George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron
(22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and
peer
Peer may refer to:
Sociology
* Peer, an equal in age, education or social class; see Peer group
* Peer, a member of the peerage; related to the term "peer of the realm"
Computing
* Peer, one of several functional units in the same layer of a ne ...
.
He was one of the leading figures of the
Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the greatest of English poets. Among his best-known works are the lengthy
narratives
A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether nonfictional ( memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller, novel, etc.). Nar ...
''
Don Juan'' and ''
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' is a long narrative poem in four parts written by Lord Byron. The poem was published between 1812 and 1818. Dedicated to " Ianthe", it describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man, who is disi ...
''; many of his shorter lyrics in ''
Hebrew Melodies
''Hebrew Melodies'' is a collection of 30 poems by Lord Byron. They were largely created by Byron to accompany music composed by Isaac Nathan, who played the poet melodies which he claimed (incorrectly) dated back to the service of the Temple ...
'' also became popular.
Byron was educated at
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...
, later traveling extensively across Europe to places such as Italy, where he lived for seven years in
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
,
Ravenna
Ravenna ( , , also ; rgn, Ravèna) is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna, in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. It was the capital city of the Western Roman Empire from 408 until its collapse in 476. It then served as the c ...
, and
Pisa after he was forced to flee England due to lynching threats. During his stay in Italy, he frequently visited his friend and fellow poet
Percy Bysshe Shelley. Later in life Byron joined the
Greek War of Independence fighting the
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
and died leading a campaign during that war, for which
Greeks
The Greeks or Hellenes (; el, Έλληνες, ''Éllines'' ) are an ethnic group and nation indigenous to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea regions, namely Greece, Cyprus, Albania, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, and, to a lesser extent, oth ...
revere him as a
folk hero
A folk hero or national hero is a type of hero – real, fictional or mythological – with their name, personality and deeds embedded in the popular consciousness of a people, mentioned frequently in folk songs, folk tales and other folklore; a ...
. He died in 1824 at the age of 36 from a fever contracted after the
First
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
and
Second Sieges of Missolonghi.
His only legitimate child,
Ada Lovelace, was a founding figure in the field of
computer programming
Computer programming is the process of performing a particular computation (or more generally, accomplishing a specific computing result), usually by designing and building an executable computer program. Programming involves tasks such as anal ...
based on her notes for
Charles Babbage's
Analytical Engine. Byron's extramarital children include
Allegra Byron
Clara Allegra Byron (12 January 1817 – 20 April 1822) was the illegitimate daughter of the poet George Gordon, Lord Byron and Claire Clairmont.
Born in Bath, England, she was initially named Alba, meaning "dawn", or "white", by her mother. A ...
, who died in childhood, and possibly
Elizabeth Medora Leigh
Elizabeth Medora Leigh (15 April 1814 – 28 August 1849) was the third daughter of Augusta Leigh. It is widely speculated that she was fathered by her mother's half-brother Lord Byron, although her mother's husband Colonel George Leigh was he ...
, daughter of his half-sister Augusta Leigh.
__TOC__
Family and early life
![CaptainByron](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/CaptainByron.jpg)
George Gordon Byron was born on 22 January 1788, on
Holles Street in London, England – his birthplace is now supposedly occupied by a branch of the department store
John Lewis
John Robert Lewis (February 21, 1940 – July 17, 2020) was an American politician and civil rights activist who served in the United States House of Representatives for from 1987 until his death in 2020. He participated in the 1960 Nashville ...
.
Byron was the only child of Captain
John Byron (known as 'Jack') and his second wife Catherine Gordon, heiress of the
Gight
Gight is the name of an estate in the parish of Fyvie in the Formartine area of Aberdeenshire, Scotland, United Kingdom. It is best known as the location of the 16th-century Gight (or Formartine) Castle, ancestral home of Lord Byron.
Gight Cas ...
estate in
Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Byron's paternal grandparents were
Vice-Admiral John Byron and Sophia Trevanion. Having survived a shipwreck as a teenage midshipman, Vice Admiral John Byron set a new speed record for circumnavigating the globe. After he became embroiled in a tempestuous voyage during the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
, John was nicknamed 'Foul-Weather Jack' Byron by the press.
Byron's father had previously been somewhat scandalously married to
Amelia, Marchioness of Carmarthen, with whom he had been having an affair – the wedding took place just weeks after her divorce from her husband, and she was around eight months pregnant. The marriage was not a happy one, and their first two children – Sophia Georgina, and an unnamed boy – died in infancy. Amelia herself died in 1784 almost exactly a year after the birth of their third child, the poet's half-sister
Augusta Mary. Though Amelia succumbed to a wasting illness, probably tuberculosis, the press reported that her heart had been broken out of remorse for leaving her husband. Much later, 19th-century sources blamed Jack's own "brutal and vicious" treatment of her.
[.]
Jack then married Catherine Gordon of Gight on 13 May 1785, by all accounts only for her fortune. To claim his second wife's estate in Scotland, Byron's father took the additional surname "Gordon", becoming "John Byron Gordon", and occasionally styled himself "John Byron Gordon of Gight". Byron's mother had to sell her land and title to pay her new husband's debts, and in the space of two years, the large estate, worth some £23,500, had been squandered, leaving the former heiress with an annual income in trust of only £150.
In a move to avoid his creditors, Catherine accompanied her profligate husband to France in 1786, but returned to England at the end of 1787 to give birth to her son.
The boy was born on 22 January in lodgings at Holles Street in London, and christened at
St Marylebone Parish Church
St Marylebone Parish Church is an Anglican church on the Marylebone Road in London. It was built to the designs of Thomas Hardwick in 1813–17. The present site is the third used by the parish for its church. The first was further south, near Ox ...
as "George Gordon Byron". His father appears to have wished to call his son 'William', but as her husband remained absent, the young Byron's mother named him after her own father
George Gordon of Gight
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the ...
, who was a descendant of
James I of Scotland
James I (late July 139421 February 1437) was King of Scots from 1406 until his assassination in 1437. The youngest of three sons, he was born in Dunfermline Abbey to King Robert III and Annabella Drummond. His older brother David, Duke of ...
, and died by suicide in 1779.
![Byronmother](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Byronmother.jpg)
Catherine moved back to
Aberdeenshire in 1790, where Byron spent part of his childhood.
His father soon joined them in their lodgings in Queen Street, but the couple quickly separated. Catherine regularly experienced mood swings and bouts of melancholy,
which could be partly explained by her husband's continuingly borrowing money from her. As a result, she fell even further into debt to support his demands. It was one of these importunate loans that allowed him to travel to
Valenciennes
Valenciennes (, also , , ; nl, label=also Dutch, Valencijn; pcd, Valincyinnes or ; la, Valentianae) is a commune in the Nord department, Hauts-de-France, France.
It lies on the Scheldt () river. Although the city and region experienced a ...
, France, where he died of a "long & suffering illness" – probably tuberculosis – in 1791.
When Byron's great-uncle, who was posthumously labelled
the "wicked" Lord Byron, died on 21 May 1798, the 10-year-old boy became the sixth Baron Byron of
Rochdale
Rochdale ( ) is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, at the foothills of the South Pennines in the dale on the River Roch, northwest of Oldham and northeast of Manchester. It is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough ...
and inherited the ancestral home,
Newstead Abbey
Newstead Abbey, in Nottinghamshire, England, was formerly an Augustinian priory. Converted to a domestic home following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, it is now best known as the ancestral home of Lord Byron.
Monastic foundation
The prio ...
, in Nottinghamshire. His mother proudly took him to England, but the Abbey was in an embarrassing state of disrepair and, rather than living there, she decided to lease it to
Lord Grey de Ruthyn, among others, during Byron's adolescence.
Described as "a woman without judgment or self-command", Catherine either spoiled and indulged her son or vexed him with her capricious stubbornness. Her drinking disgusted him and he often mocked her for being short and corpulent, which made it difficult for her to catch him to discipline him. Byron had been born with a deformed right foot; his mother once retaliated and, in a fit of temper, referred to him as "a lame brat".
[.] However, Byron's biographer,
Doris Langley-Moore, in her 1974 book, ''Accounts Rendered'', paints a more sympathetic view of Mrs Byron, showing how she was a staunch supporter of her son and sacrificed her own precarious finances to keep him in luxury at Harrow and Cambridge. Langley-Moore questions 19th-century biographer
John Galt
John Galt () is a character in Ayn Rand's novel ''Atlas Shrugged'' (1957). Although he is not identified by name until the last third of the novel, he is the object of its often-repeated question "Who is John Galt?" and of the quest to discover ...
's claim that she over-indulged in alcohol.
Upon the death of Byron's mother-in-law Judith Noel, the Hon. Lady Milbanke, in 1822, her will required that he change his surname to "Noel" so as to inherit half of her estate. He obtained a
Royal Warrant, allowing him to "take and use the surname of Noel only" and to "subscribe the said surname of Noel before all titles of honour". From that point he signed himself "Noel Byron" (the usual signature of a peer being merely the peerage, in this case simply "Byron"). It is speculated that this was so that his initials would read "N.B.", mimicking those of his hero,
Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader wh ...
. Lady Byron eventually succeeded to the
Barony of Wentworth, becoming "Lady Wentworth".
Education
Byron received his early formal education at
Aberdeen Grammar School
Aberdeen Grammar School is a state secondary school in Aberdeen, Scotland. It is one of thirteen secondary schools run by the Aberdeen City Council educational department.
It is the oldest school in the city and one of the oldest grammar school ...
in 1798 until his move back to England as a 10 year old. In August 1799 he entered the school of Dr.
William Glennie
William Glennie (7 April 1761 – 7 January 1828) was a teacher to Lord Byron and father to a number of Australian pioneers.
Early life
He was born 1761 in Drumoak, Aberdeenshire, the son of John Glennie and Jean Mitchell. He married Mary Gardi ...
, in
Dulwich
Dulwich (; ) is an area in south London, England. The settlement is mostly in the London Borough of Southwark, with parts in the London Borough of Lambeth, and consists of Dulwich Village, East Dulwich, West Dulwich, and the Southwark half ...
.
[.] Placed under the care of a Dr. Bailey, he was encouraged to exercise in moderation but could not restrain himself from "violent" bouts in an attempt to overcompensate for his deformed foot. His mother interfered with his studies, often withdrawing him from school, with the result that he lacked discipline and his classical studies were neglected.
In 1801, he was sent to
Harrow School, where he remained until July 1805.
An undistinguished student and an unskilled cricketer, he did represent the school during the very first
Eton v Harrow
The Eton v Harrow cricket match is an annual match between public school rivals Eton College and Harrow School. It is one of the longest-running annual sporting fixtures in the world and is the last annual school cricket match still to be pla ...
cricket match at
Lord's in 1805.
His lack of moderation was not restricted to physical exercise. Byron fell in love with Mary Chaworth, whom he met while at school,
and she was the reason he refused to return to Harrow in September 1803. His mother wrote, "He has no indisposition that I know of but love, desperate love, the worst of all maladies in my opinion. In short, the boy is distractedly in love with Miss Chaworth."
In Byron's later
memoirs, "Mary Chaworth is portrayed as the first object of his adult sexual feelings."
![John Fitzgibbon 2nd Earl of Clare-cropped](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9a/John_Fitzgibbon_2nd_Earl_of_Clare-cropped.jpg)
Byron finally returned in January 1804,
to a more settled period, which saw the formation of a circle of emotional involvements with other Harrow boys, which he recalled with great vividness: "My school friendships were with (for I was always violent)". The most enduring of those was with
John FitzGibbon, 2nd Earl of Clare
John FitzGibbon, 2nd Earl of Clare KP GCH PC (10 July 1792 – 18 August 1851) was an Anglo Irish aristocrat and politician.
Early life
FitzGibbon was born on 10 July 1792. He was the eldest son of John FitzGibbon, 1st Earl of Clare and ...
—four years Byron's junior—whom he was to meet unexpectedly many years later in Italy (1821). His nostalgic poems about his Harrow friendships, ''Childish Recollections'' (1806), express a prescient "consciousness of sexual differences that may in the end make England untenable to him." Letters to Byron in the John Murray archive contain evidence of a previously unremarked if short-lived romantic relationship with a younger boy at Harrow,
John Thomas Claridge.
The following autumn, he entered
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...
, where he met and formed a close friendship with the younger John Edleston. About his "protégé" he wrote, "He has been my almost constant associate since October, 1805, when I entered Trinity College. His voice first attracted my attention, his countenance fixed it, and his manners attached me to him for ever." Byron composed ''Thyrza'', a series of elegies, in his memory.
[.] In later years, he described the affair as "a violent, though love and passion". This statement, however, needs to be read in the context of hardening public attitudes toward homosexuality in England and the severe sanctions (including public hanging) against convicted or even suspected offenders. The liaison, on the other hand, may well have been "pure" out of respect for Edleston's innocence, in contrast to the (probably) more sexually overt relations experienced at Harrow School. The poem "The Cornelian" was written about the cornelian that Byron received from Edleston.
