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Updated: June 12, 2025
The Winchester Tower, originally inhabited by William of Wykeham, was bestowed upon Sir Jeffry Wyatville as a residence by George the Fourth; and, on the resignation of the distinguished architect, was continued to him for life by the present queen.
But it is to be hoped that the design of Sir Jeffry Wyatville will be fully carried out in the lower ward, by the removal of such houses on the north as would lay Saint George's Chapel open to view from this side; by the demolition of the old incongruous buildings lying westward of the bastion near the Hundred Steps, by the opening out of the pointed roof of the library; the repair and reconstruction in their original style of the Curfew, the Garter, and the Salisbury Towers; and the erection of a lower terrace extending outside the castle, from the bastion above mentioned to the point of termination of the improvements, and accessible from the town; the construction of which terrace would necessitate the removal of the disfiguring and encroaching houses on the east side of Thames Street.
This tower was raised thirty-three feet by Sir Jeffry Wyatville, crowned with a machicolated battlement, and surmounted with a flag-tower. The circumference of the castle is 4180 feet; the length from east to west, 1480 feet; and the area, exclusive of the terraces, about twelve acres. For the present the works are suspended.
Among the stags' horns that decorate the walls will be seen two mighty headpieces that once belonged to Irish elks and were discovered in a peat bog. The chimney-piece here belongs to the period before Wyatville began his transformation of the interior. Not least of the attractions of Longleat are its surroundings.
During the mania for rebuilding, all the Elizabethan work of Ralph Symons was replaced by Essex, and in the nineteenth century the notorious Wyatville, whose Georgian Gothic removed all the glamour from Windsor Castle, finished the work. DOWNING. The remaining colleges belong to the period we may call recent.
His first efforts were destroyed by a disastrous fire, but in 1578 the stately house was finished and, as far as the exterior is concerned, was practically as we see it to-day. The interior was entirely remodelled at the beginning of the nineteenth century by Sir Jeffrey Wyatville. James Thynne "Tom of Ten Thousand " was the Lord of Longleat in 1682.
The grand staircase and state drawing-room are of admirable proportions and form part of the work of Wyatville. In the drawing-room is treasured a cabinet of coral and a writing tablet which belonged to Talleyrand. The great hall, which contains a collection of armour and ancient implements of war of much importance and value, has a fine wooden roof and minstrels' gallery.
A prince of consummate taste and fine conceptions, George the Fourth meditated, and, what is better, accomplished the restoration of the castle to more than its original grandeur. He was singularly fortunate in his architect. Sir Jeffry Wyatville was to him what William of Wykeham had been to Edward the Third.
It is a curious coincidence that this tower, after a lapse of four centuries and a half, should become the residence of an architect possessing the genius of Wykeham, and who, like him, had rebuilt the kingly edifice SIR JEFFRY WYATVILLE. William of Wykeham retired from office, loaded with honours, in 1362, and was succeeded by William de Mulso. He was interred in the cathedral at Winchester.
Internally the alterations made by the architects have been of corresponding splendour and importance. "The first and most remarkable characteristic of operations of Sir Jeffry Wyatville on the exterior," observes Mr. Poynter, "is the judgment with which he has preserved the castle of Edward the Third.
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