0:38:08 > 0:38:12'encouraged by the arts-loving George as King George IV.
0:38:13 > 0:38:17'The columns on the portico were even recycled
0:38:17 > 0:38:20'from his palace, Carlton House, after it was demolished.'
0:38:23 > 0:38:26Another voice raised in support of the National Gallery
0:38:26 > 0:38:30was that of Thomas Lawrence, George's one-man PR machine.
0:38:30 > 0:38:34Lawrence knew very well how art could transform the life
0:38:34 > 0:38:38of an ordinary boy. Painting had taken him from humble beginnings
0:38:38 > 0:38:40to the very top of society.
0:38:40 > 0:38:43His meteoric rise started while he was still a child
0:38:43 > 0:38:46in the market town of Devizes.
0:38:48 > 0:38:51A little town in Wiltshire might seem quite a surprising place
0:38:51 > 0:38:53for a society portrait painter to grow up,
0:38:53 > 0:38:57but Devizes was a key stopping point on Britain's busiest coach route
0:38:57 > 0:38:59from London through to Bath.
0:38:59 > 0:39:01So the whole of fashionable London came here.
0:39:01 > 0:39:03If they wanted a meal or a bed for the night,
0:39:03 > 0:39:07they stopped at this inn, which was run by the young painter's father,
0:39:07 > 0:39:09Thomas Lawrence senior.
0:39:17 > 0:39:19Picture the scene. It's the 1770s.
0:39:19 > 0:39:22You've just arrived here at the Bear Inn.
0:39:22 > 0:39:25You've got off a stagecoach. You're tired, you're hungry.
0:39:25 > 0:39:27But the landlord, Thomas Lawrence senior,
0:39:27 > 0:39:29as he offers you a drink,
0:39:29 > 0:39:32he says, "Would you like to see my ten-year-old son reciting a poem
0:39:32 > 0:39:35or taking your portrait?"
0:39:35 > 0:39:37This may have sounded like a bit of a bore,
0:39:37 > 0:39:40but if you chose the poem, the boy would leap up onto the table,
0:39:40 > 0:39:42recite from Milton. That was pretty good,
0:39:42 > 0:39:45but if you handed over your guinea for your portrait,
0:39:45 > 0:39:49you'd have quickly realised that you were in the hands of a genius.
0:39:49 > 0:39:52The actor David Garrick, who'd witnessed
0:39:52 > 0:39:55both of the boy's party tricks, said he couldn't work out
0:39:55 > 0:39:58whether the young Lawrence's future lay with the pencil
0:39:58 > 0:40:00or the stage.
0:40:03 > 0:40:06'In 2011, I visited the first exhibition
0:40:06 > 0:40:10'of Lawrence's work in 30 years, at the National Portrait Gallery.
0:40:10 > 0:40:12'He's long been a neglected artist,
0:40:12 > 0:40:15'but in his own time, he was the world's top portrait painter.
0:40:18 > 0:40:21'Lawrence produced THE visual record of the vanished world
0:40:21 > 0:40:24'of Regency society.
0:40:24 > 0:40:27'He particularly enjoyed painting wealthy and beautiful women,
0:40:27 > 0:40:30'and the ladies enjoyed his attentions.
0:40:30 > 0:40:35'Even the regent's matronly sister is shooting us a saucy look.'
0:40:35 > 0:40:38There's a rather brilliant contemporary review
0:40:38 > 0:40:41of this painting here, of Lady Selina Meade.
0:40:41 > 0:40:46It just goes, "Ha, it's Lady Selina Meade, very tasty indeed."
0:40:49 > 0:40:53Lawrence was clearly a very attractive, flirtatious,
0:40:53 > 0:40:56smooth individual. One of his friends said
0:40:56 > 0:40:59that if you got a letter from him saying, "Yes, I can come to dinner,"
0:40:59 > 0:41:01it felt like you were getting a love letter.
0:41:01 > 0:41:06This is Mrs Isabella Wolff. She became a sort of muse to him,
0:41:06 > 0:41:09and he spent the best part of 15 years
0:41:09 > 0:41:11finishing this portrait.
