Fig 1: The main front and gates, with eagle-topped piers, of the manor house
MAPPERTON HOUSE answers the popular ideal of a time-worn English manor house, with its rambling outline and mellow stonework. The property and associated estate have been owned since the Middle Ages by minor gentry families and, until 1919, had never been sold, but descended by marriage or inheritance. The story of the present building, almost certainly erected near or on the site of a yet more ancient house, begins with one Robert Morgan (d. 1567). His family had been in possession of the manor since the 15th century, but his father had resided in Worcestershire. Morgan’s initiative to rebuild perhaps followed his marriage to Mary Wogan, who came from just over the Somerset border.
It must have been in the 1540s that Morgan built both a hall—elements of which are now subsumed within the remodelled central block of the house—and the north wing to its left. A lost inscription that proudly commemorated the work was visible in the hall in the 1760s. The north wing is closely dateable, sharing with a well-known group of local houses characteristic angle pilasters terminating in spiral finials. Parallels are to be found at Melbury, built by 1542 for Sir Giles Strangways, Clifton Maybank of 1545–50 (fragments survive on the north front at Montacute) and the north wing of Athelhampton. At Mapperton, the corner pilasters are topped with heraldic beasts carrying shields of arms, a detail also formerly found at Milton Abbey. These beasts are certainly original, because the griffin holding the family shield can be seen in an etching of 1816, before the house underwent antiquarian restoration.
Denne historien er fra June 08, 2022-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra June 08, 2022-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
