Middle Court

Having gained access to the Middle Court via the gatehouse on its east side, visitors to Theobalds in the mid-1570s would have found themselves in an area 110 ft (33.5 m) square (see Figs 1, 2 and 7).Footnote ³⁰ Aside from the eastern gatehouse range – which was of two storeys with a flat roof – the courtyard ranges rose through three main storeys. In the north and south ranges, the levels must have been relatively low, especially on the ground and first floors, since they were matched in height by the two main levels of the hall range to the west. The roofs of all three ranges were, like that of the eastern block, flat with leaded walks. At the four corners of the Middle Court there were towers, while there were additional turrets at the centres of the two side ranges. At the courtyard's south-east corner, a narrow range projected into the Great Garden. This was also of three storeys, and seemingly had a tower at its southern end.

The east façade of the hall range featured an elaborate stone frontispiece, which formed a five-bay loggia at ground-floor level. On either side of the loggia were bay windows, lighting the upper end of the hall and the winter parlour respectively. At upper-floor level, the frontispiece formed an external walkway, which gave access to an arch containing ‘verrie manie faire curious paintinges and gildinges of pictures [probably carvings], whereof two are called the pictures of Peace and Warre’.Footnote ³¹ Above, the range's roof was flat, serving as an additional walkway.Footnote ³² At its centre was a timber lantern ‘of excellent workemanshipp curiouslie wrought’, containing a chiming clock.Footnote ³³

Facing the hall, on the inside of the gatehouse range, was another loggia, this one of seven bays, with turret staircases at each end. The wall on the loggia's east side contained windows overlooking the Dial or Base Court – the first of Theobalds's main courtyards, forming the approach to the house. In projecting bays either side of the gateway were two rooms, that on the south serving as the porter's lodge (see Fig. 8).Footnote ³⁴ Above was a long gallery, with windows opening on to balconies (see Fig. 9).

Importantly, when it comes to the courtyard façade of the south range, a design appears to survive (Fig. 11). This drawing, included in Thorpe's book and associated with a contemporary plan, was identified by Summerson as being related to Theobalds.Footnote ³⁵ It certainly conforms with much that is known about the house. For instance, the cross-section on the right seems to show the great hall with cellar below, while that on the left represents the intersection of the south range with the lower gatehouse block. At the centre of the range is a columned doorway with a bay window above; such a doorway is shown in this position on Thorpe's ground-floor plan (see Fig. 1).

Fig. 11. Drawing by John Thorpe of an unnamed house, identified as being a design for the courtyard façade of the south (state) range of Theobalds's Middle Court (courtesy of the Trustees of Sir John Soane's Museum). It is probably a copy by Thorpe of an original design dating from c. 1567. The design was altered in execution

In certain other respects, however, the design was clearly altered in execution: a floor level was added above the great hall, and the roofs of all the courtyard's ranges were flat rather than pitched. The form of the windows may have changed also: the lawyer Roger Wilbraham, who visited Theobalds in 1599, reported of the Middle Court: ‘the windowes beneth but one light, those above 2 lightes without transome, and compassed at the top’.Footnote ³⁶ Compass windows were bay windows usually having a semi-circular profile. The earliest, securely dateable, extant example is that on the north front of Burghley House, which is dated 1587, so those at Theobalds must have been an innovation.Footnote ³⁷ Although Wilbraham's description may relate to the range's garden front, it seems certain that the drawing in Thorpe's book must represent an early proposal, perhaps of c. 1567. It is the only evidence we have as to the possible appearance of the courtyard's state range – and also the range to the north, presumably designed in a matching style.

Ground Floor

The principal entrance to Theobalds's interior was via the arch at the centre of the loggia of the hall range. According to the parliamentary survey, lead pipes fed two cisterns in ‘two peeces’ of this arch, probably basins on either side.Footnote ³⁸ As is known from Thorpe's ground plan (see Fig. 1), the door led directly into the screen passage, with the great hall on the south and the Conduit Court on the west. The survey records that – like most of the ‘polite’ rooms at Theobalds – the hall's walls were wainscotted, and its screen was timber, bearing a dial and coat of arms (undoubtedly those of Cecil); this was topped by a minstrels' gallery or ‘clockloft’.Footnote ³⁹ In medieval tradition, the hall was high, rising through the equivalent of ground, first and second floors of the Middle Court. It had an oriel window at its south-east and from its upper end was overlooked by an opening, set in a ‘wainscott case wrought and carved’, accessible from the great staircase (see Fig. 11).Footnote ⁴⁰ The room was paved and had a chimneypiece of blue marble. An account shows that in 1585 ‘Jenings’ was paid ‘to tryck out England on ye Hall wall in whyt and black’ and ‘to mak ye fram for ye chart of England’.Footnote ⁴¹ ‘Tricking’ was a method of indicating the tinctures (or colours) in a coat of arms by the use of abbreviations or symbols, so Jenings – if not a painter himself – was perhaps preparing the heraldic decoration for the painter and ensuring it was accurate.

According to the survey, the hall boasted an elaborate roof, ‘arrched over at the top with curved timber of curious workemanshipp’.Footnote ⁴² As there was a long gallery above the hall (see below), this cannot have been a timber roof of standard design and construction, like that shown in the drawing of c. 1567 (see Fig. 11). The timberwork can only have been decorative, positioned beneath a flat ceiling. The result must have been something like the great hall at Longleat in Wiltshire (as reworked in the early 1570s) and the slightly later great hall at Wollaton Hall in Nottinghamshire (Fig. 12), both of which have non-structural hammerbeam trusses with a chamber above (the ‘Prospect Room’ in the case of Wollaton).Footnote ⁴³

Fig. 12. The roof of the great hall at Wollaton Hall, Nottinghamshire (built 1580–88; © Country Life). The hammerbeam trusses are decorative rather than structural, as there is another chamber (the ‘Prospect Room’) above the hall. The roof may have been influenced by that of the great hall at Theobalds

At the low end of the hall, beyond the screen passage, were the pantry and buttery, with the usual triple door arrangement, but most of the service rooms were at basement level, the great kitchen and pastry rising up through the ground floor also (see Fig. 2). This left space for a winter parlour, which by 1650 was known as the ‘King's waiters’ chamber’; it contained a chimneypiece of grey Sussex marble, with an overmantel bearing a coat of arms (presumably those of Cecil).Footnote ⁴⁴ Seemingly, the room was equal in height to the ground and first floors of the Middle Court's side ranges, and it had a large bay window, looking east. Here, the Cecils would have dined and entertained on an informal basis, and the schedule of accommodation for the royal visit of 1572 confirms that the room was to be used for the ‘Lord Treasurer's table’ – that is, as Burghley's dining chamber.Footnote ⁴⁵

The winter parlour was situated close to the ‘north stairs’, which rose in a parallel position to the great stairs on the south. Thorpe's plan shows that these two staircases were of similar arrangement, with quarter landings (see Fig. 1). The north stairs led to the Cecils’ second-floor lodgings and the long gallery over the hall, as well as to the lead walk on the west side of the hall and the walk on top of the hall range, which – after 1585 – provided access to the leads of the Conduit Court.

