Trumpeters heralded a feast fit for a Queen when Elizabeth I visited Longleat House in Wiltshire 450 years ago, the accounts show.
Image - Longleat credit Tom Andres
The Elizabethan mansion was still being built when the Queen made Longleat a stop on one of her famous ‘progresses’ around her kingdom.
And her arrival was initially resisted by its owner Sir John Thynne, whose descendant, the 8th Marquess of Bath, still calls Longleat home today.
Original documents connected to the historic visit go on display from Saturday 20 July, including Elizabeth’s signature on a letter sent to Sir John while she was still a princess.
Emma Challinor, Longleat Archivist, said: “When Longleat was included in the itinerary for the Queen’s 1574 progress through the West Country, Sir John appears to have not been entirely happy.
“Surviving records mention Longleat’s ‘unreadiness’ to host a royal visit, and he later reported that his household was laid low with a ‘sweating sickness’.”
The Queen suspected that these were excuses made by Sir John in a bid to dodge the massive expense and effort that hosting the royal entourage demanded, and he was interrogated on the subject in a stern letter from the Earl of Sussex.
However, Sir John ultimately redeemed himself when he hosted the Queen to dinner on 2 September 1574, with Elizabeth later commending the ‘good cheer’ provided at Longleat.
Account books in the Longleat Archives give a sense of the occasion, listing trumpeters employed for the day and flowers purchased to decorate the house. Pheasants, partridges, guinea fowl and larks were all on the menu, as well as some of her majesty’s favourite sweets, musk comfits.
The real sweetener, however, appears to have been the present given to the Queen by her host, a fabulously expensive jewel in the shape of a phoenix, set with a massive emerald and encrusted with fifty diamonds and rubies.
“The jewel cost Sir John Thynne an eye-watering £140, about £45,000 in today’s money, but Elizabeth was pleased,” said Emma.
“The accounts for the purchase and the letter preserving the Queen’s favourable comment about this ‘great jewel’ also feature in the exhibition,” she added
The exhibition is part of the House tour and runs until 3 November with tickets available at www.longleat.co.uk
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