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60-565: Sudbury Hall is a country house in Sudbury, Derbyshire , England. One of the country's finest Restoration mansions, it has Grade I listed building status, and the garden is Grade II listed in Historic England's Register of Parks and Gardens . The National Trust Museum of Childhood is housed in the 19th-century servants' wing of Sudbury Hall. In 1086, following the Norman Conquest ,

120-428: A fortunate few; it was the centre of its own world, providing employment to hundreds of people in the vicinity of its estate . In previous eras, when state benefits were unheard of, those working on an estate were among the most fortunate, receiving secured employment and rent-free accommodation. At the summit of this category of people was the indoor staff of the country house. Unlike many of their contemporaries prior to

180-524: A mixture of high architecture , often as interpreted by a local architect or surveyor, and determined by practicality as much as by the whims of architectural taste. An example of this is Brympton d'Evercy in Somerset, a house of many periods that is unified architecturally by the continuing use of the same mellow, local Ham Hill stone . The fashionable William Kent redesigned Rousham House only to have it quickly and drastically altered to provide space for

240-545: A portrait of George Vernon (1635/6-1702), the builder of Sudbury Hall, by John Michael Wright , (oil on canvas, 1660). Other portraits in the collection include: The house was used for the internal Pemberley scenes in the BBC dramatisation (1995) of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice . The house's centrally-positioned domed cap-house featured in the title shot of Yorkshire Television's children's programme The Book Tower . English country house An English country house

300-475: 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 people, the term distinguished between town and country. However, the term also encompasses houses that were, and often still are, the full-time residence for the landed gentry who dominated rural Britain until

360-500: Is called a castle, but not all buildings with the name "castle" are fortified (for example Highclere Castle in Hampshire ). The term stately home is subject to debate, and avoided by historians and other academics. As a description of a country house, the term was first used in a poem by Felicia Hemans , "The Homes of England", originally published in Blackwood's Magazine in 1827. In

420-488: Is considered to be one of the finest Restoration staircases in Britain. It is noted for its white-painted balustrade with luxuriant, carved foliage. The landing ceiling is adorned with ornate plasterwork by Robert Bradbury and James Pettifer (1675) and ceiling paintings of mythological scenes by Louis Laguerre . Other plasterwork within the house was designed by Pettifer, Bradbury and Samuel Mansfield of Derby. Of particular note in

480-473: Is politics; they talk politics; and they make politics, quite spontaneously. There are no written terms for distinguishing between vast country palaces and comparatively small country houses; the descriptive terms, which can include castle , manor and court , provide no firm clue and are often only used because of a historical connection with the site of such a building. Therefore, for ease or explanation, Britain's country houses can be categorised according to

540-609: Is the ITV series Downton Abbey . Dumbing down In the late 20th century, the proportion of young people attending university in the UK increased sharply, including many who previously would not have been considered to possess the appropriate scholastic aptitude. In 2003, the UK Minister for Universities, Margaret Hodge , criticised Mickey Mouse degrees as a negative consequence of universities dumbing down their courses to meet "the needs of

600-502: The Reform Act 1832 . Frequently, the formal business of the counties was transacted in these country houses, having functional antecedents in manor houses . With large numbers of indoor and outdoor staff, country houses were important as places of employment for many rural communities. In turn, until the agricultural depressions of the 1870s , the estates, of which country houses were the hub, provided their owners with incomes. However,

660-606: The Restoration era , but George Vernon's building is based on a Jacobean design, with its ornate Great Staircase and Long Gallery. Notably, the state rooms are located on the west side of the building and the servants' quarters on the east side, a traditional layout preferred by Tudor architects. Architectural historian Cherry Ann Knott has suggested that the design of the hall was based on Crewe Hall in Cheshire , which stands around 1.5 miles from Haslington Hall , where George Vernon

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720-488: The drawing room is an ornately carved overmantel by Grinling Gibbons . Between c.1872 and 1880, architect George Devey significantly modified and extended an early 19th-century servants' east wing to Sudbury Hall; this now houses the National Trust Museum of Childhood. Sudbury holds a large collection of portraits of Vernon family members, as well as other paintings and works of fine art. Of particular note are