On the south, adjacent to the great staircase, was the great parlour. This had a bay window overlooking the Great Garden and, like the winter parlour, seems to have risen through the equivalent of two storeys of the Middle Court. Used as the queen's waiters’ room by 1650, the parlour featured a chimneypiece ‘cut into Antickes and other wilde beasts’, with jambs of blue marble.Footnote ⁴⁶ Schedules of accommodation show that, during Queen Elizabeth's visits, the room was used as her presence chamber (for receptions and audiences), with the great hall serving as great or guard chamber.Footnote ⁴⁷ Beneath was a colonnaded wine cellar, apparently a space of some grandeur.Footnote ⁴⁸

The great parlour was linked to the chapel, positioned at the west end of the south range and also accessible directly from the Middle Court (see Figs 1 and 2). The chapel's east end was placed beneath an upper closet, the point of division being marked by a ‘good faire lettis wainscott’ screen.Footnote ⁴⁹ According to the parliamentary survey, its walls were ‘full of scripture verses, callenders and direccons for morning and evening prayer, Monthes of the yeare Degrees of Marriage the Raigne of the kinges of England and the like’, while the windows were painted. Box pews were arranged ‘college-style’, separated by a central aisle.Footnote ⁵⁰

The remainder of the ground floor of Theobalds's south range was accessed directly from the courtyard. To the east of the chapel were two good-sized rooms with a back staircase between them, leading to the first-floor lodgings and state apartment above. The room next to the chapel was the chaplain's chamber,Footnote ⁵¹ while the chamber to the east, beyond the back stair, housed Lord Burghley's wardrobe and, on at least one royal visit, the Queen's Robes.Footnote ⁵² The room at the east end of the south range was also used for the Queen's Robes during visits; this had a bay window and was associated with an inner closet.Footnote ⁵³

In the comparable position at the east end of the north range – also with a bay window – was the steward's chamber, used during royal visits as the plate house.Footnote ⁵⁴ The function of the other rooms on the ground floor of the north range is not clear, since they were not named or allocated in schedules of accommodation. Thorpe's plan (see Fig. 1) shows that the area included at least three fair-sized chambers, one having a bay window overlooking the Privy Garden. Given their proximity to service rooms – including the pastry and privy kitchen – it is likely that these served as the lodgings or workrooms of upper members of Burghley's household.

First Floor

As has been stated, the major rooms of the hall range seem to have risen through ground- and first-floor levels. Meanwhile, on both south and north sides of the Middle Court, the first floors comprised lodgings intended for the Cecils’ relatives, friends and guests. In reconstructing the layouts of these rooms, the schedules of accommodation are invaluable.

On the north, there were four sets of lodgings (see Fig. 3). In the early seventeenth century, almost certainly in altered form, they served as the apartment of the Prince of Wales. This was probably because they were associated with the Green Gallery on the south-east, a long gallery being considered a highly desirable component of any state apartment by the Jacobean period, especially in a royal palace.Footnote ⁵⁵ Each lodging – a term usually used to describe a bedchamber and pallet chamber – was accessible via a separate staircase, as was conventional for the time. That at the west seems to have been situated adjacent to the north stairs, above the great kitchen. It was occupied during the 1572 royal visit by Edward de Vere (1550–1604), seventeenth Earl of Oxford, Burghley's ward and the husband of his eldest daughter, Anne (1556–88). The main room was also known as ‘the La of Oxfordes Chamber’ and Lady Vere's Chamber or Nursery, reflecting its use by Elizabeth de Vere (1575–1627), born at Theobalds and brought up by her grandparents.Footnote ⁵⁶

To the east, beneath the rooms of Lord Burghley, was a lodging used by – and named after – Edward Manners (1549–87), third Earl of Rutland, another of Burghley's wards.Footnote ⁵⁷ Beyond this was a lodging described as being ‘over ye pve kytene’, which occupied the east half of the range at basement level.Footnote ⁵⁸ Finally, to the east of this, was a comparatively large lodging – comprising a chamber, inner chamber and pallet chamber – which seems to have enjoyed access to the Green Gallery on the south-east. This lodging was occupied by Lord Burghley himself during the royal visit of 1572, when his own rooms were given over to the queen. In 1591, it was used by Sir Walter Raleigh (1554–1618).Footnote ⁵⁹

The equivalent lodgings in the south range were higher in status; they overlooked the Great Garden and lay beneath the state apartment. However, they were smaller in extent, since the west part of the range contained the upper chapel and chapel closet. Adjacent to this closet was the first of three sets of lodgings. Located beneath Queen Elizabeth's bedchamber, it included a room known as the ‘Lord Keeper's Chamber’, so presumably it had at some point accommodated Burghley's brother-in-law, Sir Nicholas Bacon (1510–79).Footnote ⁶⁰ During royal visits, the room was used by the queen's attendants, and it was still the ‘Maide of Honors chamber’ in 1650.Footnote ⁶¹ A staircase in this general area is shown on Thorpe's ground plan (see Fig. 1), and this would have connected the lodging to the state apartment above.

On the immediate east was a chamber which took its name from Ambrose Dudley (c. 1530–90), third Earl of Warwick, a royal official and brother of the Earl of Leicester. Warwick was married to one of Queen Elizabeth's most favoured attendants, Anne (1548/9–1604), née Russell, and other intimate royal aides occupied the room in later years. Finally, the lodging at the east end of the south range – with a bay window overlooking the Dial Court – was known as the ‘Lord Admiral's Chamber’ by at least 1572, taking its name from Edward Clinton (1512–85), first Earl of Lincoln.Footnote ⁶² As with Lord Warwick, Lincoln was married to an aide of the queen, Elizabeth (1527–90), n ée FitzGerald.