0:41:11 > 0:41:14As well as producing an amazing painting together,
0:41:14 > 0:41:18it's also said that they produced an illegitimate child.
0:41:20 > 0:41:23There was an awful lot of gossip about what went on
0:41:23 > 0:41:25at Lawrence's sittings. In 1806,
0:41:25 > 0:41:28he was suspected of getting too friendly
0:41:28 > 0:41:30with Caroline, the Princess of Wales,
0:41:30 > 0:41:32during late-night portrait sessions.
0:41:32 > 0:41:35Lawrence had to sign a written affidavit
0:41:35 > 0:41:38that nothing had happened, and that the door had been unlocked
0:41:38 > 0:41:41at all times.
0:41:41 > 0:41:43'George himself seems to have had ambivalent feelings
0:41:43 > 0:41:46'about Lawrence's relationship with his wife,
0:41:46 > 0:41:49'but he overcame his misgivings when he realised
0:41:49 > 0:41:51'that Lawrence could make him look fantastic.'
0:41:52 > 0:41:55In 1815, with the Battle of Waterloo,
0:41:55 > 0:41:58the Napoleonic Wars finally came to an end.
0:41:58 > 0:42:00The Allies, with Britain in the lead,
0:42:00 > 0:42:03were victorious at last.
0:42:03 > 0:42:05George celebrated the end of the wars
0:42:05 > 0:42:09by commissioning Lawrence to paint the Allied kings and commanders,
0:42:09 > 0:42:11and rewarded him with a knighthood.
0:42:11 > 0:42:14The innkeeper's boy was now Sir Thomas Lawrence.
0:42:14 > 0:42:17Painting the Allied leaders would keep Lawrence busy
0:42:17 > 0:42:20for many years to come.
0:42:22 > 0:42:26The end of the fighting would affect the British profoundly.
0:42:26 > 0:42:29'The sense of a closed, isolated island evaporated,
0:42:29 > 0:42:33'and slowly the narrow world of the dandies and St James's
0:42:33 > 0:42:37'would disappear. It was replaced by a hunger for continental travel.'
0:42:37 > 0:42:41SONG: "La Mer" by Charles Trenet
0:42:41 > 0:42:43# La mer
0:42:45 > 0:42:46# Qu'on voit danser
0:42:46 > 0:42:50# Le long des golfes clairs...
0:42:50 > 0:42:54'The later years of the Regency would see Romantic poets
0:42:54 > 0:42:57'darting about Europe, and Turner discovering the light of Venice.
0:42:57 > 0:43:01'Those who couldn't get away could always read about it
0:43:01 > 0:43:04'in the countless travelogues now being published.
0:43:04 > 0:43:07'Voyagers wrote of the warm welcome they received from everybody
0:43:07 > 0:43:10'except the French, who greeted the British
0:43:10 > 0:43:12'with vindictive irritation.'
0:43:12 > 0:43:15So, this is a really exciting moment for the British.
0:43:15 > 0:43:16They've beaten Napoleon,
0:43:16 > 0:43:19their country is the reigning European superpower.
0:43:19 > 0:43:21They want to go and see for themselves
0:43:21 > 0:43:24what their army has been fighting over.
0:43:24 > 0:43:26# Voyez
0:43:26 > 0:43:29# Pres des etangs
0:43:29 > 0:43:31# Ces grands roseaux mouilles #
0:43:31 > 0:43:36Many tourists made a detour for the battlefield of Waterloo itself,
0:43:36 > 0:43:38a victory described by the Duke of Wellington
0:43:38 > 0:43:42as "the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life".
0:43:43 > 0:43:47The Battle of Waterloo was on the 18th of June 1815.
0:43:47 > 0:43:52By the 19th of June, the battlefield was already a visitor attraction.
0:43:52 > 0:43:55An eye witness reports a carriage full of people
0:43:55 > 0:43:57coming out from Brussels. They all got out,
0:43:57 > 0:43:59and they examined the field.
0:43:59 > 0:44:03Within a few months it had become a regular day-out destination.
0:44:03 > 0:44:05There were hordes of guides to show you around.
