Hatfield House is a

country house An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...

set in a large park, the Great Park, on the eastern side of the town of Hatfield,

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is one of the home counties in southern England. It borders Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire to the north, Essex to the east, Greater London to the south, and Buckinghamshire to the west. For govern ...

, England. The present Jacobean house, a leading example of the

prodigy house Prodigy houses are large and showy English country houses built by courtiers and other wealthy families, either "noble palaces of an awesome scale" or "proud, ambitious heaps" according to taste. The prodigy houses stretch over the period ...

, was built in 1611 by

Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, (1 June 156324 May 1612), was an English statesman noted for his direction of the government during the Union of the Crowns, as Tudor England gave way to Stuart period, Stuart rule (1603). Lord Salisbury s ...

and Chief Minister to

King James I James VI and I (James Charles Stuart; 19 June 1566 – 27 March 1625) was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until hi ...

. It is a prime example of Jacobean architecture. The estate includes extensive grounds and surviving parts of an earlier palace. The house is currently the home of

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury Robert Michael James Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury, Baron Gascoyne-Cecil, (born 30 September 1946), is a British Conservative politician. From 1979 to 1987 he represented South Dorset in the House of Commons, and in the 1990s he wa ...

. It is open to the public.

History

An earlier building on the site was the Royal Palace of Hatfield. Only part of this still exists a short distance from the present house. That palace was the childhood home and favourite residence of

Queen Elizabeth I Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". El ...

. Built in 1497 by the Archbishop of Canterbury (formerly Bishop of Ely),

King Henry VII Henry VII (28 January 1457 – 21 April 1509) was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizure of the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death in 1509. He was the first monarch of the House of Tudor. Henry's mother, Margaret Beaufo ...

's minister, John Cardinal Morton, it comprised four wings in a square surrounding a central courtyard. The palace was seized by

Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...

with other church properties. The nearby parish church of St Etheldreda's in Old Hatfield once served the bishop's palace as well as the village. Hatfield Old Palace - Close View

Henry VIII's children,

King Edward VI Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. Edward was the son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour and the first E ...

and the future Queen Elizabeth I, spent their youth at Hatfield Palace. His eldest daughter, who later reigned as

Queen Mary I Mary I (18 February 1516 – 17 November 1558), also known as Mary Tudor, and as "Bloody Mary" by her Protestant opponents, was Queen of England and Ireland from July 1553 and Queen of Spain from January 1556 until her death in 1558. Sh ...

, lived there between 1533 and 1536, when she was sent to wait on the then Princess Elizabeth as punishment for refusing to recognise Henry's marriage to Anne Boleyn and his religious reforms. In 1548, when she was only 15 years old, Elizabeth was under suspicion of having illegally agreed to marry Thomas Seymour. The house and her servants were seized by Edward VI's agent, Robert Tyrwhit, and she was interrogated there. She successfully defended her conduct with wit and defiance. Seymour was executed in 1549 for numerous other crimes against the crown. After her two months of imprisonment in the Tower of London by her sister, Queen Mary, Elizabeth returned to Hatfield. The Queen Elizabeth Oak on the grounds of the estate is said to be the location where Elizabeth was told she was queen following Mary's death, but is considered unlikely as Mary died in November. In November 1558, Elizabeth held her first

Council of State A Council of State is a governmental body in a country, or a subdivision of a country, with a function that varies by jurisdiction. It may be the formal name for the cabinet or it may refer to a non-executive advisory body associated with a head o ...

in the Great Hall. Hatfield House is a popular tourist attraction because it has so many objects associated with Queen Elizabeth I, including gloves and a pair of silk stockings that are believed to have been the first in England. The library displays a long illuminated parchment roll showing the pedigree of the queen with ancestors back to Adam and Eve. The Marble Hall holds the " Rainbow Portrait" of Elizabeth. HatfieldHallJosephNashc1840

Elizabeth's successor,

, did not like the palace. It was included in the

jointure Jointure is, in law, a provision for a wife after the death of her husband. As defined by Sir Edward Coke, it is "a competent livelihood of freehold for the wife, of lands or tenements, to take effect presently in possession or profit after the de ...

estate of his wife

Anne of Denmark Anne of Denmark (; 12 December 1574 – 2 March 1619) was the wife of King James VI and I; as such, she was Queen of Scotland The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the constitutional fo ...