From c. 1574, this area of the house was associated with the first-floor lodgings in the projecting gallery range. These were three in number, and were similarly intended for guests of high status. They were each separately accessed by staircases on the east, adjacent to the Dovehouse Court. The lodging at the far end of the range – ‘in a tower’ – was the largest, with a chamber and two pallet chambers.Footnote ⁶³ In 1577 and 1583, this was allocated to the queen's cousin Henry Carey (1526–96), first Baron Hunsdon, and in 1591 it was used as the dining room of Robert Devereux (1565–1601), second Earl of Essex, whose main rooms were on the floor above.Footnote ⁶⁴

Close to all these lodgings was the long gallery on the upper storey of the gatehouse range, accessible via stair turrets at each end of the loggia. The gallery was probably accessible from the first-floor lodgings to north and south, although there is no conclusive evidence of this. The room, completed in 1573/74, was known as ‘ye paynted Gallory’ or, by at least 1607–09, as the Green Gallery.Footnote ⁶⁵ In the parliamentary survey of 1650, the room was described as being 109 ft (33.2 m) long and 12 ft (3.7 m) wide, with two freestone chimneypieces. The gallery had windows opening on to the Middle Court, with ‘three Belconie doors’, demonstrating that the surviving elevation drawing was altered in execution (see Fig. 9). On the east side were further windows opening on to ‘two small stone Belconies’.Footnote ⁶⁶ These formed part of the central section of the gallery, which jutted out towards the Dial Court (see Figs 3 and 8).

The earliest known detailed description of the Green Gallery's interior is that of Jacob Rathgeb, secretary to the Duke of Wirtemberg, who visited Theobalds in 1592. He recalled a ‘hall’ containing depictions of ‘the kingdom of England, with all its cities, towns and villages, mountains and rivers; as also the armorial bearings and domains of every esquire, lord, knight, and noble who possesses lands and retains to whatever extent’.Footnote ⁶⁷ Eight years later, Baron Waldstein stated that the room featured

Further information was supplied by Frederic Gerschow, secretary to the Duke of Stettin-Pomerania, who visited in 1602 and described the gallery as displaying ‘all England, represented by 52 trees, each tree representing one province’.Footnote ⁶⁹ In the parliamentary survey of 1650, the gallery was stated to have been ‘latelie divided into fower lodginge Roomes, and two lobbies’; this probably happened after 1640, when Johann Albrecht de Mandelslo visited and described the room's decoration without noting any subdivision.Footnote ⁷⁰

First and foremost, the Green Gallery's interior reflected Lord Burghley's interest in pedigrees, which was in evidence throughout Theobalds. Burghley is likely to have been responsible for the gallery's scheme; a drawing by him, showing trees hung with empty shields for coats of arms and banners bearing the names of various Cecils, must give an impression of the finished result (Fig. 13). As well as coats of arms, however, it is clear that the scheme included geographical and cartographic information, another area in which Burghley was interested and involved. He was apparently an active supporter of Christopher Saxton, who carried out the first cartographic survey of England and Wales, producing a series of thirty-four maps engraved between 1574 and 1578. A collection of early proofs of Saxton's maps – with Burghley's annotations – survives, bound up with other maps as his own personal atlas of England and Wales (Fig. 14).

Fig. 13. Detail of a drawing by Lord Burghley showing the genealogy of the Cecils depicted on shields and banners hung on branches (HHA, CP 143/12–13; courtesy of the Marquess of Salisbury). The drawing may give an impression of the interior decoration of the Green Gallery at Theobalds

Fig. 14. Christopher Saxton's map of Northumberland, as published in 1579, with annotations by Lord Burghley, from Burghley's personal atlas (BL Royal 18 D. III, ff. 71v–72; © The British Library Board)

The contemporaneity between Saxton's survey and the decoration of the Green Gallery is notable, the survey of England having been completed by March 1574.Footnote ⁷¹ Thus, the gallery's decorative scheme would have been innovative – drawing upon the first accurate maps of the country – and of great interest and use to Burghley, his peers and the queen herself. It also served to represent the greatness of England and Wales, an appropriate theme given that the gallery seems to have served as a ‘show room’ for visitors.

Second Floor, Attics and Towers

In the Middle Court at Theobalds, as at great houses such as Hampton Court (1514–29), status was expressed vertically: the most important rooms on both the south and north sides were at the highest (second-floor) level. The house's first, and – until the 1580s – only, state apartment was on the south, running eastwards from the top of the great staircase (see Fig. 4). The convenience and success of the apartment is proven by the fact that it continued to be used by Queen Elizabeth even after the completion of the much grander suite in the Conduit Court.Footnote ⁷² One of the advantages of this earlier suite may have been its height, and therefore its distance: for Elizabeth, comparative inaccessibility was an advantage, and it also aided tight security.

The first room of the suite was the great or dining chamber, later known as the queen's presence chamber. This was clearly used by Lord Burghley as his own great chamber, while during royal visits the room became Queen Elizabeth's privy chamber, used for her private dining.Footnote ⁷³ According to the parliamentary survey, the great chamber was wainscotted, ‘floored with spruce deale boordes, of a good scent’, and had a large window overlooking the Great Garden. Its stone chimneypiece was ‘excellentlie well carved’, and featured a device, in that it bore a black marble bowl fed with water.Footnote ⁷⁴

Adjoining the great chamber on the north was a lobby, this containing an open wainscot case ‘wrought and carved to looke downe into ye hall’.Footnote ⁷⁵ Another lobby, on the chamber's east, contained a staircase leading down to the chapel. Additionally, the great chamber seems to have had a doorway providing access to the walkway in the hall's frontispiece and from there to the Cecils’ lodgings in the north range.

