Burton Constable Hall
Encyclopedia
Capability Brown
Lancelot Brown , more commonly known as Capability Brown, was an English landscape architect. He is remembered as "the last of the great English eighteenth-century artists to be accorded his due", and "England's greatest gardener". He designed over 170 parks, many of which still endure...
with an area of 300 acres (1.2 km²). It is located 3 miles (5 km) south east of the village Skirlaugh
Skirlaugh
Skirlaugh is a village and civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England in an area known as Holderness. It is situated approximately north east of Hull city centre on the A165 road. Originally a farming community, it is now primarily a commuter village for Hull.According to the 2001 UK...
, East Riding of Yorkshire
East Riding of Yorkshire
The East Riding of Yorkshire, or simply East Yorkshire, is a local government district with unitary authority status, and a ceremonial county of England. For ceremonial purposes the county also includes the city of Kingston upon Hull, which is a separate unitary authority...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, approximately 9 miles (14.5 km) north east of the city of Hull
Kingston upon Hull
Kingston upon Hull , usually referred to as Hull, is a city and unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It stands on the River Hull at its junction with the Humber estuary, 25 miles inland from the North Sea. Hull has a resident population of...
, and has been the home of the Constable family for over 400 years. As was typical, the Elizabethan house was originally dominated by its Great Hall, which rose the full height of the building and was top-lit by a lantern. By the 18th century, the Great Hall must have seemed old fashioned, and a surviving design of circa 1730 suggests that Cuthbert Constable intended to completely remodel the interior.
Remodelling of the house in the 1760s
However, it appears that remodelling was not undertaken until the 1760s when his son William Constable commissioned a number of architects for designs. These included John Carr and Timothy Lightoler. (He also commissioned a design for the park from Capability Brown.) The decorative plasterwork was executed by James HendersonJames Henderson
James Henderson may refer to:* Big James Henderson , American powerlifter, preacher and motivational speaker* James Pinckney Henderson , American politician, first governor of Texas...
of York. At this time, Constable also acquired the plaster figures of Demosthenes
Demosthenes
Demosthenes was a prominent Greek statesman and orator of ancient Athens. His orations constitute a significant expression of contemporary Athenian intellectual prowess and provide an insight into the politics and culture of ancient Greece during the 4th century BC. Demosthenes learned rhetoric by...
and Hercules
Hercules
Hercules is the Roman name for Greek demigod Heracles, son of Zeus , and the mortal Alcmene...
with Cerebus, and plaster busts of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and the Greek poetess Sappho
Sappho
Sappho was an Ancient Greek poet, born on the island of Lesbos. Later Greeks included her in the list of nine lyric poets. Her birth was sometime between 630 and 612 BC, and it is said that she died around 570 BC, but little is known for certain about her life...
, from the sculptor John Cheere
John Cheere
John Cheere was an English sculptor, born in London. Brother of the sculptor Sir Henry Cheere, he was originally apprenticed as a haberdasher from 1725 to 1732.-Life:...
. Above the fireplace is a carving of oak boughs and garlands of laurel leaves, crowned by the Garter Star, surrounding the armourial shield of the Constable family in scagliola by Domenico Bartoli.
The Dining Room was substantially remodelled by William Constable in the 1760s, who commissioned designs from Robert Adam
Robert Adam
Robert Adam was a Scottish neoclassical architect, interior designer and furniture designer. He was the son of William Adam , Scotland's foremost architect of the time, and trained under him...
, Thomas Atkinson
Thomas Atkinson (architect)
Thomas Atkinson was an English architect, best remembered for remodelling Bishopthorpe Palace in the Gothic Revival style.- Life :...
, and Timothy Lightoler (who won the commission). The ceiling draws on contemporary interest in the excavations at Pompeii
Pompeii
The city of Pompeii is a partially buried Roman town-city near modern Naples in the Italian region of Campania, in the territory of the comune of Pompei. Along with Herculaneum, Pompeii was destroyed and completely buried during a long catastrophic eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius spanning...
and Herculaneum
Herculaneum
Herculaneum was an ancient Roman town destroyed by volcanic pyroclastic flows in AD 79, located in the territory of the current commune of Ercolano, in the Italian region of Campania in the shadow of Mt...
