Bolsover Castle, Derbyshire, England 2003
"Hardwicke is rich, Welbeck is fine,Worsope is stately, BOLS'ER DIVINE." Richard Andrews 17thC poet.
The astonishing buildings at Bolsover aroused the curiosity of King Charles I who, in 1634, was treated here to one of the most extravagant entertainments of the time. Today Bolsover is still used for concerts and other entertainment events.
Bolsover Castle has caught the imagination of its visitors for four centuries. Part of its attraction is its unlikely position; perched high over a motorway, on the site of a medieval castle, in the middle of a former coal-mining area. Another fascination of these unique buildings is that, since they were built, they has been relatively little changed to suit the need of the succeeding centuries. This is particularly true of the Little Castle which has been referred to as an expression in stone of the lost world of Elizabethan chivalry and romances.
The Little Castle is probably the most unusual part of Bolsover, begun by Charles Cavendish in 1612 as a fantasy house for leisure and lavish entertaining. Contrasting with this tower-house of tightly stacked rooms is the Terrace Range 
- a long sequence of imposing state rooms stretching out along the ridge. Charles' son, William, completed the remarkable interior of the Little Castle after his father died, and was responsible for most of the Terrace Range, including the last phase of building on the site in the 1660s. He also added the impressive Riding House buildings, to serve his obsession with horses.
Pictures of Bolsover Castle
The Riding House
The Terrace Range
The Little Castle
Interior of the Little Castle
The Anteroom contains wallpaintings with figures that illustrate three of the four Humours that were believed to govern the human temperament. They demonstrate the Renaissance idea that human beings fall into four types: the melancholic (symbolized by the old man and the girl over the door), the choleric or hot-tempered (the soldier and his mistress) and the phlegmatic or cool, and slow to anger (the fisherman and his wife). One Humour, the sanguine, is mysteriously missing. It is thought that this was intentional, the witty implication being that the castle's owner, William Cavendish himself, represented the high spirited, hot-blooded Humour. At the far end of the room is a painting of the Four Elements as an architectural arrangement. There are no figures in this picture, but if William stood below it, the sequence would be completed by his own presence!
The wall paintings in the Hall take on the Hercules theme of the front entrance (Hercules supporting the balcony). Here there are paintings that show four of Hercules' labours, in which he subdues various violent animals.
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