On the east, the state apartment continued with a withdrawing chamber, known in Elizabethan times as the ‘vyne’ or ‘vine chamber’ – presumably on account of its decoration. During the house's time as a royal palace, it came to be known as the privy chamber.Footnote ⁷⁶ Positioned above the chapel, it had a carved chimneypiece with a wainscot overmantel. Beyond, at the centre of the south range, was the queen's bedchamber. Contemporary references make clear that this room was positioned beneath a turret, which gave it external emphasis.Footnote ⁷⁷ The parliamentary survey records that it was part lined with hangings and part panelled, with a border of wainscot ‘cutt curioslie, and coullered’, with gilded edges. Served by a stool house, the chamber had ‘fair windows’ and a stone chimneypiece with a timber overmantel featuring four pilasters.Footnote ⁷⁸ The royal arms was added in the early 1600s, though the overmantel may have featured Queen Elizabeth's arms even before this time. Visiting Theobalds in 1599, Roger Wilbraham found ‘in the Q^s chamber written over the chymney, Semper Adamas [always firm]’ – probably a mistake for Semper Eadem (always the same), which was Elizabeth I's personal motto.Footnote ⁷⁹

When it came to the area on the east of the queen's bedchamber, there were two phases of construction. In the first phase – from the completion of the south range in c. 1572 until that of the projecting range in c. 1574 – this area contained a gallery, mentioned in the schedule of accommodation of 1572.Footnote ⁸⁰ The fact that it was a key part of the original design is implied by the apparent symmetry of the plan of the Middle Court: in the north range, as shall be seen, Lord Burghley's second-floor suite included a gallery in the corresponding position.Footnote ⁸¹ Once the gallery had been superseded by the Privy Gallery in 1574 (discussed below), the space beyond the queen's bedchamber was reworked. The schedules of 1577, 1583 and 1591 show that this area included two chambers.Footnote ⁸² These were allocated to the queen's gentlewomen during royal visits, and functioned as closets – one large and heated, the other small and utilitarian. From this part of the suite a door led towards the roof walk over the Green Gallery.Footnote ⁸³ Seemingly in this area, too, was the ‘Queenes pages roome’, which was connected to the back staircase.Footnote ⁸⁴

By 1650, this inner accommodation appears to have been expanded, for the survey also includes the ‘Queen's Coffer Chamber’, which featured a wainscot overmantel ‘well painted and gilded’.Footnote ⁸⁵ This was probably positioned at the east end of the range, with a bay window looking east (see Fig. 4). A sizeable room in this position is not mentioned in any of the Elizabethan schedules of accommodation – a notable omission – and so it is probable that this area was originally occupied by the north end of the Privy Gallery.Footnote ⁸⁶ It could have been partly separated off as a lobby, like those later included at each end of the first-floor long gallery at Hatfield House. At Theobalds, the area must have been subsequently divided off to form a completely separate chamber, perhaps in c. 1605–06.

Additionally, the inner area of the state apartment was associated with rooms in the towers (see Fig. 5). The queen's back staircase led to the leads of the south range and the lodging in the tower at the south-east of the court, which had a ‘faire large window looking eastward’.Footnote ⁸⁷ The staircase seems also to have formed the principal access to the room in the tower above the queen's bedchamber, a position of importance.Footnote ⁸⁸

In c. 1572–74, Theobalds's state apartment was extended by the addition of a long gallery. The provision of this space clearly constituted the raison d’être for the construction of the three-storeyed projecting range (see Fig. 10), and it seems that this feature of the Theobalds layout proved immensely influential in reinforcing a fashion for the building of spacious long galleries in association with state apartments. Earlier country houses that included state apartments with long galleries were Hampton Court (c. 1514–16) and Ingatestone Hall in Essex (c. 1540–45), but they were by no means common in the first half of the sixteenth century. That situation changed after the mid-1570s: almost all later Elizabethan and Jacobean country houses of significant size and pretension featured long galleries, including Holdenby, Kirby Hall (c. 1575–84) and Wollaton Hall.Footnote ⁸⁹ The natural conclusion is that Cecil's work at Theobalds was a catalyst, being innovative in both this and other respects.

Initially, Burghley had provided a relatively modest gallery in the south range. Now, he made up for any error of judgement by building a grand gallery, which was known as the Queen's Gallery by 1583 and retained this name until 1650,Footnote ⁹⁰ although it was also known as the Privy Gallery.Footnote ⁹¹ According to the parliamentary survey, the room was 14 ft (4.3 m) wide and 109 ft (33.2 m) long – the same length as the Green Gallery.Footnote ⁹² It had an ‘arch seelinge’ – seemingly a barrel-vault, like that in the long gallery at Chastleton House in Oxfordshire (1607–12; Fig. 15).Footnote ⁹³ The room's walls were panelled and ‘well painted’, the chimneypiece was of freestone, while (judging by the surviving elevation drawing) there were bay windows on the room's west side, overlooking the Great Garden. There may also have been bay windows on the room's east, in the upper levels of the two staircase turrets. Opening off the gallery was a stool house, while the room's northern end contained a door leading to the lead walk over the Green Gallery.Footnote ⁹⁴

Fig. 15. The interior of the barrel-vaulted long gallery at Chastleton House, Oxfordshire, built in 1607–12 (© National Trust Images/Nadia Mackenzie). It may have been influenced by the barrel-vaulted Privy Gallery at Theobalds, built in the 1570s

Other descriptions of the Privy Gallery appear to survive, a fact that has not been acknowledged before. Frederic Gerschow, a visitor of 1602, was probably referring to this room when he described a gallery containing ‘the coats-of-arms of all the noble families of England, 20 in number, also all the viscounts and barons, about 42, the labores of Herculis, and the game called billiards, on a long cloth-covered table’.Footnote ⁹⁵ Another to refer to the Privy Gallery was Johann Albrecht de Mandelslo, a visitor of 1640. He recorded that the gallery contained portraits ‘en grand’ of Queen Elizabeth, several other queens of England, and a group of Protestant leaders – John Frederick (1503–54), Elector of Saxony, Admiral Chatillon (1519–72), Cardinal Chatillon (1517–71), and their brother Francois de Coligny d'Andelot (1521–69) – as well as portraits of the Turkish emperors and ‘les travaux d'Hercule en sept tableaux’.Footnote ⁹⁶

In a tower at the south end of the Privy Gallery was a lodging clearly intended to be used by someone associated with the occupant of the state apartment.Footnote ⁹⁷ Given this intimate connection, it is fascinating to find that the lodging was used successively by Queen Elizabeth's two most notable favourites – firstly, in 1577 and 1583, by Robert Dudley (1532/3–88), first Earl of Leicester, and in 1591 by Leicester's godson, Robert Devereux, the Earl of Essex.Footnote ⁹⁸ According to schedules of accommodation, the lodging comprised a chamber with two pallet chambers, though the parliamentary survey seems to refer to three chambers, with three associated lobbies. One of these chambers featured a freestone chimneypiece, carved and gilded, with a timber overmantel ‘painted with pictures and covered green and gilt with gold’.Footnote ⁹⁹ Another was referred to as the ‘corner chamber’ and had windows looking south and west into the Great Garden, with a ‘fair chimneypiece of stone, with a rich painting over it’. This was probably the principal room of the queen's favourites, for in 1591 it is clear that Essex was accommodated on the gallery's ‘garden side’.Footnote ¹⁰⁰ Accounts of 1578 record the painting of ‘my Lo of Lec Armes over the chymne’,Footnote ¹⁰¹ and this is likely to refer to the ‘corner chamber’; the painting probably served to commemorate the earl's stay of May 1577. A staircase here led to the ground-floor Still House Chamber (used by Leicester's servants during his stays), the loggia and the garden, as well as to the first-floor lodgings; in 1591, the southernmost of these provided a dining room for Essex, thereby expanding his suite.Footnote ¹⁰²