Byron spent three years at Trinity College, engaging in sexual escapades, boxing, horse riding, and gambling. While at
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...
, he also formed lifelong friendships with men such as
John Cam Hobhouse, who initiated him into the Cambridge Whig Club, which endorsed liberal politics, and
Francis Hodgson, a Fellow at King's College, with whom he corresponded on literary and other matters until the end of his life.
Career
Early career
![Burgage Manor - geograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/Burgage_Manor_-_geograph.org.uk_-_1144170.jpg)
While not at school or college, Byron dwelt at his mother's residence Burgage Manor in
Southwell, Nottinghamshire
Southwell (, ) is a minster and market town in the district of Newark and Sherwood in Nottinghamshire, England. It is home to the grade-I listed Southwell Minster, the cathedral of the Anglican Diocese of Southwell and Nottingham. The populat ...
.
While there, he cultivated friendships with
Elizabeth Bridget Pigot
Elizabeth Bridget Pigot (1783–1866) was a correspondent, friend and biographic source for Lord Byron.
Biography
Pigot was born on 20 September 1783 in St Werburgh's parish in Derby, to Dr John Hollis Pigot and his wife Margaret (born Becher). ...
and her brother John, with whom he staged two plays for the entertainment of the community. During this time, with the help of Elizabeth Pigot, who copied many of his rough drafts, he was encouraged to write his first volumes of poetry. ''Fugitive Pieces'' was printed by Ridge of Newark, which contained poems written when Byron was only 17. However, it was promptly recalled and burned on the advice of his friend the Reverend J. T. Becher, on account of its more amorous verses, particularly the poem ''To Mary''.
''Hours of Idleness'', which collected many of the previous poems, along with more recent compositions, was the culminating book. The savage, anonymous criticism this received (now known to be the work of
Henry Peter Brougham
Henry Peter Brougham, 1st Baron Brougham and Vaux, (; 19 September 1778 – 7 May 1868) was a British statesman who became Lord High Chancellor and played a prominent role in passing the 1832 Reform Act and 1833 Slavery Abolition Act.
...
) in the ''
Edinburgh Review'' prompted his first major satire,
''English Bards and Scotch Reviewers'' (1809). It was put into the hands of his relation
R. C. Dallas
Robert Charles Dallas (1754 – 1824) was a Jamaican-born British poet and conservative writer. He is known also for a contentious book on Lord Byron, and a history of the Second Maroon War.
Family
Robert Charles Dallas was born in Kingston, Ja ...
, requesting him to "...get it published without his name."
Alexander Dallas gave a large series of changes and alterations, as well as the reasoning for some of them. He also stated that Byron had originally intended to prefix an argument to this poem, and Dallas quoted it. Although published anonymously, by April, R. C. Dallas wrote that "you are already pretty generally known to be the author". The work so upset some of his critics they challenged Byron to a duel; over time, in subsequent editions, it became a mark of prestige to be the target of Byron's pen.
![George Gordon Byron Autograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9d/George_Gordon_Byron_Autograph.jpg)
After his return from travels he again entrusted R. C. Dallas as his literary agent to publish his poem ''
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' is a long narrative poem in four parts written by Lord Byron. The poem was published between 1812 and 1818. Dedicated to " Ianthe", it describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man, who is disi ...
'', which Byron thought to be of little account. The first two cantos of ''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' were published in 1812 and were received with acclaim.
[.] In his own words, "I awoke one morning and found myself famous." He followed up his success with the poem's last two cantos, as well as four equally celebrated "Oriental Tales": ''
The Giaour
''The Giaour'' is a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1813 by John Murray and printed by Thomas Davison. It was the first in the series of Byron's Oriental romances. ''The Giaour'' proved to be a great success when published, consolidati ...
'', ''
The Bride of Abydos
''The Bride of Abydos'' is a poem written by Lord Byron in 1813. One of his earlier works, ''The Bride of Abydos'' is considered to be one of his "Heroic Poems", along with '' The Giaour'', '' Lara'', '' The Siege of Corinth'', '' The Corsair' ...
'', ''
The Corsair
''The Corsair'' (1814) is a long tale in verse written by Lord Byron (see 1814 in poetry) and published by John Murray in London. It was extremely popular, selling ten thousand copies on its first day of sale, and was influential throughout the ...
'', and ''
Lara
Lara may refer to:
Places
* Lara (state), a state in Venezuela
*Electoral district of Lara, an electoral district in Victoria, Australia
* Lara, Antalya, an urban district in Turkey
* Lara, Victoria, a township in Australia
* Lara de los In ...
''. About the same time, he began his intimacy with his future biographer,
Thomas Moore
Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852) was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist celebrated for his ''Irish Melodies''. Their setting of English-language verse to old Irish tunes marked the transition in popular Irish culture from Irish ...
.
First travels to the East
![Teresa Makri 1870](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Teresa_Makri_1870.jpg)
Byron racked up numerous debts as a young man, owing to what his mother termed a "reckless disregard for money".
She lived at Newstead during this time, in fear of her son's creditors.
He had planned to spend early 1808 cruising with his cousin
George Bettesworth, who was captain of the 32-gun frigate
HMS ''Tartar''. Bettesworth's death at the
Battle of Alvøen in May 1808 made that impossible.
From 1809 to 1811, Byron went on the
Grand Tour
The Grand Tour was the principally 17th- to early 19th-century custom of a traditional trip through Europe, with Italy as a key destination, undertaken by upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank (typically accompanied by a tut ...
, then customary for a young nobleman. He travelled with Hobhouse for the first year and his entourage of servants included Byron's trustworthy valet,
William Fletcher. Fletcher was often the butt of Hobhouse and Byron’s humour. The
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ...
forced him to avoid most of Europe, and he instead turned to the
Mediterranean
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western Europe, Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa ...
. The journey provided the opportunity to flee creditors, as well as to meet a former love, Mary Chaworth (the subject of his poem "To a Lady: On Being Asked My Reason for Quitting England in the Spring").
Letters to Byron from his friend Charles Skinner Matthews reveal that a key motive was also the hope of homosexual experiences. Attraction to the
Levant
The Levant () is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean region of Western Asia. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is ...
was probably also a reason; he had read about the
Ottoman and
Persia
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
n lands as a child, was attracted to
Islam (especially
Sufi mysticism), and later wrote, "With these countries, and events connected with them, all my really poetical feelings begin and end."
Byron began his trip in
Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...
from where he wrote a letter to his friend Mr Hodgson in which he describes his mastery of the Portuguese language, consisting mainly of swearing and insults. Byron particularly enjoyed his stay in
Sintra
Sintra (, ) is a town and municipality in the Greater Lisbon region of Portugal, located on the Portuguese Riviera. The population of the municipality in 2011 was 377,835, in an area of . Sintra is one of the most urbanized and densely populat ...
that is described in ''
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' is a long narrative poem in four parts written by Lord Byron. The poem was published between 1812 and 1818. Dedicated to " Ianthe", it describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man, who is disi ...
'' as "glorious Eden". From Lisbon he travelled overland to
Seville
Seville (; es, Sevilla, ) is the capital and largest city of the Spanish autonomous community of Andalusia and the province of Seville. It is situated on the lower reaches of the River Guadalquivir, in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula ...
,
Jerez de la Frontera
Jerez de la Frontera (), or simply Jerez (), is a Spanish city and Municipalities of Spain, municipality in the province of Cádiz in the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Andalusia, in southwestern Spain, located midway bet ...
,
Cádiz
Cádiz (, , ) is a city and port in southwestern Spain. It is the capital of the Province of Cádiz, one of eight that make up the autonomous community of Andalusia.
Cádiz, one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in Western Europe, ...
, and
Gibraltar
)
, anthem = " God Save the King"
, song = " Gibraltar Anthem"
, image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg
, map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe
, map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green
, mapsize =
, image_map2 = Gib ...
, and from there by sea on to Sardinia,
Malta
Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...
, and
Greece
Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...
.
While in Athens, Byron met 14-year-old
Nicolo Giraud
Nicolo or Nicolas Giraud ( – after 1815) was a friend of English Romantic poet Lord Byron. The two met in 1809 while Byron was staying in Athens. Giraud, who at that time of their relationship was a fourteen-year-old majordomo and then stud ...
, with whom he became quite close and who taught him Italian. It has been suggested that the two had an intimate relationship, including a sexual affair. Byron sent Giraud to school at a monastery in
Malta
Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...
and bequeathed him the sizeable sum of £7,000. The will, however, was later cancelled. Byron wrote to Hobhouse from Athens, "I am tired of pl & opt Cs, the last thing I could be tired of." Opt Cs refers to a quote from ''
Petronius' Satyricon,'' "," "complete intercourse to one's heart's desire," their shared code for
homosexual experiences.
In 1810 in Athens, Byron wrote "
Maid of Athens, ere we part" for a 12-year-old girl, Teresa Makri (1798–1875).
Byron and Hobhouse made their way to
Smyrna
Smyrna ( ; grc, Σμύρνη, Smýrnē, or , ) was a Greek city located at a strategic point on the Aegean coast of Anatolia. Due to its advantageous port conditions, its ease of defence, and its good inland connections, Smyrna rose to promi ...
, where they cadged a ride to
Constantinople
la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه
, alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya ( Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis ( ...
on
HMS ''Salsette''. On May 3rd, 1810, while ''Salsette'' was anchored awaiting Ottoman permission to dock at the city, Byron and Lieutenant Ekenhead, of ''Salsette''s Marines, swam the
Hellespont. Byron commemorated this feat in the second canto of ''
Don Juan''. He returned to England from Malta in July 1811 aboard .
England 1811–1816
![George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron by Richard Westall (2)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/George_Gordon_Byron%2C_6th_Baron_Byron_by_Richard_Westall_%282%29.jpg)
After the publication of the first two cantos of ''
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' is a long narrative poem in four parts written by Lord Byron. The poem was published between 1812 and 1818. Dedicated to " Ianthe", it describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man, who is disi ...
'' (1812), Byron became a celebrity. "He rapidly became the most brilliant star in the dazzling world of Regency London. He was sought after at every society venue, elected to several exclusive clubs, and frequented the most fashionable London drawing-rooms."
During this period in England he produced many works, including ''
The Giaour
''The Giaour'' is a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1813 by John Murray and printed by Thomas Davison. It was the first in the series of Byron's Oriental romances. ''The Giaour'' proved to be a great success when published, consolidati ...
,
The Bride of Abydos
''The Bride of Abydos'' is a poem written by Lord Byron in 1813. One of his earlier works, ''The Bride of Abydos'' is considered to be one of his "Heroic Poems", along with '' The Giaour'', '' Lara'', '' The Siege of Corinth'', '' The Corsair' ...
'' (1813), ''
Parisina
''Parisina'' is a 586-line poem written by Lord Byron. It was probably written between 1812 and 1815, and published on 13 February 1816.
It is based on a story related by Edward Gibbon in his '' Miscellaneous Works'' (1796) about Niccolò III d ...
'', and ''
The Siege of Corinth'' (1815). On the initiative of the composer
Isaac Nathan
Isaac Nathan (15 January 1864) was an English composer, musicologist, journalist and self-publicist, who has been called the "father of Australian music".
Early success
Isaac Nathan was born around 1791 in the English city of Canterbury to a '' ...
, he produced in 1814–1815 the ''
Hebrew Melodies
''Hebrew Melodies'' is a collection of 30 poems by Lord Byron. They were largely created by Byron to accompany music composed by Isaac Nathan, who played the poet melodies which he claimed (incorrectly) dated back to the service of the Temple ...
'' (including what became some of his best-known lyrics, such as "
She Walks in Beauty
"She Walks in Beauty" is a short lyrical poem in iambic tetrameter written in 1814 by Lord Byron, and is one of his most famous works.
It is said to have been inspired by an event in Byron's life. On 11 June 1814, Byron attended a party in Lon ...
" and "
The Destruction of Sennacherib
"The Destruction of Sennacherib" is a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1815 in his ''Hebrew Melodies'' (in which it was titled The Destruction of Semnacherib). The poem is based on the biblical account of the historical Assyrian siege of ...
"). Involved at first in an affair with
Lady Caroline Lamb
Lady Caroline Lamb (née Ponsonby; 13 November 1785 – 25 January 1828) was an Anglo-Irish aristocrat and novelist, best known for ''Glenarvon'', a Gothic novel. In 1812 she had an affair with Lord Byron, whom she described as "mad, bad, and ...
(who called him "mad, bad and dangerous to know") and with other lovers and also pressed by debt, he began to seek a suitable marriage, considering – amongst others –
Annabella Millbanke
Anne Isabella Noel Byron, 11th Baroness Wentworth and Baroness Byron (''née'' Milbanke; 17 May 1792 – 16 May 1860), nicknamed Annabella and commonly known as Lady Byron, was wife of poet George Gordon Byron, more commonly known as Lord Byro ...
