Chapter XII: Of the Edwardian or Concentric Castles (5)

There is, however, evidence of a religious house at Berkeley in the eighth century. Tilhere, Bishop of Worcester, in 778, seems to have been previously Abbot of Beorclea, as was Etheldune, also his successor at Worcester in 915. Tanner thinks the family at Berclea, mentioned in the Acts of a synod at Cloveshoe in A.D. 824, may refer to a religious house here. There was also a nunnery, for a charter by Adeliza, queen of Henry I., gives to the church of Reading, Berkeley Hern, that is, the church of Berkeley, with its appended prebends, and the prebends “duarum monalium,” which seems to refer to a nunnery. Camden says the nunnery was suppressed by Earl Godwin in the reign of the Confessor, and preserves a scandalous tale thereupon, which derives some support from a curious entry in Domesday, whence it appears that Gytha, the wife of Godwin and mother of Harold, had Ullcestre, near Berkeley, from her husband, he having bought it from Azor that she might live there till she should live at Berkeley. “Nolebat enim de ipso manerio aliquid comedere pro destructione abbatiæ.”

In Domesday, Berkeley appears as a royal demesne and free borough, which had been held by the Confessor, and belonged to William, but was held of him by Roger, called thence of Berkeley. It was the head of a soke or barony, for attached to it were “Berews,” or members, in twenty-one adjacent parishes. The castle is not mentioned, but in “Ness,” probably Sharpness, was a castellum, or castellet, claimed by the same Roger. His holding in the Liber Niger is set down as 2½ knights’ fees. He gave liberally to Stanley Priory, and died there 1096. William, his nephew, succeeded, and had a son Roger, father of Roger, who all held Berkeley, and are designated by its name. This latter Roger was a partisan of King Stephen, and was turned out of Berkeley by Henry, who gave Berkeley to Robert, son of Hardinge, Præpositus of Bristol, who died 1170, 16 Henry II., aged seventy-five, leaving Maurice Fitzhardinge, his son. To stanch the feud between the dispossessed and the new lord, Henry made up a double alliance: Helen, daughter of Fitzhardinge, was married to a son of Roger de Berkeley, and Alice, Roger’s daughter, to Maurice Fitzhardinge of Berkeley. The result was that the old Berkeleys fell back upon their manor of Cuberley, and finally died out, and the Fitzhardinges, with the estate, bore the surname of Berkeley, and have so continued. At that time the Manor or Lordship, sometimes called the Honour of Berkeley, included above thirty parishes, and extended over most of the hundred. It was rated at 160 hides, and paid a chief rent of £70.

Henry, at the time of the gift, was only Duke of Normandy, and weak, and Fitzhardinge was an important man; hence the duke treats as equal with equal, and with the estate makes a promise to build him a castle to his taste. “Et pepigi ei firmare ibi castellum secundum voluntatem ipsius Roberti,” and, on the other hand, Robert promises to be Henry’s liege. Henry visited Berkeley in 1155, when, no doubt, the present castle was begun. Henry’s charter is in excellent preservation, and is kept at Berkeley.

Another charter by Henry, when king, also there preserved, confirms to Robert Fitzhardinge, Berkelai-Herness Manor by the service of one knight, or, if he prefer it, 100 shillings per annum. A third charter is almost a copy of the second, but states the service at five knights, and is silent as to the composition. There is also a charter printed by Dugdale, by which Robert Fitzhardinge grants certain churches to St. Augustine’s at Bristol. These are the earliest title-deeds of the family. St. Augustine’s was founded by this Robert in 1142, and consecrated in 1148. He died 1170.

Maurice, son of Robert, is said to have dug the ditch between the castle and the church. He probably deepened it. He also is reputed to have built the castle exterior to King Henry’s keep, including the two gatehouses. He died in 1189.