Another gallery, the long gallery above the great hall, was apparently accessible from the queen's rooms, although it did not form part of the state or any other apartment (see Fig. 5). This is likely to have been created in the phase of work of c. 1567–70, and seems to have represented a change from the initial design. The gallery occupied a slightly higher level than that of the state apartment, although it was probably not as high as the rooms in the tower at the south end of the hall range (see Fig. 6). This lodging in the ‘great tower’ or ‘Earles Towre’ seems to have been traditionally allocated to the Lord Chamberlain, and may be identified with the ‘King's Secretary's Chamber’, plus closet and inner chamber, referred to in the survey of 1650.Footnote ¹⁰³

Probably, both gallery and tower lodging were accessed via the newel staircase which rose between the queen's great and withdrawing chambers, though the gallery was seemingly also accessible from the north staircase.Footnote ¹⁰⁴ Almost certainly, it was this gallery that Baron Waldstein referred to in 1600 when writing that ‘Upon the roof of the house there is a splendid gallery from which you can see the Tower of London’.Footnote ¹⁰⁵ The room contained ‘a closett vawted with stone for evidences’.Footnote ¹⁰⁶ This was an evidence house, a secure place for the storage of documents and other valuables, and it may have been located in the upper part of the stone frontispiece on the gallery's east side. Beyond this, nothing is known about the gallery's arrangement and decoration: by 1650, it had been subdivided into ‘12 verrie small rooms’.Footnote ¹⁰⁷ Nor is anything known about the rooms at the south and north ends of the gallery, positioned above the great chamber and Lady Burghley's lodgings respectively. It is likely, however, that those on the south comprised the chamber, pallet chamber and two ‘Chaplannes chambers’ listed in the survey, while those on the north may have included the lodging of the Lord Chamberlain;Footnote ¹⁰⁸ the latter seems to have been used earlier (in 1572) by Sir Christopher Hatton (see below).

As well as offering fine views, the gallery above the hall would have provided a route of passage between the state apartment and the lodgings of Lord and Lady Burghley. These were at second-floor level in the north range, running parallel with the queen's rooms (see Fig. 4). The composition of Lord Burghley's lodging can be set out with a fair degree of confidence. At the centre of the north range was his bedchamber, with an associated pallet chamber. Like the queen's bedchamber, Burghley's bedchamber was topped by a turret containing a room, this serving as Burghley's evidence house.Footnote ¹⁰⁹ To the east of his bedchamber was a room, listed but unallocated in the schedules of accommodation, which may have served as a withdrawing chamber.

Beyond were the ‘suitor's gallery’ and an inner room, shaped ‘lyke a squyer’.Footnote ¹¹⁰ As with Burghley's bedchamber, his gallery – no doubt named after the crowd which followed him wherever he went – found its parallel in the state apartment on the south, at least as planned before c. 1574.Footnote ¹¹¹ In 1577 and 1583, the Suitor's Gallery and square room were used for ‘the Lord Treasurer's hall’ or ‘table’ – that is, they functioned as Burghley's great chamber, while his own great chamber in the south range was used by the queen.Footnote ¹¹² During the royal visit of 1591, the square room served ‘for the council chamber’.Footnote ¹¹³ Its remote location must have been seen as an advantage, and the room had direct access to the roof walk over the Green Gallery. In addition, the schedules of accommodation for 1591 make clear that Lord Burghley's suite included a ‘book chamber’ or library which seems to have been positioned at the west end of the range.Footnote ¹¹⁴

Next to the north staircase were the rooms of Mildred Cecil (1526–89), Lady Burghley: ‘two lodgings’, ‘terninge Southward towards the hall’.Footnote ¹¹⁵ These placed the lady of the house at the heart of its daily working, with ready access to service rooms, rooms of reception and entertainment, and the first-floor lodgings where the Cecils’ relatives were accommodated. Also associated with Lady Burghley's suite was the ‘towre lodging chamb’ at the north end of the hall range, close to the rooftop long gallery (see Fig. 5); during the royal visit of 1572, this was used by Sir Christopher Hatton.Footnote ¹¹⁶ Since this constitutes the only surviving reference to the lodging (and the north-west tower) in the Elizabethan period, it is likely to have served a private, family use during royal visits. Possibly, it was the lodging of the Cecils’ eldest son, Thomas (1542–1623), or – before the completion of the Conduit Court – of Robert Cecil.

Ground Floor

As Thorpe's plan of c. 1606 shows (see Fig. 1), the north range was dominated by a single room – the north parlour, which was, by 1650, in use as the royal Council Chamber.Footnote ¹²² The parliamentary survey provides the only known detailed record of this ‘very faire Roome’, which had a bay window overlooking the courtyard. The parlour was floored with wood and ‘pavements of Divers Coulleurs’, while its walls were lined with wainscot. It had a carved freestone chimneypiece and, like the new great chamber on the south, had windows featuring coats of arms.Footnote ¹²³ At the parlour's east end was a small inner or withdrawing chamber, which was later used ‘for the Clarkes of the privie Councell to wright in’.Footnote ¹²⁴ On the parlour's west was another withdrawing room, with an adjacent staircase; this provided access to the leads, the Great Gallery and the lodgings in the north-west tower.

