Blickling Hall

History

The house was designed by the architect Robert Lyminge for Sir Henry Hobart, replacing an earlier Tudor building on the same site. The library's core collection was assembled by Sir Richard Ellys in the eighteenth century, adding to the house's status as a repository of rare manuscripts and books. Before the Hobart era, the estate belonged to the Boleyn family between 1499 and 1505.

Architecture

Blickling Hall is considered one of the finest Jacobean houses in England, built from 1616 to designs by Robert Lyminge, with the earlier Tudor building's foundations absorbed into the new structure.

Worth knowing

The estate was held by the Boleyn family in the years around 1500, a link that has fuelled long-standing claims about Anne Boleyn's early life, though the present house postdates her by nearly a century.

Gardens & grounds

The house sits within 5,000 acres of parkland shaped by a loop of the River Bure, giving the grounds a scale unusual even among National Trust properties.