Author: Murphy, James Cavanah
- Architect, architectural draughtsman and author. James Cavanah Murphy is said to have been born of obscure parentage in Blackrock, Co. Cork, and to have trained as a bricklayer. A talent for drawing brought him to the attention of Sir James Chatterton, who provided the means for him to go to Dublin. In Dublin he became a pupil at the Dublin Society's drawing schools in about 1775. What he did during the next decade is not known. He is said to have been a member of the building committee for the extension of the Parliament House in 1786.(1) On 9 November 1786, shortly before the death of the ailing THOMAS IVORY , he was appointed master of the Society's School of Drawing in Architecture in Ivory's place, but the decision was reversed the following month. His Arabian Antiquities of Spain and A History of the Mohametan empire in Spain were published posthumously in 1816.
Posts by Murphy, James Cavanah
The Alhamra at Granada
James Cavanah Murphy spent the last 12 years of his life preparing notes and drawings for a publication on this Moorish architecture. The resulting book, The Arabian Antiquities of Spain, was only partially…
The Mosque of Cordova
This article has been taken from the book “Arabian Antiquities of Spain” by Murphy, James Cavanah, 1760-1814 ,published in 1816. The text has been converted from scanned images using OCR software and may contain…
