The Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB) (also known as Anti-Scrape) is an amenity society founded by William Morris, Philip Webb, and others in 1877 to oppose the destructive 'restoration' of ancient buildings occurring in Victorian England. "Ancient" is used here in the wider sense rather than the more usual modern sense of "pre-medieval."
History
thumb|upright|Portrait of [[William Morris, founder of SPAB, by William Blake Richmond]]
Morris' call for the society to be founded was provoked by Sir Gilbert Scott's proposed restoration of Tewkesbury Abbey. In an 1877 letter printed in The Athenæum, he wrote