Launceston Castle is located in the town of Launceston, Cornwall, England. It was probably built by Robert the Count of Mortain after 1068, and initially comprised an earthwork and timber castle with a large motte in one corner. Launceston Castle formed the administrative centre of the new earldom of Cornwall, with a large community packed within the walls of its bailey. It was rebuilt in stone in the 12th century and then substantially redeveloped by Richard of Cornwall after 1227, including a high tower to enable visitors to view his surrounding lands. When Richard's son, Edmund, inherited the castle, he moved the earldom's administration to Lostwithiel, triggering the castle's decline. By 1337, the castle was increasingly ruinous and used primarily as a gaol and to host judicial assizes.
The castle was captured by the rebels during the Prayer Book Rebellion of 1549, and was garrisoned by the Royalists during the English Civil War in the 17th century. Towards the end of the civil war it was stripped for its building materials and rendered largely uninhabitable. A small gaol was erected in the centre of the bailey, which was also used for executions. The castle eventually became the county gaol for Cornwall, but was heavily criticised for its poor facilities and treatment of inmates, earning it the nickname Castle Terrible.[1] By 1842, the remaining prisoners had been moved to Bodmin Gaol and the site was closed, the castle being landscaped to form a park by the Duke of Northumberland. During the Second World War, the site was used to host United States Army soldiers and, later, by the Air Ministry for offices. The ministry left the castle in 1956 and the site was reopened to visitors.
In the 21st century, Launceston is owned by the duchy of Cornwall and operated by English Heritage as a tourist attraction. Much of the castle defences remain, including the motte, keep and high tower which overlook the castle's former deer park to the south. The gatehouses and some of the curtain wall have survived, and archaeologists have uncovered the foundations of various buildings in the bailey, including the great hall.
The early castle had earth and timber ramparts surrounding a bailey, with a defensive motte in its north-east corner.[4] The bailey was designed around a grid-plan, aligned along its north-south axis, and had a substantial timber hall in the south-west corner.[5] A large number of people lived and worked in wooden buildings that probably filled the site; the historian Oliver Creighton suggests that it would have resembled a "town within a town".[5]
The castle became the administrative centre for the earldom and was used by Robert's court.[6] There was already an existing market held at nearby St Stephen's church by the local canons, but Robert appropriated it and moved the market to outside his new castle, intending to profit from the trade.[7] A watermill was built to the south-west of the castle.[8]
The first documentary record of the castle dates from 1086 and further evidence is limited until the 13th century.[9] Robert's son, William, rebelled against Henry I of England in 1106, who confiscated the castle.[9]Reginald de Dunstanville held it between 1141 and 1175, and it passed to the then Prince John when he acquired the title of the Count of Mortain in 1189, and then passed back into the hands of the Crown after John's rebellion against his brother, Richard I, in 1191.[10] King John gave the castle to Hubert de Burgh, sheriff of Cornwall.[11]
A circular keep was constructed, probably in the late-12th century, on the castle's motte, along with two stone gatehouses and towers along the walls.[12] The wooden buildings in the bailey were rebuilt in stone and the construction work spread up onto the inside edges of the ramparts.[13] Some of these houses may have belonged to the members of the castle-guard, feudal knights who were granted local estates in return for helping to defend the castle.[14]
Henry III's younger brother, Richard of Cornwall, was granted the earldom in 1227.[13] Backed by the revenues from the lucrative Cornish tin mining industry, he reconstructed the defences at the castle.[15][a] Richard only visited Cornwall occasionally during his life, probably using Berkhampsted and Wallingford castles as his primary residences in England, and the work may have been designed to impress the Cornish nobility, with whom Richard had a difficult relationship.[17]
A small deer park was established to the south-west of the castle during this period, incorporating the castle mill within its boundaries, and it was occasionally supplied with deer from Kerrybullock, another park belonging to the earldom.[18][b] A later survey showed the park being a league–3 miles (4.8km)–in circumference, and able to hold up to 40 deer.[20]
Richard rebuilt the walls and the gatehouses at Launceston, building a high tower to increase the height of the keep, probably to allow guests to enjoy the view of his deer park.[21] The bailey was cleared of its older buildings and a new great hall was constructed in the south-west corner.[22] The castle's inhabitants ate well, enjoying a wide range of food including prime cuts of venison brought into the castle, probably mostly from the larger deer parks belonging to the earldom across the region.[23]