The north parlour served as a grand space for daily dining and entertainment for the Cecil family.Footnote ¹²⁵ In particular, though, it must have been used by Robert Cecil, for whom the estate of Theobalds had apparently been acquired. It seems that Theobalds was formally settled on Robert by an indenture of 16 June 1587, and it has been said that he took possession of the house around spring 1589, Lord Burghley moving to Robert's house of Pymmes in nearby Edmonton.Footnote ¹²⁶ Certainly, increasingly prominent in the political and court arenas, Robert would have required lodgings of status. Knighted (at Theobalds) in 1591 and elevated to the Privy Council the same year, he was then appointed Secretary of State in 1596 and remained a significant figure under James I – he was created first Earl of Salisbury in 1605 and appointed Lord Treasurer in 1608. It is known that Theobalds contained a lodging allocated to the Earl of Salisbury by 1607–09 and, although its location is not mentioned, it is likely that this refers to the rooms on the ground floor of the Conduit Court's west range, which were named ‘ye Lord of Salisburies Lodginges’ in the survey of 1650 (see Fig. 2).Footnote ¹²⁷

Thus, the north parlour can be seen as the first room in Robert Cecil's great apartment, and there seems to have been a similar apartment on the south of the courtyard, perhaps intended for Robert's future wife – he married Elizabeth Brooke (1562–97) on 31 August 1589 – or a high-status visitor. While the suite on the south is likely to have continued into the south-west tower, that on the north was larger, extending into the western range, probably leaving the rooms in the north-west tower as a self-contained lodging. By 1650, the chambers in the west range included ‘my Lord of Salisbury's Dining Room’, an adjacent ‘Retiring Room’, another room adjoining a stool house, and ‘Lord Salisbury's bedchamber’.Footnote ¹²⁸

The rooms in the tower at the north-west corner of the Conduit Court probably represent the ‘double lodging’ in which John Wolley (d. 1596), Secretary to Queen Elizabeth, was accommodated in 1591.Footnote ¹²⁹ It is notable, given his accommodation in this part of the house, that Wolley was a close colleague of Robert Cecil. Other friends and allies of Robert Cecil to be accommodated in this area during the royal visit of 1591 were John Stanhope (c. 1540–1621), Master of the Posts, and Sir George Carew (1555–1629), Master of the Ordnance in Ireland.Footnote ¹³⁰

At the south-west corner of the Conduit Court, under the state bedchamber, were rooms occupied during the royal visit of 1591 by William Brooke (1527–97), tenth Baron Cobham.Footnote ¹³¹ He was perhaps Lord Burghley's oldest friend but – more relevant for his accommodation in this area – he was also, from 1589, Robert Cecil's father-in-law. This lodging comprised four rooms and was adjacent to the terrace on the south side of the house. It may have been the same lodging of four rooms named in the parliamentary survey as the chambers of the ‘Marquis of Hambleton’, probably a reference to James (1606–49), third Marquess of Hamilton, a favourite of James I and Charles I. According to the survey, the lodging included a bedchamber, with a door leading to the Great Garden, and a dining room, looking north.Footnote ¹³² The survey shows that there were three rooms on the east of this lodging, allocated by 1650 to Henry Rich (1590–1649), first Earl of Holland, one of James I's intimates.Footnote ¹³³ Thorpe's ground plan of c. 1606 (see Fig. 1) does not show a sufficient number of rooms in this area, so it is probable that the large chamber which stood beneath the great chamber was subdivided at some point after 1607.

On the outer side of the south range, facing the Great Garden, there was a loggia. This had seven arches and its walls were ‘painted with the kinges and queenes of England, and the pedigrees of the old lord Burley's and divers other antient families, with paintinges of many castles and battailes’.Footnote ¹³⁴ The loggia was accessible from beyond the foot of the great staircase, and therefore served to link house and garden. Visitors to describe this loggia were Paul Hentzner, who came to Theobalds in 1598, and Baron Waldstein, who visited two years later and mentioned a ‘gallery’ featuring ‘portraits of the Cecil family, with an account of the notable acts of each under different reigns’.Footnote ¹³⁵ In 1640, Mandelslo described the loggia as including the arms of Cecil and his wife, ‘who were descended from the ancient Kings of England’; above were statues of several English kings.Footnote ¹³⁶

Returning to the interior of the house from the loggia, a visitor would have encountered the great staircase. The great stair had been in this position since the completion of the hall range in 1570, providing access to the state apartment on the second floor of the Middle Court. It also had an adjacent flight descending to the basement, where rooms included wine cellars beneath the great parlour and the new south range. With the remodelling of the Conduit Court, the great staircase is likely to have been altered; it is certainly known that work was under way on the glazing of the stair's compartment in 1582.Footnote ¹³⁷

Lord Burghley's feelings about the need for grandeur in the ascent to state rooms have been recorded, and it is likely that the staircase at Theobalds was impressive and innovative.Footnote ¹³⁸ In 1650, it was described as a ‘verry faire halfe pace stairecase with carved posts, and with Lyons on the topps excellent well carved’.Footnote ¹³⁹ It was made up of thirty-two steps and, judging by Thorpe's plan (see Fig. 1), was of open-well construction. Thorpe seems to show a screen dividing the staircase from the lobby; this may have resembled that at Knole in Kent and may, as at that house, have been carried through to the stair's upper part. The survey makes clear that the staircase – named the ‘Kinges Staires’ – had five foot paces or landings, and it must therefore have risen twice round, through two floor levels.Footnote ¹⁴⁰ The stair hall bore a plaster ceiling, with ‘gilded pendance hanginge Downe’.Footnote ¹⁴¹ As Summerson noted, this staircase is believed to survive (though altered), having apparently been re-erected at Crews Hill House, Enfield, then at nearby Theobalds Park, and finally, in c. 1933, at Herstmonceux Castle, Sussex, where it remains today (Fig. 16).Footnote ¹⁴²

Fig. 16. The staircase at Herstmonceux Castle, East Sussex, said to have originally been the great staircase at Theobalds, probably created c. 1570 and altered in the early 1580s (© Crown copyright: Historic England Archive). The stair was apparently moved to Herstmonceux from Enfield in c. 1933

First Floor and Towers

From the 1580s, Theobalds's great staircase led to both the state apartment in the Middle Court and that in the Conduit Court (see Fig. 4). It also provided access to the leaded walk over the loggia on the west of the hall, which led to the north side of the house. Thus, it represented a crucial joining point. The first apartment to be encountered by a visitor would have been the state suite of the Conduit Court. This was made up of six main rooms and, in plan, was L-shaped. The most public room was the great chamber, known as the ‘King's Presence Chamber’ by 1650.Footnote ¹⁴³ In the sixteenth century, it would have been used – by Burghley and the queen – for dining in state, as well as receptions and entertainments. The interior of the great chamber is well documented, and constituted perhaps the most extraordinary decorative scheme at Theobalds. For Jacob Rathgeb, a visitor of 1592, the room was ‘so ornamental and artistic that its equal is not easily to be met with’; its overall effect was ‘right royal’.Footnote ¹⁴⁴

