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Henry Parke

English architect

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionNov 15, 2024
Entity authorityQ18068400
Source-derived summary

Henry Parke (1790–1835) was an English architect and draughtsman.

Life

He was a son of John Parke the oboist, was intended for the bar, and studied under a special pleader; but a speech impediment led him to abandon the law. He studied architecture, and his father placed him with Sir John Soane, who used him as a draughtsman for his Royal Academy lectures. He became versed in mathematics, geometry, mechanics, and drawing, both architectural and landscape.

Between 1820 and 1824 Parke visited Italy, Sicily, Genoa, Greece, and Egypt, ascending the Nile in 1824 with a fellow-student, John Joseph Scoles. At Rome and elsewhere he worked with Frederick Catherwood, Thomas Leverton Donaldson, and others, measuring antique remains and modern works. On returning to England, at the end of 1824, he worked out his sketches.

Parke died 5 May 1835. Many of his oil and water-colour drawings and marine works were sold at Sotheby's by auction in May 1836.

Works

In 1829 Parke published a Map of Nubia, comprising the Country between the First and Second Cataracts of the Nile, and gave a plan of the island of Philæ.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Henry Parke” as english architect. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Henry, Parke and English.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1790, 1835, 1820, 1824—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1790-01-01. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Henry, Parke and English providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Henry Parke”, the useful work is to connect “english architect” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Nov 15, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q18068400. VIAF identifies the subject as 61490951. The Library of Congress control number is nr2003030585. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1790, 1835, 1820 and 1824.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

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  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Henry Parke”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Henry Parke primary sources, Henry Parke archive and Henry research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Henry Parke” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.