The grandeur of Norfolk's own Downton Abbey, Costessey Hall in Old Costessey
- Credit: Archant
Some are in ruins, some are lost to time, others are guarded by ghosts: Norfolk once boasted dozens of county houses and halls, many of which fell to the wrecking ball.
Weird Norfolk has chosen 10 favourites that remain only as ruins, photographs or distant memories, including former sanitoriums and asylums, scenes of dreadful murders and homes of ghosts destined to walk the invisible corridors eternally.
Boyland Hall
There are believed to be around 200 lost villages in Norfolk and Boyland – close to Morningthorpe – is one of their number. Lost to time, only echoes of its past remain. Boyland Hall was a large Elizabethan house to the north of the village which was rebuilt in the 19th century in the Gothic Revival style but fell into disrepair after the death of its owner in 1930 and was demolished in 1947. Once a small medieval village, Boyland has been swallowed by the parishes which were once on its border, but there have been settlements here for many centuries. Secret tunnels are said to snake under Boyland Hall towards the Norman castle at New Buckenham, Kenninghall Palace in Breckland and the priory of Old Buckenham Castle. This corner of the world hides its secrets well. The ghost of Oliver Cromwell was said to haunt the stairs of the Hall.