Torksey Castle

It is a 16th-century Tudor stone-built fortified manor house founded by the Jermyn family of Suffolk.

Though the Jermyn family retained control of the estate after the Civil War, the property was not restored, but continued to deteriorate.

Also, the hall was built quite close to the flood-prone River Trent, which may have stood the family in good stead as a source of transportation and commerce (as the Lords of Torksey had been permitted to levy tolls on the river's travellers), but which also contributed to the damage of the building through flooding.

Although the structure is a hall rather than a castle, it bears similar architectural design features, including angular projecting towers and crow-stepped gables.

It is obvious from the materials and architectural features of the remaining structure that the building was constructed, at least in layout if not in ornament, to the latest Renaissance fashion.

The lower or ground floor level is built of thin limestone blocks, is very plain and has small mullioned windows, meaning it was probably used as the domestic area of the house, where the servants would have worked, but probably not slept.

The upper level is built in red brick in English bond and most probably constitutes a piano nobile, a principle still very much new in Northern Europe at the time.