Raby Castle

After Charles Neville, 6th Earl of Westmorland, led the failed Rising of the North in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots in 1569 Raby Castle was taken into royal custody.

[7] In the second half of the 14th century the Nevilles began rebuilding several of their properties in northern England, including Raby Castle between roughly 1367 and 1390.

[10] In the closing years of the century the Nevilles were becoming one of the most powerful families in northern England, comparable to the House of Percy, who had been made Earls of Northumberland in 1377.

[8] In 1378 Thomas Hatfield Bishop of Durham granted John de Neville a licence to fortify his property at Raby.

[7] Ralph was created Earl of Westmorland on 29 September 1397 by Richard II as a reward for his loyalty in the face of political unrest.

The Nevilles were Catholics and Charles was one of the leaders of the failed Rising of the North in 1569 against England's Protestant Queen Elizabeth I. Owing to the severity of the threat to the Crown, more than 800 rebels were executed and Charles Neville and Thomas Percy (Earl of Northumberland and another leader of the rebellion) fled into exile.

[3] On 17 March 1849, when William the then Prince of Orange succeeded to the throne of the Netherlands, he was at that moment a guest of the Duchess of Cleveland in Raby Castle.

[3] The case was decided in 1891 when the Committee of Privileges of the House of Lords deemed his relative, Henry Vane, to be the 9th Baron Barnard and inheritor of the vast estates of Raby.

[4] Access to the gatehouse is via a door through the curtain wall,[2] which rose to a height of thirty feet from the waters of the moat.

In 2023, American television drama series Billions used the castle as the home of Bobby Axelrod, played by Damian Lewis,[22] as shown in Season 7, Episode 2: "Original Sin".

Noted artists whose work is in the castle's collection include Giordano, Van Dyck and Sir Joshua Reynolds.

The Small Drawing Room has a fine collection of sporting paintings, reflecting the interests of the family, including works by Ben Marshall, Henry Bernard Chalon and Sir Alfred Munnings, among others.

[24] The pictures in the ante-library are chiefly of the Dutch and Flemish schools of painting and include works by Pieter de Hooch and David Teniers the Younger.