Clayton Mordaunt Cracherode (1730–1799) was an English book and old master print

Old master print

An old master print is a work of art produced by a printing process within the Western tradition . A date of about 1830 is usually taken as marking the end of the period whose prints are covered by this term. The main techniques concerned are woodcut, engraving and etching, although there are...

 collector, and a major benefactor of the British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

.

Life

His father, Colonel Mordaunt Cracherode, had command of the marines in George Anson

George Anson, 1st Baron Anson

Admiral of the Fleet George Anson, 1st Baron Anson PC, FRS, RN was a British admiral and a wealthy aristocrat, noted for his circumnavigation of the globe and his role overseeing the Royal Navy during the Seven Years' War...

's voyage round the world; his mother was Mary, daughter of Thomas Morice, paymaster of the British forces in Portugal, and sister of William Morice, high bailiff of Westminster, who married Atterbury's eldest daughter. Clayton Cracherode was born at Taplow

Taplow

Taplow is a village and civil parish within South Bucks district in Buckinghamshire, England. It sits on the east bank of the River Thames facing Maidenhead on the opposite bank. Taplow railway station is situated near the A4 south of the village....

, Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....

, on 23 June 1730, and educated at Westminster School

Westminster School

The Royal College of St. Peter in Westminster, almost always known as Westminster School, is one of Britain's leading independent schools, with the highest Oxford and Cambridge acceptance rate of any secondary school or college in Britain...

 from 1742, and Christ Church, Oxford

Christ Church, Oxford

Christ Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...

, from 1746; "Mr C was perhaps the most amiable man that ever went from Westminster to Christ Church", says his obituary, rather cryptically. He took the degree of B.A. on 4 May 1750, and that of M.A. on 5 April 1763, retaining his Studentship at Christ Church until his death.

Cracherode took Anglican orders, and for some time held the curacy of Binsey

Binsey

Binsey is a hill on the northern edge of the Lake District in Cumbria, England. It is detached from the rest of the Lakeland hills, and thus provides a good spot to look out at the Northern and North Western Fells of the Lake District, as well as the coastal plain and, across the Solway Firth,...

, near Oxford, but his church career went no further. On the death of his father in 1773 he inherited a fortune. He was both F.R.S. and F.S.A., and in 1784 he was elected a trustee of the British Museum. He died at Queen Square

Queen Square

Queen Square is a square in the Bloomsbury district of the London Borough of Camden, England. Queen Square was originally constructed between 1716 and 1725.- Name :...

, Westminster, on 5 April 1799, and was buried on 13 April near his mother, in the east cloister of Westminster Abbey

Westminster Abbey

The Collegiate Church of St Peter at Westminster, popularly known as Westminster Abbey, is a large, mainly Gothic church, in the City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom, located just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English,...

.

According to his obituary in The Gentleman's Magazine

The Gentleman's Magazine

The Gentleman's Magazine was founded in London, England, by Edward Cave in January 1731. It ran uninterrupted for almost 200 years, until 1922. It was the first to use the term "magazine" for a periodical...

(almost the only source for details on his personality and life beyond his collecting), Cracherode had never ridden a horse, which was considered remarkable for someone of his class at the time, and in contrast to his father "The greatest journey of his life was from London to Oxford".

Bequest

He had never married, and his will left the following to the British Museum (with valuation figures at his death):4,500 volumes (£10,000), seven portfolios of drawings, one hundred portfolios of prints (£5,000 with the drawings), coins and medals (£6,000), engraved gems (£2,000), and shells and minerals (£500). Two books only, the Complutensian Polyglot, and the editio princeps

Editio princeps

In classical scholarship, editio princeps is a term of art. It means, roughly, the first printed edition of a work that previously had existed only in manuscripts, which could be circulated only after being copied by hand....

 of Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

 which formerly belonged to De Thou, were excepted. The former he gave to Shute Barrington

Shute Barrington

Shute Barrington was an English churchman, Bishop of Llandaff in Wales, as well as Bishop of Salisbury and Bishop of Durham in England.-Life:...

, bishop of Durham, and the latter to Cyril Jackson

Cyril Jackson

Cyril Jackson was Dean of Christ Church, Oxford 1783–1809.Jackson was born in Yorkshire, and educated at Manchester Grammar School, Westminster School and the University of Oxford. In 1771 he was chosen to be sub-preceptor to the two eldest sons of King George III, but in 1776 he was dismissed,...

; these volumes ultimately came to the national collection. His collection of prints included superb examples of Rembrandt, Dürer, and especially Italian printmakers, and is one of the foundations of the Brish Museum's collection, although since they were not catalogued until later (and after a serious series of thefts in 1806), in many cases his prints cannot be specifically identified. He shared the taste of his age for portrait prints. He was "the second great benefactor of the collection" (after Sir Hans Sloane

Hans Sloane

Sir Hans Sloane, 1st Baronet, PRS was an Ulster-Scot physician and collector, notable for bequeathing his collection to the British nation which became the foundation of the British Museum...

).