Robert, his son, bore the name of Berkeley. He was in arms against John, who held the castle from 1211 till his death in 1216. Lord Robert died 1220. His brother, Lord Thomas, received Henry III. here in 1220. He died 1243. Maurice, his son, here entertained Prince Edward in 1256. He added to the estates, and is said to have strengthened the castle. Thomas, his son, sixth lord, was a great soldier, and served at Bannockburn. He died 1321. Maurice, his son, took part against the Despensers, and was imprisoned by the king till his death, in 1326. Edward seized the castle, which was held by the Despensers. Lord Thomas, his son and successor, received Edward II. here as a captive, 15th April, 1327, and here the king seems to have been murdered by Maltravers and Gournay, 21st September, 1327. A payment was charged to the Exchequer for prayers for his soul in the castle chapel.

Lord Thomas held the castle from 1326 till his death in 1361. He fought at Cressy and Poitiers, and probably made money in the wars, for he is reputed to have made great alterations in the castle, and probably the hall and the Decorated work generally is his doing. He is said to have built Thorpe Tower. He may have raised it, but it is apparently as old as the keep. The Berkeley arch, seen in great perfection in St. Augustine’s Church, now Bristol Cathedral, and here introduced, as was proper, in a plainer form, is attributed to Knowle, Abbot of St. Augustine’s, from 1306 to 1332. The connexion of the Berkeleys with the monks of St. Augustine’s was intimate, and the same architect was likely enough to be employed by both.

Another Thomas, grandson to the former, here received Richard II., in 1386-7. This is the Lord Berkeley mentioned in “Shakespeare’s Richard II.,” when the castle is described as—

“Mann’d with three hundred men, as I have heard,
And in it are the Lords of York, Berkeley, and Seymour.”

Lord Thomas pronounced the deposition of Richard in Parliament in 1399. John of Trevisa, whose translations from the Apocalypse are yet seen on the ribs of the chapel roof at Berkeley, was vicar of this parish during the life of this lord. Lord Thomas left a daughter only, married to Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, who strove hard, but in vain, to oust the heir male, James de Berkeley. Lord Warwick appeared before the castle in 1418 with an armed force, and his heirs preferred a suit at law which lasted 150 years, varied with occasional combats, one of which, known as the battle of Nibley Green, led to the settlement of the dispute, Lord Lisle, the claimant, being slain in the field by William Lord Berkeley. William, the next lord, was created Earl of Nottingham by Richard III., and Marquis of Berkeley by Henry VII., in return for which he alienated the estate from his brother and male heir in favour of the latter king and his heirs male, nor did the Berkeleys recover it until the death of Edward VI. and the failure of the royal male line, when the castle was recovered by Henry, who resumed the title of Berkeley, after an alienation of 61 years 4 months and 20 days.

Henry VII. is said to have erected the kitchen, but probably he only put a new roof upon it.

During the Parliamentary struggle, the Lord of Berkeley seems to have been a moderate Royalist, with strong friends among the Parliamentary leaders. In 1642 it was surrendered to Lieutenant-Colonel Arthur Forbes, for the Parliament, but was not pillaged, and even the arms contained in it were not removed. Probably this moderation was abused, for, 24th September, 1645, being held by Sir Charles Lucas, it was stormed from the churchyard by Colonels Rainsborough and Morgan, and free plunder allowed to the soldiery. Fortunately, at the moment of victory, a pressing order came for the march of the troops to assist Fairfax, on which the plunder was compounded for at 5s. a head. Such goods as were taken away were inquired after and restored, and the chief mischief seems to have been confined to the muniment room, where the charters and title-deeds were torn and mutilated. In 1646 the out-works were destroyed, and the arms, ammunition, and drawbridge removed to Gloucester. Probably the great breach was then made by the workmen employed upon the earthworks, which would account for the careful manner in which the wall has been cut away.

George, Lord Berkeley, was created in 1679, by Charles II., Viscount Dursley and Earl of Berkeley, titles still extant.

BODIHAM CASTLE, SUSSEX.

About four miles below the ancient Priory of Robertsbridge, and fourteen, by its own sinuous course, above its junction with the sea below the old Cinque Port of Rye, the Rother, a considerable Sussex river, receives from the north an important tributary known as the Kent Ditch, and, time out of mind, the boundary of the two counties. The waters meet obliquely, and between them intervenes a tongue or cape of high land tapering and falling gradually towards the junction, and occupied by the church, village, and castle of Bodiham.

