Today's post covers my visit to Auckland Castle in Bishop's Auckland, County Durham. I visited the castle in the middle of August and had a good look around. First, I'll discuss a brief history of the castle. This castle replaced Durham Castle as the official residence of the bishops of Durham in the 1800s, but the castle history dates to the 12th century. It was popular as a deer park, and a house was set up at the end of th 1100s. The house had additional rooms added onto it, including a chapel, great hall, and defensive walls. This medieval building was replaced by a new castle in the 1600s. The castle sits amongst 800 acres of deer park and woodland. The castle was reopened to visitors in 2019 and restored with funding and has a couple of additional museums under construction; it hopes to bring people into the town for a longer duration of time.
Access to the castle is through a gated archway, and down the hillside on the left is the walled garden. There was construction work happening, and the walled garden did not look too interesting from above, so I gave it a miss.
I entered the castle, and the first part of the castle to visit is the chapel, known as St. Peter's Chapel. This chapel is at the heart of the castle and has been used for over 350 years. It was created from the remains of the medieval Great Hall.
After seeing the chapel, it was a walk across another room to the staircase.
The throne room was the next room to visit, and it was constructed in the early 1800s.
The Long Dining Room was the next room to see, and it features a collection of paintings calld Twelve Sons, which feature "Jacob and his twelve sons". This features a set of twelve of originally thirteen paintings. All but one of the paintings (the thirteenth) were purchased, and a replica of the unpurchased painting was created. The paintings date from the 1700s. The paintings were offered to be sold in 2001, but they were saved in 2011 and donated to Auckland Castle Trust to enable the public to view them. Prior to this, the paintings could only be seen on arrangement.
Afterwards, I checked out another room of paintings.
Next to see were some rooms of the Bishop, and these held paintings and other interesting items.
Th Bishop's Study features a layout from the late 1930s with the bishop standing against dictators (namely Hitler) and standing against war. The bishop helped to stand up for Jewish people and attempting to bring together unity for all. Another room off this study mentions that the bishop's wife planned events for the community and supported rights of miners. She held a party for the miners and their families.
The additional rooms featured the bishop's private rooms along with history through the ages. The bishop and his family still live in one of the wings of the castle.
When I visited the castle, there was an art exhibition to also see, and the exhibition was about the seven sins. I saw a lot of artwork relating to the seven deadly sins (from the Bible), and Tracey Emin "It was Just a Kiss" was one of the pieces in neon. I captured a few of the artworks below.
The Deer Park features the Deer House, which is also worth a visit to see. I covered the deer house here: Deer House at Auckland Castle
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