|
More than 5000 entries on the history, culture and life of Britain (published in 1993 by Macmillan, now out of print)
|
Burghley House
|
|
(19km/12m NW of Peterborough) The most imposing of late Elizabethan mansions, built 1555–87 by Lord *Burghley, apparently to his own design, and still lived in by his descendants. Its traditional 16C exterior (central gatehouse, large heavily mullioned windows, flanking corner towers) conceals spectacular baroque interiors commissioned a century later, mainly from Antonio Verrio. Of his elaborately painted effects the most dramatic is the 'heaven room', in which figures tumble from the ceiling down the walls; in a very successful piece of trompe l'oeil they even seem to step from the walls on to the floor. The park as seen today was landscaped by Capability *Brown. Since 1961 Burghley has been the setting each September for the major autumn *three-day event, the Burghley Horse Trials.
|
|
|
|