Anyone entering the Entrance Hall through the front door will find their eyes drawn to the central motif in the north coving of the ceiling. Two lions rampant flank the collar of the Order of the Thistle, which bears the Order’s Latin motto “Nemo Me Impune Lacessit” or “None may harm me with impunity”. Legend has it that the motto’s origins come from the “guardian thistle” playing its part in the defence of the ancient realm of Scotland. During a night time attack by Norwegian Vikings, one of them let out a cry of pain as he stepped on a prickly thistle, so alerting the Scottish defenders.

The “me” in "None may harm me with impunity" was ascribed originally to the thistle itself, but by extension now refers to the Order of the Thistle as well as the Scottish regiments which have adopted it. One of the regiments that adopted the motto was that of the Scots Guards, in which Lord Dumfries served as part of the 3rd Foot Regiment.

Inside the collar, is the family’s coat of arms crowned by an Earl’s coronet. Positioned below is St Andrew bearing the Cross. Either side of the lions the circular motif of the collar is repeated framing the Crichton wyvern and eight pointed star badge of the Order of the Thistle respectively. This motif is repeated below the two smaller collars to the right and left of the central emblem. A swirling ribbon inscribed with the family motto ‘God Send Grace’ weaves together the whole composition.

Originally plain white, and therefore reliant solely upon the play of light across the crisp and intricately detailed relief of the plaster work for legibility, the decorations gently ease the eye of the visitor from the more austere elegance of the exterior of the House into delicately undulating rococo scrolls. The original, restrained colour palette was complemented by a sparse furnishing scheme still in place today. By entering the other public rooms, vibrant fabrics and gilt surfaces would, by contrast, provide a tastefully rich and colourful visual experience.

Clearly, the decorations are no longer plain white – a testament to the changing tastes of the House’s residents over the years. The current colour scheme was introduced in 1877 when the 3rd Marquess of Bute commissioned the Glasgow firm Campbell and Smith to decorate the front hall.

At this time, Lord Bute had to temporarily relocate his family to Dumfries House as the family seat of Mount Stuart had recently burnt down. In a letter from Lady Bute to her sister Angela, she writes that she found the Hall ‘much improved’ after it had been decorated. The plaster detail would have been of equal relevance to Lord Bute as he, too, had been awarded the Order of the Thistle. 

The Eagle Table is in keeping with the classical theme of the Entrance Hall. Such eagle console tables are suitable for a “Roman style banqueting hall”, as they recall the story of the shepherd Ganymede who was born aloft by an eagle to serve as Jupiter's cup-bearer at the banquet of the Gods.”

This particular table is one of only a handful of pieces of furniture which Francis Brodie made for Lord Dumfries. The surviving invoice from 5th August 1753 describes it as: ‘a marble slab supported by an Eagle – guilt in burnished gold’. Alongside a Lady’s closet, a corner cupboard and a chimney mirror, all listed on the same invoice, this group of furniture pre-dates the building and therefore the furnishing of Dumfries House. They were doubtless intended for Lord Dumfries’s House in Edinburgh or, indeed, for Leifnorris, the earlier house on the estate.

The eagle table does look slightly diminuitive in the Entrance Hall at Dumfries House, seeming to confirm that it was made for a smaller and older interior. It may well have been part of an 18th century makeover of Leifnorris. At Dumfries House the function of the eagle table was most likely to act as a sideboard together with the buffet niche behind on such occasions when the Entrance Hall was used for banqueting.

Francis Brodie was the oldest cabinetmaker amongst those patronised by Lord Dumfries and came from a wealthy and established family. The family name did, however, fall into infamy following the exploits of Francis’ son William ‘Deacon’ Brodie. Francis Brodie’s connections enabled him to fill his order books with some of the most illustrious clients in Scotland, yet little identified furniture survives. A drawing of this table, which is reminiscent of William Kent’s design for a sideboard in 1726, features amongst a number of objects on Brodie’s distinctive letterhead. Thus, there exists a wonderfully rare survival of Brodie’s design on the one hand, which can be compared with the executed piece for Lord Dumfries on the other. 

Circa 1758, attributed to Benjamin Cole

This miniature 18th century model of the solar system or planetarium has appeared on the earliest surviving inventory at Dumfries House, and whilst it has always sat on its mahogany travel case, it may have originally been covered with a glass dome. These devices are so called after a planetarium made by John Rowley (d 1728) for Charles Boyle, the fourth Earl of Orrery. Rowley had modelled it on an earlier planetarium constructed for Prince Eugene Savoy and renamed it ‘Orrery’ in honour of his patron – a name which appears to have stuck to this type of scientific instrument in Britain ever since.

This particular orrery has been attributed to Benjamin Cole, who was an apprentice to Thomas Wright, one of the best known makers of orreries, who operated from Fleet Street in the earlier part of the 18th century. In 1740 Wright’s business passed to Cole, who was then succeeded by his son in 1758. Although no invoice appears to have survived it is possible that Lord Dumfries acquired this orrery at the same time as he commissioned furniture from Chippendale in St Martin’s Lane, which was little over a mile away.

To own this instrument in the 18th century was very much an expression of the more enlightened notions of its owner in regard to modern scientific thinking and processes. A veritable gentleman’s toy, it is proof, if ever required, that men have always been drawn to the latest in gadgets, geegaws and gimcrackery, albeit the orrery an expensive and useful one! It would have been such a novelty that it’s not hard to imagine demonstrations of its mechanism (a handle can make the horizontal discs rotate) forming part of an evening’s entertainment in the Drawing Room, where it was first listed at Dumfries House. 

Put together from five slabs of solid mahogany of a chocolate brown variety, these chairs are characteristic of Alexander Peter’s solid yet elegant pieces for Dumfries House. It is feasible that the decoration of the back was planned in tandem with the visual programme for the ceiling of the Entrance Hall. Interestingly, John Bonnar applied the eight pointed star of the thistle badge correctly on its point. This solution is altogether more elegant than the rather clumsy looking stars in the coving and frieze above, all of which rest on the flat surface of the cross.

On 31st August 1758 Lord Dumfries was billed for ‘8 mahogany chairs for the hall” followed a year later by another invoice for a commission by the painter John Bonnar from Edinburgh to have ‘painted 8 crests, within the Order of the Garter, on the back of hall chairs’. Lord Dumfries had, of course, been awarded the Order of the Thistle in 1752. The prototype of this hall chair derives from the sgabello chair from the Italian Renaissance and was first introduced into England in the early 17th century. Scottish-made chairs of this type are rare finds in Scotland, and so a set such as these in such remarkable condition is yet another testament to the manner in which the House and its contents have been preserved in situ.

Hall chairs, such as these, were not only an effective way to dress the otherwise sparely furnished hall and its walls, but what with their hard and slightly sloping seat, they also caused the right amount of discomfort for anyone who may have come to Dumfries House seeking Lord Dumfries’s attention in matters of lapsed payments...