780-596: The manor of Sudbury was listed in the Domesday Book . The Vernon family came to Sudbury as a result of the 16th-century marriage of the Sudbury heiress Ellen Montgomery to Sir John Vernon (d.1545), a son of Sir Henry Vernon of Haddon Hall in Derbyshire . The present house at Sudbury was built shortly after the restoration of King Charles II , between 1660 and 1680 by George Vernon, grandfather of George Venables-Vernon

840-458: The science fiction short story " The Marching Morons " (1951), by Cyril M. Kornbluth which also features a modern-day protagonist in a future dominated by low-intelligence persons. Moreover, the novel Brave New World (1931), by Aldous Huxley , discussed the ways a utopian society was deliberately dumbed down in order to maintain political stability and social order by eliminating complex concepts unnecessary for society to function (e.g.,

900-502: The 1850s, with the English economy booming, new mansions were built in one of the many revivalist architectural styles popular throughout the 19th century. The builders of these new houses were able to take advantage of the political unrest in Europe that gave rise to a large trade in architectural salvage. This new wave of country house building is exemplified by the Rothschild properties in

960-419: The 18th century with houses such as Castle Howard , Kedleston Hall and Holkham Hall . Such building reached its zenith from the late 17th century until the mid-18th century; these houses were often completely built or rebuilt in their entirety by one eminent architect in the most fashionable architectural style of the day and often have a suite of Baroque state apartments, typically in enfilade , reserved for

1020-858: The 1990 New York City Teacher of the Year award, and "The Seven-Lesson Schoolteacher", his acceptance speech upon being named as the New York State Teacher of the Year for 1991. Gatto writes that while he was hired to teach English and literature, he came to believe he was employed as part of a social engineering project. The "seven lessons" at the foundation of schooling were never explicitly stated, Gatto writes, but included teaching students that their self-worth depended on outside evaluation; that they were constantly ranked and supervised; and that they had no opportunities for privacy or solitude. Gatto speculated: Was it possible, I had been hired, not to enlarge children's power, but to diminish it? That seemed crazy, on

1080-464: The 1st Baron Vernon . George Vernon used his new-found wealth from marrying Northamptonshire heiress Margaret Onley to build a grand new mansion on the site of a smaller house. He kept meticulous accounts of the building project, and because there is no record of any payment to an architect, historians surmise that George designed Sudbury Hall himself. George Vernon also established the Estate village close to

1140-481: The 20th century, the term was later popularised in a song by Noël Coward , and in modern usage it often implies a country house that is open to visitors at least some of the time. In England, the terms "country house" and "stately home" are sometimes used vaguely and interchangeably; however, many country houses such as Ascott in Buckinghamshire were deliberately designed not to be stately, and to harmonise with

1200-474: The 20th century, they slept in proper beds, wore well-made adequate clothes and received three proper meals a day, plus a small wage. In an era when many still died from malnutrition or lack of medicine, the long working hours were a small price to pay. As a result of the aristocratic habit of only marrying within the aristocracy, and whenever possible to a sole heiress, many owners of country houses owned several country mansions, and would visit each according to

1260-636: The 8th Lord Vernon, George Francis Augustus Venables-Vernon, died aged 26 in Malta from an illness contracted while in service as an officer in World War I . As a result, the Sudbury estate was subject to Death duties , the taxation which had been introduced in 1894 by the Liberal Government . As with many other large estates across Britain, this increased financial burden compelled the 9th Lord Vernon, Francis Venables-Vernon , to sell off tracts of land and some of

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1320-655: The Hall to provide housing for his servants, labourers and tradesmen. The buildings in the village still survive intact today. Sudbury Hall was leased for three years from 1840 by Queen Adelaide , the widow of William IV of the United Kingdom . The east wing was added by George Devey in 1876–83. By the late 19th century, the extent of the Sudbury Estate stretched from Cubley down to Marchington in Staffordshire . In 1916,

1380-542: The National Trust consulted 100 child "ambassadors" to redesign the visitor experience for children. It reopened in October 2022, rebranded as The Children’s Country House at Sudbury , equipped with a dressing up and dancing area, a mirror ball, a neon sign with the words "Party like it’s 1699", an escape room experience and humorous speech bubbles hung next to portraits. The revised visitor experience has been criticised by

