Towneley Park is owned and managed by
Burnley Borough Council
Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Bru ...
and is the largest and most popular park in
Burnley
Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Bru ...
,
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly.
The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...
, England. The main entrance to the park is within a mile of the town centre and the park extends to the south east, covering an area of some . At the southern end of the park is Towneley Hall, Burnley's art gallery and museum. To the north are golf courses and playing fields and to the south 24 acres of broadleaf woodland. On the southern boundary is a working farm called Towneley Farm with pastures and plantations extending eastwards into
Cliviger
Cliviger is a civil parish in the Borough of Burnley, in Lancashire, England. It is situated to the southeast of Burnley, and northwest of Todmorden. According to the 2011 census, the parish has a population of 2,238.
Although the whole parish ...
.
History
The hall was the home of the
Towneley family
The Towneley or Townley family are an English (UK) family whose ancestry can be traced back to Anglo-Saxon England. Towneley Hall in Burnley, Lancashire, was the family seat until its sale, together with the surrounding park, to the corporatio ...
from around 1200. The family once owned extensive estates in and around Lancashire and the
West Riding of Yorkshire
The West Riding of Yorkshire is one of three historic subdivisions of Yorkshire, England. From 1889 to 1974 the administrative county County of York, West Riding (the area under the control of West Riding County Council), abbreviated County ...
. The hall not only contains the 15th-century
Whalley Abbey
Whalley Abbey is a former Cistercian abbey in Whalley, Lancashire, England. After the dissolution of the monasteries, the abbey was largely demolished and a country house was built on the site. In the 20th century the house was modified ...
vestments, but also has its own chapel – with a finely carved
altarpiece
An altarpiece is an artwork such as a painting, sculpture or relief representing a religious subject made for placing at the back of or behind the altar of a Christian church. Though most commonly used for a single work of art such as a painting o ...
made in
Antwerp
Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504, around 1525. The male line of the family died out in 1878 and in 1901 one of the daughters, Lady O'Hagan, sold the house together with of land to Burnley Corporation for £17,600. The family departed in March 1902.
Between 2005 and 2011, the
Heritage Lottery Fund
The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom.
History
The fund's predecessor bodies were ...
granted £2.1 million to help fund a major programme of restoration of the Park.
Collections
The art gallery contains important Victorian and
Pre-Raphaelite
The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (later known as the Pre-Raphaelites) was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics, founded in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, James ...
works by
Burne-Jones
The Burne-Jones Baronetcy, of Rottingdean in the County of Sussex, and of The Grange in the Parish of Fulham in the County of London, was a title in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom. It was created on 4 May 1894 for the artist and designer ...
,
Waterhouse,
Alma-Tadema and
Zoffany
Johan Joseph Zoffany (born Johannes Josephus Zaufallij; 13 March 1733 – 11 November 1810) was a German neoclassical painter who was active mainly in England, Italy and India. His works appear in many prominent British collections, includin ...
. watercolours by Turner and local artist Noel H. Leaver, a collection of Lancashire furniture, The Whalley Abbey vestments, natural history, local social and military history, the Towneley Family. The Deer Pond in Towneley Park is a
Local Nature Reserve.
Traditions
According to folklore, the hall was said to have been haunted by a
boggart
A boggart is a creature in English folklore, either a household spirit or a malevolent '' genius loci'' (that is, a geographically-defined spirit) inhabiting fields, marshes, or other topographical features. Other names of this group include ''bu ...
. This spirit appeared once every seven years, just prior to the death of one of the residents. The boggart was linked to 'Sir John Towneley', who in life supposedly oppressed the poor of the district. According to writer Daniel Codd, there are later stories of a strange ghostly white apparition that appears by the
River Calder.
[Codd, Daniel (2011). ''Paranormal Lancashire''. Amberley. p.78-79, 149. ]
Gallery
File:TotemTowneley.JPG, An example of the woodland sculptures
File:Towneley Hall.jpg, Hall from the southwest
File:Folyds Cross 1520.JPG, Foldy's cross
File:StatueTowneley.JPG, Towneley Cenotaph
See also
*
Grade I listed buildings in Lancashire
This is a list of Grade I listed buildings in Lancashire, England.
In the United Kingdom, the term "listed building" refers to a building or other structure officially designated as being of special architectural, historical or cultural signifi ...
*
Listed buildings in Burnley
Burnley is a town in Lancashire, England. Its unparished area contains 190 buildings that are recorded in the National Heritage List for England as designated listed buildings. Of these, one is listed at Grade I, the highest of the t ...
*
Richard Towneley
Richard Towneley (10 October 1629 – 22 January 1707) was an English mathematician, natural philosopher and astronomer, resident at Towneley Hall, near Burnley in Lancashire. His uncle was the antiquarian and mathematician Christopher Townele ...
*
Charles Townley
Charles Townley FRS (1 October 1737 – 3 January 1805) was a wealthy English country gentleman, antiquary and collector, a member of the Towneley family. He travelled on three Grand Tours to Italy, buying antique sculpture, vases, coins, manu ...
References
External links
* https://towneley.org.uk
Towneley Park- official site at Burnley
Towneley Park Management PlanFriends of Towneley Park (Registered Charity Number: 1144988)*
{{Authority control
Parks and commons in Burnley
Museums in Lancashire
Country houses in Lancashire
Art museums and galleries in Lancashire
Historic house museums in Lancashire
Grade I listed buildings in Lancashire
Grade II listed parks and gardens in Lancashire
Buildings and structures in Burnley
Local Nature Reserves in Lancashire
History of Burnley Borough