Arundel Castle
thisispoki and I watched TimeTeam last night, about a gatehouse in Esher. We both quite fancy living in such opulent surroundings and the programme reminded me that I've always wanted to look round Arundel Castle and that since it's now spring, it would be open again. Combined with a weather forecast for a beautiful spring day and we decided that we'd go visit.
We reached Arundel at about 10.30am. The castle is opened in stages, so the first place to visit was the 14th century Fitzalan Chapel. The chapel is part of the same building as the parish church - this stems from a very unusual history. The original church was Catholic and seized by Henry VIII during his somewhat belligerent changing of the faith in England. He subsequently sold it to Henry Fitzalan, who was the 12th Earl of Arundel (and married to Catherine Grey, of the same family as Lady Jane Grey). As a consequence of this, the church was divided into the chapel (and remains Catholic), whilst the other end is the Anglican Parish and Priory church of St Nicholas. An iron grille divides the two parts and whilst we wandered around the chapel, we could clearly hear the morning service taking place in the parish church.
At 11am, the keep opened - this is one of the oldest parts of the castle, a circular tower known as the Barbican, in the original Norman motte and bailey style. It dates to the 11th centruy and from the top, you can see spectacular views to the east, west and south. The view to the north is blocked, as the castle is still occupied by the Dukes of Norfolk and Earls of Arundel - the Fitzalan Howard family. And they have private gardens in what used to be the tilting yard and unsurprisingly, don't want legions of visitors gawping at them. There's also a contemporary gatehouse and there were various jackdaws perched over it. For some reason, there seems to be a peculiar aptness for corvids being resident at castles - the Tower of London has captive ravens, but it seems that just about every other castle that I've visited has intendent jackdaws. In fact, at Alnwick Castle, the jackdaws came and begged for bits of picnic, happily taking bits of sandwich from your hands! Anyway, the keep has a restored portcullis and you can see all the mechanics of how it was raised and lowered, along with a couple of doors in the crenellations which could be opened in order to throw things on any attackers. There was also a display of Civil War history, since both sides, Republicans and Royalists, took turns in occupying the castle during the hostilities.
By the time that we'd finished looking round that, at midday, the "main castle rooms and bedrooms" were opened. These are all within the much more recently built 19th century part of the building - a magnificent Gothic edifice to the south east of the Barbican. These include rooms that accomodated guests including Queen Victoria and most have wonderful original Victorian bathrooms, complete with baths, sinks and WCs - all with the original porcelain. In fact, this piece of the castle was built with all "mod-cons" at the time - it was one of the first stately homes in England to have full electrical lighting, installed in 1891. Unfortunately, no photography is allowed in this part of the castle, since many of the precious paintings and tapestries are from way before the building and can be damaged by flashlights. This is pretty usual in most of the stately homes that I've visited. thisispoki was surprised that the original portrait of Charles I by Van Dyke was hanging on the wall, and could be studied in very close quarters, as he was under the impression that such a famous thing would be in the National Portrait Gallery. However, I've visited many more country houses, castles etc., so I'm used to these precious things being available. I was very taken with three Canalettos in one of the formal sitting rooms, which have only been available for the public to see them in the last decade, as they were previously kept within the private living spaces of the family. I expect that the only way that they could be kept as part of the family collection is to add them to the public viewing area, since inheritance tax would really be a hefty quantity, unless put into a charitable trust (which is how the castle is now set up). The room that I would really love to live in was the Library though, a wonderful cosy cave of dark wood panelling, big dark red velvet sofas, huge sprays of brass light fittings and a gallery running round a windowed area. I spent so long drooling, that the guide came over to see whether I was having difficulty in finding the information on the room.
After the main rooms and bedrooms, we'd both been consistently on our feet for about two and a half hours and a sit down was called for. Fortunately - it also seemed a good time for lunch, so we headed to the castle restaurant. After some refreshment, we exited the castle, to bright sunny skies and headed over to the gardens. In comparison with all this history, a wonderful contemporary formal garden, called the Collector Earl's garden was created and opened last year. It's a gorgeous area, with fountains and wooden pergolas and a wooden "Oberon's Palace" which contains an innovative fountain, consisting of a golden crown held aloft only by a jet of water and cunningly designed to deflect the water down to drains in the floor. The interior walls of the "palace" are decorated with mosaic pictures and a collage of shells, in an old tradition. The garden also sits under the shadow of the Victorian Catholic Cathedral, which is located outside the castle grounds, but looms impressively beside the garden walls.
