History
Burghley was built for Sir William Cecil, later 1st Baron Burghley, who was Lord High Treasurer to Queen Elizabeth I, between 1558 and 1587 and modelled on the privy lodgings of Richmond Palace. It was subsequently the residence of his descendants, the earls and, since 1801, marquesses of Exeter, since 1961 owned by a charitable trust established by the family.
Lady Victoria Leatham, antiques expert and television personality, followed her father, Olympic gold-medal winning hurdler and runner, IAAF President and MP David "Burghley", the 6th marquess by running the house from 1982 to 2007. Her daughter Miranda Rock is now the most active, live-in trustee.
The house is one of the main examples of stonemasonry and proportion in 16th-century English Elizabethan architecture, reflecting the prominence of its founder and rich agricultural wool trade of the Cecil estates and has a suite of rooms remodelled in the baroque style, with carvings by Grinling Gibbons. The main part of the house has 35 major rooms on the ground and first floors. There are more than 80 lesser rooms and numerous halls, corridors, bathrooms and service areas.
In the 17th century, the open loggias around the ground floor were enclosed. Although the house was built in the floor plan shape of the letter E in honour of Queen Elizabeth, it is now missing its north-west wing. During the period of the 9th earl's ownership, and under the guidance of Capability Brown, the south front was raised to alter the roof line, and the north-west wing was demolished to allow better views of the new parkland.
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“Hence poetry is something more philosophic and of graver import than history, since its statements are rather of the nature of universals, whereas those of history are singulars.”
—Aristotle (384–322 B.C.)