ABSTRACT
Gilpin and his contemporaries were aware of the picturesque potential of Gothic architecture, but at Enmore Castle, designed by its owner the Second Earl of Egmont, and built in 1751–7, he pointed out that the medieval details were little more than window-dressing, obscuring a symmetrical, essentially classical, design. On the whole, the Grecian architecture seems much better adapted to a private dwelling-house, than the Gothic. It has a better assortment, if Gilpin may so speak, of proper ornaments, and proportions for all its purposes. Nor are the conveniencies, which the Grecian architecture bestows on private buildings, less considerable, than the beauty of its decorations. A large butteress or two perhaps propped the wall, in some part, where the attack of an enemy had made it weak: while the keep, rising above the castle, formed generally a grand apex to the whole.