1440-775: The Savage tries reading Shakespeare to the masses and is not understood). More malevolent uses of dumbing down to preserve the social order are also portrayed in The Matrix , Nineteen Eighty-Four and many dystopian movies. The social critic Paul Fussell touched on these themes ("prole drift") in his non-fiction book Class: A Guide Through the American Status System (1983) and focused on them specifically in BAD: or, The Dumbing of America (1991). A compilation of essays by philosophers, politicians, artists and thinkers titled Dumbing Down

1500-535: The Vernon Family; Joanna Fitzalan Howard, daughter of John Lawrance Venables-Vernon, 10th Baron Vernon accused the National Trust of " dumbing down " by turning her ancestral home into "a child-centred theme park". The National Trust have stated that the new experience offers "new ways for children to learn about the history of Sudbury Hall" and that the speech bubbles inform children about "hidden symbolism in historic portraits". The changes have also been criticised by

1560-569: The Vernon family, and in 1967, Sudbury Hall and its principal contents along with part of the gardens and parkland, was transferred by the 10th Baron Vernon [John Lawrence Venables-Vernon] via the Land Fund to the National Trust , in part payment of death duties. The remainder of the Sudbury Estate is still held by Vernon descendants. In 2020 Sudbury Hall closed to the public for renovations, during which

1620-467: The best-known examples of the showy prodigy house , often built with the intention of attracting the monarch to visit. By the reign of Charles I , Inigo Jones and his form of Palladianism had changed the face of English domestic architecture completely, with the use of turrets and towers as an architectural reference to the earlier castles and fortified houses completely disappearing. The Palladian style, in various forms, interrupted briefly by baroque ,

1680-520: The circumstances of their creation. The great houses are the largest of the country houses; in truth palaces, built by the country's most powerful – these were designed to display their owners' power or ambitions to power. Really large unfortified or barely fortified houses began to take over from the traditional castles of the crown and magnates during the Tudor period, with vast houses such as Hampton Court Palace and Burghley House , and continued until

1740-475: The contents of Sudbury Hall. In the 1930s and 1940s, the 9th Lord was able to buy back some of this land to provide social housing in Sudbury village. During World War II , a US Air Force hospital was based in Sudbury Park, close to RAF Sudbury . The land was purchased by the government in 1948 and converted into HM Prison Sudbury , with a housing estate for prison officers. Death duties continued to burden

1800-513: The country saw the building of the first of the unfortified great houses. Henry VIII 's Dissolution of the Monasteries saw many former ecclesiastical properties granted to the King's favourites, who then converted them into private country houses. Woburn Abbey , Forde Abbey and many other mansions with abbey or priory in their name became private houses during this period. Other terms used in

1860-428: The design of the wing around the next corner. These varying "improvements", often criticised at the time, today are the qualities that make English country houses unique. Wealthy and influential people, often bored with their formal duties, go to the country in order to get out of London, the ugliest and most uncomfortable city in the world; they invented the long week-end to stay away as long as possible. Their métier

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1920-427: The early 1970s, hundreds of country houses were demolished . Houses that survived destruction are now mostly Grade I or II listed as buildings of historic interest with restrictions on restoration and re-creation work. However such work is usually very expensive. Several houses have been restored, some over many years. For example at Copped Hall where the restoration started in 1995 continues to this day. Although

1980-399: The face of it, but slowly, I began to realize that the bells and confinement, the crazy sequences, the age-segregation, the lack of privacy, the constant surveillance, and all the rest of the national curriculum of schooling were designed exactly as if someone had set out to prevent children from learning how to think, and act, to coax them into addiction and dependent behavior. In examining

2040-473: The home counties and Bletchley Park (rebuilt in several styles, and famous for its code-breaking role in World War II). The slow decline of the English country house coincided with the rise not just of taxation, but also of modern industry, along with the agricultural depression of the 1870s. By 1880, this had led some owners into financial shortfalls as they tried to balance maintenance of their estates with

2100-435: The household. These houses were always an alternative residence to a London house. During the 18th and 19th centuries, for the highest echelons of English society, the country house served as a place for relaxing, hunting and running the country with one's equals at the end of the week, with some houses having their own theatre where performances were staged. The country house, however, was not just an oasis of pleasure for

2160-551: The immediately preceding war then in World War I, were now paying far higher rates of tax, and agricultural incomes had dropped. Thus, the solution for many was to hold contents auctions and then demolish the house and sell its stone, fireplaces , and panelling . This is what happened to many of Britain's finest houses. Despite this slow decline, so necessary was the country house for entertaining and prestige that in 1917 Viscount Lee of Fareham donated his country house Chequers to