A town borough was formally created in 1201, and by the 1220s there was a settlement established outside the castle gates; some of those residents who had been moved out of the bailey may have resettled there.[24] Richard built a stone wall around the new town, linking it to the castle defences, intending it both as a defensive measure and to impress visitors.[25]
Richard's son Edmund inherited the earldom in 1272 and moved the administrative hub of the earldom to Lostwithiel, closer to the tin mining industries.[26] Launceston Castle remained significant as a site of local government, but it soon fell into neglect.[27] When Edmund died in 1300, he left no heirs and the property reverted to the Crown.[28]
14th–16th centuries
The eastern edge of the bailey, overlooking the remains of a D-shaped tower, the motte, keep and the High Tower
Edward II gave the earldom, including Launceston Castle, to his royal favourite Piers de Gaveston but, following Gaveston's execution in 1312, the castle passed to Walter de Bottreaux.[29] In 1337, Edward III's son, Edward the Black Prince, was made the first Duke of Cornwall and acquired Launceston Castle.[26] A survey reported a range of problems with the poorly-maintained fortification, noting that the walls–which were supposed to have been repaired by the knights of the castle-guard–were "ruinous", and that various buildings inside the bailey, including two prison buildings, were "decayed" and in need of new roofs.[30] By this time the constable of the castle was living in the north gatehouse.[31] Repairs to Launceston were undertaken in the 1340s and Edward held a council meeting at the castle in 1353, which was increasingly being used mainly for the holding of judicial assizes and as a gaol.[32]
In the 15th century, the castle's bailey was subdivided by a long wall, and the high tower on top of the keep was turned into an additional prison building.[32] Launceston played little part in the dynastic Wars of the Roses that broke out after 1455; the castle was given to the Yorkist favourite Halnatheus Malyverer in 1484, but Henry VII's victory the following year saw him replaced by Sir Richard Edgcumbe.[33] After Edgcumbe's death in 1489 his son Piers Edgecumbe took over as constable for life. When the antiquarianJohn Leland visited in 1539, he noted that the castle was "the strongest, though not the biggest", he had ever seen, but the only buildings he noted were the chapel and the great hall, which was then being used for assize and court sessions.[34]
Launceston Castle played a role in Cornish politics during the middle of the 16th century. In 1548, Sir William Body, a royal commissioner sent by Edward VI to destroy the Catholic shrines at Helston, was killed by two local Cornish men.[35] In retaliation, 28 local men were arrested and executed at the castle.[35] Anger grew, and in 1549 a wider uprising called the Prayer Book Rebellion took place.[36] It was headed by Sir Humphrey Arundell, who marched up through the county and took Launceston Castle that summer, probably without a struggle.[37] The castle was then used to imprison the royalist leader, Sir Richard Grenville, who died during his detention there.[38]John Russell, the Earl of Bedford, subsequently defeated the rebels and retook Launceston, capturing Arundel who was seized in the street fighting.[39]
During the 16th century, the castle began to be used as a rubbish tip by the adjacent town, and under Henry VIII the deer park, which was no longer needed to generate venison for the duchy, fell into disuse.[40] By 1584, the antiquarian John Norden described the castle as "now abandoned", observing that although the hall was very spacious, the chapel was in a state of some decay.[41]
17th–18th centuries
John Speed's depiction of Launceston town and castle in 1611
In 1637, Launceston Castle was used to imprison the Puritan writer John Bastwick; contemporary accounts noted that the decaying castle was "so ruinous that every small blast of wind threatened to shatter it down upon his head".[42] Shortly afterwards, the English Civil War broke out between the followers of Charles I and Parliament. The castle was predominantly held by the Royalists, until it was finally taken by the Parliamentarian general, Sir Thomas Fairfax, in February 1646.[43] Before retreating from the town, the Royalist forces reportedly stripped the castle of the lead from its roofs and gave the timbers to the townsfolk to use as fuel.[43] It was left in such a poor condition that Parliament did not bother to slight it, unlike many other captured castles.[43]
A survey in 1650 showed that the town houses and their gardens had encroached on the external defences and that the only inhabitable part of the castle was the north gatehouse; the assizes were moved to a new hall built within the town itself.[44] In the same year, Parliament sold off the properties of the duchy of Cornwall, and Colonel Robert Bennett, a Baptist teacher and supporter of Oliver Cromwell, purchased the castle, its deer park and its gaol.[45] The north gatehouse began to be partially used as a prison, and in 1656 was used to hold various members of the Society of Friends, including George Fox, their founder, who described it as a "nasty stinking place".[46]
