Baile Hill is a man-made earth mound in the Bishophill area of York, England. It is the only remaining feature of the fortification known as the Old Baile .
The origins of Baile Hill date back to 1068. Having seized York in that year, William the Conqueror built a castle on the south side of the city close to the River Ouse. Then, as a response to a rebellion the following year, a second castle was built on the opposite side of the river. There is no clear evidence which of these castles was built first, but it is generally thought to be the one which stood on the site of the later York Castle on the east side of the river, followed by the Old Baile on the west side.
Like its opposite counterpart, the Old Baile was of motte and bailey design. The motte was approximately 40 feet (12 m) high and 180 feet (66 m) in diameter, and was surrounded by a large ditch. A flight of steps led to a wooden structure at the top which was surrounded by a fence, also made of wood. The bailey lay to the north-west of the motte and was rectangular. Around its perimeter was an earth rampart and an outer ditch.
The castle, it is believed, was not in regular use for long. By the 13th century it was in the hands of the Archbishop of York and in 1322 Archbishop Melton agreed to defend it in times of war. By c. 1340 part of the city wall had been built along the south-east and south-west sides of the Old Baile, incorporating the existing ramparts and ditch, however, these defences were rarely called into use. The only notable occasion was the siege of York in 1644 during the Civil War, when Baile Hill was used as a royalist gun emplacement. Apart from that, however, the Old Baile was used mainly for grazing and recreation activities, particularly archery during the medieval period.
Today, Baile Hill stands at the junction of Baile Hill Terrace and Cromwell Road. The only other visible evidence of the former castle are two slight dips in the city wall rampart, one next to Baile Hill and the other close to Victoria Bar, which indicate the location of the former ditch. Houses built during the 1880s cover the rest of the Old Baile.
Great and Little Kimble cum Marsh is a civil parish in central Buckinghamshire, England. It is located 5 miles (8 km) to the south of Aylesbury. The civil parish altogether holds the ancient ecclesiastical villages of Great Kimble, Little Kimble, Kimblewick and Marsh, and an area within Great Kimble called Smokey Row. The two separate parishes with the same name were amalgamated in 1885, but kept their separate churches, St Nicholas for Great Kimble on one part of the hillside and All Saints for Little Kimble on other side at the foot of the hill.
York Castle is a fortified complex in the city of York, England. It consists of a sequence of castles, prisons, law courts and other buildings, which were built over the last nine centuries on the south side of the River Foss. The now ruined keep of the medieval Norman castle is commonly referred to as Clifford's Tower. Built originally on the orders of William I to dominate the former Viking city of Jórvík, the castle suffered a tumultuous early history before developing into a major fortification with extensive water defences. After a major explosion in 1684 rendered the remaining military defences uninhabitable, York Castle continued to be used as a gaol and prison until 1929.
A motte-and-bailey castle is a European fortification with a wooden or stone keep situated on a raised area of ground called a motte, accompanied by a walled courtyard, or bailey, surrounded by a protective ditch and palisade. Relatively easy to build with unskilled labour, but still militarily formidable, these castles were built across northern Europe from the 10th century onwards, spreading from Normandy and Anjou in France, into the Holy Roman Empire, as well as the Low Countries it controlled, in the 11th century, when these castles were popularized in the area that became the Netherlands. The Normans introduced the design into England and Wales. Motte-and-bailey castles were adopted in Scotland, Ireland, and Denmark in the 12th and 13th centuries. By the end of the 13th century, the design was largely superseded by alternative forms of fortification, but the earthworks remain a prominent feature in many countries.
York has, since Roman times, been defended by walls of one form or another. To this day, substantial portions of the walls remain, and York has more miles of intact wall than any other city in England. They are known variously as York City Walls, the Bar Walls and the Roman walls. The walls are generally 13 feet (4m) high and 6 feet (1.8m) wide. They are the longest town walls in England.
Castle Acre Castle and town walls are a set of ruined medieval defences built in the village of Castle Acre, Norfolk. The castle was built soon after the Norman Conquest by William de Warenne, the Earl of Surrey, at the intersection of the River Nar and the Peddars Way. William constructed a motte-and-bailey castle during the 1070s, protected by large earthwork ramparts, with a large country house in the centre of the motte. Soon after, a small community of Cluniac monks were given the castle's chapel in the outer bailey; under William, the second earl, the order was given land and estates to establish Castle Acre Priory alongside the castle. A deer park was created nearby for hunting.
Bedford Castle was a large medieval castle in Bedford, England. Built after 1100 by Henry I, the castle played a prominent part in both the civil war of the Anarchy and the First Barons' War. The castle was significantly extended in stone, although the final plan of the castle remains uncertain. Henry III of England besieged the castle in 1224 following a disagreement with Falkes de Bréauté; the siege lasted eight weeks and involved an army of as many as 2,700 soldiers with equipment drawn from across England. After the surrender of the castle, the king ordered its destruction (slighting).