. However, in 1813 he met for the first time in four years his half-sister,
Augusta Leigh
Augusta Maria Leigh (''née'' Byron; 26 January 1783 – 12 October 1851) was the only daughter of John "Mad Jack" Byron, the poet Lord Byron's father, by his first wife, Amelia, née Darcy (Lady Conyers in her own right and the divorced wife ...
. Rumours of incest surrounded the pair; Augusta's daughter Medora (b. 1814) was suspected to have been Byron's child. To escape from growing debts and rumours, Byron pressed in his determination to marry Annabella, who was said to be the likely heiress of a rich uncle. They married on January 2nd, 1815, and their daughter,
Ada
Ada may refer to:
Places
Africa
* Ada Foah, a town in Ghana
* Ada (Ghana parliament constituency)
* Ada, Osun, a town in Nigeria
Asia
* Ada, Urmia, a village in West Azerbaijan Province, Iran
* Ada, Karaman, a village in Karaman Province, ...
, was born in December of that year. However, Byron's continuing obsession with Augusta Leigh (and his continuing sexual escapades with actresses such as
Charlotte Mardyn
Charlotte Mardyn (1789 – after 1844) was an English actress of Irish descent of the early 19th-century who was rumoured to have been the mistress of Lord Byron.
Early life
Little is known of her early life or origins owing to her telling va ...
and others) made their marital life a misery. Annabella considered Byron insane, and in January 1816 she left him, taking their daughter, and began proceedings for a legal separation. Their separation was made legal in a private settlement in March 1816. The scandal of the separation, the rumours about Augusta, and ever-increasing debts forced him to leave England in April 1816, never to return.
Life abroad (1816–1824)
Switzerland and the Shelleys
File:Portrait of Percy Bysshe Shelley by Curran, 1819.jpg, Percy Bysshe Shelley, 1819
File:Claire Clairmont, by Amelia Curran.jpg, Claire Clairmont
Clara Mary Jane Clairmont (27 April 1798 – 19 March 1879), or Claire Clairmont as she was commonly known, was the stepsister of the writer Mary Shelley and the mother of Lord Byron's daughter Allegra. She is thought to be the subject of a poe ...
, 1819
File:Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Rothwell.tif, Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel '' Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also ...
, 1840
After this break-up of his domestic life, and by pressure on the part of his creditors, which led to the sale of his library, Byron left England, and never returned. (Despite his dying wishes, however, his body was returned for burial in England.) He journeyed through Belgium and continued up the
Rhine
), Surselva, Graubünden, Switzerland
, source1_coordinates=
, source1_elevation =
, source2 = Rein Posteriur/Hinterrhein
, source2_location = Paradies Glacier, Graubünden, Switzerland
, source2_coordinates=
, so ...
river. In the summer of 1816 he settled at the
Villa Diodati
The Villa Diodati is a mansion in the village of Cologny near Lake Geneva in Switzerland, notable because Lord Byron rented it and stayed there with John Polidori in the summer of 1816. Mary Shelley and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who had rented a house ...
by
Lake Geneva
, image = Lake Geneva by Sentinel-2.jpg
, caption = Satellite image
, image_bathymetry =
, caption_bathymetry =
, location = Switzerland, France
, coords =
, lake_type = Glacial la ...
, Switzerland, with his personal physician,
John William Polidori. There Byron befriended the poet
Percy Bysshe Shelley and Shelley's future wife,
Mary Godwin. He was also joined by Mary's stepsister,
Claire Clairmont
Clara Mary Jane Clairmont (27 April 1798 – 19 March 1879), or Claire Clairmont as she was commonly known, was the stepsister of the writer Mary Shelley and the mother of Lord Byron's daughter Allegra. She is thought to be the subject of a poe ...
, with whom he'd had an affair in London. Several times Byron went to see
Germaine de Staël
Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein (; ; 22 April 176614 July 1817), commonly known as Madame de Staël (), was a French woman of letters and political theorist, the daughter of banker and French finance minister Jacques Necker and Suzan ...
and her
Coppet group
The Coppet group (''Groupe de Coppet''), also known as the Coppet circle, was an informal intellectual and literary gathering centred on Germaine de Staël during the time period between the establishment of the Napoleonic First Empire (1804) a ...
, which turned out to be a valid intellectual and emotional support to Byron at the time.
![Lord Byron - Childe Harold's Pilgimage - Dugdale edition](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/Lord_Byron_-_Childe_Harold%27s_Pilgimage_-_Dugdale_edition.jpg)
Kept indoors at the
Villa Diodati
The Villa Diodati is a mansion in the village of Cologny near Lake Geneva in Switzerland, notable because Lord Byron rented it and stayed there with John Polidori in the summer of 1816. Mary Shelley and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who had rented a house ...
by the "incessant rain" of
"that wet, ungenial summer" over three days in June, the five turned to reading fantastical stories, including ''
Fantasmagoriana
''Fantasmagoriana'' is a French anthology of German ghost stories, translated anonymously by Jean-Baptiste Benoît Eyriès and published in 1812. Most of the stories are from the first two volumes of Johann August Apel and Friedrich Laun's (1 ...
'', and then devising their own tales. Mary Shelley produced what would become ''
Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus
''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a Sapience, sapient Frankenstein's monster, creature ...
'', and Polidori produced ''
The Vampyre
"The Vampyre" is a short work of prose fiction written in 1819 by John William Polidori taken from the story Lord Byron told as part of a contest among Polidori, Mary Shelley, Lord Byron, and Percy Shelley. The same contest produced the novel '' ...
'', the progenitor of the
Romantic vampire genre. ''The Vampyre'' was the inspiration for a fragmentary story of Byron's, "
A Fragment".
Byron's story fragment was published as a postscript to ''
Mazeppa''; he also wrote the third canto of ''Childe Harold''.
Italy
Byron wintered in
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
, pausing in his travels when he fell in love with Marianna Segati, in whose Venice house he was lodging, and who was soon replaced by 22 year-old Margarita Cogni; both women were married. Cogni could not read or write, and she left her husband to move in with Byron. Their fighting often caused Byron to spend the night in his
gondola
The gondola (, ; vec, góndoła ) is a traditional, flat-bottomed Venetian rowing boat, well suited to the conditions of the Venetian lagoon. It is typically propelled by a gondolier, who uses a rowing oar, which is not fastened to the hull, ...
; when he asked her to leave the house, she threw herself into the Venetian canal.
![Bayron's visit to San Lazzaro by Aivazovsky (1899)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/Bayron%27s_visit_to_San_Lazzaro_by_Aivazovsky_%281899%29.jpg)
In 1816, Byron visited
San Lazzaro degli Armeni
San Lazzaro degli Armeni (, "Saint Lazarus of the Armenians"; called Saint Lazarus Island in English sources; hy, Սուրբ Ղազար, Surb Ghazar) is a small island in the Venetian Lagoon which has been home to the monastery of the Mekhita ...
in Venice, where he acquainted himself with
Armenian culture
The culture of Armenia encompasses many elements that are based on the geography, literature, architecture, dance, and music of the people.
Creative arts
Literature
Literature began in Armenia around 401 A.D. The majority of the literary ...
with the help of the monks belonging to the
Mechitarist Order. With the help of Father Pascal Aucher (Harutiun Avkerian), he learned the
Armenian language
Armenian ( classical: , reformed: , , ) is an Indo-European language and an independent branch of that family of languages. It is the official language of Armenia. Historically spoken in the Armenian Highlands, today Armenian is widely spoken th ...
and attended many seminars about language and history. He co-authored ''Grammar English and Armenian'' in 1817, an English textbook written by Aucher and corrected by Byron, and ''A Grammar Armenian and English'' in 1819, a project he initiated of a grammar of Classical Armenian for English speakers, where he included quotations from
classical and
modern Armenian
Modern Armenian ( hy, աշխարհաբար, ''ashkharhabar'' or ''ašxarhabar'', literally the "secular/lay language") is the modern vernacular (vulgar) form of the Armenian language. Although it first appeared in the 14th century, it was not until ...
.
Byron later helped to compile the ''English Armenian Dictionary'' (''Barraran angleren yev hayeren'', 1821) and wrote the preface, in which he explained Armenian oppression by the Turkish
pasha
Pasha, Pacha or Paşa ( ota, پاشا; tr, paşa; sq, Pashë; ar, باشا), in older works sometimes anglicized as bashaw, was a higher rank in the Ottoman political and military system, typically granted to governors, generals, dignitar ...
s and the Persian satraps and the Armenian struggle of liberation. His two main translations are the ''Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians'', two chapters of
Movses Khorenatsi
Movses Khorenatsi (ca. 410–490s AD; hy, Մովսէս Խորենացի, , also written as ''Movses Xorenac‘i'' and Moses of Khoren, Moses of Chorene, and Moses Chorenensis in Latin sources) was a prominent Armenian historian from the late a ...
's ''
History of Armenia'', and sections of
Nerses of Lambron
Saint Nerses of Lambron (, Nerses Lambronatsi) (1153–1198) was the Archbishop of Tarsus in the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia who is remembered as one of the most significant figures in Armenian literature and ecclesiastical history.
Life
Nerses ...
's ''Orations''.
[ Soghomonyan, Soghomon A. "''Բայրոն, Ջորջ Նոել Գորդոն''" (Byron, George Noel Gordon). ]Soviet Armenian Encyclopedia
The ''Armenian Soviet Encyclopedia'' ( hy, Հայկական սովետական հանրագիտարան, ''Haykakan sovetakan hanragitaran''; ASE) publishing house was established in 1967 as a department of the Institute of History of the Armeni ...
. vol. ii. Yerevan, Armenian SSR: Armenian Academy of Sciences
The National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia (NAS RA) ( hy, Հայաստանի Հանրապետության գիտությունների ազգային ակադեմիա, ՀՀ ԳԱԱ, ''Hayastani Hanrapetut’yan gitut’yunneri az ...
, 1976, pp. 266–267.
His fascination was so great that he even considered a replacement of the
Cain story of the Bible with that of the legend of Armenian patriarch
Haik. He may be credited with the birth of
Armenology and its propagation. His profound lyricism and ideological courage has inspired many Armenian poets, the likes of
Ghevond Alishan,
Smbat Shahaziz Smbat Shahaziz ( hy, Սմբատ Շահազիզ, 1840 in Ashtarak, Armenia – January 5, 1908 in Moscow, Russia) was an Armenian educator, poet and publicist.
Biography
Born in a family of a priest, he was the youngest of six brothers. He was h ...
,
Hovhannes Tumanyan
Hovhannes Tumanyan ( hy, Հովհաննես Թումանյան, classical spelling: Յովհաննէս Թումանեան, – March 23, 1923) was an Armenian poet, writer, translator, and literary and public activist. He is the nationa ...
, Ruben Vorberian, and others.
In 1817, he journeyed to
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
. On returning to Venice, he wrote the fourth canto of ''Childe Harold''. About the same time, he sold Newstead Abby and published ''
Manfred
''Manfred: A dramatic poem'' is a closet drama written in 1816–1817 by Lord Byron. It contains supernatural elements, in keeping with the popularity of the ghost story in England at the time. It is a typical example of a Gothic fiction.
Byr ...
'', ''
Cain'', and ''The Deformed Transformed''. The first five cantos of ''
Don Juan'' were written between 1818 and 1820. During this period he met the 18-year-old
Countess Guiccioli, who found her first love in Byron; he asked her to elope with him.
Because of his love for the local aristocratic, young, newly married Teresa Guiccioli, Byron lived in
Ravenna
Ravenna ( , , also ; rgn, Ravèna) is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna, in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. It was the capital city of the Western Roman Empire from 408 until its collapse in 476. It then served as the c ...
from 1819 to 1821. Here he continued ''Don Juan'' and wrote the ''Ravenna Diary'' and ''My Dictionary and Recollections''. Around this time he received visits from
Percy Bysshe Shelley, as well as from
Thomas Moore
Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852) was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist celebrated for his ''Irish Melodies''. Their setting of English-language verse to old Irish tunes marked the transition in popular Irish culture from Irish ...
, to whom he confided his autobiography or "life and adventures", which Moore, Hobhouse, and Byron's publisher,
John Murray,
burned in 1824, a month after Byron's death.
Of Byron's lifestyle in Ravenna we know more from Shelley, who documented some of its more colourful aspects in a letter: "Lord Byron gets up at two. I get up, quite contrary to my usual custom … at 12. After breakfast we sit talking till six. From six to eight we gallop through the pine forest which divide Ravenna from the sea; we then come home and dine, and sit up gossiping till six in the morning. I don’t suppose this will kill me in a week or fortnight, but I shall not try it longer. Lord B.'s establishment consists, besides servants, of ten horses, eight enormous dogs, three monkeys, five cats, an eagle, a crow, and a falcon; and all these, except the horses, walk about the house, which every now and then resounds with their unarbitrated quarrels, as if they were the masters of it… .