Hendrick de Cort's pastoral depiction of the castle in the late-18th century; note the fortified bridge (centre) and the Watch Tower (right), later destroyed
When Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660, Bennett was removed from his post as constable.[48] He was initially replaced by Thomas Rosse and then, in 1661, by Philip Piper.[49] A gaol was built in the centre of the bailey in the late-17th century; it was bought by the constable and was adopted as the county gaol.[50] In 1690, the county complained to the King that the constable, Sir Hugh Pyper, had allowed it to fall into disrepair and that the male and female prisoners were sleeping together in the same quarters.[51] Two years later, the Crown granted the post of constable in perpetuity to Hugh and for two generations after him; in exchange, Hugh agreed to invest £120 in repairing the facility.[51] The bailey was also used for carrying out executions.[52][c]
The Pyper family's control of the constableship concluded in 1754, and George II then appointed a sequence of constables who became responsible for running the castle and county gaol on behalf of the duchy of Cornwall.[54] In 1764, the north gatehouse was partially demolished by Coryndon Carpenter, a former mayor of Launceston and the castle's constable, who used the materials to help built a new mansion alongside the castle, called Eagle House.[55] Parts of the north-west curtain wall were destroyed in the process of his landscaping work.[52] When the artist William Gilpin visited in 1775, he praised the picturesque condition of the ruins.[56]
The prisoner reformer John Howard reported in 1777 that the gaol was very small, forming a main room with three separate cages running along one side; one of these cages was reserved for female prisoners.[57] The upper room was used as a chapel, and food for the inmates was lowered through a hole by the prison gaoler.[57] In 1779, after complaints were made by about the conditions, £500 was granted by Parliament and the gaol was enlarged to comprise a day room and a total of seven cells for male and female prisoners, with accommodation for the prison governor on the first floor.[58][c] In exchange, the county agreed to take over the maintenance of the gaol.[59] By 1795, Hugh Percy, the 2nd Duke of Northumberland, had become an important local landowner in the region and acquired the rights to the post of constable from the Duke of Cornwall, the then Prince George.[60]
19th–21st centuries
The castle bailey, photographed at the end of the 19th century
In 1834, Western Road was built along the southern edge of the castle.[61] This required the demolition of part of the castle wall and the fortified bridge, and the weakening of the foundations caused the subsequent collapse of the south-eastern tower later that year.[61] The town of Launceston declined in importance in the 19th century and from 1823 onwards the county gaol, which had a reputation for filthy and unhealthy conditions, began to be run down in favour of the facility at Bodmin Gaol.[62] In 1838 the county government and the assizes were moved to Bodmin, which was more centrally located in Cornwall, resulting in the closure of the castle's gaol and its final demolition in 1842.[63]
By now the castle was in disrepair, and the bailey and the earthworks were covered with a combination of pigsties, cabbage gardens and a skittle alley used by a local pub.[64] Local tradition states that the visiting Queen of Portugal, Maria II of Portugal, complained about the condition of the site to Queen Victoria, which resulted in Hugh Percy, the 3rd Duke of Northumberland and the castle's constable, landscaping the area to create a public park between 1840 and 1842 at a cost of £3,000.[65][c] The south gatehouse was repaired, and the remains of the north gatehouse turned into stables.[66] Hugh sold off his local interests in 1864 and the Northumberlands' control of the post of constable lapsed with the death of his brother Algernon Percy, the 4th duke, the following year.[67] The post lay vacant until in 1883 the local Member of Parliament, Hardinge Giffard, was appointed as the constable by the then Prince Edward in his capacity as the Duke of Cornwall.[67]
During the later stages of the Second World War, the bailey was levelled and used to hold a set of temporary Nissen huts that formed a hospital for United States Army personnel.[68] In 1945, the site was leased by the Air Ministry for use as offices.[69] The Ministry of Works took over the guardianship of the castle in 1951.[69] The ministry put pressure on the Air Ministry to leave the site, which occurred in 1956; the bailey was then grassed over again.[69]Archaeological excavations were carried out in the bailey between 1961 and 1982, uncovering many of the medieval buildings.[70]
In the 21st century, Launceston Castle is owned by the duchy of Cornwall and operated by English Heritage; as of 2013, annual visitor numbers averaged between 23,000 and 25,000.[71] The remains are protected under UK law as scheduled monuments and a grade I listed building.
