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Mapledurham House
Mapledurham House is an Elizabethan stately home located in the civil parish of Mapledurham in the English county of Oxfordshire. It is a Grade I listed building, first listed on 24 October 1951. History and architecture The manor of Mapledurham was bought in 1490 by Richard Blount of Iver however the current house was started by Sir Michael Blount (c1530-1610) and has remained in the Blount-Eyston family to this day. Building was started around 1585, at the time of the Spanish Armada, in the classic Elizabethan E-shape. It includes a late 18th-century chapel built in the Strawberry Hill Gothic style for the recusant Roman Catholic owners of the house. Prior to the Catholic Emancipation, the owners would hide priests in its priest holes, some of which were only discovered in the 21st century, and secretly celebrate Mass with a makeshift altar hidden inside a writing desk. The estate covers much of the village including Mapledurham Watermill and part of the church. Anne of Den ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mapledurham
Mapledurham is a small village, civil parish and country estate beside the River Thames in southern Oxfordshire. The large parish borders Caversham, the most affluent major district of Reading, Berkshire. Historic buildings in the area include the Church of England parish church of St. Margaret, Mapledurham Watermill and Mapledurham House. Village The village is on the north bank of the River Thames about northwest of Reading. Road access is by a narrow and steep lane from Trench Green on the rural road from Caversham to Goring Heath, Goring-on-Thames and other places. The village is closer geodesically (as the crow flies) to Reading's centre than some parts of its districts but it is highly conserved, traffic-calm and rural. The access lane becomes the main street of the village and terminates on the bank of the River Thames, where it is surrounded by a cluster of three significant buildings. The Church of England parish church of St. Margaret was mainly built in the 14th an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Writing Desk
Writing is a medium of human communication which involves the representation of a language through a system of physically inscribed, mechanically transferred, or digitally represented symbols. Writing systems do not themselves constitute human languages (with the debatable exception of computer languages); they are a means of rendering language into a form that can be reconstructed by other humans separated by time and/or space. While not all languages use a writing system, those that do can complement and extend capacities of spoken language by creating durable forms of language that can be transmitted across space (e.g. written correspondence) and stored over time (e.g. libraries or other public records). It has also been observed that the activity of writing itself can have knowledge-transforming effects, since it allows humans to externalize their thinking in forms that are easier to reflect on, elaborate, reconsider, and revise. A system of writing relies on many of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fawley Court
Fawley Court is a country house, with large mixed-use grounds standing on the west bank of the River Thames at Fawley in the English county of Buckinghamshire. Its former deer park extended east into the Henley Park area of Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire that abuts it to the south. Following World War II, it was run as Divine Mercy College by the Polish Congregation of Marian Fathers, with its associated library, museum and was one of the cultural centres for the Polish minority in the United Kingdom until its closure and sale in the 2009. It is listed at Grade I for its architecture. Parts and location The main building sits five times its length away from the river, 600m along the 2112m Henley Royal Regatta course and has a private promenade covering approximately half of the course, adjoining its two small farms to the south. Its former deer park extended west into the Henley Park area of Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, which has an even larger estate, but more modest buildin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Foxwarren Park
Foxwarren Park, at Wisley in Surrey, is a Victorian country house and estate. On sandstone Ockham and Wisley Commons, it was designed in 1860 by the railway architect Frederick Barnes for brewing magnate and MP, Charles Buxton. It is a Grade II* listed building. From 1919 to 1955, it was owned by Alfred Ezra who was President of the Avicultural Society — he assembled a collection of rare birds and animals on the estate — in 1939 it housed the last known pink-headed ducks in the world. It was then owned by Hannah Weinstein and chosen for films and television series including ''The Adventures of Robin Hood''. History Charles Buxton, brewer, philanthropist and politician, was also an amateur architect. Having rented a range of properties around the growing village of Weybridge in the 1850s, he purchased the site for Foxwarren Park in 1855. He was heavily involved in the design of the new house, working with Frederick Barnes, known more for his designs for railway s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hardwick House, Oxfordshire
Hardwick House is a Tudor house on the banks of the River Thames on a slight rise at Whitchurch-on-Thames in the English county of Oxfordshire. It is reputed to have been the inspiration for E. H. Shepard's illustrations of Toad Hall in the book ''The Wind in the Willows'' by Kenneth Grahame, although this is also claimed by Mapledurham House, Fowey Hall Hotel, Foxwarren Park and Fawley Court. History King Charles I of England visited the house while he was a prisoner on escort from Oxford. Hardwick House was bought by Richard Lybbe in 1526; that family ended in an heiress Isabella Lybbe who married Philip Powys in 1730 and their Powys descendants had their home there for a further 130 years. Caroline Powys, wife of Philip Lybbe Powys of Hardwick House maintained a diary from 1756 which recorded the daily social round of her class in gossipy detail. She wrote of visits to neighbouring country houses, the winter balls and assemblies in Henley and the seasons in London and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Wind In The Willows
