Derbyshire is home to many fine stately homes and Chatsworth is one of the most memorable.
There has been a mansion on the present site since the second half of the 16th century, but Chatsworth's history dates back to Anglo-Saxon times.
The name is a corruption of "Chetelsourde" meaning "Chetel's manor". Chetel was deposed after the No
rman Conquest and Chatsworth ceased to be a large estate until the 15th century, when it was acquired by a family called Leche who already owned other property nearby.
They may have enclosed the first park at Chatsworth and built a house on the high ground in what is now the south-eastern part of the garden.
In 1549 they sold all their property in the area to Sir William Cavendish, Treasurer of the King's Chamber and then husband of the more famous Bess of Hardwick.
State Dining Room
Bess was the daughter of a Derbyshire squire called John of Hardwick and she persuaded her husband to sell all his property in Suffolk and settle in her native county.
Bess finished the house in the 1560s and lived there with her fourth husband, George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury.
In 1568 Shrewsbury was entrusted with the custody of Mary, Queen of Scots, who brought his prisoner to Chatsworth several times from 1570 onwards.
She lodged in the apartment above the great hall which is now known as the Queen of Scots rooms.
Mary Queen of Scot's Bower
Bess died in 1608 and Chatsworth passed to her second son William, who was created 1st Earl of Devonshire in 1618.
The 4th Earl of Devonshire, who was to become the 1st Duke in 1694, was an advanced Whig and was forced to retire to Chatsworth during the reign of James II (1685–88).
The first Duke rebuilt Chatsworth in Classical style between 1686 and 1707, with the Library and North Wing added by the 6th Duke between 1790 and 1858.
In 1811 the 6th Duke inherited the title and eight major houses: Chatsworth, Hardwick Hall, Devonshire House, Chiswick House, Lismore Castle and Bolton Abbey
The painted Hall
Most of the UK's country houses were put to institutional use during World War II.
Some of those which were used as barracks were badly damaged, but the 10th Duke arranged for Chatsworth to be occupied by Penhros College, a now defunct girls' public school from Colwyn Bay in Wales.
The contents of the house were packed away in eleven days and 300 girls and their teachers moved in for a six-year stay.
The whole of the house was used, including the state rooms, which were turned into dormitories.
The Great Hall
Throughout the house, there are magnicent displays of paintings, furniture, silver, tapestries and porcelain and a gallery of neo-classical sculptures.
The collection is always growing and recent additions include ceramics by Edmund de Waal, modern sculpture and painting by Lucian Freud and Sean Scully.
The State Music Room
Famous curiosities include royal thrones, a giant ancient Greek marble foot, a lace cravat carved from wood, the fan of a Rolls Royce jet engine and the unique illusionistic painting of a violin hanging on a door.
THE GARDENS
The French Gardens
At the same time as he was rebuilding the house, the 1st Duke created one of the grandest baroque formal gardens in England.
It featured numerous parterres cut into the slopes above the house, and many fountains, garden buildings and classical sculptures.
The Italian Gardens
The principal surviving features from this time include The Cascade.
The Cascade is a set of stone steps over which water flows from a set of fountains at the top.
It was built in 1696 and rebuilt on a grander scale in 1701.
The Great Cascade
In 1703 a grand baroque Temple or Cascade House designed by Thomas Archer was added at the top.
A major restoration of both the Cascade and the Cascade House was carried out in 1994–1996.
The Canal Pond: this is a 314-yard-long rectangular lake to the south of the house which was dug in 1702.
The Sea-horse Fountain: a sculptural fountain in a circular pond on the lawn between the house and the Canal Pond. Originally the centrepiece of the main parterre.
The Weeping Willow catches lots of visitors unawares
The Willow Tree Fountain: This is an imitation tree which squirts water on the unsuspecting from its branches.
The tree has been replaced twice and was restored in 1983.
Another view of the Weeping Willow that squirts water
The park was landscaped by the 4th Duke (1720-1764), who engaged 'Capability' Brown to reshape the formal garden into the more natural one you see today.
The 6th Duke engaged Joseph Paxton as the head gardener, resulting in the enrichment of the gardens and the creation of the Emperor Fountain as well as the now demolished Great Conservatory.
Chatsworth's demolished Great Conservatory, begun in 1836 and completed in 1841, which was the largest glasshouse in the world at the time.
It was 277 feet (84 m) long, 123 feet (37 m) wide and 61 feet (19 m) high, and cost £33,099 (more than a farm labourer could have earned in 1,000 years).
A carriage drive ran the length of the building between lush tropical vegetation.
The Orangery
A visitor to the gardens said: "In the garden, to which we pass from the orangery, is an immense tropical conservatory, covering an acre and a quarter.
"It has a carriage drive through it, and is rich in lofty palms, bananas, and other eastern trees, with flocks of birds of brilliant tropical plumage.
"Here, also, is the hothouse built for the Victoria Regia Lily, which requires such excessive heat; it was designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, and suggested the gigantic glass palace of the first exhibition in Hyde Park in 1851."
The Victoria Regia water lily in the Great Conservatory, it could bear the weight of small children
The Great Conservatory was demolished after World War I as all the plants had died as it had not been heated during the war, and the cost of running it was no longer considered acceptable.
The house and gardens have remained little changed since the 6th Duke's time.
