Photos from walk on March 20th from Ewelme

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Helicopter and sheep

 

 

The route took us past Brighwell House, but the view was hidden by the hedge, and lots of trees when we got close

 

But I had started some research beforehand, so just as well I managed one photo of the house.

 

Britwell House was built in 1727–28 for Sir Edward Simeon. The architect is unknown but Simeon himself designed the oval chapel, added in 1769. In front of the house to the southeast is a freestanding neoclassical column, with a large stone urn as a finial. It was built for Sir Edward Simeon in 1764 as a monument to his parents. In Britwell Park, north of the house, is a limestone obelisk with a pineapple finial. It too was erected for Sir Edward Simeon in the middle of the 18th century. The house, monument and obelisk are all Grade II* listed buildings. [Wikipedia]

Britwell House was the Hicks’ main family home, and a place to experiment for designer David Hicks. David and Pamela Hicks bought the Georgian property (with 20th century additions) shortly after their wedding in 1960. The house and its contents were sold in 1979 when his business declined and taxes and maintenance became too costly.

 

After the auction of Britwell House, the Hicks family moved to The Grove, a smaller house on the estate, in the valley below Britwell.

 

David Hicks spent the last 18 years of his life working on the house and garden at The Grove, which remains the Hicks family home today. He died of lung cancer in 1998, but went out in style: He designed his own coffin, in which he ‘lay in state’, according to his precise instructions, in the ground-floor room of the Gothick pavilion, also of his own design.Inspired by the Anglo-French gardens of the early 18th century, he created avenues and vistas of various sizes, forming an intricate sequence of green ‘rooms’, using a combination of rigid formality and lush romanticism. [source]

 

If you want to live here: Available 25th March 2025 £1,900 pcm (£1520 in 2019) A private two bedroom wing of a spectacular historic manor house with far reaching views over the Chiltern Hills. [Details]. Seperately, a Bell Tower apartment was let in February.

 

Full blossom tree

 

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At the end, I had a look at Ewelme Church – St. Mary the Virgin. We visited this exactly 6 years ago (21 March 2019) with a talk by Norman Francis.

 

Andy found a link which provides 360 degree views of the interior, but that didn’t stop me looking up at the roof:

 

The highlight is the tomb of Alyce Chaucer

 

 

There’s an Alyce Chaucer Festival May 16-18, to celebrate the 550th anniversary of her death. The leaflet says:

Alyce Chaucer (1404-1475) is buried in the magnificent alabaster tomb in the church in Ewelme, where she lived in the manor and where she died. She was granddaughter of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer, and next to her tomb is that of her parents.

 

Alyce inherited Ewelme Manor from her mother, Matilda Burghersh, and her father, Thomas Chaucer, statesman, diplomat and five times Speaker of the House of Commons.

 

Although Alyce was born a commoner, she died in 1475 as a ‘Serene Princess. This Festival traces the remarkable story of her ascent to the very centre of power and the world in which she lived.

 

An astute courtier, Alyce was also pious. In addition to rebuilding St Mary’s church and adding to it a chantry chapel, she and William de la Pole, founded the Ewelme almshouses, a grammar school and provided for two priests to teach at the school and minister to the parish. Her creation of God’s House in Ewelme has benefited the community for nearly 600 years and continues to do so today.

 

The tomb, a cadaver monument… is a type of funerary monument to a deceased person, featuring a sculpted tomb effigy of a skeleton, or of an emaciated or decomposing dead body, with closed eyes. It was particularly characteristic of the Late Middle Ages when they were designed as a memento mori to remind viewers of the transience and vanity of mortal life compared to the eternity and desirability of the Christian after-life. Cadaver monuments first appeared in the 1380s, and I read somewhere that this is the earliest female one. [Wikipedia]

 

Back in the car park, a pea weevil. Must be springtime.

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