Tea at Trianon: Llanthony Secunda Manor

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, August 16, 2019

Llanthony Secunda Manor

An old manor house is for sale. From Bristol Live:

With spiral stone staircases, flagstone floors, crafted wooden doors and ornate arched windows, you'd be forgiven for thinking you'd either gone back in time or wandered onto the set of a Harry Potter film if you walked into Llanthony Secunda Manor. With a great dining hall as a well as a library, it's a historic building made modern without losing any of its ancient charm or character, and it's on the market for £875,000. The former grange farm was built more than 700 years ago, in around 1205, and is believed to have been owned by Henry VIII during the dissolution of the monasteries in 1536-41. (Read more.)