As usual, I took huge numbers of photos. It was a wonderful way to spend a spring Sunday.
We reached Arundel at about 10.30am. The castle is opened in stages, so the first place to visit was the 14th century Fitzalan Chapel. The chapel is part of the same building as the parish church - this stems from a very unusual history. The original church was Catholic and seized by Henry VIII during his somewhat belligerent changing of the faith in England. He subsequently sold it to Henry Fitzalan, who was the 12th Earl of Arundel (and married to Catherine Grey, of the same family as Lady Jane Grey). As a consequence of this, the church was divided into the chapel (and remains Catholic), whilst the other end is the Anglican Parish and Priory church of St Nicholas. An iron grille divides the two parts and whilst we wandered around the chapel, we could clearly hear the morning service taking place in the parish church.
At 11am, the keep opened - this is one of the oldest parts of the castle, a circular tower known as the Barbican, in the original Norman motte and bailey style. It dates to the 11th centruy and from the top, you can see spectacular views to the east, west and south. The view to the north is blocked, as the castle is still occupied by the Dukes of Norfolk and Earls of Arundel - the Fitzalan Howard family. And they have private gardens in what used to be the tilting yard and unsurprisingly, don't want legions of visitors gawping at them. There's also a contemporary gatehouse and there were various jackdaws perched over it. For some reason, there seems to be a peculiar aptness for corvids being resident at castles - the Tower of London has captive ravens, but it seems that just about every other castle that I've visited has intendent jackdaws. In fact, at Alnwick Castle, the jackdaws came and begged for bits of picnic, happily taking bits of sandwich from your hands! Anyway, the keep has a restored portcullis and you can see all the mechanics of how it was raised and lowered, along with a couple of doors in the crenellations which could be opened in order to throw things on any attackers. There was also a display of Civil War history, since both sides, Republicans and Royalists, took turns in occupying the castle during the hostilities.
By the time that we'd finished looking round that, at midday, the "main castle rooms and bedrooms" were opened. These are all within the much more recently built 19th century part of the building - a magnificent Gothic edifice to the south east of the Barbican. These include rooms that accomodated guests including Queen Victoria and most have wonderful original Victorian bathrooms, complete with baths, sinks and WCs - all with the original porcelain. In fact, this piece of the castle was built with all "mod-cons" at the time - it was one of the first stately homes in England to have full electrical lighting, installed in 1891. Unfortunately, no photography is allowed in this part of the castle, since many of the precious paintings and tapestries are from way before the building and can be damaged by flashlights. This is pretty usual in most of the stately homes that I've visited. thisispoki was surprised that the original portrait of Charles I by Van Dyke was hanging on the wall, and could be studied in very close quarters, as he was under the impression that such a famous thing would be in the National Portrait Gallery. However, I've visited many more country houses, castles etc., so I'm used to these precious things being available. I was very taken with three Canalettos in one of the formal sitting rooms, which have only been available for the public to see them in the last decade, as they were previously kept within the private living spaces of the family. I expect that the only way that they could be kept as part of the family collection is to add them to the public viewing area, since inheritance tax would really be a hefty quantity, unless put into a charitable trust (which is how the castle is now set up). The room that I would really love to live in was the Library though, a wonderful cosy cave of dark wood panelling, big dark red velvet sofas, huge sprays of brass light fittings and a gallery running round a windowed area. I spent so long drooling, that the guide came over to see whether I was having difficulty in finding the information on the room.
After the main rooms and bedrooms, we'd both been consistently on our feet for about two and a half hours and a sit down was called for. Fortunately - it also seemed a good time for lunch, so we headed to the castle restaurant. After some refreshment, we exited the castle, to bright sunny skies and headed over to the gardens. In comparison with all this history, a wonderful contemporary formal garden, called the Collector Earl's garden was created and opened last year. It's a gorgeous area, with fountains and wooden pergolas and a wooden "Oberon's Palace" which contains an innovative fountain, consisting of a golden crown held aloft only by a jet of water and cunningly designed to deflect the water down to drains in the floor. The interior walls of the "palace" are decorated with mosaic pictures and a collage of shells, in an old tradition. The garden also sits under the shadow of the Victorian Catholic Cathedral, which is located outside the castle grounds, but looms impressively beside the garden walls.
As usual, I took huge numbers of photos. It was a wonderful way to spend a spring Sunday.