Ancient Castle as Stately Home

What would it be like to live in a truly authentic medieval castle today? 

Situationed in West Sussex, Arundel Castle serves as the principal seat and home of the family of the Duke of Norfolk and has been in the family's ownership or over 400 years. Unlike the adventure in Wales to Conwy Castle, which is a shell of its former glory, Arundel Castle is still a running and working castle, remodeled and restored after some historical disasters.

Arundel castle's history starts, as much of English history does, with William the Conqueror. He granted the earldom of Arundel to Roger de Montgomery, who built the castle in 1067. After a few reversions to the crown, the FitzAlan family received Arundel Castle in the thirteenth century and had it until 1580. The FitzAlan line ended when it was united with the Howard family in the 1500s when Mary FitzAlan, daughter to the nineteenth earl, became the first wife of Thomas Howard, the 4th Duke of Norfolk. (This the same Duke of Norfolk from this entry who was executed by Elizabeth I for high treason. Arundel Castle was among the lands lost because of Norfolk's betrayal.) It was because of this marriage that the modern Dukes of Norfolk derive their surname as FitzAlan-Howard and Arundel Castle as their seat. The castle was later returned to the family. 

The castle underwent changes and restructuring to meet the requirements of the nobility throughout history. When Empress Matilda stayed at Arundel in 1139, apartments were constructed to accommodate her and her entourage, which survive to this day. The FitzAlans renovated and repaired the castle, and added to the well tower and a new entrance to the keep. A chapel was added in the fourteenth century.  The castle was badly damaged during the Civil War when it was besieged twice by the Royalist who took control, and then later by the Parliamentarian forces. The castle wasn't repaired from this damage until the 8th Duke began repairs, and the 11th Duke completed them. He desired to live and entertain at the castle over his other ducal properties. He designed and built the library, which has been revised and remodeled. The 13th Duke continued improvements to the castle, building a new suite of rooms for Queen Victoria and Prince Albert's visit in 1848, and refurbishing all parts of the castle where the Queen may visit. 

The current castle was completed around 1900 by the 15th Duke and was one of the first English country houses to be fitted with electric light, service elevators, and central heating. The castle appears truly medieval from the outside, what with crenulations, towers, and arrow slits, but it has all the conveniences of the modern period within. 

A Private Library For All

Samuel Pepys, Secretary of the Admiralty, Member of Parliament, President of the Royal Society, was born in 1633 and died in 1703. He's most famous as a diarist of seventeenth-century life in London. He was also a lifelong book collector and had amassed quite a large library. One of the treasures of the library is the series of diaries Pepys kept from 1660 to 1669.

Upon his death, he directed in his will that his library should pass to Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he was a Scholar. His directions precisely stipulation that his library be housed at Magdalene after the death of his nephew and heir John Jackson. 

Pepys' 3,000 volumes, bound specially for him, are to stand at the College as they were when he died, without addition or subtraction, 'for the benefit of posterity.' The volumes are kept as he left them, arranged 'according to heighth' in the book-presses which he had made for him in a naval dockyard. His catalogue, shelf-list, and library desk are still in use. 

The content of Pepys' library reflects a wide range of interests. Literature, history, science, music, and the fine arts are strongly represented. 

Pepys wrote, and I quite strongly believe, that a private library should comprehend 'in fewest books and least room the greatest diversity of subjects, styles and languages its owner's reading will bear.' 

Well said and practiced, sir.

A House Through Time

The history of Audley End closely aligns with key events in English history. 

Audley End was not always a grand manor house, but started existence as an Benedictine Abbey, until the Reformation when Henry VIII was confiscating the Church's lands and assets for the Crown. The Abbey was granted to Henry VIII's Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Audley, who converted the Abbey into a house. He married Elizabeth Grey, sister to Lady Jane Grey (of famed Nine Day Queen), and their daughter married Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, who owned Audley end until he was executed by Elizabeth I in 1572 for high treason for conspiring with Mary Queen of Scots. The Howard family lost the estate of Audley End and their titles...until another stroke of history changed the family's fate. 

Audley's grandson, also named Thomas Howard, redeemed the family's reputation and gained Elizabeth I's confidence by his successful command of a ship during England's defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1566. Under James I, Howard was made 1st Earl of Suffolk and appointed Lord Chamberlain. With his newfound wealth and associations to the crown, Howard demolished Audley's original house to build a grander estate fit for a king. James I visited twice and, for the Jacobean period, Audley End was the largest privately owned house in England. 

It may have looked like this at one time:

Only the front section, a quarter of the original building remains today. To build this monstrosity of a house, Howard, as Lord Treasurer embezzled funds and was convicted of corruption, extortion, and bribery. The debt of building the house was the family's downfall and was inherited by later generations with the house for the next 120 years. King Charles II eased the family's debt by buying the house because of it's proximity to Newmarket races. The family remained on the property as keepers of the new palace. Charles II didn't use the house and his successor, William III, returned the house to family in 1701. 

By this time, the house had deteriorated and the architecture was out of fashion. The family, unable to afford repairing the house, began reducing it to the north and south wings. The 10th Earl of Suffolk solved the family's debts by marrying a wealthy brewery heiress, but because the had no children, the long association of this house with the historic Howard family ended. After the Earl's death in 1745, his wife sells off the contents of the house and a nephew inherits Audley End. The nephew, the first Earl of Braybrooke, restores the house by adding galleries, rooms,and storeys. He also hired "Capability Brown" to remodel the grounds with rolling green hills and Palladian bridges. The interior as it is displayed today were the efforts of the 3rd Earl of Braybrooke whose aim was to recover the Jacobean character of the house in the 19th century. Surviving Jacobean elements were repaired and new work in the same style was added.