.S.I find that my enumeration of the animals in this Circean Palace was defective … . I have just met on the grand staircase five peacocks, two guinea hens, and an Egyptian crane. I wonder who all these animals were before they were changed into these shapes."
![La Grotta di Byron](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/La_Grotta_di_Byron.jpg)
In 1821, Byron left Ravenna and went to live in the
Tuscan city of
Pisa, to which Teresa had also relocated. From 1821 to 1822, Byron finished Cantos 6–12 of ''Don Juan'' at Pisa, and in the same year he joined with
Leigh Hunt
James Henry Leigh Hunt (19 October 178428 August 1859), best known as Leigh Hunt, was an English critic, essayist and poet.
Hunt co-founded '' The Examiner'', a leading intellectual journal expounding radical principles. He was the centre ...
and Shelley in starting a short-lived newspaper, ''The Liberal'', in whose first number ''
The Vision of Judgment'' appeared. For the first time since his arrival in Italy, Byron found himself tempted to give dinner parties; his guests included the Shelleys,
Edward Ellerker Williams
Edward Ellerker Williams (22 April 1793 – 8 July 1822) was a retired army officer who became a friend of Percy Bysshe Shelley in the final months of his life and died with him.
Early life
Edward Williams was born in India, the son of an East ...
,
Thomas Medwin
Thomas Medwin (20 March 1788 –2 August 1869) was an early 19th-century English writer, poet and translator. He is known chiefly for his biography of his cousin, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and for published recollections of his friend, Lord Byron.
...
, John Taaffe, and
Edward John Trelawny
Edward John Trelawny (13 November 179213 August 1881) was a British biographer, novelist and adventurer who is best known for his friendship with the Romantic poets Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron. Trelawny was born in England to a family ...
; and "never", as Shelley said, "did he display himself to more advantage than on these occasions; being at once polite and cordial, full of social hilarity and the most perfect good humour; never diverging into ungraceful merriment, and yet keeping up the spirit of liveliness throughout the evening."
Shelley and Williams rented a house on the coast and had a schooner built. Byron decided to have his own yacht, and engaged Trelawny's friend, Captain
Daniel Roberts, to design and construct the boat. Named the ''Bolivar'', it was later sold to
Charles John Gardiner, 1st Earl of Blessington
Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English and French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*karilaz'' (in Latin alphabet), whose meaning was "f ...
, and
Marguerite, Countess of Blessington, when Byron left for Greece in 1823.
Byron attended the beachside cremation of Shelley, which was orchestrated by Trelawny after Williams and Shelley drowned in a boating accident on 8 July 1822. His last Italian home was in
Genoa
Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian census, the Province of ...
. While living there he was accompanied by the Countess Guiccioli, and the Blessingtons. Lady Blessington based much of the material in her book, ''Conversations with Lord Byron'', on the time spent together there. This book became an important biographical text about Byron’s life just prior to his death.
Ottoman Greece
![Lord Byron in Albanian Dress by Phillips, 1813](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/Lord_Byron_in_Albanian_Dress_by_Phillips%2C_1813.jpg)
Byron was living in Genoa in 1823, when, growing bored with his life there, he accepted overtures for his support from representatives of the Greek independence movement from the
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
. At first, Byron did not wish to leave his 22-year-old mistress, Countess Teresa Guiccioli, who had abandoned her husband to live with him. But ultimately Guiccioli's father, Count Gamba, was allowed to leave his exile in the Romagna under the condition that his daughter return to him, without Byron. At the same time that the philhellene, Edward Blaquiere, was attempting to recruit him, Byron was confused as to what he was supposed to do in Greece, writing: "Blaquiere seemed to think that I might be of some use-even ''here'';—though ''what'' he did not exactly specify". With the assistance of his banker and Captain
Daniel Roberts, Byron chartered the brig ''Hercules'' to take him to Greece. When Byron left Genoa, it caused "passionate grief" from Guiccioli, who wept openly as he sailed away. The ''Hercules'' was forced to return to port shortly afterwards. When it set sail for the final time, Guiccioli had already left Genoa. On July 16th, Byron left Genoa, arriving at
Kefalonia in the
Ionian Islands on August 4th.
His voyage is covered in detail in
Donald Prell
Donald B. Prell (July 7, 1924 – July 28, 2020) was an American World War II veteran, venture capitalist and futurist who created ''Datamation'', the first magazine devoted solely to the computer hardware and software industry.
Early life
Prell ...
's ''Sailing with Byron from Genoa to Cephalonia''. Prell also wrote of a coincidence in Byron's chartering the ''Hercules''. The vessel was launched only a few miles south of
Seaham Hall
Seaham Hall is an English country house, now run as a spa hotel, in County Durham.
History
Seaham Hall was built in the 1790s by Sir Ralph Milbanke, 6th Baronet. In 1815 the poet Lord Byron married Anne Isabella Milbanke at Seaham Hall. The fr ...
, where in 1815 Byron married Annabella Milbanke. Between 1815 and 1823 the vessel was in service between England and Canada. Suddenly in 1823, the ship's Captain decided to sail to Genoa and offer the ''Hercules'' for charter. After taking Byron to Greece, the ship returned to England, never again to venture into the Mediterranean. The ''Hercules'' was aged 37 when, on September 21,1852, she went aground near
Hartlepool, 25 miles south of
Sunderland, the place where her keel had been laid in 1815. Byron's "keel was laid" nine months before his official birth date, January 22, 1788. Therefore in ship-years, he was also 37 when he died in Missolonghi.
Byron initially stayed on the island of
Kefalonia, where he was besieged by agents of the rival Greek factions, all of whom wanted to recruit Byron to their own cause. The Ionian islands, of which Kefalonia is one, were under British rule until 1864. Byron spent £4,000 of his own money to refit the Greek fleet. When Byron travelled to the mainland of Greece on the night of December 28, 1823, Byron's ship was surprised by an Ottoman warship, which did not attack his ship, as the Ottoman captain mistook Byron's boat for a fireship. To avoid the Ottoman Navy, which he encountered several times on his voyage, Byron was forced to take a roundabout route and only reached Missolonghi on 5 January 1824.
After arriving in
Missolonghi
Missolonghi or Messolonghi ( el, Μεσολόγγι, ) is a municipality of 34,416 people (according to the 2011 census) in western Greece. The town is the capital of Aetolia-Acarnania regional unit, and the seat of the municipality of Iera Polis ...
, Byron joined forces with
Alexandros Mavrokordatos, a Greek politician with military power. Byron moved to the second floor of a two-story house and was forced to spend much of his time dealing with unruly
Souliotes
The Souliotes were an Orthodox Christian Albanian tribal community in the area of Souli in Epirus from the 16th century to the beginning of the 19th century, who via their participation in the Greek War of Independence came to identify with the ...
who demanded that Byron pay them the back-pay owed to them by the Greek government. Byron gave the Souliotes some £6,000. Byron was supposed to lead an attack on the Ottoman fortress of Navpaktos, whose Albanian garrison were unhappy due to arrears in pay, and who offered to put up only token resistance if Byron was willing to bribe them into surrendering. However, Ottoman commander Yussuf Pasha executed the mutinous Albanian officers who were offering to surrender Navpaktos to Byron and arranged to have some of the arrears paid out to the rest of the garrison. Byron never led the attack on Navpaktos because the Souliotes kept demanding that Byron pay them more and more money before they would march; Byron grew tired of their blackmail and sent them all home on 15 February 1824. Byron wrote in a note to himself: "Having tried in vain at every expence-considerable trouble—and some danger to unite the Suliotes for the good of Greece-and their own—I have come to the following resolution—I will have nothing more to do with the Suliotes-they may go to the Turks or the devil...they may cut me into more pieces than they have dissensions among them, sooner than change my resolution". At the same time, Guiccioli's brother, Pietro Gamba, who had followed Byron to Greece, exasperated Byron with his incompetence as he continually made expensive mistakes. For example, when asked to buy some cloth from Corfu, Gamba ordered the wrong cloth in excess, causing the bill to be 10 times higher than what Byron wanted. Byron wrote about his right-hand man: "Gamba—who is anything but ''lucky''—had something to do with it—and as usual—the moment he had—matters went wrong".
![Lord Byron at Missolonghi](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Lord_Byron_at_Missolonghi.jpg)
To help raise money for the revolution, Byron sold his estate in England, Rochdale Manor, which raised some £11,250. This led Byron to estimate that he now had some £20,000 at his disposal, all of which he planned to spend on the Greek cause. In today's money Byron would have been a millionaire many times over. News that a fabulously wealthy British aristocrat, known for his financial generosity, had arrived in Greece made Byron the object of much solicitation in that desperately poor country. Byron wrote to his business agent in England, "I should not like to give the Greeks but a ''half helping'' hand", saying he would have wanted to spend his entire fortune on Greek freedom. Byron found himself besieged by various people, both Greek and foreign, who tried to persuade him to open his pocketbook for support. By the end of March 1824, the so-called "Byron brigade" of 30 philhellene officers and about 200 men had been formed, paid for entirely by Byron. Leadership of the Greek cause in the Roumeli region was divided between two rival leaders: a former ''Klepht'' (bandit),
Odysseas Androutsos
Odysseas Androutsos ( el, Οδυσσέας Ανδρούτσος; 1788 – 1825; born Odysseas Verousis el, Οδυσσέας Βερούσης) was a Greek military and political commander in eastern mainland Greece and a prominent figure of the ...
; and a wealthy
Phanariot
Phanariots, Phanariotes, or Fanariots ( el, Φαναριώτες, ro, Fanarioți, tr, Fenerliler) were members of prominent Greek families in Phanar (Φανάρι, modern ''Fener''), the chief Greek quarter of Constantinople where the Ecumen ...
Prince,
Alexandros Mavrokordatos. Byron used his prestige to attempt to persuade the two rival leaders to come together to focus on defeating the Ottomans. At same time, other leaders of the Greek factions like
Petrobey Mavromichalis
Petros Mavromichalis (; 1765–1848), also known as Petrobey ( ), was a Greek general, politician and the leader of the Maniot people during the first half of the 19th century. His family had a long history of revolts against the Ottoman Emp ...
and
Theodoros Kolokotronis
Theodoros Kolokotronis ( el, Θεόδωρος Κολοκοτρώνης; 3 April 1770 – 4 February 1843) was a Greek general and the pre-eminent leader of the Greek War of Independence (1821–1829) against the Ottoman Empire. Kolokotronis's g ...
wrote letters to Byron telling him to disregard all of the Roumeliot leaders and to come to their respective areas in the Peloponnese. This drove Byron to distraction; he complained that the Greeks were hopelessly disunited and spent more time feuding with each other than trying to win independence. Byron's friend
Edward John Trelawny
Edward John Trelawny (13 November 179213 August 1881) was a British biographer, novelist and adventurer who is best known for his friendship with the Romantic poets Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron. Trelawny was born in England to a family ...
had aligned himself with Androutsos, who ruled Athens, and was now pressing for Byron to break with Mavrokordatos in favour of backing the rival Androutsos. Androutsos, having won over Trelawny to his cause, was now anxious to persuade Byron to put his wealth behind his claim to be the leader of Greece. Byron wrote with disgust about how one of the Greek captains, former ''Klepht''
Georgios Karaiskakis
Georgios Karaiskakis ( el, Γεώργιος Καραϊσκάκης), born Georgios Karaiskos ( el, Γεώργιος Καραΐσκος; 1782 – 1827), was a famous Greece, Greek military commander and a leader of the Greek War of Independence.
...
, attacked Missolonghi on April 3, 1824 with some 150 men supported by the Souliotes as he was unhappy with Mavrokordatos's leadership, which led to a brief bout of inter-Greek fighting before Karaiskakis was chased away by April 6th.
Byron adopted a nine-year-old Turkish Muslim girl called Hato, whose parents had been killed by the Greeks. He ultimately sent her to safety in Kefalonia, knowing well that religious hatred between the Orthodox Greeks and Muslim Turks was running high and that any Muslim in Greece, even a child, was in serious danger. Until 1934, most Turks did not have surnames; Hato's lack of a surname was quite typical for a Turkish family at this time.
Byron pursued his Greek page, Lukas Chalandritsanos, with whom he had fallen madly in love, but the affections went unrequited.
Byron spoiled the teenage Chalandritsanos outrageously, spending some £600 (the equivalent to about £24,600 in today's money) catering to his every whim over the course of 6 months and writing his last poems about his passion for the Greek boy. Chalandritsanos was only interested in Byron's money. When the famous Danish sculptor
Bertel Thorvaldsen heard about Byron's heroics in Greece, he voluntarily resculpted his earlier bust of Byron in Greek marble.