In 1585, Lord Burghley stated that the room had been created after the queen found fault ‘with the smal mesure of her chamber’, almost certainly the great chamber in the Middle Court. He wrote that the new room ‘need not be envied of any for riches in it, more than the shew of old oaks, and such trees with painted leaves and fruit’.Footnote ¹⁴⁵ The earliest known description of the room – and a record that has been rarely cited to date – is given in an undated letter written by Charles Cavendish to his mother, Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury. The letter can be confidently ascribed to July 1587, when Queen Elizabeth was staying at Theobalds. Cavendish, who was obviously one of the party, wrote that:

Much of what Cavendish describes is confirmed by later accounts, including that by Rathgeb, who wrote in 1592:

According to Baron Waldstein, these trees were columns, ‘covered with the bark of trees, so that they do in fact look exactly like oaks and pines’.Footnote ¹⁴⁸ This decoration led to the room's Elizabethan title, the Arbour or Arbor – a name mentioned in contemporary documents but not hitherto acknowledged by historians. It was known as such by at least 1585, and in 1591 was clearly referred to by this name as the first room in the queen's state apartment.Footnote ¹⁴⁹

Another feature of the great chamber, the ‘fayre rock’ or grotto, was under construction in 1584, and included sparkling quartz ‘priors stones’ from St. Vincent's Rock near Bristol.Footnote ¹⁵⁰ The grotto was described by Rathgeb as ‘a very high rock, of all colours, made of real stones, out of which gushes a splendid fountain that falls into a large circular bowl or basin, supported by two savages’.Footnote ¹⁵¹ Waldstein wrote of it as ‘an overhanging rock or crag (here they call it a “grotto”) made of different kinds of semi-transparent stone, and roofed over with pieces of coral, crystal, and all kinds of metallic ore’. He added that it was ‘thatched with green grass, and inside can be seen a man and a woman dressed like wild men of the woods, and a number of animals creeping through the bushes’.Footnote ¹⁵² At its base stood a bronze centaur. Clearly, the grotto was largely decorative, although the fountain may have been partly intended for the washing of hands after meals (a fountain also featured in the great chamber of the Middle Court).

Such an elaborate and curious ‘device’ must have delighted Elizabeth and her courtiers, but the great chamber's ceiling was even more extraordinary. In 1592, Rathgeb wrote of this in the following terms:

Cavendish's description (quoted above) gives further clues as to how this effect was achieved. It would seem that the ceiling was made of boards, painted like the sky and pierced with holes. Above these holes lights were set which, after dark, gave the impression of stars. The movement of the sun and moon – along the length of the chamber, around 60 ft (18.3 m) – must have been incredible indeed. No more is known about this ceiling, or who carried out the work. It seems certain, however, that its mechanism was set within a space above the boards, and that the great chamber did not, therefore, carry through the full height of the range.

Other features of the great chamber were a ‘cloth of estatt mad of thin horne of divers colers’ and, according to Baron Waldstein, two chimneypieces, one of alabaster and another ‘in black and white marble’.Footnote ¹⁵⁴ The parliamentary survey refers only to the latter, which had ‘4 pilasters of the same stone wth the Queenes armes in the midst richlie gilt wth two Brasse Colomes of the figures of Vulcan & Venus standinge before ye jammes of the chimney’.Footnote ¹⁵⁵ It was being made in 1581–82.Footnote ¹⁵⁶ The great chamber's windows included bays opening both north and south. According to the survey, these were set with ‘severall Coates of Armes’, which a visitor remarked belonged to ‘the principal potentates of the world’.Footnote ¹⁵⁷ Following contemporary conventions in planning, it is likely that the west wall of the great chamber fell just beyond these bay windows.

According to the 1591 schedule of accommodation, the ‘Queen's Arbour’ was followed by another state room: the privy chamber, a name the room retained during Theobalds's years as a royal palace.Footnote ¹⁵⁸ In 1650, the privy chamber was part wainscotted and part fitted for hangings, and contained a chimneypiece of black and white marble, with carved figures on each side and a ‘faire frontispiece’ of the same stone, carved and set above.Footnote ¹⁵⁹

By 1650, the privy chamber was followed by the ‘withdrawinge Chamber’, which had clearly existed for some time.Footnote ¹⁶⁰ Part of the room was fitted for hangings and the rest ‘verrie fairely wainscotted’.Footnote ¹⁶¹ This room is not mentioned in the 1591 schedule, and seems a strange omission given its importance and the comparative detail of the document. It is therefore possible that the withdrawing chamber was created by Sir Robert Cecil, as part of the alterations he undertook during the early seventeenth century. The creation of the room would have involved curtailing the earlier privy chamber and, possibly, state bedchamber, and the insertion of a wall with a chimneystack (see Fig. 4). The chimneypiece of the withdrawing chamber may be seen to offer support of this theory: in being made of ‘richlie carved and gilded’ freestone, with a timber overmantel, it broke the sequence of the others in the state apartment, which were of black and white marble.Footnote ¹⁶²

Dominating the south-west tower of Theobalds was the state bedchamber. This featured a chimneypiece of black and white marble, with three pilasters and ‘carved works, wrought and sett above the same’.Footnote ¹⁶³ A ‘great square window’ overlooked the Great Garden, and there were ‘twooe lesser windowes’, looking west.Footnote ¹⁶⁴ The walls were part panelled ‘with special worke’, and the plastered ceiling was painted and gilded – it seems to have featured 120 ‘knobbes’.Footnote ¹⁶⁵ The 1591 schedule refers to a single pallet chamber (closet) in association with this bedchamber.Footnote ¹⁶⁶ This was presumably the room with a stone chimneypiece ‘where the pages of the Backstaires weighted’, and the survey also mentions an adjacent stool house.Footnote ¹⁶⁷ The back staircase – the lower part of which is shown in Thorpe's plan (see Fig. 1) – was referred to in the survey as the ‘Gallerie Staires’.Footnote ¹⁶⁸ It led to the leaded walk and rooms in the south-west tower, as well as to the ground-floor lodgings and courtyard.

