Last updated on August 23rd, 2023 at 11:47 am
For some, Lacock Abbey will always be associated with the invention of photography; for others, it is the Tudor-Gothic-Victorian house that gets the juices flowing; for me, the real pleasure was in wandering through cloisters and gardens.
It was September and a stroll beyond the inevitable National Trust shop took us past pastel-shaded cottage-garden style borders, through a community allotment area, an orchard, rose garden (Lady Elizabeth’s, no less – whoever she was) and into a bosky wood. The allotments are bursting with produce and colour, the fruit trees heavy and pendulous. A rope-swing dangles irresistibly (yes, we did). Beyond the woods, the Wiltshire landscape beckons: a flock of sheep cotton-balls its way across lush, green, fields; we merely await the imminent arrival of Little Bo-Peep to turn the whole place into a veritable pastoral idyll. A step along tree-lined paths to what might have been an old fish-pond ends abruptly at a ha-ha, where a couple sit, deep in intimate conversation; like guilty voyeurs, we turn quickly away and are relieved to be confronted with a wonderful view of the old Abbey across a meadow.
Lacock Abbey was established between 1229 and 1232 by Lady Ela, Countess of Salisbury. Ela founded two religious houses: Lacock, for Augustinian nuns, and Hinton Charterhouse in Somerset for Carthusian monks. Both were in memory of her late husband, William Longespée, the Earl of Salisbury, who, in addition to his little problem (could he sometimes be a sleepless knight, I wondered?), was an illegitimate son of King Henry II. So William was half-brother to kings Richard I and Nasty John. He and Ela were a well-connected, powerful, couple and, rather disappointingly, Longespée seems to have meant something like ‘longsword’. Anyway, Lady Ela became Abbess of Lacock in 1240, lived to 74, a ripe old age in those days, and was buried in the abbey church. Much later, her tombstone was moved to the cloisters and reads: “Below lie buried the bones of the venerable Ela, who gave this sacred house as a home for the nuns. She also had lived here as holy abbess and Countess of Salisbury, full of good works”.
The abbey prospered through the Middle Ages, largely due to revenue from wool – occasionally referred to as ‘white gold’. It sustained a community of between 15 and 25 nuns, mostly ladies from well-to-do families, as well as the lay sisters who did most of the menial work. When Lacock Abbey was dissolved during the reign of Henry VIII, it was bought by Sir William Sharington in 1540 for the sum of £783.00. Sharington was something of an ambitious rogue, a Member of Parliament, holder of several offices, member of Queen Catherine Parr’s household and an associate of Sir Thomas Seymour. Lacock was just one of the many properties he managed to acquire in Wiltshire, as well as in Dorset, Gloucestershire and Somerset, between 1540 and 1548. As under treasurer of the Bristol Mint, in 1549 Sharington was found guilty of debasing coinage and embezzlement and he narrowly escaped execution (unlike his friend, Seymour). Sharington’s legacy, though, despite demolishing Lacock’s abbey church, was his retention of the main conventual building, adapting the upper rooms into an elegant home and adding a wonderful octagonal tower; but he left the ground floor, including the cloisters, largely intact. And I’m so glad he did.
There is a story that Olive Sharington, William’s niece and heiress, was looking out of an upper window being serenaded from below by her sweetheart, John Talbot, when, for some reason (possibly to elope), she jumped. Allegedly, her billowing Tudor skirts acted as a parachute, thus preventing serious injury. But she did manage to land on her boyfriend and knock him unconscious – assuming, of course, that he hadn’t already swooned at the sight of his beloved’s descent, like a heavenly body through the sky. Fortunately the young lad recovered and went on to marry his leaping lover – and in consequence the Talbot family came to own Lacock Abbey.
Lacock Abbey was briefly occupied by Parliamentary troops during the Civil War, and later by Royalists – who sensibly surrendered to a superior Parliamentary force after an honourably short siege in 1645, thus probably saving the house from considerable damage.
The Talbots survived. In 1753, a John Ivory Talbot gave the place a make-over, creating the Gothic style (described as ‘Strawberry Hill Gothic’ in the Shell Book of English Villages – but what do they know?) we see today, with its decorative features like the external parapets and cupolas. It was John Ivory who converted the Great Hall into what I believe is the most wondrous room in the house, with a barrel ceiling and niches on the walls containing 27 terracotta figures by the Austrian artist Victor Alexander Sederbach – of whom, apparently, nothing is known other than this work of his in Lacock. The figures are extraordinary – images seemingly cooked up between Disney and a bunch of pre-Raphaelites. They include representations of William and Ela, various saints, Death, one immediately recognisable as Gandalf (actually a depiction of the Greek philosopher, Diogenes) and the prophet Aaron and the Scapegoat, the creature that bore the sins of the children of Israel (but don’t take my word for it – I looked it up).
