Talbot Photo 2(129)

Genre: Urban Topographical Photography

One of three copies (prints 128-130) of this subject, a view looking along the facade of Queen's College, towards the Church of St Peter-in-the-East. This is the original image used as plate 1 of 'The Pencil of Nature', published on the 24th June 1844. Due to damage to the negative, a replacement photograph was taken in 1846, possibly by Nicolaas Henneman. Print trimmed to image and laid down on card measuring 208 x 265 mm.

The accompanying text for plate 1 reads, 'This building presents on its surface the most evident marks of the injuries of time and weather, in the abraded state of the stone, which probably was of a bad quality originally. The view is taken from the other side of the High Street - looking North. The time is morning. In the distance is seen at the end of a narrow street the Church of St. Peter's in the East, said to be the most ancient church in Oxford, and built during the Saxon era. This street, shortly after passing the church, turns to the left, and leads to New College.'

For the variant view, probably taken by Nicolaas Henneman in 1846, after the negative of the earlier photograph had become damaged, see Talbot Photo 2 (1-4). For a discussion of the two versions of this image, see Larry J. Schaaf, 'The Photographic Art of William Henry Fox Talbot' (Princeton University Press, Princeton and London, 2000), p. 176.

[Schaaf 1461.]