. In 1607, King James gave it to his chief minister,

, in exchange for

Theobalds Theobalds House (also known as Theobalds Palace) in the parish of Cheshunt in the English county of Hertfordshire, was a significant stately home and (later) royal palace of the 16th and early 17th centuries. Set in extensive parkland, it was a r ...

, which was the Cecils' family home on the current site of Cedars Park, Broxbourne. Cecil, who liked building, tore down three wings of the royal palace (the back and sides of the square) in 1608 and used the bricks to build the present structure. The richly carved wooden Grand Staircase and the rare stained glass window in the private chapel are among the house's original Jacobean features. Cecil employed Robert Lemynge to supervise the construction, with input from the royal surveyor

Simon Basil Simon Basil (fl. 1590 — 1615) was an English surveyor or architect, who held the post of Surveyor of the King's Works, 1606-15. Works Simon Basil's first recorded appearance, in 1590, was drawing a plan of Ostend, a military objective at the tim ...

, and

Inigo Jones Inigo Jones (; 15 July 1573 – 21 June 1652) was the first significant architect in England and Wales in the early modern period, and the first to employ Vitruvian rules of proportion and symmetry in his buildings. As the most notable archit ...

who visited in October 1609. Cecil's descendant,

Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (; 3 February 183022 August 1903) was a British statesman and Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom three times for a total of over thirteen y ...

, was three times

prime minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...

during the closing years of

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...

's reign. The city of Salisbury, Rhodesia (now Harare, Zimbabwe) was founded in his time and named for him. He is also known for often putting members of his family into the government while prime minister. As his first name was Robert, this habit is sometimes said to have given rise to the popular expression '

Bob's your uncle "Bob's your uncle" is a phrase commonly used in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth countries that means "and there it is" or "and there you have it" or "it's done". Typically, someone says it to conclude a set of simple instructions or when a ...

' (meaning roughly 'It's all right, everything is sure to come off'). During World War II, Hatfield House was the location of the first Civil Resettlement Unit and acted as headquarters for the scheme. CRUs were created to help repatriated British

prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held Captivity, captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold priso ...

transition back to civilian life and the luxurious setting of Hatfield was considered very beneficial to these men. On 12 July 1945, the

king King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

and

queen Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mother ...

visited the CRU at Hatfield, which generated significant news coverage.

Gardens

The Gardens, covering , date from the early 17th century and were laid out by

John Tradescant the elder John Tradescant the Elder (; c. 1570s – 15–16 April 1638), father of John Tradescant the Younger, was an English naturalist, gardener, collector and traveller. On 18 June 1607 he married Elizabeth Day of Meopham in Kent, England. She had bee ...

. Tradescant visited Europe and brought back trees and plants that had never previously been grown in England. The gardens included orchards, fountains, scented plants, water parterres, terraces, herb gardens and a foot maze. They were neglected in the 18th century, but restoration began in Victorian times and continues under the present Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury. During World War I, the grounds were used to test the first British tanks. An area was dug with trenches and craters and covered with barbed-wire to represent

no man's land No man's land is waste or unowned land or an uninhabited or desolate area that may be under dispute between parties who leave it unoccupied out of fear or uncertainty. The term was originally used to define a contested territory or a dump ...

and German trench lines on the Western Front. To commemorate this, the only surviving

Mark I tank British heavy tanks were a series of related armoured fighting vehicles developed by the UK during the First World War. The Mark I was the world's first tank, a tracked, armed, and armoured vehicle, to enter combat. The name "tank" was initial ...

was sited at Hatfield from 1919 to 1970 before being moved to

The Tank Museum The Tank Museum (previously The Bovington Tank Museum) is a collection of armoured fighting vehicles at Bovington Camp in Dorset, South West England. It is about north of the village of Wool and west of the major port of Poole. The collection ...

, Bovington. The

Rhodesian Light Infantry The 1st Battalion, Rhodesian Light Infantry (1RLI), commonly The Rhodesian Light Infantry (RLI), was a regiment formed in 1961 at Brady Barracks (Bulawayo, Southern Rhodesia) as a light infantry unit within the army of the Federation of Rhodesi ...

Regimental Association has placed its 'Troopie' memorial statue on the grounds of Hatfield House due to the long association of the Cecil family with

Southern Rhodesia Southern Rhodesia was a landlocked self-governing British Crown colony in southern Africa, established in 1923 and consisting of British South Africa Company (BSAC) territories lying south of the Zambezi River. The region was informally kn ...

