Secrets of the Manor House - Part 1/4 

Tragically, in the 1950's over a hundred ancient ancestral seats were destroyed because their owners could neither afford their upkeep or the 89 per cent taxes that they had to pay. Fortunately, the remaining great houses were opened up to the public for a fee on certain days and that is how they survived. Some were converted into posh hotels, and others rented to film and documentary makers like Brideshead Revisited and Downton Abbey. These ancient great houses are not only England's heritage, they are the world's heritage. They are mankind's heritage. Thank you for uploading this!

I missed these programmes on TV, and I look forward to watching them here on UTube. Thank you for posting these for others to share. Diana.

Magnificent architecture. We will never again see such quality of craftsmanship.

I love their humility and his appreciation and almost wonder at things he lives with every day. That's rather special. And the butler seems a lovely man.

This really is quite a realistic view into the lives of aristocratic family's in Britain so thank you for the upload

I am so very happy that the society for the care and up keep of these great mannors and grounds are taken care of. I have had the pleasure of touring a few in England and here in Europe. It is a dream like walk through history itself. Wonderful and I thought that the servants were of a higher consideration than other trades, so not true and a harsh life to be sure.

These manors were major employers in the building and maintaining of them for many years. People forget most of these were built before during the industrial age. Without them a lot of people would not have had jobs.

This is marvelous. Thank you so much for uploading this.

I simply adore British manor houses! This noble sense of continuity they have. You can find restoration, georgian, regency, victorian and edwardian pieces blend all together in a most aristocratic result... Private architecture and genteel interior decoration at its best! We support National Trust!!!

I find this show fascinating, thanks for posting!

Hi Sue, I believe this is due to the US audience (not completely sure) as a previous UK series The Edwardian Country House was renamed Manor House for the US market. The term manor houses appears to be used interchangeably with stately homes.

Thanks so much for uploading this. I missed most of the program on tv and it would not play on my iphone so I was thrilled to find it on youtube. I enjoyed it.

A lot of books ive read made me think that the commoners found it a privilege to work in the castles.

Coming from the states where monarchy never existed i find it fascinating that there are real live Kings Queens etc exist. Love it

Thank you so much for this show...really enjoyed it!

Like the point, but I highly disagree on this regard: "We Brits have nothing to be proud..." Perhaps if we focus on the good things we have. I am danish/swedish, but my great-grandmother was english and very proud of her heritage that she passed it on to us. Being british/english is more than just the manor houses :D

Wow, that chandelier is mesmerising me. Appreciate the upload.

Samuel west, your voice is the best!

What is so sad is this is exactly where America is heading at breakneck speed and most Americans can not (or refuse to) see it.

Brilliant program...

Superb! An absolute "Must see" !

I like the Manor House and the Secrets and I hope for new episodes.

Wouldve loved to see how they built these back then.

How very sad, how tragic, that the 1st consequences of industialization - which increased productivity, so in theory should have increased wealth for everyone, even if not equally - were simply to drive the two extremes further apart. That is the very essence of waste: starvation in the face of plenty. Surely there must have been some sense in which the individuals at the top felt compelled - not acting by choice - to keep being more extravagant. Can they all be sociopaths?? I feel so naive.

The best job, IMO, would have been taking care of the horses...mucking out a barn being preferable to emptying chamber pots.

wow such beautiful homes.

Downton Abbey sent me here.

Yeah, that was one advantage. You didn't have to spend much money on yourself (if at all) so almost all the cash you made could be saved or sent to your family. Many domestic workers were young people who did send all their money back to their family. In the Edwardian period, however, many domestic servants did start to leave for better jobs and those that stayed did start to demand better pay and working conditions.

Edward was the playboy King as his mother Queen Victoria had ruled for so long and she wouldn't give him anything to do.

Irrepressible forces? Try family feud that cost lives. Two kings, cousins, grandchildren of Queen Victoria couldn’t get along.

When he said to imagine the sound of music being played in the great hall I imagined Christopher Plummer singing Edelweiss. Sorry..lol

The great Edwardian meritocrats -- images of General Kitchener, HH Asquith's family etc -- keep being shown as 'the aristocracy.' As an American I must ask: Does the BBC research department (if there is one) not know better?

It's like a real life Downton Abbey - they even have the American lady of the house! I have to say, now that these people are the curious minorities, I find it all quite fascinating to watch. I doubt I'd have thought that way had I been around in Edwardian times, though. Us lower orders have come a very long way in the past 100 years, thank the lord!

I disagree that the manor house was in its heyday 100 years ago, because technology was having its impact. But it certainly still existed in all it's glory.

I read a memoir : "The Road to Nab's End"- a description of life at the bottom- his grandmother starved to death. His bright sister couldn't make use of a scholarship because- no shoes. American version: vast wealth of places like parts of California and Manhattan, Nantucket, etc. 32 million for a penthouse apartment in NYC. And one in four American children are on food stamps (EBT card). Middle class jobs are evaporating. The real unemployment rate is much higher. So... when does WW3 start?

