Course:History 344 Nasty Families/Education/Grand Tour

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The Grand Tour has been defined as a journey made by the classically educated male members of the upper classes to complete their classical education by visiting the sites associated with classical literature.[1] This was where young men of the highest class rounded off their education with a Grand Tour of the Continent. [2] This practice reached its heyday during the 17th and 18th centuries. [3] This was not simply a practice of being sent abroad for a formal education, as it was a much less structured experience. [4] France and Italy were on the regular itinerary, many went to the Iberian peninsula, the Germanic empire, Switzerland and even Greece. [5] The classic Grand Tour has stops at Paris, Rome, Venice, Florence and Naples. [6] In fact, by the 1630’s Rome and Naples had become the focal points for most Tours. [7] It was expected for these men who had been classically educated for them to be interested in Roman monuments, sites of classical battles and homes of Latin poets. [8] This Tour was individually tailored for the specific young man, for example those from military families usually went and viewed military reviews and fortifications. [9] The majority of the young men who undertook these tours rarely expected to have to work for a living, they were from well of families and expected to inherit comfortable independence. [10] For these young men, the tour was an attempt to fill the space between school and their inheritance.[11] It was referred to as an educational experience but was more of a status symbol and a chance for the young men to sow a few wild oats. [12] This was really for the rich and Ashe Windham is cited as having spent £600 per annum in the 1690’s. [13]


  1. ↑ Hugh Brigstocke, “The 5th Earl of Exeter as Grand Tourist and Collector,” Papers of the British School at Rome, 72, (2004), 331.
  2. ↑ Helen M. Jewell, Education in Early Modern England, (New York, St. Martins Press:1998), 123.
  3. ↑ Jewell, Education, 123.
  4. ↑ Jewell, Education, 123.
  5. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  6. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  7. ↑ Brigstocke, “The 5th Earl,” 331.
  8. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  9. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  10. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  11. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  12. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
  13. ↑ Jewell, Education, 124.
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