Chawton House

Chawton House is a grade ll* listed Elizabethan manor house in the village of Chawton in Hampshire. It was formerly the home of Jane Austen's brother, Edward Austen Knight, and is now a library and study centre.

In 1992 a 125-year lease on the house was purchased for £1.25 million by a foundation established by Sandra Lerner and Leonard Bosack, co-founders of Cisco Systems.

The house has been extensively restored and is now The Centre for the Study of Early Women's Writing, 1600-1830, which runs study programmes in association with the University of Southampton. It incorporates Chawton House Library, opened in 2003, a collection of over 9,000 books together with related original manuscripts, formerly located in Redmond, Washington, U.S.

Chawton House is the venue of the Annual General Meeting of the Jane Austen Society of the United Kingdom. In 2003 the Jane Austen Society of North America held its 25th Anniversary AGM in the grounds of Chawton House.

The present Chawton House was built c.1580, principally by John Knight. Based on a previous Manor house owned by the Knight family since 1551, it was subsequently extended and altered c.1655 and again in the 18th and 19th centuries. The house is built of flint with stone dressings and a tiled roof. The 17th-century south front has two storeys with an attic and three gables.

John Knight served as MP for Lymington from 1593 to 1597 and High Sheriff of Hampshire for 1609-10. The house passed down in the family until the male line failed with the death of Sir Richard Knight, after which it was devised to a relative by marriage, Richard Martin, who thereupon changed his name to Knight. It then passed to Thomas Brodnax, a relative, who did the same. His son, Thomas Knight, died childless and bequeathed the house to Edward Austen, the elder brother of Jane Austen, who also added Knight to his name. It then descended in that last Knight family until inherited in poor condition by Richard Knight in 1987, who sold it in 1992.

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