, with plasterwork by Giuseppe Cortese. The overmantel plaque of Bacchus
Dionysus
Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...
and Ariadne
Ariadne
Ariadne , in Greek mythology, was the daughter of King Minos of Crete, and his queen Pasiphaë, daughter of Helios, the Sun-titan. She aided Theseus in overcoming the Minotaur and was the bride of the god Dionysus.-Minos and Theseus:...
riding on a panther was modelled on famous antique cameos illustrated in Pierres Antiques Gravées, published 1724 by Philip, Baron von Stosch and Bernard Picart
Bernard Picart
Bernard Picart , was a French engraver, son of Etienne Picart, also an engraver. He was born in Paris and died in Amsterdam. He moved to Antwerp in 1696, and then spent a year in Amsterdam before returning to France at the end of 1698...
. This room was again redecorated in the 19th century.
The Long Gallery
The Long GalleryLong gallery
Long gallery is an architectural term given to a long, narrow room, often with a high ceiling. In British architecture, long galleries were popular in Elizabethan and Jacobean houses. They were often located on the upper floor of the great houses of the time, and stretched across the entire...
, along the west front of the upper floor, was completed by the end of the 16th century. When Dame Margaret Constable was given leave to ‘walke at her pleasure' in 1610, the Long Gallery would have been sparsely furnished, and probably remained as such throughout the 17th century. However, its panelling dates from the late 17th century, as does the marble fireplace. Its elm and mahogany bookcases were installed in the 1740s by Cuthbert Constable
Cuthbert Constable
Cuthbert Constable , born Cuthbert Tunstall, was an English physician and antiquary, "the Catholic Maecenas of his age"....
, and the neo-Jacobean plasterwork on the ceiling and frieze dates from the 1830s. In 1833, the Clifford-Constables began restoring the Long Gallery, including the acquisition of sphinx tables by Giuseppe Leonardi with tops of specimen marbles by Giacomo Raffaelli
Giacomo Raffaelli
Giacomo Raffaelli was an Italian mosaicist from Rome. He is the author of a copy of Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper commissioned by Napoleon I. The mosaic resides at Vienna in the Minoritenkirche.- Sources :...
.
Museums
Although it is known that a museum existed in 1774, its location remains a mystery. It was referred to as the "White room adjoining Gallery" in the inventory of 1791, when it housed a number of framed drawings. The present-day Museum Rooms were, according to a plan of 1775, two bedrooms separated by a dressing room. By the 1850s an elaborate theatre had been created in this area, with the outer room serving as an auditorium and the inner room as a stage and fly tower. The Museum Rooms in their present form date from the 1970s, when William Constable's assorted collections of scientific material were recovered from attics where they had been stored since the early 19th century. The museum now displays part of the most substantial Cabinet of Curiosities to be found in any English country house. In 2003, the Burton Constable Foundation purchased an 18th century telescope which had, prior to its sale around 1960, been for some two centuries a well–known feature of the house. It was originally acquired by William Constable, who purchased it from the famous York clockmaker Henry HindleyHenry Hindley
Henry Hindley was an 18th century clockmaker and maker of scientific instruments. He was the inventor of a screw-cutting lathe. He built a clock for York Minster, England, where he apparently lived for much of his life, in 1752....
in 1760 for the sum of 100 guineas (£105). It is thought to be the world's first equatorially-mounted telescope.
Chinese room
The Chinese Room was inspired by visits to Brighton Pavilion in the 1830s by Marianne, Lady Clifford-Constable and her sister Eliza. Thomas Brooks carved the gilded dragons. Marianne designed the dragon chair, which was carved in 1841 by Thomas Wilkinson Wallis while still serving his apprenticeship with Thomas Ward of Hull.Burton Constable's Grounds and Park
The medieval open field system was used before the deer park was created in 1517. William Senior's 1621 survey indicates that the park was then made up of a series of enclosures with the main entrance to the house from the east, approached by a walk or avenue. The ancient moat stretched around two sides of the hall. Some way to the west, there were three long, narrow fish ponds. In 1715, considerable work was undertaken for William, 4th Viscount Dunbar in levelling land for new gardens. It seems likely that a lawn was created at this time on the west front, and to the north a grove containing a geometrical arrangement of paths. In 1757, William Constable consulted Thomas KnowltonThomas Knowlton
Thomas Knowlton was an American patriot who served in the French and Indian War and was a Colonel during the American Revolution. Knowlton is considered America's first Intelligence professional, and his unit, Knowlton's Rangers, made a significant contribution to intelligence gathering during...