Architecture
Plan of the castle: A - north gatehouse; B - motte, keep and high tower; C - gatehouse and well; D - bailey; E - great hall; F - kitchen and hall; G - south gatehouse and bridge
Launceston Castle is built on a ridge that slopes from the east down to its west, where it meets a sharp incline.[72] To the north, the ground drops away to the River Kensey.[73] The castle comprises a curtain wall enclosing a bailey, with the remains of a north and south gatehouse.[74] The inside of the bailey, 110 by 120 metres (360 by 390ft) across, contains the foundations of various buildings, including the castle's great hall.[75] In the north-east corner is a motte, topped by a keep and the high tower.[76] The majority of the fortifications are built from shale stone, with the detailing carried out in granite and Polyphant stone.[76]
The castle is now entered through the 13th-century southern gatehouse, which faces towards the former deer park.[76] This entrance was once protected by a 14th-century fortified bridge, also called a barbican, but only one set of stone arches remain, showing two surviving arrow slits in arched recesses.[77] The south gatehouse has two drum towers on either side of a gateway, protected by a portcullis, and would have had three floors, linked to a wall walk around the castle.[78] It would originally have been faced with dressed stonework, which has since been removed.[79] The north gatehouse on the opposite site of the bailey originally led into the town of Launceston.[78] The first floor of the building was probably first used as the porter's room, then by the castle's constable, and finally later as a prison.[80]
The rectangular bailey forms a courtyard, the level part of which is called the Castle Green.[81] When first built, the bailey was protected by earth ramparts, until a later stone curtain wall was built around it, protected by at least three mural towers, the foundations of some of which still survive.[82] Much of the wall, including the south-eastern tower–called the Watch or Witch Tower–has been destroyed, although around a stretch 50 metres (160ft) long survives on the south-west side.[83] The foundations of various, mostly 13th-century buildings excavated during the 20th century can be seen within the bailey, including the great hall, 22 by 7 metres (72 by 23ft) across; a long narrow hall, possibly used as a courtroom; and a large kitchen.[80] A Victorian cottage is positioned by the south gatehouse, probably on the site of the earl's hall and chamber.[80]
The castle motte was built up in several stages, originally being lower in height than today, before being built up during the medieval period and scarped by cutting away at the surrounding stone.[84] It was then reinforced in 1700 with the addition of clay, before having large quantities of earth dumped on it in the late 18th century, and then being terraced in the mid-19th century.[84] The motte is separated from the bailey by a ditch, now crossed by a modern bridge.[85] In the 13th century this point was protected by a D-shaped tower, which still survives, located to one side of the gateway.[85] The causeway steps up to the top of the mound were originally a roofed, stone corridor.[86] There are the foundations of the castle well on the west side of the causeway.[72]
A circular shell keep, 26 metres (85ft) across, was constructed on the motte in the 12th century, complete with a gateway; that was later replaced, and the current entrance dates from the 13th century.[87] Rising up through the keep is the 13th-century high tower, 12 metres (39ft) in diameter, constructed from dark shale.[87] This replaced any internal rooms that the shell keep might have had, instead creating a small, cramped and unlit chamber at the base of the keep.[88] The upper chamber of the high tower was fitted with a large window and a fireplace, overlooking the deer park, and archaeologist Oliver Creighton suggests the tower was intended to be used a "private grandstand", with the parapet below being used for other forms of "lordly display" over the local community.[89] The tower now leans slightly.[86]
The keep appears to lie on the highest ground in the area, although this is actually located to the south, in the deer park.[90] Visitors would have been funnelled around the edge of the park and by the town wall towards the south gate of the castle, a route dominated by the views of the keep and tower.[91] The addition of the high tower had made the castle visible to anyone entering from Devon, framing it strikingly against the hills.[90] The keep, park and town walls probably symbolised Richard's authority as earl, and the historian Andrew Saunders has argued that the keep and high tower were also intended to resemble Richard of Cornwall's crown in his role as the King of the Romans.[92]
↑ The historian Robert Higham has suggested that potentially this work could have been carried out by Edmund of Cornwall, rather than Richard.[16]
↑ It is uncertain when Launceston deer park was created; the Forest Law had generally limited their construction in Cornwall before 1204 and the first documentary mention of it comes from 1282.[19]
1 2 3 Comparing early modern costs and prices with those of the modern period is challenging. £120 in 1692 could be equivalent to between £16,900 and £2.96 million in 2015, depending on the price comparison used. £500 in 1779 could be equivalent to between £60,600 and £5.67 million in 2015. £3,000 in 1842 is equivalent to between £254,700 and £11.5 million in 2015.[53]
Related Research Articles
A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars usually consider a castle to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. This is distinct from a mansion, palace, and villa, whose main purpose was exclusively for pleasance and are not primarily fortresses but may be fortified. Use of the term has varied over time and, sometimes, has also been applied to structures such as hill forts and 19th- and 20th-century homes built to resemble castles. Over the Middle Ages, when genuine castles were built, they took on a great many forms with many different features, although some, such as curtain walls, arrowslits, and portcullises, were commonplace.