Who was Bodi, or Bode, whose home was here established, is unknown. He was evidently a Saxon, and from the position of his estate, probably an early one, giving name it may be to a tract won in arms from the Britons. Ham is here a very common termination to the proper names of places, varied with Hurst and Den and Ley, and other less frequent but equally Saxon denominations.

The church stands on the high ground, a little north of the centre of the cape, the castle about 600 yards to the south of it, and about half the distance from the Rother, at some thirty feet or so above its level. The Rother, here and lower down, traverses broad patches of lowland, now fertile meadow, but in former days evidently inaccessible morass. The position, therefore, between the two streams with their marshy banks was defended by nature towards the south and east, the quarter from which, after the complete expulsion of the Britons and during the early Saxon period, danger was mainly to be apprehended.

The earlier lords, both Saxon and Norman, who gave name to, and derived their names from, Bodiham, pitched their homestead on the north side of the high ground, some way from the church, and upon the right bank of the Kent Ditch, where the site is still indicated by some earthworks and a moat. Nearer to, but south of the church, on the brow of the hill, above the present castle, are the remains of another earthwork, rectangular and oblong in form, the site probably either of an early residence or a still earlier encampment.

Below this brow, on the southern verge of and just within the slope, it pleased a Lord of Bodiham, having become so by marriage with its heiress, to establish a new residence. Sir Edward Dalingruge, a successful soldier in the rough school of the Black Prince and his captains, of whom his immediate chief, Sir William Knollys, was one of the roughest, having held offices of trust under Richard II., decided here to build a castle suitable to his rank, wealth, and military fame; and having, in the 9th of Richard, 1385-6, obtained the royal licence, he constructed at a vast cost, both in earthwork and masonry, the castle here described.

Bodiham is a building of very high interest. It is a complete and typical castle of the end of the fourteenth century, laid out entirely upon a new site, and constructed after one design, and at one period. It but seldom happens that a great fortress is wholly original, of one, and that a known, date, and so completely free from alterations or additions. It has, moreover, fallen into good hands. Enough, and not too much, has been done to arrest the effects of time and weather. The repairs have been well executed, and in Wadhurst stone, the proper material; and, though well watched, it is open to all who care to visit it.

In plan and details Bodiham belongs to the early Perpendicular style, and occupies a mean position between Caerphilly, a work late in the thirteenth century, and Wressil, only a few years later than Bodiham in time, but much later in style and arrangements. Like these castles, it has no keep, and its domestic buildings are constructed within and against the walls of a court, but while Caerphilly, like Harlech and Ledes, is concentric, and has a narrow outer ward, Bodiham and Wressil, like Bolton, have but one ward, one line of defences, and are only rectangular enclosures, with strong and lofty curtains, flanked by still more lofty mural towers. Pennard in Gower, though of the reign of Henry III. or his son, is, on a small scale, of the same general type as Bodiham.

Save the adjacent river and the marsh, the immediate site of Bodiham possesses no natural advantages. A sort of platform was selected upon the sloping ground, about 30 feet above the river’s level, and in it was excavated a rectangular basin, 180 yards north and south, by 117 yards east and west, and about 7 deep. To the east, the containing bank was wholly artificial, formed of the excavated material, as was also the case with the contiguous parts to the north and south. The remaining part of the south bank was also slightly raised.

On the west side, near the north end, a small natural combe descended towards the excavation, of which, being wet, it was regarded as the future feeder. A strong dam was thrown across the lower part of this combe, between it and the excavation, of which it thus formed the bank. No doubt the pool so penned in was intended as a store pond when the moat was low.