Hen Domen Welsh, meaning "old mound", is the site of a medieval timber motte-and-bailey castle in Powys, Wales. It is the site of the original Montgomery Castle, and was built by Roger de Montgomery in 1070. From 1105 the castle was the home of the de Boulers (Bowdler) family, and it is from Baldwin de Boulers that Montgomery gets its Welsh name, Trefaldwyn "The Town of Baldwin". When the castle was rebuilt in stone (1223–1234), it was decided to rebuild it on a rocky promontory a mile to the south-east – the location of the current town of Montgomery, Powys. The Hen Domen site has been extensively excavated.
In archaeology, earthworks are artificial changes in land level, typically made from piles of artificially placed or sculpted rocks and soil. Earthworks can themselves be archaeological features, or they can show features beneath the surface.
Thetford Castle is a medieval motte and bailey castle in the market town of Thetford in the Breckland area of Norfolk, England. The first castle in Thetford, a probable 11th-century Norman ringwork called Red Castle, was replaced in the 12th century by a much larger motte and bailey castle on the other side of the town. This new castle was largely destroyed in 1173 by Henry II, although the huge motte, the second largest man-made mound in England, remained intact. The motte, recognised as a scheduled monument, now forms part of a local park, and the remains are known variously as Castle Hill, Castle Mound and Military Parade.
Watch Hill Castle is a medieval motte-and-bailey on the boundary of Bowdon and Dunham Massey, Greater Manchester, England. It is a scheduled monument. The castle is located north of the River Bollin and south of a deep ravine.
Rochdale Castle was a motte-and-bailey castle in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, England. It was built in the period shortly after the Norman conquest of England.
Kirkmaiden is a parish in the Rhins of Galloway, the most southerly in Scotland; the present Church of Scotland parish has the same name as and is approximately coterminous with the original pre-Reformation parish.
While there are many castles in South Yorkshire, the majority are manor houses and motte-and-bailey which were commonly found in England after the Norman Conquest.
Southampton Castle was located in the town of Southampton in Hampshire, England. Constructed after the Norman conquest of England, it was located in the north-west corner of the town overlooking the River Test, initially as a wooden motte and bailey design. By the late 12th century the royal castle had been largely converted to stone, playing an important part in the wine trade conducted through the Southampton docks. By the end of the 13th century the castle was in decline, but the threat of French raids in the 1370s led Richard II to undertake extensive rebuilding. The result was a powerfully defended castle, one of the first in England to be equipped with cannon. The castle declined again in the 16th century and was sold off to property speculators in 1618. After being used for various purposes, including the construction of a Gothic mansion in the early 19th century, the site was flattened and largely redeveloped. Only a few elements of the castle still remain visible in Southampton.
Worcester's city walls are a sequence of defensive structures built around the city of Worcester in England between the 1st and 17th centuries. The first walls to be built around Worcester were constructed by the Romans. These early walls lasted beyond the fall of the Empire, and the defences encouraged several early Christian foundations to establish themselves in Worcester during the troubled 6th and 7th centuries. The Anglo-Saxons expanded Worcester in the 890s, forming a new walled, planned city, called a burh. The burh utilised the southern stretches of the old Roman walls, but pushed further north to enclose a much larger area. The Anglo-Saxon city walls were maintained by a share of taxes on a local market and streets, in an agreement reinforced by a royal charter.
Wareham Castle and the town defences, known locally as the Walls, were fortifications in the town of Wareham in Dorset, England.
In fortification architecture, a rampart is a length of embankment or wall forming part of the defensive boundary of a castle, hillfort, settlement or other fortified site. It is usually broad-topped and made of excavated earth and/or masonry.
Bishophill is an area of central York, in England. It lies within the city walls and has been occupied since at least the Roman period.
Snodhill Castle is a ruined motte-and-bailey castle, about 1 mi (1.6 km) south of the village of Dorstone in west Herefordshire, England. It is recognized as one of the major castles of the Welsh Marches. It was built in the 11th century to secure the border between Norman England and the Welsh Princes. Archaeological excavations show that it was one of the first Norman castles in England to have stone-built fortifications, with more sophisticated defenses being added in later centuries.
Pinxton Castle, Derbyshire, is a scheduled monument in Castle Wood that straddles Pinxton and South Normanton. In its designation as a scheduled monument, Historic England describes it as having been a motte and fortified manor, with a moated site and five fishponds. Unlike most of the about 6000 moated sites in England, a large, fortified enclosure surrounded the moat.