On the north of the state bedchamber and inner rooms was a long gallery. Known as the Great Gallery by at least 1587, and ascribed to the queen in 1591,Footnote ¹⁶⁹ the gallery was entered via a ‘faire wainscott portall, richlie carved’ and measured 123 ft (37.5 m) long and 21 ft (6.4) wide, making it the largest of Theobalds's long galleries.Footnote ¹⁷⁰ It had a plaster ceiling, featuring ‘divers pendants roses and flower deluces, painted and guilded with gold’.Footnote ¹⁷¹ It was almost certainly this ceiling that Jacob Rathgeb sketched in 1592 (Fig. 17).Footnote ¹⁷² The gallery had three square lobbies in window bays, two of which would have been on the west side, overlooking the Maze Garden, with the other on the east. There were also other windows on both sides, ‘makinge the roome verrie delightfull’, as well as windows at the gallery's north end.Footnote ¹⁷³

Fig. 17. Drawing by Jacob Rathgeb, secretary to the Duke of Wirtemberg, of a ceiling at Theobalds, 1592, as published in W.B. Rye's England as Seen by Foreigners in the Days of Elizabeth and James the First (1865). It is likely that it depicts the plaster ceiling in the Great Gallery, built in the 1580s

A door at the north-west corner of the gallery opened on to a stone staircase of thirty-two steps descending to the Maze Garden, while a door on the room's north-east led to the lead walk over the single-storey north range (see Fig. 4). Also in this area of the house was another staircase, ‘on ye North corner of the buildinge over ye greate Gallerie’.Footnote ¹⁷⁴ This, shown in Thorpe's ground plan on the west of the north parlour, led to the leads and tower lodgings.

Adjoining the gallery, seemingly close to the stone staircase, was a wainscotted ‘Lodginge Roome’ with a chimneypiece.Footnote ¹⁷⁵ This is probably the room referred to by Mandelslo, a visitor of 1640, as ‘a little cabinet panelled and painted’ at the end of the gallery.Footnote ¹⁷⁶ It may also be the ‘great passage room’ mentioned in the Royal Works accounts of 1620–21.Footnote ¹⁷⁷ It is unclear what function this room was intended to have, but it was probably more a withdrawing chamber than a lodging, since it does not appear to have been associated with a closet.

It is possible that this area of Theobalds was depicted in a contemporary painting. The work dates from c. 1630–35 and shows an interior, with the figures of King Charles I, Queen Henrietta Maria, William Herbert, third Earl of Pembroke, his brother Philip Herbert, later fourth Earl of Pembroke – the brothers served successively as Lord Chamberlain – and the court dwarf Jeffrey Hudson (Fig. 18). There are also two painted copies of the work, as well as an engraving of c. 1800. The original painting and one of the copies are associated by tradition with Theobalds, the other copy being said to represent the palace of Whitehall.Footnote ¹⁷⁸

Fig. 18. Interior view of King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria with William Herbert, third Earl of Pembroke, and his brother Philip Herbert, later fourth Earl of Pembroke, successive Lord Chamberlains; on the left is the court dwarf Jeffrey Hudson (© Crown copyright: UK Government Art Collection). The painting has been ascribed to artists including Hendrick van Steenwyck and dates from c. 1630–35. The background is said by tradition to be Theobalds, and may relate to the Great Gallery

The link with Theobalds has, before now, not been interrogated, it being believed that there was insufficient information about the house's plan to reach a conclusion.Footnote ¹⁷⁹ The present study shows that the view – if it is indeed of Theobalds – can only be of the Great Gallery, which would be appropriate as this room formed part of King Charles's state apartment and was an area he is known to have made use of.Footnote ¹⁸⁰ Although the differences with what is known about the house are numerous, there are some elements that tie in. For instance, the staircase on the right could be that which led to the Maze Garden. It is interesting, too, that an inner room is shown at the gallery's end, in the foreground. At the very least, this provides a sense of how Theobalds's ‘cabinet’ or ‘Lodginge Roome’ may have been arranged. Moreover, if the view is of Theobalds – or inspired by it – then the painting has significance as being the only fully illustrative interior depiction of the house known to exist.

In terms of its decoration, the Great Gallery featured a chimneypiece matching the others in the state apartment. Installed shortly before the queen's visit of 1591, it was of black and white marble, with eight columns and an overmantel bearing ‘Divers carved and painted figures of horse and men’.Footnote ¹⁸¹ Justus Zinzerling, a visitor of c. 1610, implies that it was inscribed in French with the history of ‘Joannes de Sitschitz’ and ‘Guil. Fanacham’, a moment of heraldic significance to the Cecil family.Footnote ¹⁸² The gallery's walls were panelled, and above were paintings of various cities. These were complete by 1592, for in that year Rathgeb recorded seeing ‘very artistic paintings and correct landscapes of all the most important and remarkable towns in Christendom’.Footnote ¹⁸³ In 1602, Frederic Gerschow added that these depicted ‘the most splendid cities in the world and their garments and fashions’.Footnote ¹⁸⁴

Hung around the gallery's walls were, according to Baron Waldstein, portraits of ‘the Roman Emperors from Julius Caesar to Domitian’, as well as some of the knights-commanders of the Golden Fleece, the English kings Richard III, Henry IV, Edward IV, Henry V, VI and VII, and – on the opposite wall to the kings – portraits of six noblemen who were prominent on the Continent: Don Juan of Austria (1547–78); Alessandro Farnese (1545–92), Duke of Parma; Lamoral (1522–68), Count of Egmont; the Admiral of France (1519–72); Louis (1530–69), Prince de Condé; and the Duke of Saxony (probably John Frederick [1503–54], Elector of Saxony).Footnote ¹⁸⁵ As James Sutton has noted, there seems to have been an emphasis on the number twelve in this decorative scheme – six portraits of English kings, six of men prominent in continental Europe, twelve Roman emperors and perhaps twelve knights of the Golden Fleece. Sutton's suggestion that there may have been twelve city views in the friezes on each side of the room seems sensible.Footnote ¹⁸⁶ The gallery is known to have contained busts of the twelve Caesars and a ‘terrestrial globe’ which was twelve spans (9 ft/2.7 m) in circumference.Footnote ¹⁸⁷ It is no wonder that overseas visitors commented upon this decorative scheme, and it is likely that Lord Burghley intended the room to have this effect, encouraging pride among visitors from abroad, educating his countrymen about European affairs, and emphasising the breadth of his own knowledge and connections.

Like the Privy Gallery of the Middle Court, the Great Gallery at Theobalds imitated royal long galleries by being placed at the inner end of the state apartment and leading nowhere. It formed the culmination of the new suite, and was clearly a magnificent room, used as the setting for grand entertainments.Footnote ¹⁸⁸ Nevertheless, like its royal equivalents, it would have been intended as a semi-private space, reflecting its proximity to the state bedchamber and associated inner rooms. The irony is that, although Queen Elizabeth clearly made use of the state rooms in the Conduit Court, she preferred to remain in her older, more limited and secluded accommodation in the Middle Court. In terms of its full usage, the Conduit Court was to experience its glory at another, later period.