In the centre, or nearly so, of the excavation, was left a rectangular island of rather above half an acre in area, raised artificially about four feet, and to be occupied by the future castle, of which the ground plan would thus be a plot of about 50 yards by 46 yards, surrounded by a wet moat from 35 to 65 yards broad. At present a sluice is provided for the occasional emptying of the moat, and probably something of the sort was originally constructed, though it would, of course, be concealed. The fact is, however, that a few vigorous workmen could at any time have cut through the bank in a few hours, and thus have deprived the castle of one of its defences. The mud, however, until dry, would be even a better protector than the water.

Bodiham Castle, then, is a rectangular enclosure 152 feet north and south, by 138 feet east and west, contained within four curtain walls. At each angle is a drum tower, 29 feet diameter, and of three quarters projection, flanking the several faces. In the centre of the north face is the great, and of the south face the lesser, gatehouse, and in the centre of each of the other faces is a square tower. There are thus eight mural towers, four cylindrical, and four rectangular, giving an agreeable variety to the outline. Besides these there is a projection from the east face of 8 feet, containing part of the chapel and the sacristy. The walls and towers all rise direct from the water. The curtain is 40 feet 6 inches high from the water to the crest of the parapet, and the towers are one-third higher, or 54 feet. The outer walls generally are 6 feet 6 inches thick, which is also the height of the parapets. The stair turrets rise 14 feet higher than their towers, and the chimneys about 9 feet. Both are octagonal, and are crested with miniature battlements in the late Perpendicular manner. There is no water gate or postern, such as those at Ledes and Caerphilly.

The great gatehouse is a very imposing structure. It is in plan a T, the horizontal limb forming the front of 30 feet breadth, and the vertical limb extending backwards as far, and containing the entrance passage. The front is composed of two towers, rectangular, but having the angles largely recessed, so as to throw forward the central part of each tower as a bold buttress, 15 feet broad by 6 feet deep. The whole projects from the curtain about 15 feet, and between the towers, deeply sunk, is the gateway.

The gateway has a slightly four-centred arch, very plain, and set in the usual square-headed shallow recess, intended apparently to receive the platform of the bridge when lifted. There are traces of the chain holes in the spandrels. The whole is placed in a deeper and plain recess, terminating above in a four-centred arch, which carries the parapet, and has behind it three machicolations which protect the entrance. Over the door is the usual portcullis chamber window, and right and left other windows, all small and lancet, some trefoil-headed, and some plain. Two pairs of loops command the approach, one pair has oylet holes at each end of the slit. The other pair have holes, rather larger, at the lower end only. It is the style of loop that marks the introduction of fire-arms. In the jambs of the portal is a half-round portcullis groove, and a little within a pair of folding doors. The entrance passage, 12 feet broad and 30 feet long, is unusually lofty. It is divided by a cross arch into two chambers, both vaulted. The first, 18 feet long, has on the right and left small lancet doors, leading by a narrow vaulted and ribbed mural passage into the lodges, 11 feet by 10 feet. On the left is a second door opening on a circular well-stair, 8 feet diameter, and unusually steep, leading to the upper chambers and roof, and terminating in a turret at the angle of the gatehouse. The vaulting has fallen in, but it is clear that it resembled that of the second chamber. Beneath the cross archway is a second portcullis, and beyond it the second part of the passage. This is 12 feet square, without lateral doorways, and vaulted. The vault is of four cells, three ribs and two half or wall-ribs springing from each corner corbel, and meeting in one central, four lateral, and four half bosses, placed upon two cross or ridge ribs. They are pierced as in the inner ward gate of the Tower of London, and possibly each contained a flower. The openings are, of the central boss 6 inches, and of the others, 4 inches diameter. These apertures can scarcely have been meant for defence; they are too small, and do not command the four corners of the passage. No doubt a long pike might be thrust down some of them, but scarcely, to be of use, down the half holes next the walls. As to pouring down melted lead, pitch, or oil, such articles were always too expensive to form a part of the regular munitions against a siege, nor is there here, nor in portcullis chambers generally, any furnace for heating such materials in any quantity.

The portal leading from this passage into the inner court has a second pair of doors, and beyond them a second portcullis. This chamber is not a part of the regular gatehouse. It forms a sort of porch projecting from it into the court, and has no upper story. A well-stair on the left opened from the court, and led up to the embattled platform which rested on the vault. This subsidiary prolongation of the length and defences of the entrance passage is believed to be peculiar to Bodiham.

