ABSTRACT
By European standards London was a relatively small city in 1550 accommodating no more than 120,000 inhabitants. Although Elizabeth showed no little interest in using architecture to enhance her role as sovereign, the aristocracy showed no reluctance to develop sumptuous properties albeit predominantly in the countryside, in order to escape from the pestilence and squalor of urban living, particularly in the summer months when government was often in recess. A number of country mansions were built within easy access of London during the Elizabethan period, the foremost of which was undoubtedly Theobalds in Hertfordshire. Having already commissioned Burghley House in northern Cambridgeshire in 1552, William Cecil, the Lord Chancellor, recognised that a residential location much closer to the capital would facilitate greater access to the centre of political power, Whitehall. At the beginning of Elizabeth’s reign, the style of architecture in London was about to change dramatically - in large measure because of the development of international trade.
