rocol Harum’s 1967 hit is one of the most haunting, enigmatic, elegiac songs in the history of pop music. Haunting, too, and enigmatic was the accompanying video, which shows band members roaming the ruins of a glorious Italianate mansion. Freestanding walls that once enclosed French Renaissance-style interiors shelter emptiness, open to the sky. No water plays in the magnificent Perseus and Andromeda Fountain. This is Witley Court, a spectacular monument to human grandiosity and excess. Built for politician and ironmaster Thomas Foley, who bought the estate in 1665, it remained in the Foley family for 180 years, growing over the generations into one of Europe’s foremost private palaces. Soaring porticoes were added by the Prince Regent’s architect, John Nash, a friend of another Thomas Foley, 2nd
