Francis Mortoft: His Book Being His Travels Through France and Italy, 1658-1659

1925

Journals G161 H2 Ser. 2 no. 57

London: Printed for the Hakluyt Society

After the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century, travelling as a pilgrim went out of fashion, and the rise in humanist studies saw the focus turn to Italy. Touring the Continent in the 16th and 17th centuries developed as a way for sons of elite families and wealthy merchants to broaden their minds and facilitate their learning. It was also a way of removing them in times of trouble, like that of the violent Interregnum of the mid-17th century. Francis Mortoft was one such ‘Interregnum tourist’. Not much is known of the traveller, but he left behind ‘an honest and straightforward narrative of a typical Grand Tour’.