Imagine working as a butler for 25 years in the same house; OMG, what an indefatigable!

This documentary may have British actors, and a narrator with an English accent, but this is a US documentary, written and produced by PBS,.

The Aristocracy, Torries, were not about to give up their wealth and status, once both world wars were immanent.

There is something I want to ask; I don't know how many English people would be watching this American PBS version of this video, but: do people think that WWI somehow functioned as (took the place of) revolution as a way of ending the extreme differences between the aristocracy & the laboring people in England? And do you think it just happened to be timely; that there would have been some other kind of revoultion if the war hadn't intervened? Or am I getting into the area of conspiracy theory?

It reminds me of downton abbey house and lifestyle

Lord Palmer's RU-vid interviews have been purged. I would like to see them upload. He told the story of how when he got hired in the family business he thought he was going to have a good position and someone threw a bucket at him and a razor blade and told him to go scrape off the gum off the women's lavatory floor.

I am an uneducated Japanese of humble means and I am not qualified to make comments on matters of state, certainly not those of another country, but I feel that Britain should preserve her heritage, including the House of Lords. I think reforms with good sense of balance is called for. Outright abolitions of institutions are unlikely to serve the best interest of Britain. "Britain for the British" is of course important but "Britain in the modern world" deserves higher consideration.

My father is a viscount and we're completely broke; a title doesn't pay the bills.

Despite their links to the "SLAVE TRADE" It is still nice to know that many of these beautiful houses have been preserved!

I enjoyed this documentary but found it rather confusing as the narrator talked about US dollars yet it’s about the British aristocracy who use pounds sterling… The cost of things should have been related in British pounds not the American currency

I just made some (naive) comments to this video, then read your comment. I think people tolerate an incredible amount of inequality before they develop the desperation to revolt, because if it comes, there will be terrible loss of life - people sense this even if they don't know it. I suspect they have to feel their chance of dying if they revolt is drawing closer to their chance of dying if they don't. Do you do think WWI took the place of revolution? Deliberately, by the aristocracy? WWII?

Reality: these are those who practiced colonization, but notice their priorities: curtains cost $1,000,000.00 (one MILLION DOLLARS); and the HUMANS that serve in their homes earn $50.00 per YEAR!!! Absolutely horrific!!!

Is this the episode "Secrets of Chatsworth"?

Does anybody know if the music throughout the show is part of a movie score? It sounds very familiar.

14:23 The Devonshire Ball!!!

What about the Viscount’s & Baronets?

Thanks for that Patrick, I might have guessed it was something like this and I know I should't let it bother me but I do hate sloppy terminology.

Has anyone seen the you tube videos, by the titles "EMPIRES OF DIRT?" They are very interesting in deed!

Interesting....

I'm confused. Most of these houses aren't manor houses

Shocking ! Sad !! No words !!

Wow!

What is the name of the house at 00:03?

and the fight for equality continues

I can't see the enormous difference. Every stately home is first and foremost a manor house.

The House of Lords should have been abolished, it isn't something that's just for show. The British nobility and royalty still control a lot of the land in Britain and dominate certain sectors. Did you know that the Queen of England has a virtual monopoly on mineral rights for radioactive materials? No one person should have that much influence.

I think that despite the hard work of the servants, working in a House was steady employment and you usually had your own room and board.

You forget your station sir,

You skipped Marquess

I'm talking about the radioactive minerals, like raw uranium and the like. Not radioactive waste which is something else.

Did she say "Texas"?

Lord Palmer :Always putting a price on everything is such a demonstration of vulgarity. But then again he did hook up with a Texan.Those drapes? The family got ripped off.

Japan is now a better place because we learnt from others. We were given a bitter lesson - don't try to take territories just because the British and the French were doing the same from long ago. Japan still has problems, but on the whole, it is a nice place. Britain is a wonderful place, I just feel that a few things are about to crumble into pieces. The House of Lords has been in effect a powerless upper house for many years. I think T B tried to make his mark on something rather useless.

The first shots are not of manor houses but stately homes, a great difference................

So how did these aristocrats view themselves as the human equivalent of the thoroughbred horse with all the inbreeding they did? I mean they have to have known, from so many years of breeding animals, that inbreeding is bad. Yet they did it to themselves; why didn't they know that was bad too and that reproducing with non-aristocrats would keep the line healthy and strong?

I wonder who Lawrence James inherited his hair from? Lol

I want Lord Palmer's podcast!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Pleas.....................................eeeeeeeeeeeee.....................!!!!!!!!!

