Members' Exclusive Lecture - Emily Brand on: The Fall of the House of Byron

In this members' exclusive lecture, Emily Brand explores the long and troubled relationship between the Byron family, religion, and the church in Georgian England, based on her book The Fall of the House of Byron. From their centuries-old association with Newstead Abbey’s priory church to Lord Byron’s contested burial and memorialisation at Hucknall Torkard, ecclesiastical spaces shaped how the Byrons were remembered, judged, and mythologised. 

This lecture examines how churches, abbeys, and parish life became stages for debates about morality, reputation, and decline in Georgian society. It also considers the powerful influence of Romanticism on attitudes to medieval ruins - how decay, abandonment, and sacred remnants were reimagined as symbols of loss, excess, and poetic legacy. Through the Byrons’ story, Emily reveals how religious spaces were never neutral backdrops, but active participants in the making, and unmaking, of aristocratic identity. 

Emily Brand is an author, historian, and genealogist specialising in the history of love and family life in Britain from the late seventeenth to the early nineteenth century. Her book The Fall of the House of Byron was widely acclaimed, selected as BBC Radio 4’s Book of the Week and named a Sunday Times, Mail on Sunday, and BBC History Magazine Book of the Year. 

Formerly a senior editor at the University of Oxford, Emily has written for outlets including BBC History Magazine, The Times, The Telegraph, and The Washington Post, and has lectured at institutions such as the British Library, the V&A, and the National Maritime Museum. She is also a contributor to What is History, Now?, exploring why family history matters today.