Castle Rising is a ruined medieval fortification in the village of Castle Rising, Norfolk, England. It was built soon after 1138 by William d'Aubigny II, who had risen through the ranks of the Anglo-Norman nobility to become the Earl of Arundel. With his new wealth, he constructed Castle Rising and its surrounding deer park, a combination of fortress and palatial hunting lodge. It was inherited by William's descendants before passing into the hands of the de Montalt family in 1243. The Montalts later sold the castle to Queen Isabella, who lived there after her fall from power in 1330. Isabella extended the castle buildings and enjoyed a regal lifestyle, entertaining her son, Edward III, on several occasions. After her death, it was granted to Edward, the Black Prince, to form part of the Duchy of Cornwall.
Castles have played an important military, economic and social role in Great Britain and Ireland since their introduction following the Norman invasion of England in 1066. Although a small number of castles had been built in England in the 1050s, the Normans began to build motte and bailey and ringwork castles in large numbers to control their newly occupied territories in England and the Welsh Marches. During the 12th century the Normans began to build more castles in stone – with characteristic square keep – that played both military and political roles. Royal castles were used to control key towns and the economically important forests, while baronial castles were used by the Norman lords to control their widespread estates. David I invited Anglo-Norman lords into Scotland in the early 12th century to help him colonise and control areas of his kingdom such as Galloway; the new lords brought castle technologies with them and wooden castles began to be established over the south of the kingdom. Following the Norman invasion of Ireland in the 1170s, under Henry II, castles were established there too.
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.
A keep is a type of fortified tower built within castles during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars have debated the scope of the word keep, but usually consider it to refer to large towers in castles that were fortified residences, used as a refuge of last resort should the rest of the castle fall to an adversary. The first keeps were made of timber and formed a key part of the motte-and-bailey castles that emerged in Normandy and Anjou during the 10th century; the design spread to England, Portugal, south Italy and Sicily. As a result of the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, use spread into Wales during the second half of the 11th century and into Ireland in the 1170s. The Anglo-Normans and French rulers began to build stone keeps during the 10th and 11th centuries, including Norman keeps, with a square or rectangular design, and circular shell keeps. Stone keeps carried considerable political as well as military importance and could take a decade or more to build.
Urquhart Castle is a ruined castle that sits beside Loch Ness in the Highlands of Scotland. The castle is on the A82 road, 21 kilometres (13 mi) south-west of Inverness and 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) east of the village of Drumnadrochit.
Restormel Castle lies by the River Fowey near Lostwithiel in Cornwall, England, UK. It is one of the four chief Norman castles of Cornwall, the others being Launceston, Tintagel and Trematon. The castle is notable for its perfectly circular design. Once a luxurious residence of the Earl of Cornwall, the castle was all but ruined by the 16th century. It was briefly reoccupied and fought over during the English Civil War, but was subsequently abandoned. It is now in the care of English Heritage and open to the public.
Rockingham Castle is a former royal castle and hunting lodge in Rockingham Forest, approximately two miles north from the town centre of Corby, Northamptonshire, England.
Okehampton Castle is a medieval motte and bailey castle in Devon, England. It was built between 1068 and 1086 by Baldwin FitzGilbert following a revolt in Devon against Norman rule, and formed the centre of the Honour of Okehampton, guarding a crossing point across the West Okement River. It continued in use as a fortification until the late 13th century, when its owners, the de Courtenays, became the Earls of Devon. With their new wealth, they redeveloped the castle as a luxurious hunting lodge, building a new deer park that stretched out south from the castle, and constructing fashionable lodgings that exploited the views across the landscape. The de Courtenays prospered and the castle was further expanded to accommodate their growing household.
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.
Lydford Castle is a medieval castle in the town of Lydford, Devon, England. The first castle in Lydford, sometimes termed the Norman fort, was a small ringwork built in a corner of the Anglo-Saxon fortified burh in the years after the Norman conquest of England. It was intended to help control Devon following the widespread revolt against Norman rule in 1068. The Norman fort had been abandoned by the middle of the 12th century.