0:44:05 > 0:44:08There were lots of little boys selling gruesome relics
0:44:08 > 0:44:11of the fallen, such as hair and bones.
0:44:14 > 0:44:17'The main feature of the battlefield now
0:44:17 > 0:44:20'is the Lion's Mound. Built in the 1820s,
0:44:20 > 0:44:23'nearly 400,000 square metres of battlefield earth
0:44:23 > 0:44:25'were shifted to build this observation point.'
0:44:30 > 0:44:34The contours of the land have been levelled out a bit
0:44:34 > 0:44:37from what the earliest visitors would have seen,
0:44:37 > 0:44:40because so much earth was scooped up to make this big hill.
0:44:40 > 0:44:44As the Duke of Wellington said, "They've ruined my battlefield!"
0:44:52 > 0:44:55'The remains of Hougoumont Farm were a particular draw
0:44:55 > 0:44:58'for the early tourists.'
0:44:58 > 0:45:02'This was the scene of some of the most bitter fighting,
0:45:02 > 0:45:05'as the French had repeatedly tried to storm the gates
0:45:05 > 0:45:07'of the British-held enclave.
0:45:11 > 0:45:14'Early visitors, in the months after the battle,
0:45:14 > 0:45:17'recorded stepping over mouldy human remains
0:45:17 > 0:45:20'and patches of charred earth where bodies had been burned.'
0:45:20 > 0:45:25When the painter Turner visited, he carefully sketched the locations
0:45:25 > 0:45:28where the greatest numbers had fallen.
0:45:31 > 0:45:33Back in England, he painted this -
0:45:33 > 0:45:35The Field Of Waterloo.
0:45:47 > 0:45:51It's the night of the battle, and storm clouds fill the sky.
0:45:54 > 0:45:56Hougoumont Farm is in flame.
0:45:58 > 0:46:02A flare warns that there are scavengers on the battlefield.
0:46:02 > 0:46:05Many of the injured were robbed and then killed by these looters.
0:46:07 > 0:46:10People are searching for their loved ones.
0:46:10 > 0:46:13The dying and the dead, the French and the English,
0:46:13 > 0:46:16are just an intermingled clump of bodies.
0:46:22 > 0:46:25'Lord Byron, the Regency's sharpest chronicler,
0:46:25 > 0:46:28'made the journey here in 1816.
0:46:29 > 0:46:33'A year after the battle, the site had been tidied up.'
0:46:35 > 0:46:38Byron found it really hard to reconcile
0:46:38 > 0:46:42his imagined visions of carnage with what he actually saw -
0:46:42 > 0:46:45fertile fields returning to farmland.
0:46:45 > 0:46:48And this is an idea that he incorporated into the canto
0:46:48 > 0:46:52of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage that he was writing at the time -
0:46:52 > 0:46:57"As the ground was before, thus let it be.
0:46:57 > 0:47:00"How that red rain hath made the harvest grow!"
0:47:02 > 0:47:06Like many other sightseers, Byron couldn't resist the opportunity
0:47:06 > 0:47:09to buy some souvenirs, and he mailed them back to his publisher
0:47:09 > 0:47:11in St James's.
0:47:14 > 0:47:17And these are some of the actual spoils of war,
0:47:17 > 0:47:20which Byron sent back to his publisher, John Murray, still here.
0:47:20 > 0:47:23Let's have a look.
0:47:29 > 0:47:35Ah! Now, we know that he sent back some cockades,
0:47:35 > 0:47:42and these are red, white and blue French Napoleonic badges
0:47:42 > 0:47:46made out of leather. Oh, look at the little eagle on the top there!
0:47:46 > 0:47:49And these would have been a very powerful sight
0:47:49 > 0:47:52in the early 19th century. To see that
0:47:52 > 0:47:54would have been like looking at a swastika today.
0:47:54 > 0:47:56It would have given that sense of fear
0:47:56 > 0:47:59to a good, respectable English person.
0:47:59 > 0:48:01This symbolises Boney, the enemy.
0:48:10 > 0:48:12Ooh, look!
0:48:14 > 0:48:17You wouldn't call that a bullet, would you? It's a piece of shot.
0:48:17 > 0:48:19That could do some damage.
