Description: The building dates from the 17th-18th centuries and incorporates masonry from Shelford Priory, an Augustinian priory founded around 1160-80. The ancient manor house, which was long occupied by the Stanhope family, was burnt down in the civil wars, when the Parliamentarians took it by storm, after it had long held out for the king, under the command of Colonel Stanhope (son of the first Earl of Chesterfield) who was slain in the conflict. Some years after this, the family rebuilt it partly out of its ruins.