A Quick Walk Around The Lake

The light was brilliant this morning and the birdsong so sweet. The lake is surrounded by woodlands and backs onto Rivenhall Place garden. Rivenhall Place enjoys a long and interesting history. The house was held by Earl Eustace of Boulogne; at the time of the Domesday Survey (1086) it passed to the Crown by the marriage of Eustace’s daughter, Matilda, to King Stephen. The Scales family were in possession from the 13th century until the death of Thomas, seventh Lord Scales in 1460 when he was seeking to hold London for King Henry VI but was murdered by boatmen. Elizabeth, his daughter, married Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers, brother to Edward IV’s queen. Earl Rivers sold Rivenhall to the Gates family, who held it until the death of Sir John Gates in 1553, executed for his support of Lady Jane Grey.
It is rumoured that Anne of Cleves, fourth wife of Henry VIII, spent the night at Rivenhall Place en route to marrying her King. Certain wooden panels in the house, decorated with tulips, lend further credence to this story since, although she was a German princess, she dressed in the ornate Dutch fashions popular in Germany at the time. Queen Mary granted the house to Susan, widow of Thomas Tonge, Clarenceux King of Arms, from whom it passed to her nephew, George White, of Hutton. In 1590 the house was sold to Ralph Wiseman whose descendants lived there until after the death of Sir William Wiseman in 1692.

The flower is called Cuckoo flower and it’s local name is lady's smock, mayflower, or milkmaids, is a flowering plant in the family Brassicaceae. It is a perennial herb native throughout most of Europe and Western Asia. The specific name pratensis is Latin for "meadow. Its name comes from the fact it flowers the same time as the cuckoo arrives.