0:48:21 > 0:48:24I'm just wondering what's on that now.
0:48:24 > 0:48:26That could be a bit of French blood.
0:48:35 > 0:48:37And another badge.
0:48:37 > 0:48:40These things look like a load of trinkets,
0:48:40 > 0:48:43and they are, in one sense, but in another sense,
0:48:43 > 0:48:46these all belonged to real individuals
0:48:46 > 0:48:49who probably gave their lives on the battlefield of Waterloo.
0:48:53 > 0:48:56There's something quite sinister about them.
0:49:03 > 0:49:05'Hidden away in a churchyard in Plymouth
0:49:05 > 0:49:09'lies an odd little postscript to the war with Napoleon.'
0:49:14 > 0:49:18This grave belongs to one of the strangest casualties
0:49:18 > 0:49:22of the Napoleonic Wars. He was killed after the Battle of Waterloo.
0:49:22 > 0:49:25The fighting was over. His name was John Boynes,
0:49:25 > 0:49:28and he was a stonemason who worked in the dockyards.
0:49:28 > 0:49:31And it says here he was "unfortunately drowned"
0:49:31 > 0:49:34returning from a trip to see Bonaparte
0:49:34 > 0:49:38out in Plymouth Sound. It was 1815. He was 35 years old.
0:49:41 > 0:49:45Napoleon had surrendered to the captain of the British ship
0:49:45 > 0:49:49HMS Bellerophon, then moored off the west coast of France.
0:49:51 > 0:49:55The ship took Boney to Torbay, and then to Plymouth Sound,
0:49:55 > 0:49:57where she waited around a bit
0:49:57 > 0:50:01while the government decided what to do with him.
0:50:01 > 0:50:04It was supposed to be a secret that Bonaparte was on board,
0:50:04 > 0:50:07but one of the crew put a message into a bottle
0:50:07 > 0:50:09and slipped it out to a passing ship,
0:50:09 > 0:50:11so the news was out. Once this had happened,
0:50:11 > 0:50:14Bonaparte was allowed to take a walk on the deck
0:50:14 > 0:50:17at six o'clock in the evening. He could be seen for miles around
0:50:17 > 0:50:20up there, and every boat in Plymouth got on the water
0:50:20 > 0:50:23to try to get a closer look.
0:50:27 > 0:50:30Normally there wouldn't have been anything remarkable
0:50:30 > 0:50:34about a naval vessel in Plymouth Sound. But this was Napoleon,
0:50:34 > 0:50:37the most famous man in Europe!
0:50:40 > 0:50:42Hello! Thank you.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45Thanks very much.
0:50:45 > 0:50:48The commotion made the authorities rather jittery.
0:50:48 > 0:50:51The captain of the Bellerophon, Captain Maitland,
0:50:51 > 0:50:55recorded, on the 30th of July, that there were more than a thousand
0:50:55 > 0:50:57of these little boats come to see Napoleon.
0:50:57 > 0:51:01The guard boats from the big ship tried to disperse the crowd
0:51:01 > 0:51:04by ramming them, with such force that some of the smaller vessels
0:51:04 > 0:51:07nearly capsized.
0:51:07 > 0:51:10Among them were two artists who captured the bizarre scene
0:51:10 > 0:51:12for posterity.
0:51:12 > 0:51:15John James Chalon gave us a panorama,
0:51:15 > 0:51:20complete with surrounding boats and the people straining to get a closer view.
0:51:20 > 0:51:23They were really excited to see Britain's mortal enemy,
0:51:23 > 0:51:26the man who'd directly affected the lives of everyone in Plymouth.
0:51:26 > 0:51:29He was repellent but fascinating.
0:51:33 > 0:51:37The artist who gave us the close-up was Charles Lock Eastlake.
0:51:37 > 0:51:41Eastlake was able to get his boat right up close to Napoleon.
0:51:41 > 0:51:44He took a few rapid sketches on the spot,
0:51:44 > 0:51:47and later he turned them into a full-length portrait.
0:51:47 > 0:51:50The fallen emperor looks a bit dishevelled,
0:51:50 > 0:51:54but he still seems to command the respect of a British sailor.
