High Sunderland Hall

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High Sunderland Hall was a manor house, built circa 1600 just outside Halifax, West Yorkshire and demolished in 1951 after falling into dereliction [1]. The house is perhaps most notable for being said to have provided Emily Brontë with her description for Wuthering Heights[2], although this is a matter for some debate[3]; the building stood just a few miles from Law Hill House, Southowram, where she spent some time as a school mistress[1].

The building was noted for its elaborate and grotesque carvings and her description of Heathcliff's wild moorland home has unmistakable echoes of the old house. Emily Brontë wrote[1]:

“ Before passing the threshold I paused to admire a quantity of grotesque carving lavished over the front and especially about the principal door, above which, among the wilderness of crumbling griffins and shameless little boys, I detected the date 1500 ... ”

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c Halifax Today article on Local Sites with Bronte associations
  2. ^ A Reader's Guide to Wuthering Heights
  3. ^ IngentaConnect Article about Everard Flintoff's book, The Geography of Wuthering Heights


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