Bradgate House (16th century) It was lived in by the Grey family for the next 220 years. It is believed that the house was the birthplace of Lady Jane Grey, later Queen, ruling for a mere 9 days before being overthrown by Mary I. Jane was executed in 1553 and when her father was executed the following year the estate passed to the crown. Local history claims that groundskeepers marked the occasion of Jane's execution by pollarding the estate's oak trees in a symbolic beheading. Examples of pollarded oaks can still be seen in the park. In 1563 the family regained favour, and the
Great Linford Linford occurs in 944, when "King Edmund gave to his thegn Aelfheah, land at Linforda with liberty to leave it to whom he wished"; it appears in the Domesday Book as "Linforda". Today, the outer buildings of the seventeenth-century Linford Manor form an Arts Centre, and the house itself is a recording studio. In the early sixteenth century, the rector of this parish Dr Richard Napier was widely known as a medical practitioner, astrologer and curer of souls. He was referred to by many in the upper classes, including the Earl of Sunderland who lived under his care for some