0:51:54 > 0:51:56Is Napoleon looking out at the crowds,
0:51:56 > 0:51:59or is he thinking about his own gloomy future?
0:51:59 > 0:52:02This picture made Eastlake's name.
0:52:02 > 0:52:04He would go on to a glorious career,
0:52:04 > 0:52:07eventually becoming president of the Royal Academy.
0:52:13 > 0:52:15There was one person notably absent
0:52:15 > 0:52:19from Napoleon's final public appearance - the Prince Regent.
0:52:19 > 0:52:23By this stage, Napoleon had been writing him personal letters,
0:52:23 > 0:52:26It would have been relatively easy for George to come to Plymouth,
0:52:26 > 0:52:31but he stayed away. I think that, even with Napoleon defeated,
0:52:31 > 0:52:34he still felt he would have been overshadowed.
0:52:38 > 0:52:42'Napoleon never did get a personal hearing from the regent.
0:52:42 > 0:52:44'After ten days, he was sent to permanent exile
0:52:44 > 0:52:47'in the South Atlantic.
0:52:47 > 0:52:50'George, meanwhile, was left with a Bonaparte fixation
0:52:50 > 0:52:53'from which he never really recovered.
0:52:53 > 0:52:57'He set about acquiring objects that connected him with Napoleon,
0:52:57 > 0:53:00'and some still remain at Buckingham Palace.'
0:53:03 > 0:53:06This amazing cloak was retrieved from Napoleon's coach
0:53:06 > 0:53:08on the battlefield of Waterloo,
0:53:08 > 0:53:11and it ended up in George's clutches.
0:53:17 > 0:53:20There's a Napoleon theme in his commissions.
0:53:20 > 0:53:23'At the end of the Marble Hall in Buckingham Palace
0:53:23 > 0:53:27'is Mars And Venus by Canova, Napoleon's favourite sculptor.
0:53:27 > 0:53:30'Oddly enough, at the end of the wars,
0:53:30 > 0:53:32'he became George's favourite sculptor too.
0:53:32 > 0:53:35'George secured this particular work
0:53:35 > 0:53:38'when he presented Canova with a snuffbox
0:53:38 > 0:53:40'containing a £500 note.'
0:53:43 > 0:53:47But the prize in George's collection was this.
0:53:47 > 0:53:49This sensational thing here
0:53:49 > 0:53:52is called the Table Of The Grand Commanders.
0:53:52 > 0:53:54Here's Alexander the Great.
0:53:55 > 0:53:58Here are other generals of antiquity.
0:53:58 > 0:54:00It's pretty much made out of porcelain.
0:54:00 > 0:54:02It was made for Napoleon,
0:54:02 > 0:54:05and a couple of years after the Battle of Waterloo,
0:54:05 > 0:54:08it was given as a gift by the restored king of France
0:54:08 > 0:54:12to George. He treasured it. It was one of his favourite possessions.
0:54:12 > 0:54:15And when he had himself painted by Thomas Lawrence,
0:54:15 > 0:54:17this table appears in the background,
0:54:17 > 0:54:20in what becomes the definitive image of George as regent,
0:54:20 > 0:54:22and then as king.
0:54:22 > 0:54:25With a few slight alterations, this would be the basis
0:54:25 > 0:54:27of all George's later state portraits.
0:54:27 > 0:54:30Lawrence reproduced the painting so often
0:54:30 > 0:54:34that he was still knocking them out even when he was on his deathbed.
0:54:34 > 0:54:36To George, this isn't just a table.
0:54:36 > 0:54:40It's a symbol of all his feelings about Napoleon.
0:54:40 > 0:54:43The message is pretty clear - this used to belong to Napoleon.
0:54:43 > 0:54:46Napoleon's been beaten. It now belongs to George.
0:54:46 > 0:54:49George himself is the grand commander.
0:54:59 > 0:55:02'When George eventually became king in 1820,
0:55:02 > 0:55:06'he would rebuild Windsor Castle as Gothic fantasy.
0:55:06 > 0:55:08'And in its design, he included a space
0:55:08 > 0:55:12'in which his victory over Napoleon could live forever.
