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For generations, residents of Collyweston \u2014 a village in central England snuggled up against the River Welland \u2014 passed down stories of a grand Tudor palace, of royal processions through the valley below, of the mother of a king who had called it home.<\/p>\n
Over hundreds of years, the stories persisted, even as memory of the palace\u2019s whereabouts faded. But the lore suddenly came to life when a handful of amateur historians unearthed portions of the long-lost palace<\/a>, buried under a few feet of soil. Historians from the University of York have verified their findings.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are a small village with a small group of enthusiasts, and what we\u2019ve basically achieved here is nothing short of a miracle,\u201d said Chris Close, 49, the chairman of the Collyweston Historical and Preservation Society<\/a>. \u201cYou know, it\u2019s not every day you get to dig up a part of your country\u2019s past.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mr. Close, soft-spoken and warm with a dimpled smile, was raised in Collyweston, with family roots that go back 400 years here. He remembers hearing stories of the palace as a young boy. It belonged to Lady Margaret Beaufort, who played a major role in the Wars of the Roses, a series of civil wars for the English throne. She acquired it in 1487, two years after her son was crowned king as Henry VII. He, his son Henry VIII, and Elizabeth I all walked the palace halls.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n After the Tudor era, which ended in 1603, the palace fell into disrepair. Its contents were sold, portions knocked down or repurposed, and new buildings went up. The palace slowly faded into history, disappearing into the dirt. Almost.<\/p>\n Fast forward to 2017, when Mr. Close became chairman of the historical society \u2014 somewhat by chance. History had never been his passion, but he had promised his great-uncle, who once led the group, to help keep it going. A year after his great-uncle\u2019s death, he made good on his promise.<\/p>\n Mr. Close \u2014 who, by day, works for a British company that builds new homes \u2014 took over the top job at the society at a precarious time. The group\u2019s membership, then mostly retirees, had dwindled, and it had just 500 pounds, about $635, in the bank. Meetings were spent poring over old Collyweston records with little mission, and the few members were considering wrapping things up. Mr. Close knew he needed to inject some energy into the proceedings.<\/p>\n He shifted the society\u2019s newsletter to email, from print. He set up social media accounts. And crucially, he asked members what they really wanted to focus on. The response was clear: They wanted to find the Tudor palace.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The villagers suspected that remnants were hidden under the soil, but with limited expertise and even less money, they did not have much to go on.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was our naivet\u00e9 that\u2019s kind of got us through this, really,\u201d Mr. Close said with a chuckle.<\/p>\n First, they relied on what little they did know about the palace\u2019s history \u2014 including local lore that had percolated for years.<\/p>\n Nowadays, Collyweston, population 564, is little more than a few pretty stone houses with picturesque views over sprawling fields. But glimpses of the royal history were visible to anyone who looked carefully, said Sandra Johnson, 68, a retired real estate agent who now does research full time for the historic society \u2014 as well as helping take care of her grandchildren.<\/p>\n She noted that local residents had long referred to a walled garden in the area as the \u201cpalace gardens,\u201d and that some terraces and fish ponds could still be seen carved into the landscape.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWe knew it was here,\u201d she said, a broad smile growing on her face. \u201cIt was just a question of getting the evidence to prove it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Over several months, the group trawled through old maps and records. That took them only so far.<\/p>\n Around that time, the group connected with Dr. Rachel Delman<\/a>, now a historian at the University of Oxford who was then doing research on the palace. Her work provided detailed descriptions of palace buildings that she had found in various historical archives.<\/p>\n The research was \u201ca little bit of a light that got shone into the project,\u201d Mr. Close said.<\/p>\n But the amateur historians soon realized that archaeology had become a high-tech pursuit and that they needed to embrace technology, too. They applied for grants and got enough money to hire a company to do a drone survey and geophysical scan of the village. The growing buzz in Collyweston around their activities helped attract new members.<\/p>\n