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拍品专文
Lord Segrave was the eldest son of Frederick, 5th Earl of Berkeley. William FitzHardinge Berkeley, 1st and last Earl FitzHardinge, created so on 17 August 1841, was earlier created on 10 September 1831 Baron Segrave of Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire. He was born on 26 December 1786 and on his father's death succeeded to the family's huge estates and unsuccessfully petitioned for a writ of summons to the House of Lords as 14th Lord (Baron) Berkeley, his inability to prove his legitimacy undermining his case. Nonetheless he was ennobled under the above titles in compensation. He was Whig Member of Parliament for Gloucestershire from 1810-11, was Lord Lieutenant from 1836-57 and died unmarried on 10 October 1857, when his peerages expired.
The seat of the Berkeley family, Berkeley Castle has been lived in by the same family since Robert Fitzharding completed the Keep in 1153. It is one of the March Castles, built on Henry II's orders, to keep out the Welsh from England. It is one of the most remarkable buildings in Britain and possibly the most outstanding example of Medieval domestic architecture in the country. Whereas other Castles were often romanticised or modernised by the Georgians or the Victorians, Berkeley remained as a Norman fortress with an enclosing curtain wall, built and enlarged throughout the medieval period.
The seat of the Berkeley family, Berkeley Castle has been lived in by the same family since Robert Fitzharding completed the Keep in 1153. It is one of the March Castles, built on Henry II's orders, to keep out the Welsh from England. It is one of the most remarkable buildings in Britain and possibly the most outstanding example of Medieval domestic architecture in the country. Whereas other Castles were often romanticised or modernised by the Georgians or the Victorians, Berkeley remained as a Norman fortress with an enclosing curtain wall, built and enlarged throughout the medieval period.