Over the outer part of the passage is the portcullis chamber. It has at each end a low four-centred arch, which concealed the head of the grate, when lifted, and above this, at each end, is the customary small window. The lobby between the well-stair and this chamber is groined and ribbed, and in the centre is a large boss carved in foliage. The gatehouse lodges have a pit or sub-basement, perhaps a cellar, perhaps merely a cavity to keep the floors dry. If cellars, they were entered by traps in the floor above. There are also, above the basement, two upper floors.

The lesser gatehouse is placed opposite to the main gate, in the centre of the southern face of the castle, and though equally lofty, is much smaller. It is a plain tower 22 feet square, projecting 15 feet in advance of the curtain, but with no internal projection. The outer gate is in the centre of the tower, and had a portcullis, and behind it were folding doors. The entrance passage is 11 feet square, vaulted as the great gateway, but not so lofty. Right and left are loops raking the curtain. A door in the west wall opens into the usual well-stair, contained within the north-west angle. There is no lodge. The inner portal was closed by doors only. It opened into a passage at the lower end of the great hall.

In front of, and outside this gatehouse, there project 9 feet into the moat two walls about 3 feet thick. They seem to have contained between them a bridge pit, over which a bridge dropped from the gateway, upon a cross wall which remains. The pit is filled up. Opposite, the counterscarp of the moat, 62 yards distant, is revetted, and from it projects a half-hexagonal pier. How this intervening space was traversed is not now seen. Scarcely by a boat, for the pier is evidently intended to support a timber bridge, and a boat could not conveniently be reached from it. Probably there was a footway upon tressels or wooden piers.

Thus much of the two gatehouses, the only towers which are machicolated. Each leads into the court of the castle, an open space 86 feet south and north, by 76 feet east and west; round which are placed, against the curtains, the domestic buildings, 22 to 30 feet in depth, some of one floor, some of two, but all of nearly equal height, and so placed as to conceal the curtain and the lower parts of the towers from the inner court.

Right and left of the great gatehouse the buildings had a ground and first floor. Those on the left, or to the east, were rather more ornate, as being nearer to the state apartments. The north-east and north-west towers communicated on each side with these rooms. They have sub-basement pits, with loops, a ground and two upper floors. They differ somewhat in details, but each has a well-stair in its gorge wall, and mural closets and fireplaces at the several levels. The pits are circular, the chambers above hexagonal.

Along the west side are offices, and probably servants’ apartments, and rooms for the garrison. In the centre a large and handsome doorway, with a window on each side and traces of a porch, opens into a small kitchen, a room 21 feet by 16 feet, having on each side a fireplace, with a converging tunnel, and an arched head of 12 feet span and 2 feet rise. There is no hood or projection. The roof was open, and at the battlement level. A gallery seems to have run across above the door, entered from the room to the south, and beneath it in the wall is also a door.

The enclosure next south seems to have been of two floors. The lower room, 38 feet by 22 feet, was probably for stores or for the servants; the upper was the lesser hall. The lower room had two windows to the court and a small door, and perhaps between the windows a shallow fireplace with a bold hood. Above was a noble room of the same size. The lower room opened into the west tower. This, like the east tower, is 25 feet broad, by 21 feet deep, and of 15 feet projection from the curtain. The sub-basement here was evidently a cellar. It has three loops a little above the water-level. A well-stair in the south-east angle leads upwards from the ground-level.

Along the south side were placed the great kitchen, buttery, and great hall. The kitchen, 33 feet by 24 feet, occupies the south-west angle, and communicates with the adjacent angle tower. It has two large fireplaces, of 12 feet span, in the north and south walls. The former has an oven in its west jamb, an afterthought, as it projects into the adjacent room. The other had a large stone hood, of which one springing stone remains, and is buttressed by a corbel, placed in the hollow angle to receive its thrust, as at St. Briavels. The kitchen had an open, lofty roof. Next is the buttery, of two floors, with traces of a cellar below. It is 18 feet by 24 feet, and opened into the hall by three equilaterally arched doorways side by side, each towards the hall, having a deep hollow early Perpendicular moulding. These opened into a passage under the music-gallery.