So what’s all this about photography? Arguably the most famous Talbot of Lacock Abbey was William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-77), who was something of a polymath, but best known as the inventor of the negative/positive photographic process. He was inspired whilst visiting Lake Como in 1833, trying to sketch the scenery and thinking “how charming it would be if it were possible to cause these natural images to imprint themselves durably and remain fixed on the paper.” After some experimentation, he took his first picture, of the oriel window at Lacock, in 1835 (today, the world’s earliest surviving photographic negative) and, over the next few years, developed the means to produce any number of prints from the same negative. There is, understandably, a museum of photography at Lacock – the curiously named Fox Talbot Museum of Photography. The museum displays some of Fox Talbot’s early photographic trials, including portraits of his family and life at Lacock, the work of other photographic pioneers (such as Daguerre and Wedgwood) and a bewildering amount of complicated-looking photographic equipment. Interesting how far, and how quickly, the medium has developed (pun intended).
Fox-Talbot’s grand-niece, Matilda Talbot, donated Lacock Abbey, and indeed most of the adjoining village, to the National Trust in 1944. Thanks to her – and the previous Talbots, Sharingtons and, of course, Lady Ela – you can wander about the house, grounds – and the particularly beautifully preserved abbey cloisters and adjoining rooms. As you visit the latter, perhaps you can picture yourself at JK Rowling’s fictitious Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, for Lacock Abbey’s illustrious film credits include ‘Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets’ and ‘Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince’. The sacristy, where the abbey’s valuables would have been kept, was turned into Professor Snape’s potions class; the chapter house was where Harry found the unsettling Mirror of Erised and the Warming Room (which contains a real Tudor cauldron) became Professor Quirrell’s defence against the dark arts class. You might also recognise the cloisters, where Harry, his friends and Mrs Norris the cat, wandered. Don’t forget to look up at the ceilings, though, with their wonderful bosses. Lacock Abbey has been featured in other film and TV productions too, including ‘Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindelwald’, ‘The other Boleyn Girl’ and ‘Wolf Hall’ as well as episodes of ‘Robin of Sherwood’.
As others have noted, Lacock Abbey is really two houses, the ground floor medieval former convent and the first floor Tudor-Gothic-Victorian mansion. The latter’s chintzy bedrooms and book and picture-lined corridors did little for me, though it is packed with artwork, there are some fascinating features and I really did want to spend Christmas in the Great Hall. Keep your eyes open for a copy of the Magna Carta. It is a reproduction, but from an original (dated 1225) issued to William Longespée, once held in the abbey archives and passed down through the Talbots. The original is now in the British Library. Lacock also holds an extremely rare 14th century book, Expositiones Vocabulorum Biblie, by William Brito, which is a kind of dictionary for the bible that was once held in the abbey library. Somehow, it survived the dissolution – and it also contains some of the abbey’s medieval accounts.
Over a fireplace in the Stone Gallery, created from the old nuns’ dormitory, are what look like a couple of funerary helmets, or mort helms. These were highly decorated armoured helmets – possibly once part of a genuine suit of armour – placed near memorials to knights. They can often be seen in churches – I couldn’t find out anything about the ones in Lacock (if that’s what they are – I should have asked when I was there).
Fox Talbot’s study was interesting and I found an over-blown(!) Venetian glass chandelier in the South Gallery curiously alluring. Pride of the collection, though, has to be the ‘household wants indicator’ in the kitchen, a reminder not to forget such essentials as prunes, isinglass, turpentine and dentifrice. It’s a cross between an early 20th century spreadsheet and a shopping list – though how you’d take it round the supermarket is beyond me – but probably a ‘must have’ for any self-respecting Downton Abbey fan with enough wallspace. It seems they occasionally come up for sale on EBay.
Lacock is about 3 miles south of Chippenham and a magnet for tourists from all over the world. Lacock village, seemingly suspended in a period beyond living memory, has featured in countless period dramas, including Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Moll Flanders and Cranford.
Decades ago, before I knew its significance, I cycled through the village on my way to somewhere else. I wish I had stopped.
I can’t wander through an old Abby cloister without thinking of the monks or nuns who once paced back-and-forth here.
The photographs are wonderful. I liked the stories as well, especially the one about the “leaping lover”, I heard it before, but I can’t remember where.
Fab post!
As a bit of a history nerd, I would LOVE to visit this place. Everything about it is absolutely fascinating. You Europeans are so fortunate to be surrounded by so many reminders of your long and rich history. U.S. history is but a toddler in comparison.
I appreciate your humor, too. 🙂
Yes – but you have so much to look forward to…and much more space! Joking aside, it’s a shared heritage. And thank you!
So glad I found your blog! I love history & historic buildings. This was so interesting!! & I can’t get the vision of a Tudor young lady falling from the sky with her skirt as a parachute, out of my mind! brilliant!
Thank you – welcome aboard! Yes – quite an image, isn’t it?! 🙂
I want one of those household wants indicators !
I think I’ll stick with a spreadsheet…
I love Lacock Abbey, especially the cloisters and the garden.
I have two lasting memories from one of my visits there.
1. Walking along the side of the road in the town and falling into a large pothole!
2. After enjoying the grounds I went into the Abbey where unexpectedly the internal doors automatically closed as we were walking around. It was a little spooky as it occurred but there was a technical explanation 🙂
Ouch! Twice. Not a good experience – hope it doesn’t put you off a return trip!
