Welbeck Academy

The Welbeck Academy or Welbeck Circle is a name that has been given to the loose intellectual grouping around William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the first half of the 17th century. It takes its name from Welbeck Abbey, a country house in Nottinghamshire that was a Cavendish family seat. Another term used is Newcastle Circle. The geographical connection is, however, more notional than real; and these terms have been regarded also as somewhat misleading. Cavendish was Viscount Mansfield in 1620, and moved up the noble ranks to Duke, step by step; "Newcastle" applies by 1628.

Newcastle was a royalist exile in continental Europe in the latter part of the First English Civil War and the Interregnum. He then returned to England and lived to 1676. His life shows many instances of cultural and intellectual patronage.

A scientific interest was optics. The group involved in these studies included Charles Cavendish (William's brother), Thomas Hobbes, Robert Payne and Walter Warner. This core "academy" group was disrupted when Newcastle took on responsibility for the Prince of Wales, in 1638. At a later point John Pell was in Newcastle's service.

Charles Cavendish's circle included Henry Bond, Richard Reeve or Reeves the instrument-maker, John Twysden and John Wallis. He was a patron of William Oughtred.

Newcastle in the 1630s became a major patron to Ben Jonson. His second wife was Margaret Cavendish, née Lucas, the writer. Newcastle was called "our English Maecenas" by Gerard Langbaine the Younger; he was a patron after the Restoration to both John Dryden and Thomas Shadwell. Other writers he supported included William Davenant, William Sampson, James Shirley and John Suckling. He bought sculptures by Francesco Fanelli for Welbeck.

...
Wikipedia