Oxburgh Hall and Parish Church

As promised in my post on Castle Acre I'm taking you back to the end of June and our visit to Norfolk one last time, to Oxburgh Hall.  Once again it was a warm afternoon - goodness where did those warm afternoons go?  I could have done with a few more of them through July and was hoping August might be better but from here it looks worse.  I do like to have a sunny, warm summer to build me up to face autumn and winter but, at the moment, it looks like autumn has arrived early.   

Anyway back to memories of June.

Oxburgh Hall is a wonderful 15th century moated manor house completed in 1482 by the Bedingfeld family.

The manor house is a very photogenic building surrounded as it is by its moat which when we visited was glistening in the sunshine with bright blue damselflies buzzing over the water's surface.

It was very hard to get a photo of that bridge over the moat without anyone walking across it but I managed a very quick shot.

I loved the window above

The inner courtyard, here you will find the cafe, shop and facilities.

In contrast to its medieval exterior the inside of Oxburgh shows how each generation of the Bedingfeld family has changed it.

In a glass panelled, light restricted room are  embroidered wall hangings made by two famous ladies, Mary, Queen of Scots and Bess of Hardwick.  Below are a pair of scissors said to have been used by Mary, Queen of Scots.  It was hard to photograph them and I see I've caught reflections of the room behind and other visitors in the glass.

The King's bedroom

From the 'Tudor' style bedroom you can access the priest's hole - too enclosed a space for me and also the roof where there were wonderful views of the roof tops and chimneys as well as the knot garden.

In 1487 Henry VII and his wife Elizabeth of York visited the Hall and the two bedrooms reflect this visit although are probably not the rooms they actually used whilst there.

I didn't take many photos inside as all the rooms were very crowded.

There are some lovely gardens, woodland walks and also a family chapel (my photos of the interior were rubbish so I can't show you inside) but I was more interested in the Parish Church which stands close to the Hall and is accessible from its grounds.

You will notice the different spelling of Oxborough the church and road signs are spelt in a more modern way than the Hall which is spelt Oxburgh, which I assume is an older way of spelling the name.   I also notice that the name of the owners is spelt in two ways in various places some using Bedingfeld and some Bedingfield.

The church, dedicated to St John is a fascinating building.  Not least because it lost its spire - twice.

The church originally had a stone spire rebuilt in 1877 after it had been struck by lightening.  The replacement lasted until 28th April 1948 when it it collapsed  across the nave destroying that too. Luckily no one was hurt.   An eye witness said that she was standing in her garden across the way and heard 'cracking noises' and then the tower opened and the spire went down into it.  Someone else working in a field nearby saw the spire disappear from view.

The war memorial is dedicated to five of the Oxburgh (sic) men who died in the first World War.  I bought a fascinating booklet in the church containing all the research done on the five men and their families.

They were brothers George and Charles English, brothers Arthur and Harold Mobbs and Richard Manning.

Next to the church and adjoining the chancel is the Bedingfeld Chapel added to the church in 1500 in memory of Sir Edmund Bedingfeld Knight and Marshal of Calais who died in Calais in 1496.  His wife Margaret is also buried here.

It is amazing that these rare terracotta tombs survived the collapse of the spire and tower.

There are also monuments to later Bedingfelds in the chapel.

The present Parish church is now in what was the chancel of the old church.

Castle Acre

In this post I'm taking you back to Norfolk where we spent a few days at the end of June.  There are still a couple of places that I want to record, I've already written a post on Castle Rising and Pensthorpe Waterfowl Gardens so next up is Castle Acre.  It is a lovely village and boasts the ruins of both a Priory and a Castle and we visited both.

It was quite a warm day - seems like a dream after the weather we've been experiencing lately - but warm it was.  We were the first visitors to arrive at the Priory ruins that day so, like we did with Castle Rising, had the place to ourselves for about half an hour which was good for taking photographs without feeling I was in anyone's way.