The hall was about 50 feet long by 26 feet broad, with an open roof. It had, at the dais end of the south wall, a window of two lights, with a transom; the lower pair square-headed, the upper pair pointed. The whole is in a recess, with a flat segmental arch. There are said to have been two windows in the north wall, looking into the court, and here probably was the fireplace, for fireplaces and not central hearths seem to have been in fashion here. The hall door remains. It is a handsome archway with a double ogee moulding. It opened below the music-gallery, and at the other end of this passage was the entrance to the lesser gatehouse, so that there was access from the court to the gate, through a passage screened off from the occupied part of the hall. Of course, the lesser gateway was used for foot-passengers only. A passage somewhat similar crosses the lower end, not of the hall itself, but of the vaults below the hall, at Kenilworth.

The state apartments and chapel occupied the east side, and the former seem mostly to have been of two floors.

Behind the end of the hall was a large room, called the armoury, from which opened the south-east tower. Here the sub-basement is hexagonal, and was vaulted and groined. The vaulting has fallen away, but the corbels remain, and the six gables and wall-ribs. Probably this was a private store or cellar, for it has no fire or garderobe, and though the vaulting was elegant, the chamber, being at or a trifle below the water-level, must always have been damp. The upper floors were of timber.

Probably the term armoury is modern, and here were the withdrawing-rooms, to which a passage led from the north end of the dais, outside the hall. There remains a platform of masonry, which seems to have been laid to carry such a passage.

North of these rooms are traces of others, which communicated with the east tower and chapel, and were probably private apartments, with windows to the court. Under the whole was a range of cellars, below the court level, but with doors and loops ascending to it.

Next comes the chapel, 29 feet by 19 feet, having a large pointed window of three lights at the east end. The floor, of timber, covered a cellar, having a loop, rising to the court, and a door in the south wall. The eastern end has a solid raised platform for the altar, and near it a small north window. To the south is a small plain-pointed piscina, and near it a lancet door, opening by steps into a vaulted and groined mural chamber, 11 feet by 6 feet, intended as a sacristy, having two lockers, and a small window to the moat. The chapel door was in the south wall, leading from the lower private apartments. Above the sacristy is a rather larger room, having a door from the upper apartments, and a square-headed window, of two trefoiled lights, looking into the chapel; evidently the lord’s private seat, whence, unseen, he could be present at mass. There was no west door, or direct entrance from the court. The chapel seems to have had an open timber roof.

The masonry throughout the castle is excellent ashlar, the material a fine-grained, soft, but durable sandstone. There is but little ornament. There were seven main well-staircases, each terminating in an octagonal turret, serving as a head. The stairs did not ascend to the top of the turret, which was domed over, and inaccessible. The rooms are almost all furnished with fireplaces, and very many with mural garderobes which seem to have been closed with curtains, or not at all, since there are no marks of doors. Their shafts descend within the walls, and discharge into the moat below the surface. The windows generally are small, that of the chapel and of the hall are the only ones even of tolerable size, towards the moat.

The drum towers look older than their real date, their gorge-walls, general proportions and arrangement, well-staircases, and lancet and often trefoiled windows, savouring of the Edwardian period. Their hexagonal interiors, however, and the bold and simple moulding that crowns their parapets, belong to the Perpendicular style. The chimneys throughout are octagonal, well-proportioned, but plain, save the embattled moulding above. They may be later than the castle.

The three armorial shields over the great gateway represent Bodiham or Bodeham, Dalingruge, and Wardeux. The central, being that of the founder, is placed angle-wise beneath his helmet and crest. There were also three shields above the lesser gateway. One was, no doubt, Dalingruge, as before, another was Knollys, out of compliment to that commander.

