Corfe Castle

The next home and garden was Corfe Castle, down very close to the coast, established originally by William the Conqueror, but later acquired by the powerful Bankes family. They were loyal to the king, Charles I, in the Civil War, and stoutly defended Corfe Castle, succumbing only to trickery by the low-life Parliamentarians. After the war was over, the king beheaded, etc., the victors "slighted" Corfe, as with so many other monuments that would have come in handy in this age of travel and tourism. It's still there, though, bits of it, and certainly takes less time to tour than it would have had it not been slighted. Anyhow, after the Parliamentarians rendered Corfe uninhabitable, the Bankes moved on, establishing Kingston Lacy. I'll just let the pix below speak for themselves: this is what an 11th-12th century castle would look like if it were blown up in the mid-17th century (except for the Victorian choo-choo I was going to video for Penelope; but didn't).

Badbury Rings

The Badbury Rings are an iron-age hill-fort on the Kingston Lacy estate. We rarely pass up a good iron-age hill-fort...

Approaching Badbury Rings on foot; you'd think it just another hill, unless you
noticed the giant terracing

Thus; pre-Roman; after the Romans took over, the hill-fort village declined, the
population moving to a new town nearby' on the Stour

Entering the ditch and ramparts 

Summit marker, I guess; it's in the middle of the now-forested hill-fort, useless
to anyone that doesn't have X-ray vision

Walking along the top rampart; I would guess the ditch is twenty feet deep; and
then there are two more ditches and two more ramparts; very steep too; designed
to discourage/impede would-be attackers

The immediate area has been inhabited some 6,000 years, as attested by these
nearby mounds; well, as you can see, Crebain out of Dunland were massing--
spies of Saruman!--so we had to move on to the next home and garden

Kingston Lacy 2

The Kingston Lacy story continues...

Van Dyke portrait of Richard Weston, Earl of Portland

Up in the bedrooms, this was to be a death-bed, but the intended
occupant died before it was finished; the heirs attempted to cancel
the order but it was too late and the bed arrived two years later

Holy Circumcision, Batman!

In the so-called "tented" rooms

The grand staircase is flanked by two enormous Snyders; he was the Rubens
assistant who specialized in animals...

Not a gender-neutral room

Bed-spread made from wedding gown/veil; an
English tradition, we were told...

In the kiddie corner

Order of the day, every day

"You rang, sir?" episode 2

A tiny bit of the Egypt collection in the basement; one of the
largest private Egypt collections, including an obelisk in the
gardens; some of the collection is in the British Museum

A painting of the original Whitehall, before it burned; later appropriated from
Cardinal Wolsey by Henry VIII who turned it into his palace...

Kingston Lacy 1

After Chichester Cathedral, we walked and shopped a bit in Chichester, pretty even in the rain, and then drove on through the New Forest, on our way eventually to another home and garden, Kingston Lacy. New Forest was named by William the Conqueror. Evidently he found that the Saxons had already named everything, but he wanted a forest of his own and chose this one, giving it a new name: New Forest. We were actually looking for a specific tree, Knightswood, but never did find it. New Forest has been preserved, never logged, since William. I've seen my share of forests, and, frankly this one didn't seem much different from other seral forests. Oh well. We found a secluded (and forested) parking lot near the Badbury Rings, a mile from Kingston Lacy, and spent the rainy night there.

I was hoping to get more expeditious with the blog, since I am many days behind, but Kingston Lacy was so interesting in so many ways I have to give it two posts. Its guests over the years included the likes of Pitt, the Duke of Wellington, the Kaiser (1907) and more.

The house, 1660s, remodeled extensively in the 19th; an Inigo Jones product,
although he died before it was completed

At the entrance are three more than life-size bronzes, the Lord
and Lady Bankes, and their Lord, Charles I; she's holding the
key because she held the keys to the Bankes family fortress,
Corfe Castle, which the Parliamentarians took at length but
only by stealth...they donned Royalist uniforms... hence the
expression, we were told, "turncoats"

Looking out at a side garden; it was a very blustery day, and the Trust had closed
all the gardens and forest paths

Library

Keys to Corfe Castle (which we'll visit shortly)

A Guido Reni ceiling piece

Another comfy room

The dining room has an organ in it!

Annibale Caracci's Prometheus; one of three
Caraccis in the dining room

Next room, a Velasquez portrait of a cardinal

This, a nice little copy of Las Meninas (note gold leaf label
above this and most of the other paintings); one of the later
Bankes was an ambassador to Spain and managed to pick up
a few paintings while there

And this, Rubens' very famous Portrait  of Maria Serra 
Pallavicino, a new sort of  portrait style that heavily 
influenced van Dyck, Reynolds, and Gainsborough 

Chichester Cathedral

Chichester Cathedral was on our list of sights to see since it is said to be the "typical" English cathedral. Before visiting it we spent an administrative day at a Caravan Club "farm/camp" a few miles outside the city. A much-needed day to rest and regroup, and to enjoy the rain from the inside.

Chichester Cathedral from the northeast; note the squared- off apse and then the
13th century Lady Chapel protruding from it; the building was begun in 1075,
when the episcopate was moved from Selsey to Chichester; consecrated in 1108;
fires and collapses over the centuries resulted in much reconstruction, and there
are Gothic elements all around; but it is still much a Norman church

Chichester is more or less unique among English cathedrals
in having a separate campanile; it was built in the 15th
century, after both the west end towers had collapsed;
subsidence is a problem (!) and one guesses the architects
of the time didn't want yet another collapse on the church;
so far the campanile has stayed up; the large central spire,
visible from the sea, collapsed in the 1860s, but was rebuilt

Nave view; four-part Gothic vaulting; note the screen...

The Arundel Screen closer up; removed after the Civil War, reinstated in the
20th century

Elevation: Chichester is double-aisled, again pretty much
unique among English cathedrals; large galleries;
clerestory with little in the way of windows; arches mostly
rounded

Beautiful organ, smack in the middle of the church;
"Chichester Cathedral, you're bringing me down,
You stood and you watched as..." wait, no...

Interior of the Lady Chapel

St. Thomas Becket on the right; St. Edmund Pontigny (?)
on the left

Window done by Marc Chagall

One of two very old Medieval reliefs, Raising of Lazaraus,
12th century

Way down there, mosaic from Noviomagus Reginorem, one of the earliest Roman
towns in Britain; indeed Chichester's old city street plan is just the Romans'

14th century Arundel tomb (Arundel Castle, which we visited
in 2009, is not all that far away)

Business opportunity: the church across from the Cathedral has been converted
into a bar, West's Bar (Tawana and Wes note); beer, wine, and spirits (nyuk, nyuk,
nyuk)