2220-438: The income they provided. Some relied on funds from secondary sources such as banking and trade while others, like the severely impoverished Duke of Marlborough , sought to marry American heiresses to save their country houses and lifestyles. The ultimate demise began immediately following World War I . The members of the huge staff required to maintain large houses had either left to fight and never returned, departed to work in

2280-484: The landscape, while some of the great houses such as Kedleston Hall and Holkham Hall were built as "power houses" to dominate the landscape, and were most certainly intended to be "stately" and impressive. In his book Historic Houses: Conversations in Stately Homes , the author and journalist Robert Harling documents nineteen "stately homes"; these range in size from the vast Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard to

2340-415: The late 19th and early 20th centuries were the swansong of the traditional English country house lifestyle. Increased taxation and the effects of World War I led to the demolition of hundreds of houses ; those that remained had to adapt to survive. While a château or a Schloss can be a fortified or unfortified building, a country house, similar to an Ansitz , is usually unfortified. If fortified, it

2400-540: The latter two are ducal palaces, Montacute, although built by a Master of the Rolls to Queen Elizabeth I, was occupied for the next 400 years by his descendants, who were gentry without a London townhouse , rather than aristocracy. They finally ran out of funds in the early 20th century. However, the vast majority of English country houses, often owned at different times by gentlemen and peers , are an evolution of one or more styles with facades and wings in different styles in

2460-604: The market": these degrees are conferred for studies in a field of endeavour "where the content is perhaps not as [intellectually] rigorous as one would expect, and where the degree, itself, may not have huge relevance in the labour market": thus, a university degree of slight intellectual substance, which the student earned by "simply stacking up numbers on Mickey Mouse courses, is not acceptable". In Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling (1991, 2002), John Taylor Gatto presented speeches and essays, including "The Psychopathic School", his acceptance speech for

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2520-639: The minuscule Ebberston Hall , and in architecture from the Jacobean Renaissance of Hatfield House to the eccentricities of Sezincote . The book's collection of stately homes also includes George IV's Brighton town palace, the Royal Pavilion . The country houses of England have evolved over the last five hundred years. Before this time, larger houses were usually fortified, reflecting the position of their owners as feudal lords , de facto overlords of their manors . The Tudor period of stability in

2580-416: The most eminent guests, the entertainment of whom was of paramount importance in establishing and maintaining the power of the owner. The common denominator of this category of English country houses is that they were designed to be lived in with a certain degree of ceremony and pomp. It was not unusual for the family to have a small suite of rooms for withdrawing in privacy away from the multitude that lived in

2640-399: The munitions factories, or filled the void left by the fighting men in other workplaces. Of those who returned after the war, many left the countryside for better-paid jobs in towns. The final blow for many country houses came following World War II ; having been requisitioned during the war, they were returned to the owners in poor repair. Many estate owners, having lost their heirs, if not in

2700-468: The names of houses to describe their origin or importance include palace , castle , court , hall , mansion , park , house , manor , and place . It was during the second half of the reign of Elizabeth I , and under her successor, James I , that the first architect-designed mansions, thought of today as epitomising the English country house, began to make their appearance. Burghley House , Longleat House , and Hatfield House are among

2760-450: The nation for the use of a prime minister who might not possess one of his or her own. Chequers still fulfills that need today as do both Chevening House and Dorneywood , donated for sole use of high-ranking ministers of the Crown. Today, many country houses have become hotels, schools, hospitals and museums, while others have survived as conserved ruins, but from the early 20th century until

2820-468: The owner of a "power house" or a small manor, the inhabitants of the English country house have become collectively referred to as the ruling class, because this is exactly what they did in varying degrees, whether by having high political influence and power in national government, or in the day-to-day running of their own localities or "county" in such offices as lord/deputy lieutenant , magistrates , or occasionally even clergy. The Country house mystery

2880-521: The owner's twelve children. Canons Ashby , home to poet John Dryden 's family, is another example of architectural evolution: a medieval farmhouse enlarged in the Tudor era around a courtyard, given grandiose plaster ceilings in the Stuart period , and then having Georgian façades added in the 18th century. The whole is a glorious mismatch of styles and fashions that seamlessly blend together. These could be called