. Around its base is a roll of regimental members ('troopies') who fell in the

Rhodesian Bush War The Rhodesian Bush War, also called the Second as well as the Zimbabwe War of Liberation, was a civil conflict from July 1964 to December 1979 in the unrecognised country of Rhodesia (later Zimbabwe-Rhodesia). The conflict pitted three for ...

and several inscriptions, including 'In reconciliation and hope for future peace in Zimbabwe'.

Tours

The State Rooms can be seen in the midweek guided tours and visitors can look around in their own time at weekends. On Friday, the Garden Connoisseur's Day, the house is open for guided tours and pre-booked specialist groups. There are five miles of marked trails.

Film credits

Long gallery, Hatfield House-19670646391

Hatfield House has been used for

location filming In geography, location or place are used to denote a region (point, line, or area) on Earth's surface or elsewhere. The term ''location'' generally implies a higher degree of certainty than ''place'', the latter often indicating an entity with an ...

on a number of film and television productions, including: '' Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes'' (1984); ''

Orlando Orlando () is a city in the U.S. state of Florida and is the county seat of Orange County. In Central Florida, it is the center of the Orlando metropolitan area, which had a population of 2,509,831, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures re ...

'' (1992); ''Batman'' (1989); '' Tomb Raider: Underworld'', '' Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life'', ''

Rise of the Tomb Raider ''Rise of the Tomb Raider'' is a 2015 action-adventure video game developed by Crystal Dynamics and published by Microsoft Studios and Square Enix's European subsidiary. The game is the eleventh main entry in the ''Tomb Raider'' series, the s ...

'' and ''

Shadow of the Tomb Raider ''Shadow of the Tomb Raider'' is a 2018 action-adventure video game developed by Eidos-Montréal and published by Square Enix's European subsidiary. It continues the narrative from the 2015 game ''Rise of the Tomb Raider'' and is the twelfth ...

''; ''

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ''Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'' is a 1964 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. The story features the adventures of young Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory of eccentric chocolatier Willy Wonka. The story was originall ...

'' (2005); ''

The New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...

'' (2005); '' Elizabeth: The Golden Age'' (2007); ''

Hot Fuzz ''Hot Fuzz'' is a 2007 action comedy film directed by Edgar Wright and written by Wright and Simon Pegg. Starring Pegg, Nick Frost, Timothy Dalton, and Jim Broadbent, the film centres on two police officers investigating a series of mysteriou ...

'' (2007); ''

Shakespeare in Love ''Shakespeare in Love'' is a 1998 romantic period comedy-drama film directed by John Madden, written by Marc Norman and playwright Tom Stoppard, and produced by Harvey Weinstein. It stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes, Geoffrey Rush, Col ...

'' (1998); '' Dustbin Baby''; ''

Sherlock Holmes Sherlock Holmes () is a fictional detective created by British author Arthur Conan Doyle. Referring to himself as a " consulting detective" in the stories, Holmes is known for his proficiency with observation, deduction, forensic science and ...

'' (2009); ''

Agatha Christie's Marple ''Agatha Christie's Marple'' (or simply ''Marple'') is a British ITV (TV network), ITV television programme loosely based on the books and short stories by British crime novelist Agatha Christie. The title character was played by Geraldine McEw ...

'' (2010); ''

Get Him to the Greek ''Get Him to the Greek'' is a 2010 American comedy film written, produced and directed by Nicholas Stoller and starring Russell Brand and Jonah Hill. Released on June 4, 2010, the film is a spin-off sequel of Stoller's 2008 film '' Forgetting S ...

'' (2010); ''

Antiques Roadshow ''Antiques Roadshow'' is a British television programme broadcast by the BBC in which antiques appraisers travel to various regions of the United Kingdom (and occasionally in other countries) to appraise antiques brought in by local people (g ...

'' (2010); '' MasterChef Australia'' (2010); ''Garden Secrets'' (2010); ''

Royal Upstairs Downstairs ''Royal Upstairs Downstairs'' is a British television documentary series of 20 half-hour episodes broadcast by BBC Two each Monday to Friday evening from 7 March to 1 April 2011. The title is a reference to the drama series '' Upstairs, Downstairs' ...