, head gardener of the Londesborough Estate which belonged to the Earl of Burlington
Earl of Burlington
Earl of Burlington is a title that has been created twice, the first time in the Peerage of England and the second in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The first creation was for Richard Boyle, 2nd Earl of Cork, on 20 March 1664...
. Knowlton proposed a menagerie (still surviving at the north end of the lakes) and a stove garden set close to the house on the west front, which contained a greenhouse
Greenhouse
A greenhouse is a building in which plants are grown. These structures range in size from small sheds to very large buildings...
62 m long. Lancelot 'Capability' Brown, who was responsible for landscaping between the years 1772 and 1782, joined the ponds to create the two lakes separated by a dam-cum-bridge, planting clumps of trees, installing sunk fences and the ha-ha. The Elizabethan stable block adjacent to the house was demolished to be replaced in 1768 by Lightoler's Palladian stables. The depression still visible in the east lawns is evidence of Brown's ha-ha which originally ran from the north pond to the Stable Block. Closer to the house, a new Orangery was completed in 1782 to the designs of Thomas Atkinson with artificial stone ornament supplied by Eleanor Coade
Eleanor Coade
Eleanor Coade was a devout Baptist and remained unmarried until her death on 16 November 1821 in Camberwell Grove, Camberwell, London. Her obituary notice was published in The Gentleman's Magazine which declared her ‘the sole inventor and proprietor of an art which deserves considerable notice’...
.
Whale skeleton
An unusual feature in the park during the 19th century was the skeleton of an 18 m long Sperm WhaleSperm Whale
The sperm whale, Physeter macrocephalus, is a marine mammal species, order Cetacea, a toothed whale having the largest brain of any animal. The name comes from the milky-white waxy substance, spermaceti, found in the animal's head. The sperm whale is the only living member of genus Physeter...
erected on ironwork. The bull whale had been stranded in 1825 on the shore at nearby Tunstall
Tunstall, East Riding of Yorkshire
Tunstall is a village in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, in an area known as Holderness. It is situated approximately north west of the town of Withernsea, near to the North Sea coast...
and was carefully dissected and studied by James Alderson
James Alderson
Sir James Alderson MD, FRS was an English physician born and based in Kingston upon Hull. He was President of the Royal College of Physicians.-Biography:...
, a celebrated Hull surgeon. The whale skeleton was brought to Burton Constable, since as Lord Paramount of the Seigniory of Holderness, Sir Clifford was entitled to anything of interest that washed up on the foreshore. This famous whale also came to the attention of Herman Melville
Herman Melville
Herman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....
, who published his masterpiece Moby-Dick
Moby-Dick
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, was written by American author Herman Melville and first published in 1851. It is considered by some to be a Great American Novel and a treasure of world literature. The story tells the adventures of wandering sailor Ishmael, and his voyage on the whaleship Pequod,...
in 1851: "at a place in Yorkshire, England, Burton Constable by name, a certain Sir Clifford Constable has in his possession the skeleton of a Sperm Whale ... Sir Clifford's whale has been articulated throughout; so that like a great chest of drawers
Chest of drawers
A chest of drawers, also called a dresser or a bureau, is a piece of furniture that has multiple parallel, horizontal drawers stacked one above another...
, you can open and shut him, in all his long cavities—spread out his ribs like a gigantic fan—and swing all day upon his lower jaw. Locks are to be put upon some of his trap doors and shutters; and a footman will show round future visitors with a bunch of keys at his side. Sir Clifford thinks of charging twopence for a peep at the whispering gallery in the spinal column; threepence to hear the echo in the hollow of his cerebellum; and sixpence for the unrivalled view from his forehead.".
See also
- Constable Burton HallConstable Burton HallConstable Burton Hall is a handsome mansion of dressed stone in the village of Constable Burton in North Yorkshire whose owners are the Wyvill Family. The house has an elegant Ionic portico in and the principal entrance is approached by a double flight of steps...
- a house which is easily confused with Burton Constable Hall