Hackness is mentioned as the site of a double monastery or nunnery by Bede, writing in the early 8th century. The present Church of Saint Peter is a Grade I listed building, parts of which date from the 11th century.[2]
The church also possesses fragments of a high cross dating from the late 8th or early 9th century. These preserve parts of a Latin prayer for Saint Æthelburh and an illegible inscription, apparently in the runic alphabet.[3]
Hackness Hall and its landscape gardens were created in the 1790s. The house, a Grade I listed building, was commissioned by Sir Richard Van den Bempde-Johnstone, who had inherited the estate through his mother. A new entrance was added in 1810. Fire damage in 1910 was restored under the direction of Walter Brierley.[4]
There is a tennis club in the village with three grass courts and two hard courts, on the road to Lowdales and Highdales. The club was able to celebrate 90 years of tennis in Hackness in 2013.[6]
^J. L. Simmons, "A Source for Shakespeare's Malvolio: The Elizabethan Controversy with the Puritans" in Huntington Library Quarterly, vol. 36 (May 1973), pp. 181–201
.svg)