The battlements generally have a plain ∧ coping, with a beaded ridge towards the field. The merlons are much broader than the embrasures, but are not pierced. The coping is not repeated in the embrasures. No well has been discovered, nor any lead piping, as at Ledes, where the castle was supplied with pure water from a spring at some little distance. On the whole, the castle, for its period, is unusually severe in its arrangements, there being scarcely any traces of luxury. It was a castle, not a manor house, nor palace.

There remains to be described a very singular feature in this castle, the approach to the great gateway. At present, a causeway of earth, about 6 feet broad, springs from the north bank of the moat, and proceeds direct, about 62 feet, towards the opposite gateway. It then stops abruptly, and its head is revetted in masonry, which, however, is modern. Opposite, 11 feet distant, the water flowing between, is an octagon of 16 feet on each face, or 40 feet diameter, rising as an island out of the moat, and revetted all round. There was evidently a shifting bridge of some kind between this octagon and the causeway. Whether this octagon carried any superstructure is uncertain, probably it had only the parapet, of which traces remain.

Crossing the octagon in the same straight line, there is reached a second gap, of 6 feet, and beyond this is a rectangular island about 21 feet north and south, by 20 feet broad, also revetted all round, and on which revetment stood the walls of the barbican. This was, therefore, a rectangular building, traversed by the entrance passage, and having a doorway at either end, the outer guarded by a portcullis, and the inner by doors. The passage was vaulted and apparently groined. It seems to have been of one stage only, the platform resting on the vault and battlements. In the north-west corner was a well-stair, opening from the passage, and ascending to the roof. Grose’s drawing shows this as though it was a side or foot entrance, which does not appear to have been the case. The work is excellent ashlar, but only the west side remains.

The barbican is about 54 feet from the great gate, and at present is connected with it by a causeway. As this causeway is here and there seen to be revetted, it may be original, in which case it was possibly broken at either end, and the connection carried on by bridges falling from the barbican and from the great gate. This, however, is conjecture only.

Some doubt has arisen as to how the octagon was originally approached from the main land. This doubt is caused by the presence of a demi-pier of masonry projecting from the west bank a few yards from its north end, and therefore opposite to the octagon. It is therefore supposed that the causeway from the north bank is an addition, and that another causeway, or some kind of communication, was laid from the west bank to the octagon, a much greater distance, nearly thrice as far. No doubt a similar half-pier on the south bank indicates a communication thence with the lesser gateway, but here there seems no reason whatever for the suggested lengthening and bend in the approach. On the whole, for whatever purpose the western pier may have been intended, the evidence is in favour of the approach having always been along the present line. Neither the north nor the west bank is commanded seriously by higher ground. That to the north rises, no doubt, but scarcely so as to give any great advantage to archers posted to annoy those entering the castle, and certainly no greater advantage than could be gained from the rising ground to the west. Possibly the pier was intended for the mooring and protection of the boats employed on that side of the moat. A road, still traceable, led up to this demi-pier.

This double outwork in the moat is peculiar, it is supposed, to Bodiham. At Ledes, indeed, there are two barbicans, but they are not exactly in the moat, but upon the bank, and are deeply intrenched, so as to carry the water round them. At Caerphilly, there is a single large isolated pier in the centre of the moat, now dry, which pier was connected by drawbridges with the great gate and the counterscarp, and may be likened to the octagon in the present instance.

BORTHWICK TOWER, IN MIDLOTHIAN.

Borthwick has been selected and is included in these examples as a noble specimen of military architecture, and the finest extant specimen of the Peel tower so celebrated upon the Scottish border; meaning by a “Peel” a stronghold of which the tower is the only considerable work, and which stands within a walled base-court or barmkin of moderate area. Here, indeed, the dimensions of the tower are those of a Norman keep, and the court, though small, is guarded by bastion towers of large diameter, but still the tower is itself the fortress, and was obviously the residence of the lord and his family, not only during a siege, but at all times. Such fortresses as Lochleven and Urquhart on Loch Ness, though far inferior to Borthwick in strength of masonry and grandeur, are nevertheless castles, whereas Borthwick is a Peel.

