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More than 5000 entries on the history, culture and life of Britain (published in 1993 by Macmillan, now out of print)
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Penrhyn Castle
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(3km/2m E of Bangor) Neo-Norman castle built and furnished in 1820–35 by Thomas Hopper (1776–1856) for George Dawkins-Pennant, whose fortune derived from the Penrhyn slate mines and from sugar plantations in *Jamaica. The exterior makes a tolerably restrained use of *Romanesque themes, but the interiors (in particular the grand staircase) are a riot of medieval decorative motifs, culled from the books of ornament then becoming fashionable and thrown together with a dizzy and exhilarating sense of abandon.
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