Hatfield House
| Hatfield House | |
| Hertfordshire | |
|---|---|
 Hatfield House | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | TL237084 |
| Location: | 51°45’38"N, 0°12’33"W |
| Town: | Hatfield |
| History | |
| Country house | |
| Information | |
| Owned by: | The Earl of Salisbury |
| Website: | www.hatfield-house.co.uk |
Hatfield House is a vast country house set in a large park, the Great Park, on the eastern side of the town of Hatfield in Hertfordshire. It has been the seat of the Marquesses of Salisbury, and before then the Earls of Salisbury, since the days of King James I.
The present Jacobean house is a leading example of a "prodigy house". It built in 1611 by Robert Cecil, First Earl of Salisbury and Chief Minister to King James I as he had been to Queen Elizabeth I, and replaced the Royal Palace of Hatfield. Cecil's heirs have held it ever since.
The hosue is a prime example of Jacobean architecture. The estate includes extensive grounds and surviving parts of an earlier palace. It is opened to the public and frequently hosts public events.
Early history
An earlier building on the site was the Royal Palace of Hatfield. Only part of this still exists, a short distance from the present house. That palace was the childhood home and favourite residence of Queen Elizabeth I. Built in 1497 by the Bishop of Ely, King Henry VII's minister John Cardinal Morton, it comprised four wings in a square surrounding a central courtyard. The palace was seized by Henry VIII with other church properties.
Henry VIII's children, King Edward VI and the future Queen Elizabeth I, spent their youth at Hatfield Palace. His eldest daughter, who later reigned as Queen Mary I, lived there between 1533 and 1536, when she was sent to wait on the then Princess Elizabeth, as punishment for refusing to recognise Henry's marriage to Anne Boleyn and his religious reforms.
In 1548, when she was only 15 years old, Elizabeth was under suspicion of having illegally agreed to marry Thomas Seymour, the House and her servants were seized by Edward VI's agent Robert Tyrwhit, and she was interrogated there. She successfully defended her conduct with wit and defiance. Seymour was executed in 1549 for numerous other crimes against the crown. After her two months of imprisonment in the Tower of London by her sister Queen Mary, Elizabeth returned to Hatfield. The Queen Elizabeth Oak on the grounds of the estate is said to be the location where Elizabeth was told she was Queen following Mary's death.
In November 1558, Elizabeth held her first Council of State in the Great Hall.
Elizabeth's successor, King James I, did not like the palace much and so gave it to Elizabeth's (and his own) chief minister Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, in exchange for Theobalds which was the Cecils' family home on the current site of Cedars Park, Broxbourne. Cecil liked to build and so tore down three wings of the royal palace (the back and sides of the square) in 1608 and used the bricks to build the present structure.
In the time of the Second Marquess (known as "The Matador" for his bluntness) the house suffered a disastrous fire, all but destroying one wing. The Marquess's mother died in the fire, which was apparently caused by her habit of smoking in bed while wearing an inflammable wig. The Marquess rebuilt the damaged wing.
Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, was three times prime minister during the closing years of Queen Victoria's reign and had Hatfield as his seat. Apart from his achievements, his longevity in office and many sage witticisms he saw the city of Salisbury in Rhodesia named after him (now renamed Harare in Zimbabwe). He was succeeded by his nephew, Arthur Balfour.
The house today
Hatfield House is a popular tourist attraction because it has so many objects associated with Queen Elizabeth I, including some gloves and a pair of silk stockings that are believed to have been the first ones in England. The library displays a 22-foot long illuminated parchment roll showing the pedigree of the Queen with ancestors back to Adam and Eve. The Marble Hall holds the "Rainbow Portrait" of Elizabeth.
The State Rooms house many important paintings, furniture, tapestries and armour. The richly carved wooden Grand Staircase and the rare stained glass window in the private chapel are among the house's original Jacobean features.
The archives in the house hold state and private records going back to William Cecil (Robert's father and predecessor as Queen Elizabeth's chief minister).
Gardens
The Gardens, covering 42 acres (170,000 m²), date from the early 17th century, and were laid out by John Tradescant the elder. Tradescant visited Europe and brought back trees and plants that had never previously been grown in England. The gardens included orchards, fountains, scented plants, water parterres, terraces, herb gardens and a foot maze. They were neglected in the 18th century, but restoration began in Victorian times and continues under the present Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury.
During First World War, the grounds were used to test the first British tanks. An area was dug with trenches and craters and covered with barbed-wire to represent no man's land and German trench lines on the Western Front. To commemorate this, the only surviving Mark I tank was sited at Hatfield from 1919 until 1970 before being moved to The Tank Museum, Bovington.[1]
The Rhodesian Light Infantry Regimental Association has placed its 'Troopie' memorial statue on the grounds of Hatfield House, due to the long association of the Cecil family with Southern Rhodesia . Around its base is a roll of regimental members ('troopies') who fell in the Rhodesian Bush War and several inscriptions, including 'In reconciliation and hope for future peace in Zimbabwe'.[2]
Tours
The State Rooms can be seen in the midweek guided tours, and visitors can look around in their own time at weekends. On Friday, the Garden Connoisseur's Day, the House is open for guided tours and for pre-booked specialist groups. There is also five miles of marked trails.
Film credits
The house has frequerntly appeared on film, notably:[3]
- Orlando (1992)
- Batman (1989): many interior scenes of Wayne Manor, and the 1992 sequel Batman Returns
- The two Lara Croft films. Also the outside of Lara's mansion in the video game Tomb Raider: Underworld is based on Hatfield House. In Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life, The Long Gallery and the Library of the house were used for filming the scene where the MI6 agents meet Lara and gives her a task to retrieve Pandora's Box. The Bo Ken self-defence practice scene was filmed in the entrance hall of the house.
- The New World (2005)
- Elizabeth: The Golden Age' (2007), in which Hatfield stood in for Chartley Hall, where Mary, Queen of Scots was kept captive before her execution. The predecessor film, Elizabeth, contains a scene set at Hatfield, where Elizabeth receives news of her while sitting beneath the famous oak, though the scene was filmed elsewhere.
- Shakespeare in Love (1998), portraying a location in Greenwich.
- 'The Secret of Chimneys (2010 episode of Agatha Christie's Marple), portraying the titular "Chimneys".
- Dustbin Baby (television film)
- Sherlock Holmes (2009 film), a scene filmed in the Long Gallery
- Get Him to the Greek (2010)
- My Week with Marilyn (2011): internal scenes represented as Windsor Castle, and the Broad Water (where the River Lea flows through Hatfield Park) was used in a skinny dipping scene.
- Other films include Cromwell, Henry VIII and His Six Wives, The Avengers (1998), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, V for Vendetta, Mortdecai (2015)
Outside links
 |
("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Hatfield House) |
- Hatfield House
- National Monuments Record: No. 364603 – Hatfield Palace
References
- ↑ "Identity Crisis". The Bovington Tank Museum. May 2006. http://www.tankmuseum.co.uk/newsart_0506.html. Retrieved 11 January 2008.
- ↑ Troper Report
- ↑ "Filming". Hatfield House. 2010. Archived from the original on 4 October 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5tEEAgpJe. Retrieved 4 October 2010.
- Cecil, David. The Cecils of Hatfield House: An English Ruling Family. Houghton Mifflin, 1973. [written by the younger son of the 4th Marquess of Salisbury]