About
Longthorpe Tower stands on the western edge of Peterborough as one of England's most extraordinary medieval survivals — a modest stone tower that conceals within its plain exterior the most complete set of fourteenth-century domestic wall paintings surviving anywhere in England. The tower was added around 1300 to an earlier thirteenth-century manor house belonging to the Thorpe family, a prosperous local dynasty who held the manor of Longthorpe from the late thirteenth century. In its architecture the tower is typical of its period: a square rubble-stone structure of three storeys with ground-floor storage, a great chamber above, and domestic accommodation at the upper level. Its extraordinary significance lies entirely within the great chamber on the first floor, where an astonishing programme of Gothic wall paintings commissioned around 1330 covers every surface from floor to ceiling.
The discovery of these paintings in 1945 — revealed when whitewash was stripped from the walls by a tenant during renovation work — was one of the great art-historical sensations of the twentieth century. The programme encompasses the full range of medieval iconographic tradition. The Wheel of Fortune, perhaps the most powerful of all medieval allegorical images, dominates the composition. The Nativity, the Three Living and Three Dead — a macabre morality subject showing three living noblemen meeting three cadavers who warn them of mortality — and a frieze of apostles, prophets, and saints fill the walls alongside a remarkable gallery of naturalistic birds and animals: peacocks, rabbits, an owl, a hermit at prayer, a man on horseback, and an animated rabbit warren.
What makes Longthorpe uniquely significant is its domestic context. These were not paintings commissioned for a cathedral, abbey, or royal palace, but for the private chamber of a minor country nobleman of moderate wealth. Their survival demonstrates that the elaborate visual culture of late medieval Christianity extended deep into private domestic life well below the level of the great nobility. The iconographic programme is complex and theologically sophisticated, suggesting a patron with access to illuminated manuscripts and a high level of religious education.
English Heritage manages the tower and access is typically by guided tour, allowing visitors to receive a full and properly contextualised explanation of the remarkable imagery. The village of Longthorpe retains much of its historic character, and the adjacent parish church of St Botolph provides an additional point of interest for visitors making the short journey from Peterborough city centre. The paintings were stabilised after their discovery and are now considered among the most important medieval art finds made in England in the twentieth century.
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Plan Your Visit
⏱️ Recommended Visit Duration
💡 Visitor Tips
- Book your guided tour in advance through the English Heritage website — the tower operates by guided tours only and walk-up visitors cannot be admitted
- Check English Heritage website for current opening dates before visiting: the site opens April to September only, on Thursday to Sunday
- English Heritage members receive free admission — if you plan to visit other EH sites, membership quickly pays for itself
- Tours have limited capacity; book early if visiting during summer weekends or school holiday periods
- The great chamber can be dimly lit — if permitted, bring a camera with good low-light performance to capture the painting details
- Combine your visit with Peterborough Cathedral (about 2 miles east) for a full day of outstanding medieval heritage in a single trip
- The tower has steep medieval stairs and is not suitable for wheelchair users or visitors with limited mobility — check with EH if you have specific requirements
- Allow more time than you might expect: the paintings reward careful study and your guide will have much to tell you about the complex iconographic programme
Highlights
The Great Chamber Wall Paintings
The great chamber on the first floor of Longthorpe Tower is one of the supreme achievements of 14th-century English domestic art. Every surface — walls, window embrasures, and the vaulted ceiling — is covered with paintings executed around 1330 in earth pigments applied directly to the plaster. The programme is extraordinary in both its ambition and its degree of preservation, offering a near-complete vision of the visual world of a prosperous medieval household.
Unlike paintings in churches or cathedrals designed to instruct a broad congregation, these were created for the private contemplation and spiritual enrichment of the tower's owner and his intimate household. The discovery of their existence in 1945 came as a complete surprise to the art-historical world and fundamentally changed understanding of the extent to which ambitious decorative patronage had permeated private medieval domestic life below the level of the highest nobility.
The Wheel of Fortune
The most prominent and immediately striking of the wall paintings is the Wheel of Fortune — a great circular image that dominates one wall of the great chamber and stands as one of the finest medieval depictions of this enormously popular subject surviving in England. The image shows Fortune, the personification of worldly change and instability, turning her great wheel as the figures of kings and nobles rise on one side and fall helplessly on the other.
Some figures cling to the wheel as they ascend toward prosperity; others tumble downwards as Fortune abandons them.
It is a deeply moral image drawn from the philosophical tradition of Boethius, whose Consolation of Philosophy was one of the most widely read texts of the medieval world, and it served as a constant reminder to the tower's occupants of the transitory nature of earthly power and the vanity of human ambition.
The Three Living and the Three Dead
Among the most vivid and memorable of the allegorical subjects depicted at Longthorpe is the Three Living and the Three Dead — a narrative sequence of unsettling directness. Three living noblemen, wealthy, well-dressed, and riding out in the full confidence of prosperity and power, encounter three cadavers in various stages of decomposition who confront them with an unflinching message: what the living are now, the dead once were, and what the dead are, the living shall in time become.
The subject was enormously popular across late medieval Europe as a vehicle for Christian meditation on death and the vanity of earthly pleasures.
At Longthorpe the three cadaverous figures are depicted with remarkable boldness, their decaying forms creating a powerful contrast with the fine clothes and horses of their living counterparts. The image would have confronted every visitor to the tower's great chamber with the inescapable reality of their own mortality.
The Nativity and Sacred Iconography
Alongside the allegorical and moral subjects, the Longthorpe paintings include a substantial programme of sacred imagery drawn from the life of Christ and the tradition of medieval saints. The Nativity scene shows the Christ child in the manger with the Virgin Mary, Joseph, and attendant angels rendered in the characteristic flat, linear style of English Gothic painting of the early 14th century.
A frieze of standing apostles and prophets runs around the chamber at a lower level, each identifiable by their individual attributes according to established medieval convention.
The combination of narrative religious subjects with didactic moral imagery reflects the sophisticated theological literacy of the patron who commissioned the work and demonstrates the extent to which a private household of modest means could aspire to the same visual vocabulary as great religious institutions.
Collections
Longthorpe Tower's central treasure is its unique cycle of 14th-century domestic wall paintings — the most complete such scheme surviving in England — filling the great chamber with allegorical, moral, sacred, and secular subjects in the characteristic style of English Gothic art around 1330. Interpretive materials provided during guided tours cover the iconographic programme in detail, explaining individual subjects and their relationship to medieval theological and philosophical traditions.
The tower's own medieval fabric — vaulted ground floor, great chamber, and upper accommodation — provides a vivid impression of a minor fortified domestic residence of the early 14th century.
The Wall Paintings of Longthorpe Tower
The permanent display comprises the wall paintings themselves, experienced through guided tours led by trained English Heritage guides. Interpretation boards provide context on the discovery of the paintings, their conservation, and their significance in the history of English medieval art.
Current Exhibitions
No current exhibitions. Please check the museum website for updates.