Both the Castle and the Priory were built by the de Warenne family.  William de Warenne was a Norman Knight who fought at the Battle of Hastings built the castle and his son and other descendants founded the Priory towards the end of the 11th century.  Here is a - link - to more of its history.

 

The West front of the Priory church which even in ruins is very impressive in length and height.  The monks at Castle Acre Priory were members of the Cluniac order and they were noted for their seven assemblies each day which were very elaborate with processions, masses, songs and prayer, for which this long elegant church must have been an inspirational backdrop.

The outer entrance porch to the right of the photos and the Prior's Lodgings

The Nave of the Priory Church showing part of the 15th century west window.

The steps would have led to the monk's dormitory on the first floor

The latrine block - the infirmary would have been above this

A side view of the Prior's Lodgings

A view of the Priory ruins from the Brew House, the priory had its own kitchens, fishponds, brew house, bakery, water mill and barn and as you wander around you can spot where these would have been.

You can stand on the little balcony above as you go inside the Prior's Lodgings.

Underneath the West range which contains the Prior's Lodgings which include a study and a private chapel.

The Prior's Study

Above some of the smaller architectural details I spotted on the way round the ruins

As you enter the visitor centre and entrance you pass by the herb garden which is tucked away at the side.  It was in a very pretty courtyard with herbs set in four sections for use in the Priory - herbs for strewing, healing, decorative and culinary uses.  There were many herbs and scented geraniums for sale too and I'd meant to go back to have a better look before moving on to the castle, but I changed my mind as I was so tempted to buy plants and we couldn't have looked after them on our travels.

The castle is a fine example of a motte and bailey castle and the inner and outer baileys are clearly still very well defined.  You can walk through the village from the Priory to the Castle or the other way round of course as there is ample parking at both places.  We decided to take the car with us as we wanted to have a picnic lunch at the castle and it seemed easier to take it with us.

The inner bailey on the hill

From the walkway above castle walls you can see where the main entrance to the castle would have been.  Above is what remains of the west gate.

In my next 'return to Norfolk' post I want to tell you about Oxburgh Hall, but there may be another Five on Friday and the July Scavenger Hunt before then.  I still have some photos to get for the scavenger hunt as I'm struggling a bit with it for some reason.

Pensthorpe Natural Park

It was raining the day we visited Pensthorpe and it just happened to be Paul's birthday too.  He particularly wanted to see the red squirrels here as well as the water birds and wild flower meadows.  This reminded me that we'd seen red squirrels in Scotland last year for his birthday  - link to post here.

We did eventually see a red squirrel at Pensthorpe

The last time we visited, must have been about twenty years ago it was called Pensthorpe Waterfowl Park. It has expanded and changed quite a lot since then.

 This covered viewing area was very useful in the pouring rain.

We ventured out and started to wander around the  Mill Pond and the other meres and lakes to see what we could find.  I fell for this little chap.

Crested Merganser

White-naped cranes with little one - just a day old when I took the photo

Tufted duck

Smew

These Eurasian cranes were very noisy.

These cranes made no noise at all

At this point we were making our way back to the shop and cafe as we were getting quite wet -  a coffee break was calling.

Back outside again we followed the bug walk and the wildflower meadow walk along by the river Wensum which runs through the park.

The wildflower meadows were full of damsel flies and the paths alive with little toadlets.  I showed photos of these on my 30 Days Wild blog - link here as I managed to continue the daily posts whilst away with limited access to the internet.

Below are some of the other beautiful birds we saw.....

Avocet

Little Stint

Turtle Doves - two turtle doves.  I didn't see a partridge in a pear tree though.

Not a bird but a fascinating sculpture in one of the gardens

Barnacle goose

Mandarin duck

My favourite geese - Greylags

So distinctive and such a beautiful shape.

Apologies for the number of photos.  I have loads more and there are some beautiful garden areas to explore too.  We spent nearly all day there.  Got wet through, dried out, got wet again and by the time we left the sun was shining.