High up on open downland in Northamptonshire stands a
remarkable building that was the brainchild of an extraordinary man. When he
died in 1605 his dream died with him, but it has remained ever since just as he left it .
Sir Thomas Tresham
Born in 1543, Thomas Tresham came from a wealthy and
well-connected Northamptonshire family that was staunchly Catholic and had
prospered during the reign of Queen Mary I (1553-8).
Thomas became head of the family in 1559 at the early age of
15 but continued with his studies, being admitted as a lawyer of the Middle
Temple when only 17.
The Elizabethan age was one in which people with talent and
the right connections could become extremely wealthy and tended to spend their
wealth on building magnificent houses, many of which can still be seen today.
Thomas Tresham never had the wealth of people like William Cecil (the builder
of Burghley House), but that did not stop him from going on a building spree of
his own.
Tresham’s main problem was his adherence to the Catholic
faith at a time when this was becoming positively dangerous. During the early
part of Elizabeth I’s reign this was no impediment, as is evidenced by Thomas
Tresham being knighted by the Queen in 1575, but after the attempted invasion
of England by King Philip of Spain in 1588, being a Catholic in England was
tantamount to being a foreign agent. Practicing Catholics had to keep their
heads down or risk a terrible punishment.
Thomas Tresham found that his net wealth was severely
depleted during his later years, mainly through having to pay fines for not
attending Anglican church services. Much of the building work was therefore
financed through borrowing money that he was never able to repay.
He also spent a considerable amount of time in prison, being arrested as a political hostage at any time that the government suspected that
the safety of the realm was under threat from foreign Catholics.
Another problem for the Treshams, following the death of
Queen Elizabeth in 1603, was that Francis, Thomas’s elder son and heir, became
involved in the Gunpowder Plot to overthrow the government of King James I. It
is known that the Plot failed because an anonymous message was sent to Lord
Monteagle warning him not to attend the opening of Parliament because a ‘great
blow’ could be expected. It is entirely possible that the warning was sent by
Francis Tresham.
Sir Thomas Tresham died in September 1605 and Francis
Tresham was soon under arrest after the failure of the Gunpowder Plot in
November. He died in December before coming to trial. His younger brother Lewis
inherited the estate but also the massive debts that came with it. The building
ventures of Sir Thomas therefore came to a grinding halt at his death.
Sir Thomas the builder
Thomas Tresham’s first building venture was the Market House
at Rothwell, which is the nearest town to Rushton, where he was lord of the
manor. This was a gift to the town and is notable for the carved coats of arms
of ninety local families. This was started in 1578 but not finished during Sir
Thomas’s lifetime. Indeed, it had to wait until 1897 for the roof to be added!
His second venture, however, was completely different. This
was the Triangular Lodge on his Rushton Estate, built between 1593 and 1597.
The building was used to house the man who looked after the rabbit warrens on
the estate, but it has all the characteristics of a ‘folly’ in that its true
purpose was devotional. It is a temple to the Trinity, with the focus on the
number three – three sides, three floors, three gables on each side, etc, etc.
The Triangular Lodge was far from complete when Sir Thomas
started work on Lyveden New Bield (which means ‘New Building’). He also did
some work on his main residence, Rushton Hall, at the same time.
Started, but never finished
Lyveden is about nine miles to the east of Rushton and was
the Treshams’ second estate. There was already a manor house here (Lyveden Old
Bield, dating from the 14th century) but Sir Thomas had the idea of
building a ‘garden lodge’ at the top of the hill behind the manor house. He
would also create an artificial landscape of terraces and canals, all for the
purpose of entertaining guests, playing the role of country gentleman and also
indulging his fetish for religious symbolism based on numbers.
The size of the building as it exists today, plus the
apparent plan to make it even bigger, suggests that Sir Thomas had a great deal
of entertaining in mind. There would have been plenty of room for many guests
to be accommodated, plus the necessary servants, but it is doubtful that he
intended to make the house his principle place of residence.
Work started in 1594 but it must have been very frustrating
for Sir Thomas that he was prevented from overseeing the construction in person
by virtue of being held under house arrest or in prison for much of the time
after this date. At the time of his death in 1605 the New Bield was a roofless
three storey structure, which is just what visitors can see today. The work
stopped when Sir Thomas died and never restarted.
The quality of the materials and workmanship was such that
the house looks almost as though the workmen have just downed tools for the
weekend but will be back to carry on in a few days’ time. Despite the exposed
site there has been very little damage due to storm or erosion, and efforts to
remove stone for other building work have proved fruitless – it was too well
built to be demolished.
