3771 x 2576 px | 31,9 x 21,8 cm | 12,6 x 8,6 inches | 300dpi
Date de la prise de vue:
2011
Informations supplémentaires:
Corsham Court is an English country house in a park designed by Capability Brown. It is in the town of Corsham, 3 miles (5 km) west of Chippenham, Wiltshire and is notable for its fine art collection, based on the nucleus of paintings inherited in 1757 by Paul Methuen from his uncle, Sir Paul Methuen, the diplomat. It is currently the home of James Methuen-Campbell, the eighth generation of the Methuens to live there, and the Heir Presumptive to the title Baron Methuen. Corsham was a royal manor in the days of the Saxon kings, reputed to have been a seat of Ethelred the Unready. After William the Conqueror, the manor continued to be passed down through the generations in the royal family. It often formed part of the dower of the Queens of England during the late 14th and early 15th centuries, becoming known as Corsham Reginae. During the 16th century, the manor went to two of Henry VIII's wives, namely Catherine of Aragon until 1536, and Katherine Parr until 1548. During the reign of Elizabeth I the estate passed out of the royal family; the present house was built in 1582 by Thomas Smythe. The owner of Corsham Court in the mid-seventeenth century was the commander of the Parliamentarian New Model Army in Wiltshire; his wife, Lady Margaret Hungerford, built what came to be known as the Hungerford Almshouses in the centre of town. In 1745, Paul Methuen bought the house, which has since remained in the Methuen family. In 1761-64, Lancelot 'Capability' Brown was commissioned to redesign and enlarge the house and landscape the park. Brown set the style of the present day building by retaining the Elizabethan stables, the Riding School, and the great gabled front to the house, which he doubled in depth and provided gabled wings at either end of the house, creating the Picture Gallery and State Rooms in the east wing and a library and new kitchens in the west wing.