Gloucester Castle was a Norman-era royal castle situated in the city of Gloucester in Gloucestershire, England. It was demolished in 1787 and replaced by Gloucester Prison.
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.
Trematon Castle is situated near Saltash in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It was the caput of the feudal barony of Trematon. It is similar in style to the later Restormel Castle, with a 12th-century keep. Trematon Castle overlooks Plymouth Sound and was built probably by Robert, Count of Mortain on the ruins of an earlier Roman fort: it is a motte-and-bailey castle and dates from soon after the Norman conquest. It occupies a sentinel position one and a half miles south-east of Trematon village.
A shell keep is a style of medieval fortification, best described as a stone structure circling the top of a motte.
Stockport Castle was a promontory castle in Stockport, Greater Manchester, England. The castle was in the medieval town, overlooking a ford over the River Mersey. It was first documented in 1173, but the next mention of it is in 1535 when it was in ruins. What remained of the castle was demolished in 1775.
Worcester Castle was a Norman fortification built between 1068 and 1069 in Worcester, England by Urse d'Abetot on behalf of William the Conqueror. The castle had a motte-and-bailey design and was located on the south side of the old Anglo-Saxon city, cutting into the grounds of Worcester Cathedral. Royal castles were owned by the king and maintained on his behalf by an appointed constable. At Worcester that role was passed down through the local Beauchamp family on a hereditary basis, giving them permanent control of the castle and considerable power within the city. The castle played an important part in the wars of the 12th and early 13th century, including the Anarchy and the First Barons' War.
Berkhamsted Castle is a Norman motte-and-bailey castle in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire. The castle was built to obtain control of a key route between London and the Midlands during the Norman conquest of England in the 11th century. Robert of Mortain, William the Conqueror's half brother, was probably responsible for managing its construction, after which he became the castle's owner. The castle was surrounded by protective earthworks and a deer park for hunting. The castle became a new administrative centre of the former Anglo-Saxon settlement of Berkhamsted. Subsequent kings granted the castle to their chancellors. The castle was substantially expanded in the mid-12th century, probably by Thomas Becket.
Warkworth Castle is a ruined medieval castle in Warkworth in the English county of Northumberland. The village and castle occupy a loop of the River Coquet, less than a mile from England's north-east coast. When the castle was founded is uncertain: traditionally its construction has been ascribed to Prince Henry of Scotland, Earl of Northumbria, in the mid-12th century, but it may have been built by King Henry II of England when he took control of England's northern counties. Warkworth Castle was first documented in a charter of 1157–1164 when Henry II granted it to Roger fitz Richard. The timber castle was considered "feeble", and was left undefended when the Scots invaded in 1173.
Creighton, Oliver Hamilton (2002). Castles and Landscapes: Power, Community and Fortification in Medieval England. London, UK: Equinox. ISBN978-1-904768-67-8.
Creighton, Oliver Hamilton (2013) [2009]. Designs Upon the Land: Elite Landscapes of the Middle Ages. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell Press. ISBN978-1-84383-825-8.
Herring, Peter (2003). "Cornish Medieval Deer Parks". In Wilson-North, Robert (ed.). The Lie of the Land: Aspects of the Archaeology and History of the Designed Landscape in the South West of England. Exeter, UK: The Mint Press. pp.34–50. ISBN978-1-903356-22-7.
Jones, T. L. (1975) [1959]. Launceston Castle, Cornwall. London, UK: Her Majesty's Stationery Office. ISBN0-11-670147-1.
Liddiard, Robert (2005). Castles in Context: Power, Symbolism and Landscape, 1066 to 1500. Macclesfield, UK: Windgather Press. ISBN0-9545575-2-2.
Mackenzie, James Dixon (1896). Castles of England: Their Story and Structure. Vol.1. New York, US: Macmillan. OCLC12964492.
Mills, Jon (2010). "Genocide and Ethnogenocide: The Suppression of the Cornish Language". In Partridge, John (ed.). Interfaces in Language. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. pp.189–206. ISBN978-1-4438-2433-0.
Moss, V. D. (1999). "The Norman Exchequer Rolls of King John". In Church, S. D. (ed.). King John: New Interpretations. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell Press. pp.101–116. ISBN978-0-85115-736-8.
Pounds, Norman John Greville (1994). The Medieval Castle in England and Wales: a Social and Political History. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN978-0-521-45828-3.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