Death
![Lord Byron on his Death-bed c](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Lord_Byron_on_his_Death-bed_c._1826.jpg)
Mavrokordatos and Byron planned to attack the Turkish-held fortress of
Lepanto, at the mouth of the
Gulf of Corinth. Byron employed a fire-master to prepare artillery, and he took part of the rebel army under his own command despite his lack of military experience. Before the expedition could sail, on February 15, 1824, he fell ill, and bloodletting weakened him further.
He made a partial recovery, but in early April he caught a violent cold; the therapeutic bleeding insisted on by his doctors, exacerbated it. He contracted a violent fever and died in Missolonghi on 19 April.
His physician at the time,
Julius van Millingen
Julius Michael Millingen (1800–1878) was an English physician and writer. He was one of the doctors treating Lord Byron at his death.
Life
He was born in London on 19 July 1800, a son of James Millingen. He spent his early years in Calais and P ...
, son of Dutch–English archaeologist
James Millingen, was unable to prevent his death. It has been said that if Byron had lived and had gone on to defeat the Ottomans, he might have been declared
King of Greece
The Kingdom of Greece was ruled by the House of Wittelsbach between 1832 and 1862 and by the House of Glücksburg from 1863 to 1924, temporarily abolished during the Second Hellenic Republic, and from 1935 to 1973, when it was once more abolishe ...
. However, modern scholars have found such an outcome unlikely.
The British historian David Brewer wrote that in one sense, Byron failed to persuade the rival Greek factions to unite, won no victories and was successful only in the humanitarian sphere, using his great wealth to help the victims of the war, Christian and Muslim, but this did not affect the outcome of the Greek war of independence.
Brewer went on to argue,
In another sense, though, Byron achieved everything he could have wished. His presence in Greece, and in particular his death there, drew to the Greek cause not just the attention of sympathetic nations, but their increasing active participation ... Despite the critics, Byron is primarily remembered with admiration as a poet of genius, with something approaching veneration as a symbol of high ideals, and with great affection as a man: for his courage and his ironic slant on life, for his generosity to the grandest of causes and to the humblest of individuals, for the constant interplay of judgment and sympathy. In Greece he is still revered as no other foreigner, and as very few Greeks are, and like a Homeric hero he is accorded an honorific standard epithet, ''megalos kai kalos'', a great and good man.
Post mortem
Alfred Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his ...
would later recall the shocked reaction in Britain when word was received of Byron's death.
The Greeks mourned Lord Byron deeply, and he became a hero. The national poet of Greece,
Dionysios Solomos
Dionysios Solomos (; el, Διονύσιος Σολωμός ; 8 April 1798 – 9 February 1857) was a Greek poet from Zakynthos, who is considered to be Greece's national poet. He is best known for writing the ''Hymn to Liberty'' ( el, Ὕμ ...
, wrote a poem about the unexpected loss, named ''To the Death of Lord Byron''. Βύρων, the Greek form of "Byron", continues in popularity as a masculine name in Greece, and a suburb of Athens is called
Vyronas
Vyronas ( el, Βύρωνας) is a suburban town and a municipality in the southeastern part of the Athens agglomeration, Greece. The town is named after George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, the famous English poet and writer, who is a national ...
in his honour.
Byron's body was embalmed, but the Greeks wanted some part of their hero to stay with them. According to some sources, his heart remained at
Missolonghi
Missolonghi or Messolonghi ( el, Μεσολόγγι, ) is a municipality of 34,416 people (according to the 2011 census) in western Greece. The town is the capital of Aetolia-Acarnania regional unit, and the seat of the municipality of Iera Polis ...
. His other remains were sent to England (accompanied by his faithful manservant,
"Tita") for burial in
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the Unite ...
, but the Abbey refused for reason of "questionable morality".
Huge crowds viewed his coffin as he lay in state for two days at number 25
Great George Street, Westminster.
He is buried at the
Church of St. Mary Magdalene in
Hucknall
Hucknall, formerly Hucknall Torkard, is a market town in the Ashfield district of Nottinghamshire, England. It lies 7 miles north of Nottingham, 7 miles south-east of Kirkby-in-Ashfield, 9 miles from Mansfield and 10 miles south of Sutton-i ...
, Nottinghamshire. A marble slab given by the
King of Greece
The Kingdom of Greece was ruled by the House of Wittelsbach between 1832 and 1862 and by the House of Glücksburg from 1863 to 1924, temporarily abolished during the Second Hellenic Republic, and from 1935 to 1973, when it was once more abolishe ...
is laid directly above Byron's grave. His daughter
Ada Lovelace was later buried beside him.
Byron's friends raised £1,000 to commission a statue of the writer; Thorvaldsen offered to sculpt it for that amount.
However, after the statue was completed in 1834, for ten years, British institutions turned it down and it remained in storage. It was refused by the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
,
St. Paul's Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and the
National Gallery
The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director ...
before
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...
finally placed the statue of Byron in its library.
In 1969, 145 years after Byron's death, a memorial to him was finally placed in Westminster Abbey.
The memorial had been lobbied for since 1907: ''The New York Times'' wrote, "People are beginning to ask whether this ignoring of Byron is not a thing of which England should be ashamed ... a bust or a tablet might be put in the Poets' Corner and England be relieved of ingratitude toward one of her really great sons."
Robert Ripley
LeRoy Robert Ripley (February 22, 1890 – May 27, 1949) was an American cartoonist, entrepreneur, and amateur anthropologist, who is known for creating the ''Ripley's Believe It or Not!'' newspaper panel series, television show, and radio show, ...
had drawn a picture of
Boatswain's grave with the caption "Lord Byron's dog has a magnificent tomb while Lord Byron himself has none". This came as a shock to the English, particularly schoolchildren, who, Ripley said, raised funds of their own accord to provide the poet with a suitable memorial.
Close to the centre of Athens, Greece, outside the National Garden, is a statue depicting Greece in the form of a woman crowning Byron. The statue is by the French sculptors
Henri-Michel Chapu and
Alexandre Falguière
Jean Alexandre Joseph Falguière (also given as Jean-Joseph-Alexandre Falguière, or in short Alexandre Falguière) (7 September 183120 April 1900) was a French sculptor and painter.
Biography
Falguière was born in Toulouse. A pupil of the ...
. Since 2008, the anniversary of Byron's death, 19 April, has been honoured in Greece as "Byron Day".
Upon his death, the barony passed to Byron's cousin
George Anson Byron, a career naval officer.
Personal life
Relationships and scandals
File:Portrait of Lady Caroline Lamb.jpg, Lady Caroline Lamb
Lady Caroline Lamb (née Ponsonby; 13 November 1785 – 25 January 1828) was an Anglo-Irish aristocrat and novelist, best known for ''Glenarvon'', a Gothic novel. In 1812 she had an affair with Lord Byron, whom she described as "mad, bad, and ...
File:Jane elizabeth countess-of-oxford1797 john hoppner.jpg, Jane Elizabeth Scott
Jane Elizabeth Harley, Countess of Oxford and Countess Mortimer (''née'' Scott; 1774–1824) was an English noblewoman, known as a patron of the Reform movement and a lover of Lord Byron.
Life
She was a daughter of the Reverend James Scott, M.A ...
"Lady Oxford"
File:Hon. Augusta Leigh.jpg, Augusta Leigh
Augusta Maria Leigh (''née'' Byron; 26 January 1783 – 12 October 1851) was the only daughter of John "Mad Jack" Byron, the poet Lord Byron's father, by his first wife, Amelia, née Darcy (Lady Conyers in her own right and the divorced wife ...
File:Annabella Byron (1792-1860).jpg, Anne Isabella Milbanke
Anne Isabella Noel Byron, 11th Baroness Wentworth and Baroness Byron (''née'' Milbanke; 17 May 1792 – 16 May 1860), nicknamed Annabella and commonly known as Lady Byron, was wife of poet George Gordon Byron, more commonly known as Lord Byro ...
in 1812 by Charles Hayter
Charles Hayter (24 February 1761 – 1 December 1835) was an English painter.
He was the son of Charles Hayter (1728–1795), an architect and builder from Hampshire, and his wife, Elizabeth Holmes. He first trained with his father, but show ...
File:Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli.gif, Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli
Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli (1800–1873) was the married lover of Lord Byron while he was living in Ravenna and writing the first five cantos of '' Don Juan''. She wrote the biographical account ''Lord Byron's Life in Italy''.
On 19 January 1 ...
Byron described his first intense feelings at the age of seven for his distant cousin Mary Duff:
My mother used always to rally me about this childish amour, and at last, many years after, when I was sixteen, she told me one day, 'O Byron, I have had a letter from Edinburgh, and your old sweetheart, Mary Duff, is married to Mr. C***.' And what was my answer? I really cannot explain or account for my feelings at that moment, but they nearly threw me into convulsions... How the deuce did all this occur so early? Where could it originate? I certainly had no sexual ideas for years afterwards; and yet my misery, my love for that girl were so violent, that I sometimes doubt if I have ever been really attached since. Be that as it may, hearing of her marriage several years after was like a thunder-stroke – it nearly choked me – to the horror of my mother and the astonishment and almost incredulity of every body. And it is a phenomenon in my existence (for I was not eight years old) which has puzzled, and will puzzle me to the latest hour of it; and lately, I know not why, the recollection (not the attachment) has recurred as forcibly as ever...But, the more I reflect, the more I am bewildered to assign any cause for this precocity of affection.
Byron also became attached to Margaret Parker, another distant cousin.
While his recollection of his love for Mary Duff is that he was ignorant of adult sexuality during this time and was bewildered as to the source of the intensity of his feelings, he would later confess that:
My passions were developed very early – so early, that few would believe me – if I were to state the period – and the facts which accompanied it. Perhaps this was one of the reasons that caused the anticipated melancholy of my thoughts – having anticipated life.
This is the only reference Byron himself makes to the event, and he is ambiguous as to how old he was when it occurred. After his death, his lawyer wrote to a mutual friend telling him a "singular fact" about Byron's life which was "scarcely fit for narration". But he disclosed it nonetheless, thinking it might explain Byron's sexual "propensities":
When nine years old at his mother's house a Free Scotch girl ay - sometimes called Mary - Gray, one of his first caretakersused to come to bed to him and play tricks with his person.
Gray later used this knowledge as a means of ensuring his silence if he were to be tempted to disclose the "low company" she kept during drinking binges. She was later dismissed, supposedly for beating Byron when he was 11.
A few years later, while he was still a child, Lord Grey De Ruthyn (unrelated to May Gray), a suitor of his mother's, also made sexual advances on him. Byron's personality has been characterised as exceptionally proud and sensitive, especially when it came to his deformity.
His extreme reaction to seeing his mother flirting outrageously with Lord Grey De Ruthyn after the incident suggests he did not tell her of Grey's conduct toward him; he simply refused to speak to him again and ignored his mother's commands to be reconciled.
Leslie A. Marchand, one of Byron's biographers, theorises that Lord Grey De Ruthyn's advances prompted Byron's later sexual liaisons with young men at Harrow and Cambridge.
Scholars acknowledge a more or less important bisexual component in Byron's very complex sentimental and sexual life. Bernhard Jackson asserts that "Byron's sexual orientation has long been a difficult, not to say contentious, topic, and anyone who seeks to discuss it must to some degree speculate, since the evidence is nebulous, contradictory and scanty... it is not so simple to define Byron as homosexual or heterosexual: he seems rather to have been both, and either."
[Emily A. Bernhard Jackson, "Least Like Saints: The Vexed Issue of Byron's Sexuality, ''The Byron Journal'', (2010) 38#1 pp. 29–37.] Crompton states: "What was not understood in Byron's own century (except by a tiny circle of his associates) was that Byron was
bisexual". Another biographer, Fiona MacCarthy, has posited that Byron's true sexual yearnings were for adolescent males.
Byron used a code by which he communicated his homosexual Greek adventures to
John Hobhouse in England: Bernhard Jackson recalls that "Byron's early code for sex with a boy" was "Plen(um). and optabil(em). -Coit(um)"
Bullough summarises:
In 1812, Byron embarked on a well-publicised affair with the married
Lady Caroline Lamb
Lady Caroline Lamb (née Ponsonby; 13 November 1785 – 25 January 1828) was an Anglo-Irish aristocrat and novelist, best known for ''Glenarvon'', a Gothic novel. In 1812 she had an affair with Lord Byron, whom she described as "mad, bad, and ...
that shocked the British public.
She had spurned the attention of the poet on their first meeting, subsequently giving Byron what became his lasting epitaph when she famously described him as "mad, bad and dangerous to know".
This did not prevent her from pursuing him.
Byron eventually broke off the relationship and moved swiftly on to others (such as
Lady Oxford), but Lamb never entirely recovered, pursuing him even after he tired of her. She was emotionally disturbed and lost so much weight that Byron sarcastically commented to her mother-in-law, his friend
Lady Melbourne, that he was "haunted by a skeleton".