I'm fascinated by the artistic beauty of the interiors and the exquisite taste of all the many British manor houses, not the pretentious, idolatrous aristocracy title thing--which is all due to somebody being rewarded land for fighting in a war,ultimately. Britain has a scourge of class arrogance and rabid foaming at the mouth class warfare, envy based leftism that is truly horrifying, which you don't see in Canada, Australia or the U.S. I like how soft spoken, gracious and polite the civilized folk of Britain are. Reminds me of traditional Southerners or old Mid Westerners in the U.S.. British and other Europeans have a respect for tradition and timeless beauty that Americans, Canadians and Australians simply don't have anymore, which can be brought back. The latter are into the sterile lines of "modern" architecture and "modern" decor, which is soulless and vapid. That is why in England they are trying to bring back beautiful architecture.

A great pity the House of Lords wasn't abolished as a consequence of these changes.

Lord the British were truly a bunch of " light in feet" type. Especially Edward....I'd be embarrassed.

Where did the Viscount went to? :S wasn't it above the Barons?

In the opening aerial view of the manor, there are little white dots on the lawn. We're these sheep?

Why are you picking on Americans? In this whole country there are about 20 houses comparable to "The English Manor House" (or whatever type of house you want to call a huge lavish English country house situated on the owner's vast land holdings), and these are not tied to land but usually to beachfront large lots for seasonal recreation in a Rhode Island, Long Island, and. Few other paces like Asheville NC which the Vanderbilts DID tie to vast acreages of mountain forests. The others were the non profit vacation homes of the Gilded Age robber barons or "captains of industry" (most were a mix who were huge philanthropists as well as hugely wealthy short lived dynasties)such as the Rockefellers, Carnegies, Frisks, Goulds, Astors, and a few others. They were not members of the House of Lords (there isn't one), they didn't hold titles (there aren't any), they were simply obscenely rich and became so through legal and illegal ways. The illegal ways, or most of them, were put a stop to by President Theodore Roosevelt who had grown up on the same posh Manhattan block as the family friends he was at the time of his presidency "bringing to heel" to make opportunities fair and equal for any investor/inventor.the simple act is that in the UK or the US, people are fascinated by the opulence of these beautiful homes, and like to go visit them. In the US, only 2 of these are privately owned, Donald Trump's Mar a Lago which survives as a private club, and some Vanderbilt cousin who kept Biltmore in North Carolina and some of its acreage by opening it to the public. The rest are run by foundations, not a National Trust, but the means of saving the homes is neither here nor there:Tourists like pay to to go see them because they're gorgeous and it's nice to imagine what it would be like to be richer than Fort Knox. People of great wealth are building homes just as expensive today minus the servants' quarters. I have absolutely no problem with how many and what size homes are built by Oprah Winfrey or Bill Gates or Richard Branson. It's fine with me if your knickers are in a twist that ever an Althorp or a Blenheim was built. Good God, the Americans didn't do it. The UK was still putting up with rolling blackouts while the US was sending someone to the moon.

If there's a bustle in your hedgerow...

I have, Magic Talisman from Britain.

I am Portuguese, French Ancient Egyptian, Scottish, and other ancient Royalty but all people see in me is a black person, my family made paper money I am from the Smiley family of Scotland.

Is 3:29 Mr. Bean?

Downton Abbey vibes

2:55 Lol, that hair. "I'm not saying the aristocrats were aliens, but..."

Lord Palmer died July 2023.

its easier for a fat man to go through the eye of a needle then for a rich man to enter through the gates of heaven

but in if you along this con urty this beatiful co. london

It's too bad how many were torn down.

If you marry into this family and this house, you will find it is a Jail.

Is that valuation of US$20 million for the rebuild of Manderston correct if so it is a steal. A Gulfstream G550 cost more. A boat for 20 mil will hardly stir any waves in Monaco. The decorator has taste looks better than some New York pent houses that cost loads more.

Today there is something grisly about the Edwardian era. Being English I find it grotesque and embarrassing. The show of wealth and the total disregard of human beings I find distasteful. My late husband a GP felt the whole lot of these building should be pulled down and I agree with him. This series shows why. We Brits have nothing to be proud of and it still continues today. Our Royal Family is of this mould and until recently paid not one penny in tax. Just take,and a wave of the hand.

Has anyone found any aristocrats in their family tree?

Lord whatsisname: Gay or European?

C

its cold in hell

why would you want to keep the teeth of your horses?

thumbs down because of the ad in the beginning

The entire Ego Minded Social Pecking Order is just really out dated, if they enjoy it so be it, but it just is tiresome. Quirky - habits. King Edward is the only of the Royal line that "feels realistic", Then Diana later offered a most warm and empathetic grace . It is quite a hollow structure. We choose our place through our thoughts, if you desire it then you should have it, but it comes through Thought rather than physical efforting. The lady from Texas is lovely.

Well, we all feel like that at times. We recently had a politician of high profile trying to justify wartime prostitutions "supposedly" arranged by Japanese government or the Imperial Japanese Army. I shall refrain from making comments on that matter as I am no expert. You should not feel ashamed of being Americans. We all love you for all the good things you have done on Japan. Every country has its forte and weakness. Our own emotions on national pride swings all the time.

Considering the fact that it IS an english word.... :P