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HISTORY
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House, Gardens and Park
The Estate Office, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Hertfordshire SG3 6PY Tel: +44 1438 812661 Fax: +44 1438 811908 Email: info@knebworthhouse.com |
Conference & Banqueting
Knebworth Conference & Banqueting Centre, Knebworth Park, Knebworth, Hertfordshire SG3 6PY Tel: +44 1438 813825 Fax: +44 1438 813003 Email: sales@knebworthhouse.com |
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www.knebworthhouse.com
© Knebworth Estates 2004 - All rights reserved | |
nebworth
was probably first a Saxon settlement. The Domesday spelling in
1085 is Chenepeworde , meaning village on the hill . Another more
romantic interpretation is Cnebba s camp suggesting that Knebworth
was formerly the home of Cnebba, the fifth-century Saxon prince.
dward
the Confessor gave the Manor of Knebworth to his Thane Aschil. After
the Conquest, the Manor and Fort were granted by William I to his
favourite counsellor, Eudo Fitzherbert, called Dapifer from his
office as Steward of the Household. During the next four hundred
years Knebworth was owned by many distinguished men, Robert de Hoo,
Thomas de Brotherton (a son of Edward I) and his son-in-law, Sir
Walter Manny K.G., Sir John Hotoft and Sir Thomas Bourchier.
ir John Hotoft was Treasurer of the Household of Henry VI. He built
the tower of 
n
17th February 1490, their grandson, Sir Robert Lytton, purchased
Knebworth from Sir Thomas Bourchier for £800. Sir Robert fought
with Henry VII at Bosworth and became Under Treasurer to the Household
and a close confidant.
n
about 1500, Sir Robert began to build on to the fifteenth-century
gatehouse a new four-sided house enclosing a central courtyard.
Successive generations up to the present have moulded the house
to their own highly individual requirements, building, demolishing,
redecorating but, fortunately, never entirely obliterating the taste
of a predecessor.
he house was described by Sir Henry Chauncy in 1700 as a large
pile of brick with a fair quadrangle in the middle of it, seated
upon a dry hill, in a fair large park, stocked with the best deer
in the country, excellent timber and well wooded and from thence
you may behold a most lovely prospect to the East. 