''The Wind in the Willows'' is a children's novel by the British novelist Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. It details the story of Mole, Ratty, and Badger as they try to help Mr. Toad, after he becomes obsessed with motorcars and gets into trouble. It also details short stories about them that are disconnected from the main narrative. The novel was based on bedtime stories Grahame told his son Alastair. It has been adapted numerous times for both stage and screen. ''The Wind in the Willows'' received negative reviews upon its initial release, but has since become a classic of British literature. It was listed at No. 16 in the BBC's survey The Big Read, and has been adapted multiple times in different mediums. Background Kenneth Grahame married Elspeth Thomson, the daughter of Robert William Thomson in 1899, when he was 40. The next year they had their only child, a boy named Alastair (nicknamed "Mouse"). He was born premature, blind in one eye, and was plagued by heal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kenneth Grahame
Kenneth Grahame ( ; 8 March 1859 – 6 July 1932) was a British writer born in Edinburgh, Scotland. He is most famous for ''The Wind in the Willows'' (1908), a classic of children's literature, as well as ''The Reluctant Dragon (short story), The Reluctant Dragon''. Both books were later adapted for stage and film, of which A. A. Milne's ''Toad of Toad Hall'', based on part of ''The Wind in the Willows'', was the first. Other adaptations include Cosgrove Hall Films' ''The Wind in the Willows (1983 film), The Wind in the Willows'' (and its subsequent long-running television series), and the Walt Disney films (''The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad'' and ''The Reluctant Dragon (1941 film), The Reluctant Dragon''). Personal life Early life Kenneth Grahame was born on 8 March 1859 in Edinburgh. When he was a little more than a year old, his father, an Faculty of Advocates, advocate, received an appointment as sheriff-substitute in Argyllshire, at Inveraray on Loch Fyne. When he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Toad Hall (The Wind In The Willows)
Toad Hall is the fictional home of Mr. Toad, a character in the 1908 novel ''The Wind in the Willows'' by Kenneth Grahame. History On his retirement from the Bank of England in 1908, Grahame returned to Blewbury in Berkshire, the county in which he grew up. In October that year he published ''The Wind in the Willows'', a novel for children featuring an array of anthropomorphic characters, including Rat (a water vole), Mole, Badger and Toad. Toad lives in a house on the edge of the River Bank, Toad Hall. The novel was almost universally condemned by critics, but achieved very considerable sales. It has been in print continuously since its publication and has been adapted for plays, a ballet, films and musicals. Originally published as plain text, it has subsequently been illustrated by a number of notable artists including Paul Bransom, Arthur Rackham and E. H. Shepard. Description Grahame's description of Toad Hall is sparse: "a handsome, dignified old house of mellowed red b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Midsomer Murders
''Midsomer Murders'' is a British crime drama television series, adapted by Anthony Horowitz and Douglas Watkinson from the novels in the '' Chief Inspector Barnaby'' book series (created by Caroline Graham), and broadcast on two channels of ITV since its premiere on 23 March 1997. The series focuses on various murder cases that take place within small country villages across the fictional English county of Midsomer, and the efforts of the senior police detective and his partner within the fictional Midsomer Constabulary to solve the crime by determining who the culprit is and the motive for their actions. It identifies itself differently from other detective dramas often by featuring a mixture of lighthearted whimsy and dark humour, as well as a notable soundtrack that includes the use of the theremin instrument for the show's theme tune. The programme has featured two lead stars—from its premiere in 1997, John Nettles as Detective Chief Inspector (DCI) Tom Barnaby, until h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Eagle Has Landed (film)
''The Eagle Has Landed'' is a 1976 British war film directed by John Sturges and starring Michael Caine, Donald Sutherland, and Robert Duvall. Based on the 1975 novel '' The Eagle Has Landed'' by Jack Higgins, the film is about a fictional German plot to kidnap Winston Churchill near the end of the Second World War. ''The Eagle Has Landed'' was Sturges's final film, and was successful upon its release. Plot Admiral Canaris, head of the ''Abwehr'', is ordered by Adolf Hitler to make a feasibility study into capturing the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill. Canaris considers it a meaningless exercise that will soon be forgotten by the Führer, but he knows this will not be the case with Heinrich Himmler. Canaris therefore orders staff officer Oberst Radl to begin the study, to avoid being discredited. Radl receives intelligence from an ''Abwehr'' sleeper agent in England, saying Churchill will stay in a Norfolk village near the coast. He begins to see potential in the op ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander Pope
Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 O.S. – 30 May 1744) was an English poet, translator, and satirist of the Enlightenment era who is considered one of the most prominent English poets of the early 18th century. An exponent of Augustan literature, Pope is best known for his satirical and discursive poetry including '' The Rape of the Lock'', ''The Dunciad'', and ''An Essay on Criticism,'' and for his translation of Homer. After Shakespeare, Pope is the second-most quoted author in ''The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations'', some of his verses having entered common parlance (e.g. "damning with faint praise" or " to err is human; to forgive, divine"). Life Alexander Pope was born in London on 21 May 1688 during the year of the Glorious Revolution. His father (Alexander Pope, 1646–1717) was a successful linen merchant in the Strand, London. His mother, Edith (1643–1733), was the daughter of William Turner, Esquire, of York. Both parents were Catholics. His mother's sister was the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Woodstock Palace
Woodstock Palace was a royal residence in the English town of Woodstock, Oxfordshire. Henry I of England built a hunting lodge here and in 1129 he built of walls to create the first enclosed park, where lions and leopards were kept. The lodge became a palace under Henry's grandson, Henry II, who spent time here with his mistress, Rosamund Clifford. Timeline Important events that took place at the palace or manor include: * The marriage of William the Lion, king of Scots to Ermengarde de Beaumont in 1186 * The signing of the Treaty of Woodstock between Henry III of England and Llewelyn the Last (1247) * The birth of Edmund of Woodstock, 1st Earl of Kent (1301-1330), the sixth son of King Edward I, and the second by his second wife Margaret of France, and a younger half-brother of King Edward II. * The birth of Edward, the Black Prince (1330), eldest son and heir apparent of King Edward III and father of King Richard II. * The marriage of Mary Plantagenet, daughter of King Edwa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