'' (2011); ''

My Week with Marilyn ''My Week with Marilyn'' is a 2011 biographical film directed by Simon Curtis and written by Adrian Hodges. It stars Michelle Williams, Kenneth Branagh, Eddie Redmayne, Dominic Cooper, Julia Ormond, Emma Watson, and Judi Dench. Based on two b ...

'' (2010); ''

Paddington Paddington is an area within the City of Westminster, in Central London. First a medieval parish then a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Paddi ...

'' (2004); ''

Mr. Holmes ''Mr. Holmes'' is a 2015 British-American mystery film directed by Bill Condon, based on Mitch Cullin's 2005 novel ''A Slight Trick of the Mind'', and featuring the character Sherlock Holmes. The film stars Ian McKellen as Sherlock Holmes, Laur ...

'' (2015); ''

Doctor Thorne ''Doctor Thorne'' by Anthony Trollope (Chapman and Hall, London, 1858) is the third novel in the ''Chronicles of Barsetshire'' series, between ''Barchester Towers'' and ''Framley Parsonage''. The idea of the plot was suggested to Trollope by ...

''; ''

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies ''Pride and Prejudice and Zombies'' is a 2009 parody novel by Seth Grahame-Smith. It is a mashup combining Jane Austen's classic 1813 novel ''Pride and Prejudice'' with elements of modern zombie fiction, crediting Austen as co-author. It was fir ...

'' (2016); ''

The Crown The Crown is the state in all its aspects within the jurisprudence of the Commonwealth realms and their subdivisions (such as the Crown Dependencies, overseas territories, provinces, or states). Legally ill-defined, the term has different ...

''; '' Breathe'' (2017); ''

All the Money in the World ''All the Money in the World'' is a 2017 biographical crime thriller film directed by Ridley Scott and written by David Scarpa. Based on John Pearson's 1995 book ''Painfully Rich: The Outrageous Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Heirs of J. Pau ...

'' (2017); ''

Trust Trust often refers to: * Trust (social science), confidence in or dependence on a person or quality It may also refer to: Business and law * Trust law, a body of law under which one person holds property for the benefit of another * Trust (bus ...

'';''

The Favourite ''The Favourite'' is a 2018 Historical drama, period black comedy film co-produced and directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, from a screenplay by Deborah Davis (screenwriter), Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara (writer), Tony McNamara. Set in early 18th ...

'' (2018); "

Sucker Sucker may refer to: General use * Lollipop or sucker, a type of confection * Sucker (slang), a slang term for a very gullible person * Hard candy ** Cough drop ** Mint (candy) Biology * Sucker (botany), a term for a shoot that arises undergro ...

" (2019); '' Enola Holmes''; '' Rebecca'' (2020); ''

Bridgerton ''Bridgerton'' is an American historical- romance streaming television series created by Chris Van Dusen for Netflix. Based on the book series by Julia Quinn, it is Shondaland's first scripted show for Netflix. It revolves around the epony ...

'' (2020); ''

Cromwell Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English politician and military officer who is widely regarded as one of the most important statesmen in English history. He came to prominence during the 1639 to 1651 Wars of the Three Ki ...

''; ''

Henry VIII and His Six Wives ''Henry VIII and His Six Wives'' is a 1972 British historical film adaptation, directed by Waris Hussein, of the BBC 1970 six-part miniseries '' The Six Wives of Henry VIII''. Keith Michell, who plays Henry VIII in the TV series, also portrays ...

''; '' The Avengers'' (1998); ''

V for Vendetta ''V for Vendetta'' is a British graphic novel written by Alan Moore and illustrated by David Lloyd (with additional art by Tony Weare). Initially published between 1982 and 1985 in black and white as an ongoing serial in the British anthol ...

''; ''

Mortdecai ''Mortdecai'' is a series of comic thriller novels written by English author Kyril Bonfiglioli. The book series deals with the picaresque adventures of a dissolute aristocratic art dealer named Charlie Mortdecai, accompanied on his adventures by h ...

'' (2015); and ''

Paddington 2 ''Paddington 2'' is a 2017 live-action animated comedy film directed by Paul King and written by King and Simon Farnaby. Based on the stories of Paddington Bear, created by Michael Bond (to whom the film is also dedicated, Bond having died th ...

''.

References

External links

*
A detailed historical record of Hatfield Palace

Photos tagged Hatfield House
at

Flickr Flickr ( ; ) is an American image hosting and video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was a popular way for amateur and professional ...

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History

Gardens

Tours

Film credits

References

Further reading

External links