In Norfolk, Oxburgh Hall mirrors itself in its moat behind a superb brick gatehouse. Built in the fifteenth century by the Bedingfeld family, who stayed faithful to Catholicism through the whole Reformation, this manor keeps a rare treasure: embroideries worked, it is said, by Mary Queen of Scots herself.
The manor of a faithful family
Oxburgh was built from 1482 by Sir Edmund Bedingfeld, who obtained from the king a licence to 'crenellate' his house: hence its tall turreted brick gatehouse, one of the finest in England, more decorative than defensive, its rose-brick reflected in the water of the moat. Henry VII himself stayed here in 1487, and the 'King's Room' is still shown. But what sets Oxburgh apart is the constancy of its owners: the Bedingfelds remained Catholic after Henry VIII's break with Rome, and stayed so for centuries, at the cost of ruinous fines, suspicion and exclusion from all public office. Like other 'recusant' families, they fitted into the house a priest hole, a secret recess in which to conceal a Catholic priest during searches. Oxburgh is thus a witness of the England that refused the Reformation and paid dearly for its loyalty.
The embroideries of Mary Stuart
The manor's treasure is a set of embroidered panels attributed to Mary Queen of Scots and to Bess of Hardwick, who was for a time her gaoler. During her long captivity in England (from about 1569 to 1584 for these works), the deposed Scottish queen spent her days embroidering, an activity of patience and of memory; into it she slipped Latin mottoes, emblems and animals charged with hidden meaning, sometimes with veiled political allusion. These works — known as the 'Oxburgh Hangings' — are among the most moving relics of her tragic fate. A Catholic manor of Norfolk thus keeps, embroidered in thread and silk, the mute testimony of a captive queen, herself Catholic, whose execution in 1587 sealed the clash of the two faiths.
What to see
- The turreted brick gatehouse (1482), and the moated manor.
- The priest hole, witness of the Catholic resistance.
- The embroideries attributed to Mary Queen of Scots and Bess of Hardwick.
- The King's Room and the setting reflected in the moat.
Seeing it differently
Look, in the floor or the thickness of a wall, for the cramped opening of the priest hole: this dark hole, where a man crouched for hours on end, says more of fear and faith than any treatise. Then, before the embroideries, draw close enough to read the mottoes and decipher the emblems: a queen stitched there, stitch by stitch, what she could not say aloud. Oxburgh is read like a manor with a false bottom — a fine brick façade reflected in the water, and, beneath it, a whole world of secrets, obstinate loyalties and concealed messages.
Did you know?
Catholic families like the Bedingfelds had 'priest holes' fitted into the thickness of the walls — tiny hiding places in which to conceal a priest during the raids of the Crown's agents. Many were devised by the Jesuit Nicholas Owen, an expert in trapdoors and false floors, later tortured to death. At Oxburgh one can still slip into one of these hides: a hole in the wall that says, better than a long speech, what it cost to keep the old faith.
Notes
Oxburgh Hall lies near Swaffham, in Norfolk; it is today a manor in the care of the National Trust.
Quiz
- To which faith did the Bedingfeld family remain loyal despite the Reformation?
- Catholicism
- Calvinism
- Anglicanism
- Which embroidered treasure does Oxburgh keep?
- Embroideries attributed to Mary Queen of Scots
- The Bayeux Tapestry
- Holbein's cartoons
- What is a 'priest hole'?
- A secret hiding place to conceal a priest
- An underground chapel
- A royal confessional