After the English Reformation, which violently expelled the old faith from its traditional places of worship and confined it primarily to the household, Catholic houses – in particular, those of the landed elites – not only became the principal places of Roman Catholic devotion, but also politically charged spaces, which the government perceived as seedbeds of ‘popery’ and sedition. State surveillance and violent raids of private homes by pursuivants, the official agents of the Privy Council, drastically increased after the first Jesuit mission in 1580 and subsequent introduction of a more rigorous recusant legislation. After 1585, for example, harbouring or assisting a priest became a felony punishable by death. It is therefore hardly surprising that continuous public scrutiny forced Catholics to take precaution and conduct their private devotional life as covertly as possible. Purpose-built hides, secret garrets, chapels, and passages as well as convenient geography and landscaping, permitting quick and stealthy movements of priests to and from the property, uniquely altered the plans and experience of Catholic homes and became essential to the fully functioning recusant household.

However, the new features were not planned to merely conceal objects, practices, and individuals, but also to regulate and even encourage their circulation, which was crucial for sustaining Catholic religious life. By designing secluded lanes and secret hides, Catholics hoped to simultaneously frustrate pursuivants’ violent intrusions as well as to facilitate secretive motions of priests, fellow coreligionists, illegal books, and devotional objects.