[
]
She began to stalk him, calling on him at home, sometimes dressed in disguise as a pageboy,
at a time when such an act could ruin both of them socially. Once, during such a visit, she wrote on a book at his desk, "Remember me!" As a retort, Byron wrote a poem entitled ''Remember Thee! Remember Thee!'' which concludes with the line "Thou false to him, thou fiend to me".
As a child, Byron had seen little of his half-sister
Augusta Leigh
Augusta Maria Leigh (''née'' Byron; 26 January 1783 – 12 October 1851) was the only daughter of John "Mad Jack" Byron, the poet Lord Byron's father, by his first wife, Amelia, née Darcy (Lady Conyers in her own right and the divorced wife ...
; in adulthood, he formed a close relationship with her that has been interpreted by some as incestuous,
and by others as innocent.
[ Augusta (who was married) gave birth on 15 April 1814 to her third daughter, ]Elizabeth Medora Leigh
Elizabeth Medora Leigh (15 April 1814 – 28 August 1849) was the third daughter of Augusta Leigh. It is widely speculated that she was fathered by her mother's half-brother Lord Byron, although her mother's husband Colonel George Leigh was he ...
, rumoured by some to be Byron's.
Eventually Byron began to court Lady Caroline's cousin Anne Isabella Milbanke
Anne Isabella Noel Byron, 11th Baroness Wentworth and Baroness Byron (''née'' Milbanke; 17 May 1792 – 16 May 1860), nicknamed Annabella and commonly known as Lady Byron, was wife of poet George Gordon Byron, more commonly known as Lord Byro ...
("Annabella"), who refused his first proposal of marriage but later accepted him. Milbanke was a highly moral woman, intelligent and mathematically gifted; she was also an heiress. They married at Seaham
Seaham is a seaside town in County Durham, England. Located on the Durham Coast, Seaham is situated south of Sunderland and east of Durham. The town grew from the late 19th century onwards as a result of investments in its harbour and ...
Hall, County Durham, on 2 January 1815. The marriage proved unhappy. They had a daughter, Augusta Ada. On 16 January 1816, Lady Byron left him, taking Ada with her. That same year on April 21st, Byron signed the Deed of Separation. Rumours of marital violence, adultery with actresses, incest with Augusta Leigh, and sodomy were circulated, assisted by a jealous Lady Caroline. In a letter, Augusta quoted him as saying: "Even to have such a thing said is utter destruction and ruin to a man from which he can never recover." That same year Lady Caroline published her popular novel '' Glenarvon'', in which Lord Byron was portrayed as the seedy title character.
Children
File:ElizabethMedoraLeigh.jpg, alt=Seated woman, looking toward her left at artist, perhaps when interrupted while reading, Elizabeth Medora Leigh
Elizabeth Medora Leigh (15 April 1814 – 28 August 1849) was the third daughter of Augusta Leigh. It is widely speculated that she was fathered by her mother's half-brother Lord Byron, although her mother's husband Colonel George Leigh was he ...
(1814–1849)
File:Ada Lovelace 1838.jpg, alt=Formal profile of standing woman, Ada Lovelace
(1815–1852)
File:Allegra Byron.jpg, alt=Young, smiling child, Clara Allegra Byron (1817–1822)
Byron wrote a letter to John Hanson from Newstead Abbey, dated 17 January 1809, that includes "You will discharge my Cook, & Laundry Maid, the other two I shall retain to take care of the house, more especially as the youngest is pregnant (I need not tell you by whom) and I cannot have the girl on the parish." His reference to "The youngest" is understood to have been to a maid, Lucy, and the parenthesised remark to indicate himself as siring a son born that year. In 2010 part of a baptismal record was uncovered which apparently said: "September 24 George illegitimate son of Lucy Monk, illegitimate son of Baron Byron, of Newstead, Nottingham, Newstead Abbey."
Augusta Leigh
Augusta Maria Leigh (''née'' Byron; 26 January 1783 – 12 October 1851) was the only daughter of John "Mad Jack" Byron, the poet Lord Byron's father, by his first wife, Amelia, née Darcy (Lady Conyers in her own right and the divorced wife ...
's child, Elizabeth Medora Leigh
Elizabeth Medora Leigh (15 April 1814 – 28 August 1849) was the third daughter of Augusta Leigh. It is widely speculated that she was fathered by her mother's half-brother Lord Byron, although her mother's husband Colonel George Leigh was he ...
, born 1814, was possibly fathered by Byron, who was Augusta's half-brother.
Byron had a child, The Hon. Augusta Ada Byron ("Ada", later Countess of Lovelace), in 1815, by his wife Annabella Byron, Lady Byron (''née'' Anne Isabella Milbanke, or "Annabella"), later Lady Wentworth. Ada Lovelace, notable in her own right, collaborated with Charles Babbage on the analytical engine, a predecessor to modern computers. She is recognised as one of the world's first computer programmers.
He also had an extramarital child in 1817, Clara Allegra Byron, with Claire Clairmont
Clara Mary Jane Clairmont (27 April 1798 – 19 March 1879), or Claire Clairmont as she was commonly known, was the stepsister of the writer Mary Shelley and the mother of Lord Byron's daughter Allegra. She is thought to be the subject of a poe ...
, stepsister of Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel '' Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also ...
and stepdaughter of William Godwin, writer of ''Political Justice'' and ''Caleb Williams''. Allegra is not entitled to the style "The Hon." as is usually given to the daughter of barons, since she was born outside of his marriage. Born in Bath in 1817, Allegra lived with Byron for a few months in Venice; he refused to allow an Englishwoman caring for the girl to adopt her and objected to her being raised in the Shelleys' household. He wished for her to be brought up Catholic and not marry an Englishman, and he made arrangements for her to inherit 5,000 lira upon marriage or when she reached the age of 21, provided she did not marry a native of Britain. However, the girl died aged five of a fever in Bagnacavallo
Bagnacavallo ( rgn, Bagnacavàl) is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Ravenna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
The Renaissance painter Bartolomeo Ramenghi bore the nickname of his native city.
Main sights
*''Castellaccio'' (15th century)
* Gia ...
, Italy, while Byron was in Pisa; he was deeply upset by the news. He had Allegra's body sent back to England to be buried at his old school, Harrow, because Protestants could not be buried in consecrated ground in Catholic countries. At one time he himself had wanted to be buried at Harrow. Byron was antagonistic towards Allegra's mother, Claire Clairmont, and prevented her from seeing the child.[.]
Scotland
Although neglected by traditional historiography, Byron had a complex identity and strong ties to Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...
. His maternal family, the Gordons, had its roots in Aberdeenshire and Byron was educated at Aberdeen Grammar School
Aberdeen Grammar School is a state secondary school in Aberdeen, Scotland. It is one of thirteen secondary schools run by the Aberdeen City Council educational department.
It is the oldest school in the city and one of the oldest grammar school ...
between 1794 and 1798. In terms of his own identity, he described himself as "half a Scot by birth, and bred/A whole one" and he reportedly spoke with a faint Scottish accent throughout his life.
Byron was regarded as a Scot by a number of his contemporaries, including his lover Lady Caroline Lamb
Lady Caroline Lamb (née Ponsonby; 13 November 1785 – 25 January 1828) was an Anglo-Irish aristocrat and novelist, best known for ''Glenarvon'', a Gothic novel. In 1812 she had an affair with Lord Byron, whom she described as "mad, bad, and ...
and by his first biographer Sir Cosmo Gordon, who described him as a "Highlander".
Byron's links to Scotland were demonstrated "in his campaign for the liberation of Greece, where a disproportionate number of his closest friends and associates had strong Scottish connexions, particularly with regard to north-eastern Scotland, which through his Gordon links remained central to the Byronic network throughout his life".
Sea and swimming
Byron enjoyed adventure, especially relating to the sea.
The first recorded notable example of open water swimming took place on 3 May 1810 when Lord Byron swam from Europe to Asia across the Hellespont Strait. This is often seen as the birth of the sport and pastime, and to commemorate it, the event is recreated every year as an open water swimming event.
Whilst sailing from Genoa to Cephalonia in 1823, every day at noon, Byron and Trelawny, in calm weather, jumped overboard for a swim without fear of sharks, which were not unknown in those waters. Once, according to Trelawny, they let the geese and ducks loose and followed them and the dogs into the water, each with an arm in the ship Captain’s new scarlet waistcoat, to the annoyance of the Captain and the amusement of the crew.
Fondness for animals
Byron had a great love of animals, most notably for a Newfoundland dog
The Newfoundland is a large working dog. They can be black, brown, or black and white. However, in the Dominion of Newfoundland, before it became part of the confederation of Canada, only black and Landseer (white-and-black) coloured dogs wer ...
named Boatswain. When the animal contracted rabies
Rabies is a viral disease that causes encephalitis in humans and other mammals. Early symptoms can include fever and tingling at the site of exposure. These symptoms are followed by one or more of the following symptoms: nausea, vomiting, ...
, Byron nursed him, albeit unsuccessfully, without any thought or fear of becoming bitten and infected.
Although deeply in debt at the time, Byron commissioned an impressive marble funerary monument for Boatswain at Newstead Abbey, larger than his own, and the only building work that he ever carried out on his estate. In his 1811 will, Byron requested that he be buried with him. The 26‐line poem "Epitaph to a Dog
"Epitaph to a Dog" (also sometimes referred to as "Inscription on the Monument to a Newfoundland Dog") is a poem by the British poet Lord Byron. It was written in 1808 in honour of his Newfoundland dog, Boatswain, who had just died of rabies. ...
" has become one of his best-known works. But a draft of an 1830 letter by Hobhouse shows him to be the author; Byron decided to use Hobhouse's lengthy epitaph instead of his own, which read: "To mark a friend's remains these stones arise/I never knew but one – and here he lies."
Byron also kept a tame bear while he was a student at Trinity out of resentment for rules forbidding pet dogs like his beloved Boatswain. There being no mention of bears in their statutes, the college authorities had no legal basis for complaining; Byron even suggested that he would apply for a college fellowship for the bear.
During his lifetime, in addition to numerous cats, dogs, and horses, Byron kept a fox
Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush'').
Twelve sp ...
, monkeys, an eagle
Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, j ...
, a crow
A crow is a bird of the genus '' Corvus'', or more broadly a synonym for all of ''Corvus''. Crows are generally black in colour. The word "crow" is used as part of the common name of many species. The related term "raven" is not pinned scientifica ...
, a falcon
Falcons () are birds of prey in the genus ''Falco'', which includes about 40 species. Falcons are widely distributed on all continents of the world except Antarctica, though closely related raptors did occur there in the Eocene.
Adult falcons ...
, peacock
Peafowl is a common name for three bird species in the genera '' Pavo'' and '' Afropavo'' within the tribe Pavonini of the family Phasianidae, the pheasants and their allies. Male peafowl are referred to as peacocks, and female peafowl are r ...
s, guinea hen
Guineafowl (; sometimes called "pet speckled hens" or "original fowl") are birds of the family Numididae in the order Galliformes. They are endemic to Africa and rank among the oldest of the gallinaceous birds. Phylogenetically, they branched ...
s, an Egyptian crane, a badger
Badgers are short-legged omnivores in the family Mustelidae (which also includes the otters, wolverines, martens, minks, polecats, weasels, and ferrets). Badgers are a polyphyletic rather than a natural taxonomic grouping, being united by ...
, geese
A goose ( : geese) is a bird of any of several waterfowl species in the family Anatidae. This group comprises the genera '' Anser'' (the grey geese and white geese) and ''Branta'' (the black geese). Some other birds, mostly related to the she ...
, a heron, and a goat. Except for the horses, they all resided indoors at his homes in England, Switzerland, Italy, and Greece.
Health and appearance
Character and psyche
I am such a strange mélange of good and evil that it would be difficult to describe me.
As a boy, Byron's character is described as a "mixture of affectionate sweetness and playfulness, by which it was impossible not to be attached", although he also exhibited "silent rages, moody sullenness and revenge" with a precocious bent for attachment and obsession.[Moore, Thomas, The Works of Lord Byron: With His Letters and Journals, and His Life, John Murray, 1835.]
Deformed foot
From birth, Byron had a deformity of his right foot. Although it has generally been referred to as a "club foot
Clubfoot is a birth defect where one or both feet are rotated inward and downward. Congenital clubfoot is the most common congenital malformation of the foot with an incidence of 1 per 1000 births. In approximately 50% of cases, clubfoot aff ...
", some modern medical authors maintain that it was a consequence of infantile paralysis ( poliomyelitis), and others that it was a dysplasia
Dysplasia is any of various types of abnormal growth or development of cells (microscopic scale) or organs ( macroscopic scale), and the abnormal histology or anatomical structure(s) resulting from such growth. Dysplasias on a mainly microscopi ...
, a failure of the bones to form properly. Whatever the cause, he was afflicted with a limp that caused him lifelong psychological and physical misery, aggravated by painful and pointless "medical treatment" in his childhood and the nagging suspicion that with proper care it might have been cured.
