Richard Gaywood

GAYWOOD, Richard (fl.1644-1668) — London

Title-page by Gaywood to Samuel Clarke, ‘A Geographicall Description of all the Countries in the Knowne World’ (London, 1671). © The Trustees of the British Museum. Museum No. 1896,1230.244.
Title-page by Gaywood to Samuel Clarke, ‘A Geographicall Description of all the Countries in the Knowne World’ (London, 1671). © The Trustees of the British Museum. Museum No. 1896,1230.244.

Etcher & engraver. Thought (on the basis of the lettering) to have engraved, with Wenceslaus Hollar, A new map of the kingdome of Englande 1662, based on John Speed and published by Peter Stent (see BME 2011). Hind notes some contemporary annotation in a copy of Sir Francis Vere, ‘The commentaries of Sr. Francis Vere : being diverse pieces of service, wherein he had command’ 1657, implying Gaywood’s involvement in some of the maps; also produced a frontispiece for William Bagwell, ‘The mystery of astronomy made plain to the meanest capacity, by an arithmetical description of the terrestrial and celestial globes’ 1655; a twin portrait of Democritus and Heraclitus after Rembrandt, featuring a globe; a title-page for George Hartgill, ‘Astronomical tables shewing the declinations, right ascentions, and aspects of three hundred sixty five of the most principall fixed stars and the number of them in their constellations’ 1656, featuring an armillary sphere; a title-page for Samuel Clarke, ‘A geographicall description of all the countries in the known world’ 1657, incorporating a globe; a frontispiece to John Wecker, ‘Eighteen books of the secrets of art & nature : being the summe and substance of naturall philosophy’ 1660, featuring a globe; a portrait of Martin Master 1660, combined with an illustration of his surveyor’s perambulator — a pedometer or waywiser; a trade-card for Arthur Tooker, featuring a globe, 1664; a portrait of Wenceslaus Hollar; a portrait of John Ogilby (see BME 2011), used as a frontispiece to Ogilby’s ‘The fables of Aesop’ 1672; a trade-card for the instrument maker John Brown, featuring measuring instruments; a print of a bird of prey, clutching a tortoise, hovering above a globe with the British Isles at the centre, etc. Chiefly known for portraits, studies of animals, etc., many published by Stent.

The most prolific English engraver of his time, Gaywood was thought by George Vertue to have been a pupil of Wenceslaus Hollar and

Frontispiece by Gaywood to ‘Eighteen Books of the Secrets of Art & Nature : Being the Summe and Substance of Naturall Philosophy, Methodically Digested. First Designed by John Wecker Dr in Physick, and now much Augmented and Inlarged by Dr R. Read, a Like Work Never Before in the English Tongue’ (London, 1660). © The Trustees of the British Museum. Museum No. 1884,1213.36
Frontispiece by Gaywood to ‘Eighteen Books of the Secrets of Art & Nature : Being the Summe and Substance of Naturall Philosophy, Methodically Digested. First Designed by John Wecker Dr in Physick, and now much Augmented and Inlarged by Dr R. Read, a Like Work Never Before in the English Tongue’ (London, 1660). © The Trustees of the British Museum. Museum No. 1884,1213.36.

was often associated with his friend Francis Barlow (see BME 2011). He married Frances Buckin at St. Bartholomew the Great 17 Jun 1657. They baptised a daughter Elizabeth at St. Sepulchre 17 Jul 1664. He was probably the Richard Gaywood, widower, who was buried at All Saints, Isleworth, 20 Dec 1670 — his will proved the following year leaving his estate principally to daughter Betty and a son Richard. “The disciple of Hollar, whose manner of engraving, or rather of etching, he imitated. But he fell greatly short of the merit of his tutor” (Strutt) — “yet he far outshone many I have mentioned” (Walpole).

St. Cross Precinct, St. Sepulchre — 1658-1659
At the sign of the Pheasant on Snow Hill — 1660
Near the Savoy in the Strand

Adams. BM. Bryan. Globe. Grant. Griffiths. Hake. Harris. Hind. Johnson. LHD. ODNB. Strutt. Wornum.