0:55:14 > 0:55:16'This is the Waterloo Chamber,
0:55:16 > 0:55:20'where the collaboration between George and his spin-meister,
0:55:20 > 0:55:23'Thomas Lawrence, is finally played out.
0:55:23 > 0:55:26The room was originally a medieval courtyard.
0:55:26 > 0:55:29It was closed over, to recall the hulk of a ship.
0:55:30 > 0:55:34But it's what's on the walls that really grabs our attention.
0:55:34 > 0:55:38Now, this has to be one of the most fabulous rooms in Europe.
0:55:38 > 0:55:41George's big rivals as royal art patrons
0:55:41 > 0:55:43were Henry VIII and Charles I,
0:55:43 > 0:55:46but neither of them did anything on the scale of this.
0:55:46 > 0:55:49There are more than 25 portraits here by Sir Thomas Lawrence,
0:55:49 > 0:55:53and these are the men who brought you the victory of Waterloo.
0:55:53 > 0:55:56We've got sovereigns, we've got statesmen,
0:55:56 > 0:55:58we've got the actual commanders of the armies,
0:55:58 > 0:56:01and they're shown in a really theatrical manner.
0:56:01 > 0:56:04They're all larger than life, and they loom down at us
0:56:04 > 0:56:07from the walls. I'd say it was like being in their presence,
0:56:07 > 0:56:09but it isn't - it's better than that.
0:56:13 > 0:56:17'In the later years of the Regency, Lawrence travelled around Europe,
0:56:17 > 0:56:19'hanging out at diplomatic conferences
0:56:19 > 0:56:22'and painting everyone on George's wish list.
0:56:29 > 0:56:32'He returned laden down with unfinished portraits,
0:56:32 > 0:56:36'and he kept polishing them up throughout the 1820s.
0:56:45 > 0:56:47'There's something unreal about this room.
0:56:47 > 0:56:50'It doesn't reflect the grim reality of Waterloo.
0:56:50 > 0:56:53'Rather, it shows what the man who commissioned it
0:56:53 > 0:56:56'desperately wanted to be true. This is George's room.'
0:56:56 > 0:56:59This is how he saw himself,
0:56:59 > 0:57:02as a warrior king in a chivalric court.
0:57:02 > 0:57:04But what's kind of glossed over here
0:57:04 > 0:57:07is the fact that he wasn't at any of the battles.
0:57:07 > 0:57:09He was always safe on the other side of the Channel.
0:57:09 > 0:57:12He seems to have forgotten this fact as time went on.
0:57:12 > 0:57:15He would sometimes amaze people by talking about Waterloo
0:57:15 > 0:57:18as if he'd been present, and there was another battle,
0:57:18 > 0:57:20the Battle of Salamanca,
0:57:20 > 0:57:23where he claimed to have led a cavalry charge
0:57:23 > 0:57:28at the vital moment when things were looking very black indeed.
0:57:30 > 0:57:33Wellington's generals, who really had been present,
0:57:33 > 0:57:35often injured, and in some cases killed,
0:57:35 > 0:57:37are hidden away in dark corners,
0:57:37 > 0:57:41as if they're not allowed to intrude upon George's fantasy.
0:57:44 > 0:57:48This room was only completed after George and Lawrence were both dead,
0:57:48 > 0:57:51but it captures the high point of George's regency.
0:57:51 > 0:57:55Here the Prince Regent was working with an extraordinary painter
0:57:55 > 0:57:59that's really like the Regency period itself.
0:57:59 > 0:58:03It's a unique mix of appearance and reality.
0:58:03 > 0:58:06They've fused together into something that's not quite the truth
0:58:06 > 0:58:09but it's spectacular all the same.
0:58:14 > 0:58:18'Next time, we explore the Regency's greatest legacy -
0:58:18 > 0:58:22'the rebuilding of Britain in the aftermath of Waterloo.
0:58:22 > 0:58:24'As we'll discover, George wasn't alone
0:58:24 > 0:58:27'in wanting to live in a world of make-believe.'
0:58:30 > 0:58:34Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:58:34 > 0:58:38E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk
0:58:38 > 0:58:38.