He was extremely self-conscious about this from a young age, nicknaming himself ' (French for "the limping devil", after the nickname given to Asmodeus
Asmodeus (; grc, Ἀσμοδαῖος, ''Asmodaios'') or Ashmedai (; he, אַשְמְדּאָי, ''ʾAšmədʾāy''; see below for other variations), is a ''prince of demons'' and hell."Asmodeus" in '' The New Encyclopædia Britannica''. Chi ...
by Alain-René Lesage
Alain-René Lesage (; 6 May 166817 November 1747; older spelling Le Sage) was a French novelist and playwright. Lesage is best known for his comic novel '' The Devil upon Two Sticks'' (1707, ''Le Diable boiteux''), his comedy ''Turcaret'' (170 ...
in his 1707 novel of the same name). Although he often wore specially-made shoes in an attempt to hide the deformed foot, he refused to wear any type of brace that might improve the limp.
Scottish novelist John Galt
John Galt () is a character in Ayn Rand's novel ''Atlas Shrugged'' (1957). Although he is not identified by name until the last third of the novel, he is the object of its often-repeated question "Who is John Galt?" and of the quest to discover ...
felt his oversensitivity to the "innocent fault in his foot was unmanly and excessive" because the limp was "not greatly conspicuous". He first met Byron on a voyage to Sardinia and did not realise he had any deficiency for several days, and still could not tell at first if the lameness was a temporary injury or not. At the time Galt met him he was an adult and had worked to develop "a mode of walking across a room by which it was scarcely at all perceptible". The motion of the ship at sea may also have helped to create a favourable first impression and hide any deficiencies in his gait, but Galt's biography is also described as being "rather well-meant than well-written", so Galt may be guilty of minimising a defect that was actually still noticeable.
Physical appearance
Byron's adult height was , his weight fluctuating between and . He was renowned for his personal beauty, which he enhanced by wearing curl-papers in his hair at night. He was athletic, being a competent boxer and horse-rider and an excellent swimmer. He attended pugilistic tuition at the Bond Street rooms of former prizefighting champion 'Gentleman' John Jackson, whom Byron called 'the Emperor of Pugilism', and recorded these sparring sessions in his letters
Letter, letters, or literature may refer to:
Characters typeface
* Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet.
* Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...
and journals.
Byron and other writers, such as his friend Hobhouse Hobhouse is a rare English surname, generally belonging to members of a family originally from Somerset. Those currently with this surname are members of several branches of this patronymic that achieved prominence from the 18th century. Originally ...
, described his eating habits in detail. At the time he entered Cambridge, he went on a strict diet to control his weight. He also exercised a great deal, and at that time wore a great many clothes to cause himself to perspire. For most of his life he was a vegetarian and often lived for days on dry biscuits and white wine. Occasionally he would eat large helpings of meat and desserts, after which he would purge himself. Although he is described by Galt and others as having a predilection for "violent" exercise, Hobhouse suggests that the pain in his deformed foot made physical activity difficult and that his weight problem was the result.[.]
Trelawny, who observed Byron's eating habits, noted that he lived on a diet of biscuits and soda water for days at a time and then would eat a "horrid mess of cold potatoes, rice, fish, or greens, deluged in vinegar, and gobble it up like a famished dog".
Political career
Byron first took his seat in the House of Lords
The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminste ...
on 13 March 1809 but left London on 11 June 1809 for the Continent. Byron's association with the Holland House
Holland House, originally known as Cope Castle, was an early Jacobean country house in Kensington, London, situated in a country estate that is now Holland Park. It was built in 1605 by the diplomat Sir Walter Cope. The building later passed ...
Whigs provided him with a discourse of liberty rooted in the Glorious Revolution of 1688
The Glorious Revolution; gd, Rèabhlaid Ghlòrmhor; cy, Chwyldro Gogoneddus , also known as the ''Glorieuze Overtocht'' or ''Glorious Crossing'' in the Netherlands, is the sequence of events leading to the deposition of King James II and ...
. A strong advocate of social reform, he received particular praise as one of the few Parliamentary
A parliamentary system, or parliamentarian democracy, is a system of democratic governance of a state (or subordinate entity) where the executive derives its democratic legitimacy from its ability to command the support ("confidence") of the ...
defenders of the Luddites
The Luddites were a secret oath-based organisation of English textile workers in the 19th century who formed a radical faction which destroyed textile machinery. The group is believed to have taken its name from Ned Ludd, a legendary weaver ...
: specifically, he was against a death penalty for Luddite "frame breakers" in Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The trad ...
, who destroyed textile machines that were putting them out of work. His first speech before the Lords, on 27 February 1812, was loaded with sarcastic references to the "benefits" of automation, which he saw as producing inferior material as well as putting people out of work, and concluded the proposed law was only missing two things to be effective: "Twelve Butchers for a Jury and a Jeffries for a Judge!". Byron's speech was officially recorded and printed in Hansard
''Hansard'' is the traditional name of the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official prin ...
. He said later that he "spoke very violent sentences with a sort of modest impudence" and thought he came across as "a bit theatrical". The full text of the speech, which he had previously written out, was presented to Dallas in manuscript form and he quotes it in his work.
Two months later, in conjunction with the other Whigs, Byron made another impassioned speech before the House of Lords in support of Catholic emancipation
Catholic emancipation or Catholic relief was a process in the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and later the combined United Kingdom in the late 18th century and early 19th century, that involved reducing and removing many of the restricti ...
. Byron expressed opposition to the established religion because it was unfair to people of other faiths.
These experiences inspired Byron to write political poems such as ''Song for the Luddites'' (1816) and ''The Landlords' Interest'', Canto XIV of ''The Age of Bronze''.
Examples of poems in which he attacked his political opponents include ''Wellington
Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by metr ...
: The Best of the Cut-Throats'' (1819) and ''The Intellectual Eunuch Castlereagh'' (1818).
Poetic works
Byron wrote prolifically. In 1832 his publisher, John Murray, released the complete works in 14 duodecimo volumes, including a life by Thomas Moore
Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852) was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist celebrated for his ''Irish Melodies''. Their setting of English-language verse to old Irish tunes marked the transition in popular Irish culture from Irish ...
. Subsequent editions were released in 17 volumes, first published a year later, in 1833. An extensive collection of his works, including early editions and annotated manuscripts, is held within the John Murray Archive at the National Library of Scotland in Edinburgh
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of t ...
.
''Don Juan''
Byron's magnum opus
A masterpiece, ''magnum opus'' (), or ''chef-d’œuvre'' (; ; ) in modern use is a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or a work of outstanding creativity, ...
, ''Don Juan'', a poem spanning 17 cantos, ranks as one of the most important long poems published in England since John Milton's '' Paradise Lost''. Byron published the first two cantos anonymously in 1819 after disputes with his regular publisher over the shocking nature of the poetry. By this time, he had been a famous poet for seven years, and when he self-published the beginning cantos, they were well received in some quarters. The poem was then released volume by volume through his regular publishing house. By 1822, cautious acceptance by the public had turned to outrage, and Byron's publisher refused to continue to publish the work. In Canto III of ''Don Juan'', Byron expresses his detestation for poets such as William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth (7 April 177023 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication '' Lyrical Ballads'' (1798).
Wordsworth's ' ...
and Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake ...
. In letters to Francis Hodgson, Byron referred to Wordsworth as "Turdsworth".
''Irish Avatar''
Byron wrote the satirical pamphlet ''Irish Avatar
''Irish Avatar'' is an 1821 pamphlet by George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, known as Lord Byron.
Background
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the so-called "Irish Question", regarding the response of the British government to ris ...
'' after the royal visit by King George IV
George IV (George Augustus Frederick; 12 August 1762 – 26 June 1830) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and King of Hanover from the death of his father, King George III, on 29 January 1820, until his own death ten ye ...
to Ireland
Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
. Byron criticised the attitudes displayed by the Irish people
The Irish ( ga, Muintir na hÉireann or ''Na hÉireannaigh'') are an ethnic group and nation native to the island of Ireland, who share a common history and Culture of Ireland, culture. There have been humans in Ireland for about 33,000 years ...
towards the Crown
The Crown is the state in all its aspects within the jurisprudence of the Commonwealth realms and their subdivisions (such as the Crown Dependencies, overseas territories, provinces, or states). Legally ill-defined, the term has different ...
, an institution he perceived as oppressing them, and was dismayed by the positive reception George IV received during his visit. In the pamphlet, Byron lambasted Irish unionists
Unionism is a political tradition on the island of Ireland that favours political union with Great Britain and professes loyalty to the United Kingdom, British Monarchy of the United Kingdom, Crown and Constitution of the United Kingdom, cons ...
and voiced muted support towards nationalistic sentiments in Ireland.
Parthenon marbles
Byron was a bitter opponent of Lord Elgin
Earl of Elgin is a title in the Peerage of Scotland, created in 1633 for Thomas Bruce, 3rd Lord Kinloss. He was later created Baron Bruce, of Whorlton in the County of York, in the Peerage of England on 30 July 1641. The Earl of Elgin is the ...
's removal of the Parthenon marbles
The Elgin Marbles (), also known as the Parthenon Marbles ( el, Γλυπτά του Παρθενώνα, lit. "sculptures of the Parthenon"), are a collection of Classical Greek marble sculptures made under the supervision of the architect and sc ...
from Athens
Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...
and "reacted with fury" when Elgin's agent gave him a tour of the Parthenon, during which he saw the spaces left by the missing friezes and metope
In classical architecture, a metope (μετόπη) is a rectangular architectural element that fills the space between two triglyphs in a Doric frieze, which is a decorative band of alternating triglyphs and metopes above the architrave of a bu ...
s. He denounced Elgin's actions in his poem '' The Curse of Minerva'' and in Canto II (stanzas XI–XV) of ''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' is a long narrative poem in four parts written by Lord Byron. The poem was published between 1812 and 1818. Dedicated to " Ianthe", it describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man, who is disi ...
''.
Legacy and influence
Byron is considered to be the first modern-style celebrity. His image as the personification of the Byronic hero fascinated the public, and his wife Annabella coined the term "Byromania" to refer to the commotion surrounding him. His self-awareness and personal promotion are seen as a beginning of what would become the modern rock star; he would instruct artists painting portraits of him not to paint him with pen or book in hand, but as a "man of action." While Byron first welcomed fame, he later turned from it by going into voluntary exile from Britain.
Biographies were distorted by the burning of Byron's memoir in the offices of his publisher, John Murray, a month after his death and the suppression of details of Byron's bisexuality by subsequent heads of the firm (which held the richest Byron archive). As late as the 1950s, scholar Leslie Marchand was expressly forbidden by the Murray company to reveal details of Byron's same-sex passions.
The re-founding of the Byron Society in 1971 reflected the fascination that many people had with Byron and his work. This society became very active, publishing an annual journal. Thirty-six Byron Societies function throughout the world, and an International Conference takes place annually.
Byron exercised a marked influence on Continental literature and art, and his reputation as a poet is higher in many European countries than in Britain, or America, although not as high as in his time, when he was widely thought to be the greatest poet in the world. Byron's writings also inspired many composers. Over forty operas have been based on his works, in addition to three operas about Byron himself (including Virgil Thomson
Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 – September 30, 1989) was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music. He has been described as a modernist, a neoromantic, a neoclass ...
's ''Lord Byron
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the ...
''). His poetry was set to music by many Romantic composers, including Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classic ...
, Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert (; 31 January 179719 November 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical and early Romantic eras. Despite his short lifetime, Schubert left behind a vast ''oeuvre'', including more than 600 secular vocal wor ...
, Rossini, Mendelssohn
Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions include sym ...
, Schumann
Robert Schumann (; 8 June 181029 July 1856) was a German composer, pianist, and influential music critic. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era. Schumann left the study of law, intending to pursue a career a ...
and Carl Loewe
Johann Carl Gottfried Loewe (; 30 November 1796 – 20 April 1869), usually called Carl Loewe (sometimes seen as Karl Loewe), was a German composer, tenor singer and conductor. In his lifetime, his songs ("Balladen") were well enough known for s ...
. Among his greatest admirers was Hector Berlioz, whose operas and '' Mémoires'' reveal Byron's influence.
In April 2020, Byron featured in a series of UK postage stamps issued by the Royal Mail to commemorate the Romantic poets on the 250th anniversary of the birth of William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth (7 April 177023 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication '' Lyrical Ballads'' (1798).
Wordsworth's ' ...
. Ten 1st class stamps were issued of all the major British romantic poets, and each stamp included an extract from one of their most popular and enduring works, with Byron's "She Walks in Beauty
"She Walks in Beauty" is a short lyrical poem in iambic tetrameter written in 1814 by Lord Byron, and is one of his most famous works.
It is said to have been inspired by an event in Byron's life. On 11 June 1814, Byron attended a party in Lon ...
" selected for the poet.
