Hampton Court before Henry VIII

When surrounded by so many of Henry VIII’s remarkable buildings at Hampton Court Palace, it’s easy to forget that their story stretches back to the days when the Tudors were a small, fledgling dynasty. But look closer in Clock Court and you’ll find hints at Hampton Court’s early Tudor floorplan, uncovered by archaeologists in the 20th century. 

Here, Daniel Jackson, Head of Historic Buildings explores the foundations hiding under the surface of Clock Court, and reveals the exciting new archaeological research taking place in 2025. As Daniel explains, these discoveries may tell us how Thomas Wolsey made Hampton Court so grand that the King wanted it for himself.

Giles Daubeney: grandfather of Hampton Court Palace

The site of Hampton Court first appears in our records in 1086 with a mention in Domesday Book. For a long time, Hampton Court was a medieval agricultural holding, the management hub for a large herd of sheep, and extensive pastureland and forests. 

It would take the vision of the Tudor Giles Daubeney – a soldier, courtier, and diplomat and eager supporter of Henry VII – to begin Hampton Court’s evolution from unassuming farmland into one of the greatest palaces in England.

After Henry VII took the throne at the Battle of Bosworth, Daubeney became one of his most trusted advisors. His success in supporting the Tudor dynasty led to great wealth and influence, and he was able to buy the lease for Hampton Court in 1494. 

Daubeney set about transforming Hampton Court into a moated manor house, spending huge sums on transforming the old agricultural buildings. His house was so impressive that Henry VII and Elizabeth of York visited on multiple occasions. 

The manor house was surrounded by a large moat and the central courtyard was in the same location as Clock Court. When you stand in Clock Court today, the different coloured bricks laid amongst the cobbles hint at the floorplan of some of Daubeney’s building, likely constructed between 1495 and 1500. 

The foundations indicated by the clever brickwork in Clock Court are all that’s left of Daubeney’s beautiful and impressive manor house. Parts of it appear to have been incorporated into Thomas Wolsey's building work from 1514 onwards, but almost nothing of the manor house survived the reign of his master Henry VIII.

No plans or images of Daubeney’s house survive, and we only have very limited descriptions of the building. So how did we decide what to show on the floor? The answer lies in archaeological excavations. 

The 15th-century foundations discovered in the 1960s and 70s

We have archaeologists from the 1960s and 70s to thank for our knowledge of Daubeney’s 15th-century manor house. These 20th-century archaeologists opened the whole southern half of the courtyard, revealing a huge amount of preserved archaeology; some of the trenches were over two metres deep in places. 

As part of this work, the archaeologists found that the building that stood here formed the principal entry into the manor house. It was built on top of the earlier medieval moat revetement wall – now shown in dark plum-coloured bricks. The building was asymmetrical with a gatehouse lying off-centre and extended into the moat and the inner courtyard. 

The excavations revealed the foundations of two large chimney stacks, and three five-sided garderobe (toilet) turrets. One of these garderobes partially survives above ground, embedded in the wall of a later building constructed by Wolsey in the 1520s. These toilets were positioned in projecting turrets and the waste would have gone directly into the moat. 

We don’t know exactly how this range was used, though it is possible it held some of the high-status accommodation, potentially even private rooms for either Daubeney or his royal visitors. As always, archaeology provided important clues about the past, which are impossible to get from historical accounts alone. And this work continues today.

New, old foundations

These Tudor foundations are badly truncated, but we can still see they are substantial and would have supported a significant building. They were likely part of a 16th-century range connecting Henry VIII’s private apartments with Thomas Wolsey’s rooms and the Long Gallery; Wolsey bought Daubeney’s manor house in 1514, with plans to create a palace fit for his role as Henry VIII’s chief minister. 

Wolsey filled in the old moat and pulled down the western range of the manor to make way for his new Base Court. The part of the earlier manor house shown in the floor of Clock Court appears to have survived and was incorporated into the new palace designs. That didn’t last long, however; Henry VIII took over the palace in 1529 and demolished Daubeney’s old range in 1536.

Henry VIII’s private sewer?

In the latest Clock Court excavations, we only get a glimpse of this 16th-century range as the trench has been kept small to minimise any disturbance of the archaeological remains. One feature we can see is the remains of at least one, but possibly two, arches in the brickwork almost one metre below the current ground level. These may be culverts used to carry the waste from the royal private apartments. The culverts appear to line up with a cistern house identified under the King’s Privy Dining room in archaeological excavations during the 1980s. 

This previously unseen Tudor building was likely demolished in 1689 during the construction of the new palace for William III and Mary II. The beautiful wall and ceiling paintings in the King's Stairs make archaeological excavations in the area challenging, which is one of the reasons this new discovery caught us by surprise. We also found evidence from 300 years of life at the palace, including 17th-century fireplaces, buried floor surfaces, and a full chronology of water, sewage and heating pipes, plus two earlier generations of electrical cables!