It is more than 400 years since Sir Thomas and his dream
died, so what you can see today is a time capsule of Elizabethan house-building
and landscape gardening.
From the look of the New Bield today it would seem that all
that is missing is the roof, but there is evidence to suggest that a further
storey was planned before the roof would have been added.
Another careful plan
As mentioned above, Sir Thomas was obsessed by the number
three at Rushton Triangular Lodge, which is a celebration of the Trinity
(Father, Son and Holy Ghost). At Lyveden the numbers five and seven also played
dominant roles. The symbolism of five is that Christ suffered five wounds on
the cross, and seven has long been regarded as a ‘holy number’, as evidenced by
its frequent use in the Book of Revelation.
The ground plan of the New Bield is four arms with a central
space, making five. Each arm ends in a five-sided bay, with each side measuring
five feet. Five fives are twenty-five, which is the date of Christmas in
December and the Annunciation in March.
As mentioned above, it looks as though Sir Thomas may have
planned to build three storeys (not counting the basement which was the domain
of the servants). Above the windows are sets of three shields and there are
diamond decorations in groups of three. The distance from one side of the
building to the other is 243 feet – a multiple of three.
The number seven is represented by the frieze between the
ground and first floors, which displays roundels depicting the seven emblems of
the Passion of Christ.
The frieze above the first floor is no longer complete, but
originally comprised a set of Bible texts in Latin. These were arranged so that
the words IESUS and MARIA appeared each side of each bay window, accompanied by
the Tresham emblem of a three-leaved clover.
Inside the building
Visitors have to use the servants’ entrance which is down a
few steps to the basement level. That is because the interior of the building
is an open shell with no floors, although there are many holes in the stonework
to show where joists were intended to be fixed. Guests would have used an
entrance at the ground floor level on the opposite side to the servants’
entrance. This ‘front door’ would have been reached by a set of steps leading
via a small porch to a room in which a niche – still visible – would have
contained a statue of the Virgin Mary.
The basement shows evidence of what the building was
intended to be used for, namely the accommodation and entertainment of guests.
You can see where the large bake ovens and the copper for heating water would
have been. You can also see that Sir Thomas wanted to preserve the external symmetry
of the building by incorporating all the rainwater pipes and flues from the
fireplaces within the walls. This would have helped to allow uninterrupted
views to be had from the planned rooftop walk that guests would have been able
to enjoy after their evening meal on fine summer evenings.
As you look up from the basement you can see signs of how
the upper floors would have been arranged. For example, the Great Chamber would
have been on the first floor, as is apparent from the intricate stonework decorations
at this level.
In the grounds
The grounds of Lyveden New Bield are just as remarkable as
the building itself. Sir Thomas employed a large force of gardeners and
labourers to create a totally artificial environment close to the house that
involved banks, ditches, spiral mounts and moats. His plan was to emulate the
great gardens of European mansions by creating one of his own on top of a hill
in Northamptonshire.
Given that there are no natural water courses up here – no
streams to be dammed to form a lake – the only recourse was to dig his moats to
a depth of about three or four feet, line them with clay, then wait for rain to
fall on the banks and drain into the prepared ditches. The plan clearly worked,
because the water courses are still there to this day. The moats were stocked
with fish – as they are now – and guests could be rowed in a boat as they tried
to see them.
There are two spiral mounts in the grounds that were
modelled on similar mounts built by other Elizabethan landowners. The idea was
that guests could take a leisurely stroll up the winding path and enjoy the
view from the summit, much as they could do from the rooftop walk mentioned
above.
As with the house, the garden project was never completed.
Sir Thomas had originally planned a four-sided moat with the central area being
planted as an orchard. There would also have been four viewing mounts rather
than two. As it stands, the moat is three-sided and two of the mounts are much
smaller than the completed ones with their spiral walkways.
There is, however, an orchard on the side of the moat facing
the Old Bield. Efforts have been made in recent years to replant this orchard
with varieties that the Treshams would have known. This has been done by
grafting specimens from the National Collection of fruit trees on to vigorous
rootstocks.
A very pleasant time can be spent at Lyveden New Bield,
which is preserved and managed by the National Trust. The site has survived so
well after 400 years that is not difficult to imagine how the dream of Sir
Thomas Tresham could have been fulfilled.
© John Welford