Byronic hero
The figure of the Byronic hero
The Byronic hero is a variant of the Romantic hero as a type of character, named after the English Romantic poet Lord Byron. Both Byron's own persona as well as characters from his writings are considered to provide defining features to the char ...
pervades much of his work, and Byron himself is considered to epitomise many of the characteristics of this literary figure. The use of a Byronic hero by many authors and artists of the Romantic movement
Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...
show Byron's influence during the 19th century and beyond, including the Brontë sisters. His philosophy was more durably influential in continental Europe than in England; Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his ...
admired him, and the Byronic hero was echoed in Nietzsche's ''Übermensch
The (; "Overhuman") is a concept in the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. In his 1883 book ''Thus Spoke Zarathustra'' (german: Also sprach Zarathustra), Nietzsche has his character Zarathustra posit the as a goal for humanity to set for itse ...
'', or superman.[.]
The Byronic hero presents an idealised, but flawed character whose attributes include: great talent; great passion; a distaste for society and social institutions; a lack of respect for rank and privilege (although possessing both); being thwarted in love by social constraint or death; rebellion; exile; an unsavory secret past; arrogance; overconfidence or lack of foresight; and, ultimately, a self-destructive manner. These types of characters have since become ubiquitous in literature and politics.
In popular culture
Bibliography
*'' Index of Titles''
*'' Index of First Lines''
Major works
* '' Hours of Idleness'' (1807)
* '' Lachin y Gair'' (1807)
* ''English Bards and Scotch Reviewers
''English Bards and Scotch Reviewers'' is an 1809 satirical poem written by Lord Byron, and published by James Cawthorn in London.
Background and description
The poem was first published anonymously, in March 1809, and a second, expanded editio ...
'' (1809)
* ''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Cantos I & II'' (1812)
* ''The Giaour
''The Giaour'' is a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1813 by John Murray and printed by Thomas Davison. It was the first in the series of Byron's Oriental romances. ''The Giaour'' proved to be a great success when published, consolidati ...
'' (1813) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''The Bride of Abydos
''The Bride of Abydos'' is a poem written by Lord Byron in 1813. One of his earlier works, ''The Bride of Abydos'' is considered to be one of his "Heroic Poems", along with '' The Giaour'', '' Lara'', '' The Siege of Corinth'', '' The Corsair' ...
'' (1813)
* ''The Corsair
''The Corsair'' (1814) is a long tale in verse written by Lord Byron (see 1814 in poetry) and published by John Murray in London. It was extremely popular, selling ten thousand copies on its first day of sale, and was influential throughout the ...
'' (1814) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Lara, A Tale
''Lara, A Tale'' is a rhymed, tragic narrative poem by Lord Byron; first published in 1814.
Background
The first work composed after Byron abandoned the idea of giving up writing and buying back his copyrights, it is regarded by critics as a co ...
'' (1814) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Hebrew Melodies
''Hebrew Melodies'' is a collection of 30 poems by Lord Byron. They were largely created by Byron to accompany music composed by Isaac Nathan, who played the poet melodies which he claimed (incorrectly) dated back to the service of the Temple ...
'' (1815)
* '' The Siege of Corinth'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Parisina
''Parisina'' is a 586-line poem written by Lord Byron. It was probably written between 1812 and 1815, and published on 13 February 1816.
It is based on a story related by Edward Gibbon in his '' Miscellaneous Works'' (1796) about Niccolò III d ...
'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''The Prisoner of Chillon
''The Prisoner of Chillon'' is a 392-line narrative poem by Lord Byron. Written in 1816, it chronicles the imprisonment of a Genevois monk, François Bonivard, from 1532 to 1536.
Writing and publication
On 22 June 1816, Lord Byron and hi ...
'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* '' The Dream'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Prometheus
In Greek mythology, Prometheus (; , , possibly meaning " forethought")Smith"Prometheus". is a Titan god of fire. Prometheus is best known for defying the gods by stealing fire from them and giving it to humanity in the form of technology, kn ...
'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Darkness
Darkness, the direct opposite of lightness, is defined as a lack of illumination, an absence of visible light, or a surface that absorbs light, such as black or brown.
Human vision is unable to distinguish colors in conditions of very low ...
'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Manfred
''Manfred: A dramatic poem'' is a closet drama written in 1816–1817 by Lord Byron. It contains supernatural elements, in keeping with the popularity of the ghost story in England at the time. It is a typical example of a Gothic fiction.
Byr ...
'' (1817) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''The Lament of Tasso'' (1817)
* '' Beppo'' (1818) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'' is a long narrative poem in four parts written by Lord Byron. The poem was published between 1812 and 1818. Dedicated to " Ianthe", it describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man, who is disi ...
'' (1818) ( text on Wikisource)
* '' Don Juan'' (1819–1824; incomplete on Byron's death in 1824) ( text on Wikisource)
* '' Mazeppa'' (1819)
* ''The Prophecy of Dante
''The Prophecy of Dante'' is a tale in verse by Lord Byron published in 1821 (see 1821 in poetry). Written at Ravenna in June 1819, the author dedicated it to the Countess Guiccioli.
The work was positively reviewed by Francis Jeffrey
Fra ...
'' (1819)
* '' Marino Faliero'' (1820)
* ''Sardanapalus
Sardanapalus (; sometimes spelled Sardanapallus) was, according to the Greek writer Ctesias, the last king of Assyria, although in fact Ashur-uballit II (612–605 BC) holds that distinction.
Ctesias' book ''Persica'' is lost, but we know of its ...
'' (1821)
* '' The Two Foscari'' (1821)
* '' Cain'' (1821)
* '' The Vision of Judgment'' (1821)
* ''Heaven and Earth'' (1821)
* ''Werner'' (1822)
* ''The Age of Bronze'' (1823)
* ''The Island'' (1823) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''The Deformed Transformed'' (1824)
''Letters and journals''
vol. 1 (1830)
''Letters and journals''
vol. 2 (1830)
Selected shorter lyric poems
* '' Maid of Athens, ere we part'' (1810) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''And thou art dead'' (1812) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''She Walks in Beauty
"She Walks in Beauty" is a short lyrical poem in iambic tetrameter written in 1814 by Lord Byron, and is one of his most famous works.
It is said to have been inspired by an event in Byron's life. On 11 June 1814, Byron attended a party in Lon ...
'' (1814) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''My Soul is Dark'' (1815) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''The Destruction of Sennacherib
"The Destruction of Sennacherib" is a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1815 in his ''Hebrew Melodies'' (in which it was titled The Destruction of Semnacherib). The poem is based on the biblical account of the historical Assyrian siege of ...
'' (1815) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Monody on the Death of the Right Hon. R. B. Sheridan'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* '' Fare Thee Well'' (1816) ( text on Wikisource)
* '' So, we'll go no more a roving'' (1817) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''When We Two Parted'' (1817) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Ode on Venice'' (1819) ( text on Wikisource)
* ''Stanzas'' (1819)
* '' Don Leon'' (not by Lord Byron, but attributed to him; 1830s)
See also
* Early life of Lord Byron
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron of Rochdale, better known as the poet Lord Byron, was born 22 January 1788 in Holles Street, London, England, and from 2 years old raised by his mother in Aberdeen, Scotland before moving back to England age ...
* Timeline of Lord Byron
This is a chronology of events in the life of George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824). Each year links to its corresponding " year in poetry" article:
1788
:''22 January'' – Born, 16 Holles Street, London. ...
* 19th century in poetry
* Bridge of Sighs
The Bridge of Sighs (Italian: ''Ponte dei Sospiri'', vec, Ponte de i Sospiri) is a bridge in Venice, Italy. The enclosed bridge is made of white limestone, has windows with stone bars, passes over the Rio di Palazzo, and connects the New Priso ...
, a Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
landmark Byron denominated
* Asteroid 3306 Byron
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* (Chapter on
online
at ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'')
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Volume 1 of Poetic drama & poetic theory in "Salzburg studies in English literature"
*
Attribution
*
Further reading
* Accardo, Peter X
Let Satire Be My Song: Byron’s English Bards and Scotch Reviewers
Web exhibit, Houghton Library, Harvard University, 2011.
*
* Calder, Angus (1984), ''Byron and Scotland'', in Hearn, Sheila G. (ed.), ''Cencrastus
''Cencrastus'' was a magazine devoted to Scottish and international literature, arts and affairs, founded after the Referendum of 1979 by students, mainly of Scottish literature at Edinburgh University, and with support from Cairns Craig, then a ...
'' No. 15, New Year 1984, pp. 21 – 24,
* Calder, Angus (ed.) (1989), ''Byron and Scotland: Radical or Dandy?'', Edinburgh University Press,
* Drucker, Peter. 'Byron and Ottoman love: Orientalism, Europeanization and same sex sexualities in the early nineteenth-century Levant' (Journal of European Studies vol. 42 no. 2, June 2012, 140–57).
* Garrett, Martin: ''George Gordon, Lord Byron''. (British Library Writers' Lives). London: British Library, 2000. .
* Garrett, Martin. ''Palgrave Literary Dictionary of Byron''. Palgrave, 2010. .
* Guiccioli, Teresa, contessa di, ''Lord Byron's Life in Italy'', transl. Michael Rees, ed. Peter Cochran, 2005, .
* Grosskurth, Phyllis: ''Byron: The Flawed Angel''. Hodder, 1997. .
* Marchand, Leslie A., editor, ''Byron's Letters and Journals'', Harvard University Press
Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the retir ...
:
*
''Volume I, 'In my hot youth', 1798–1810''
(1973)
*
''Volume II, 'Famous in my time', 1810–1812''
(1973)
*
''Volume III, 'Alas! the love of women', 1813–1814''
(1974)
*
''Volume IV, 'Wedlock's the devil', 1814–1815''
(1975)
*
''Volume V, 'So late into the night', 1816–1817''
(1976)
*
''Volume VI, 'The flesh is frail', 1818–1819''
(1976)
*
''Volume VII, 'Between two worlds', 1820''
(1978)
*
''Volume VIII, 'Born for opposition', 1821''
(1978)
*
''Volume IX, 'In the wind's eye', 1821–1822''
(1978)
*
''Volume X, 'A heart for every fate', 1822–1823''
(1980)
*
''Volume XI, 'For freedom's battle', 1823–1824''
(1981)
*
''Volume XII, 'The trouble of an index', index''
(1982)
*
''Lord Byron: Selected Letters and Journals''
(1982)
* McGann, Jerome: ''Byron and Romanticism''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. .
* Oueijan, Naji B. ''A Compendium of Eastern Elements in Byron's Oriental Tales''. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 1999.
* Patanè, Vincenzo: ''L'estate di un ghiro. Il mito di Lord Byron attraverso la vita, i viaggi, gli amori e le opere''. Venezia, Cicero, 2013. .
* Patanè, Vincenzo: ''I frutti acerbi. Lord Byron, gli amori & il sesso''. Venezia, Cicero, 2016. .
* Patanè, Vincenzo: ''The Sour Fruit. Lord Byron, Love & Sex''. Lanham (MD), Rowman & Littlefield, copublished by John Cabot University Press, Rome, 2019. .
* Rosen, Fred: ''Bentham, Byron and Greece''. Clarendon Press
Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...
, Oxford, 1992. .
* Thiollet, Jean-Pierre: ''Carré d'Art: Barbey d'Aurevilly, lord Byron, Salvador Dalí, Jean-Edern Hallier'', with texts by Anne-Élisabeth Blateau and , Anagramme éditions, 2008. .
External links
*
*
*
Poems by Lord Byron
at PoetryFoundation.org
The Byron Society
The International Byron Society
The Messolonghi Byron Society
George Gordon Byron Collection
at the Harry Ransom Center
The Harry Ransom Center (until 1983 the Humanities Research Center) is an archive, library and museum at the University of Texas at Austin, specializing in the collection of literary and cultural artifacts from the Americas and Europe for the pur ...
George Gordon Byron Collection
at the New York Public Library
George Gordon Byron Collection
at the University of Leeds
, mottoeng = And knowledge will be increased
, established = 1831 – Leeds School of Medicine1874 – Yorkshire College of Science1884 - Yorkshire College1887 – affiliated to the federal Victoria University1904 – University of Leeds
, ...
George Gordon Byron material
at Drew University
Drew University is a private university in Madison, New Jersey. Drew has been nicknamed the "University in the Forest" because of its wooded campus. As of fall 2020, more than 2,200 students were pursuing degrees at the university's three sch ...
Byron Study Center
at the University of Nottingham
, mottoeng = A city is built on wisdom
, established = 1798 – teacher training college1881 – University College Nottingham1948 – university status
, type = Public
, chancellor ...
The Byron Chronology
* ttps://www.britishlibrary.cn/en/authors/lord-byron/ Biographyat the British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
The Life and Work of Lord Byron
at EnglishHistory.net
Statue of Byron at Trinity College, Cambridge
Pictures of Byron's Walk, Seaham, County Durham
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