By Charles Roberts

It has been noted many times before but it remains as potently true as ever -- that the first site of Blickling Hall from the road is so stunning it takes the breath away. Through more than a quarter century, I have seen that sight scores of times, but it never fails to have the same wonderful effect. It is the symmetry of that great early 17th century Jacobean front which does it, with its noble windows, its Dutch gables, its corner towers and cupolas, its attendant wings and mighty yew hedges to each side of the entrance drive -- and around it all, a great frieze of mature trees.

It was built by the Hobart family, made baronets by James I in 1611. But for the visitor there is a possibility of puzzlement at repeated mentions of "the 2nd Earl", "the 8th Marquess" and so on. So let's clarify from the start. The Hobarts (curiously, pronounced Hubbard) were raised to the peerage as Earls of Buckingham in the early 1700s. But by the end of that century the male line died out and Blickling passed through the female line to the Marquesses of Lothian. It was the 11th Marquess who gave the hall and its estate of nearly 5000 acres to the Trust at the end of the last war.