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Huis Doorn is a manor house and national museum displaying the early 20th-century interior from the time when former German Emperor Wilhelm II lived in the house. The first house was built in the 9th century, but it was destroyed and rebuilt in the 14th century. It was again rebuilt in the late 18th century in a conservative manner and, in the mid-19th century, a surrounding park was laid out as an English landscape garden.
The gardens were also created in the 19th century. After World War I, Wilhelm II bought house, where he lived in exile from 1920 until his death in 1941. He is buried in a mausoleum in the gardens. After the German occupation in World War II, the house was seized by the Dutch government as hostile property.
Huis Doorn is now a national museum and a national heritage site. The interior of the house has not been changed since Wilhelm II died. Every year in June, German monarchists come to Doorn to pay their respects to the emperor.
References:The Broch of Gurness is an Iron Age broch village. Settlement here began sometime between 500 and 200 BC. At the centre of the settlement is a stone tower or broch, which once probably reached a height of around 10 metres. Its interior is divided into sections by upright slabs. The tower features two skins of drystone walls, with stone-floored galleries in between. These are accessed by steps. Stone ledges suggest that there was once an upper storey with a timber floor. The roof would have been thatched, surrounded by a wall walk linked by stairs to the ground floor. The broch features two hearths and a subterranean stone cistern with steps leading down into it. It is thought to have some religious significance, relating to an Iron Age cult of the underground.
The remains of the central tower are up to 3.6 metres high, and the stone walls are up to 4.1 metres thick.