2940-502: The ownership or management of some houses has been transferred to a private trust , most notably at Chatsworth , other houses have transferred art works and furnishings under the Acceptance in Lieu scheme to ownership by various national or local museums, but retained for display in the building. This enables the former owners to offset tax, the payment of which would otherwise have necessitated

3000-625: The pressure group Restore Trust for discouraging adult visitors unaccompanied by children, and for removing the house contents to make way for "fun active games and activities". In May 2023 the Children’s Country House at Sudbury was awarded Permanent Exhibition of the Year at the Museum and Heritage Awards 2023. Judges expressed the view that the redesign of Sudbury Hall offered a "participatory and imaginative new bold approach to interpreting historic houses and heritage". Sudbury Hall dates from

3060-457: The private sale of the art works. For example, tapestries and furniture at Houghton Hall are now owned by the Victoria and Albert Museum . In addition, increasing numbers of country houses hold licences for weddings and civil ceremonies . Another source of income is to use the house as a venue for parties, a film location or a corporate entertainment venue. While many country houses are open to

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3120-467: The public and derive income through that means, they remain homes, in some cases inhabited by the descendants of their original owners. The lifestyles of those living and working in a country house in the early 20th century were recreated in a BBC television programme, The Edwardian Country House , filmed at Manderston House in Scotland. Another television programme which features life in country houses

3180-509: The season: Grouse shooting in Scotland , pheasant shooting and fox hunting in England. The Earl of Rosebery , for instance, had Dalmeny House in Scotland, Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire, and another house near Epsom just for the racing season. For many, this way of life, which began a steady decline in 1914, continued well into the 20th century, and for a few continues to this day. In

3240-444: The second category of Britain's country houses are those that belonged to the squirearchy or landed gentry . These tend either to have evolved from medieval hall houses, with rooms added as required, or were purpose-built by relatively unknown local architects. Smaller, and far greater in number than the "power houses", these were still the epicentre of their own estate, but were often the only residence of their owner. However, whether

3300-492: The seven lessons of teaching, Gatto concluded that "all of these lessons are prime training for permanent underclasses , people deprived forever of finding the center of their own special genius". That "school is a twelve-year jail sentence, where bad habits are the only curriculum truly learned. I teach school, and win awards doing it. I should know." In France, Michel Houellebecq has written (not excluding himself) of "the shocking dumbing-down of French culture and intellect as

3360-488: The true English country house. Wilton House , one of England's grandest houses, is in a remarkably similar vein; although, while the Drydens, mere squires, at Canons Ashby employed a local architect, at Wilton the mighty Earls of Pembroke employed the finest architects of the day: first Holbein , 150 years later Inigo Jones, and then Wyatt followed by Chambers. Each employed a different style of architecture, seemingly unaware of

3420-511: Was a popular genre of English detective fiction in the 1920s and 1930s; set in the residence of the gentry and often involving a murder in a country house temporarily isolated by a snowstorm or similar with the suspects all at a weekend house party. Following the Industrial Revolution of the 18th century, a third category of country houses was built as newly rich industrialists and bankers were eager to display their wealth and taste. By

3480-509: Was born. The house is a two-storey red brick building fronted with a Baroque main entrance porch, with two levels of paired columns , each surmounted with a pediment . The carvings above the porch were sculpted by William Wilson . The interior of the house was completed in 1691. There have been a number of small alterations in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the interior was restored 1969-1971 by John Beresford Fowler . The Great Staircase, designed by Edward Pierce , dates from c.1676 and

3540-479: Was recently pointed out, [2008] sternly but fairly, by Time magazine". The science fiction film Idiocracy (2006) portrays the U.S. as a greatly dumbed-down society 500 years in the future, in which low culture and philistinism were unintentionally achieved by eroding language and education coupled with dysgenics , where people of lower intelligence reproduced faster than the people of higher intelligence. Similar concepts appeared in earlier works, notably

3600-422: Was to predominate until the second half of the 18th century when, influenced by ancient Greek styles, it gradually evolved into the neoclassicism championed by such architects as Robert Adam . Some of the best known of England's country houses were the work of only one architect/designer, built in a relatively short, particular time: Montacute House , Chatsworth House , and Blenheim Palace are examples. While

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