Looks like a fascinating place to visit.
The whole of Lacock is a lovely place to visit, Ellen.
A brilliant bit introduction to Lacock and some excellent photography. It’ll have to go on my future ‘to visit’ list.
My list never seems to get any shorter!
I know the feeling…
Hi Mike – I hadn’t looked up Lacock Abbey – but knew it was full of gorgeous buildings and streets that could be used in various period dramas. Fox Talbot I knew a bit about … but all your post and information is fascinating – I want to jump in a car and race down there. So interesting and yes I was captured by your photo of the chandelier … well that ‘to buy’ listing is such fun to see … brilliant – cheers Hilary
Yes, there was something about that chandelier…
I think I need a wants indicator. I always forget to make a list. Of course, I don’t have the walls for it, but no matter — it’s very cool!
Love everything about this, Mike. The cloisters and nursery, all the rooms and gardens and yes, your wonderful photography. Speaking of which, I had no idea about the history of the negative/positive process, just that it worked for whatever reason. So thanks also for the good info. Learned something today. And grateful that when Henry took over the abbeys and destroyed many, that this treasure was spared.
We rely on lists on the backs of envelopes…professional planning… 🙂
such a fascinating place! and the extra bonus for Harry Potter fans:))
Yes – something for everyone!
Read it in the e-mail with only your wonderful word pictures – then came here too check out the photography. Both brilliant, as always.
Thanks, Frank; interior photography could be loads better!
What a gorgeous place to visit…both house and grounds…though my favourite was the cloisters.
Torn between the cloisters and the gardens…
Thank you, Mike, for such a lovely tour of Lacock. I visited the grounds for a Proms concert many moons ago, but didn’t see the beautiful cloisters and halls.
Worth a revisit, Jane…
What a fabulous place to visit. So historic and architecturally stunning!
No aircraft, though… 🙂
There is a funerary helmet in Framlingham church near to the tomb of the second Howard Duke of Norfolk – the Flodden Helm.
I am glad the abbey is only partially adapted as it would have been such a shame to have lost all those wonderful cloisters! Thank you for such a detailed and interesting tour of this fantastic building.
I remember seeing that – might even have a photo of it somewhere…
Too old and dark for my taste, but I am very glad you mentioned the Civil War: Lacock Abbey was occupied by the Royalists who surrendered to a superior Parliamentary force after a short siege in 1645, thus probably saving the house from considerable damage. So many places were ruined during the Civil War.
Yes, it would have been a shame to lose it.
A lovely place to walk through and enjoy. I loved the “Romeo and Julliet-ish” story about the leaping young lady with billowing petticoats. Hope that marriage was long-lasting because the courtship had a fantastic beginning.
Olive and John married in 1574 but, sadly, John died in 1581. There’s a bit about Olive here.
Sad story. Their time together far too short. I’ll read more about Olive. Thanks.
I read the piece about Olive and Grace. It’s true that things never change in this world when it comes to relatives and money or land, but in the end they settled things fairly and it seems Olive turned out to be a very competent estate manager–a long-lived one at that. From her picture, I’d never imagine her jumping off a balcony.
Beautiful pictures! And by the way, when you told that story about the leaping lover, I pictured in my head a woman in medieval skirts floating to the ground like Mary Poppins, and for some reason I just couldn’t stop laughing! 🙂 A great write-up!
Thank you. Yeah – it conjures up all sorts of images!
Great post, Mike, and it’s no wonder it’s so popular with tourists. We were there in December, when it was all decorated for Christmas, the cloisters home to many Christmas trees all decorated by local school children, I think. It’s nice coming to this blog to take a much-needed break from an otherwise hectic and stressful day. Thanks for the memories. Oh good grief, I just heard Bob Hope in my head! Greetings to Mrs. Britain. xo
I remember you saying you were going after I mentioned the place once before. Hearing Bob Hope in your head? Sounds like the Road to Trouble…
A marvelous place to explore!
Exactly!
Another fascinating post and now I want to go there!
So many places..!
This looks like a wonderful place to visit. I knew about the Fox Talbot connection from studying photography in my school days, but all the other rich history is new to me. Obviously I love the medieval stuff and can imagine the nuns working away on their wool. And the story of the leaping lover made me laugh out loud – that’s a true British gem! It’s a wonder the abbey survived the dissolution so well and we can get a real insight into life within its cloisters. I’d love to see that 14th century book, and the copy of Magna Carta. I’ve been to Laycock village for a short visit, and I know it’s been used as a location in many a TV series, but I haven’t made it to the Abbey yet. With those fabulous photos and it’s great history I think it had better go on my list of places to visit – and soon. Thanks for sharing.
The Red Lion’s good too; did I mention that? 🙂
It’s always good to know where the nice pubs are! 🙂
Ah so many places I would love to visit and now I have to add this to the list! Cheers Mike, excellent overview and pictures.
Can’t equal your photos, Fraggle!
Yours are mint!
Ah – that’d be the ones with the holes in them, then…
groaning!