Though a ruin, and deserted probably for a couple of centuries, Borthwick is still in tolerable order, having been preserved by the unusual thickness of its walls and the excellence of their masonry, and the fact that both its basement and uppermost story are vaulted, and the upper vaults protected by stone roofing of a very substantial character. The intermediate timber floors are all gone, and the vast cavities are inhabited by a numerous colony of jackdaws, whose heaps of guano might be removed with advantage. No care has been or is bestowed upon the place, which until recently needed but little; now, however, the rank vegetation on the roof is displacing the tile stones, and the water penetrates the vaults. The grand fireplaces have fallen, and some of the lesser ones are about to fall. At present a few score pounds judiciously laid out would arrest the decay which, unchecked, will certainly in a very few years bring down the upper vaults, and involve the whole structure in irreparable ruin.

FIRST FLOOR.

BASEMENT.

BORTHWICK TOWER.]

The tower stands upon a tongue of rocky land, protected by deep, rugged, and wooded ravines to the south, east, and north. Down two of these flow the heads of the Middleton burn, and, below the castle, unite, to fall into the Gore water, which, gathering its springs from the adjacent Lammermuirs, flows, parallel to the railway, down a pretty pastoral valley by Gore Bridge, to the South Esk. The tower, placed over the juncture of the three streams, is a very marked object from the railway, contesting the attention of travellers with Crichton Castle, in an opposite direction, but in sight, for a few seconds, at the same time.

The platform, covered by the base-court, is an irregular figure, governed by the ground, rounded to the east, and presenting right angles to the north and south-west. Its dimensions are about 80 yards east and west, by 35 yards north and south. There is a large drum-tower at the south-west angle, and another, with a square rear, in the centre of the south front, and there are traces as of a third capping the south-east angle. These towers are 18 feet diameter, have a basement, a first and second floor, and are about 23 feet high above the court, and 35 feet to the field. In the west front, close to the angle-tower, is a gateway; an opening in a very thick low curtain, round-headed, and probably of the date of the tower. It had a drawbridge and portcullis, and may have had a low upper story. Above the door, outside, is a flat entablature, with mouldings in the Renaissance style, and the adjacent bastion and curtain are pierced with long loops, placed horizontally, evidently intended for musquetoons, and therefore insertions. They are similar to those in the north-east bastion of Berwick town wall. The southern bastion has the original vertical loops for bows and arrows. The west is the weak side, for which nature has done nothing. The curtain accordingly is on that side thickened to 12 feet or 15 feet, and there may have been a ditch, now filled up.

The court was divided by a cross wall, north and south, of no great strength, and the tower stood in the western half, from six to eight yards from the three outer walls. The northern curtain is an irregular heap of ruins; upon it, opposite to the tower door, there seems to have been a mass of masonry ascended probably by steps, and serving as an abutment to the stone arch by which the main or first-floor entrance was reached.

The _Tower_ is rectangular, 74 feet north and south by 69 feet east and west, and from 90 feet to 110 feet high, the latter height being to the ridge of the gables. In the west front is a recess, also rectangular, 14 feet broad and 24 feet deep, so that the building in plan resembles the Greek capital Π, and may conveniently be divided into a body and wings. The recess is not quite in the centre, the north wing being 31 feet and the south 29 feet broad. Also, the latter is rather the shorter, so that the north front measures 69 feet, and the south front 68 feet. The arrangement of the chambers is very simple, all being rectangular and parallel to the sides, but the mode of reaching them by staircases is very complex. The walls are of immense thickness, the north or entrance side being 14 feet, and the other from 10 feet to 11 feet. Those of the recess, being protected, are rather less, and in parts only 6 feet. It is remarkable that these thicknesses are continued with little or no reduction, to the top. The style is simple and severe, and although the material is cut stone, of remarkably fine workmanship both inside and outside the structure, there is scarcely any ornamentation. Over the outer door, in a shallow ogee niche, is a saint or bishop in low relief, and within is a handsome canopied niche for a statue and a sort of seat of state or sedile for the lord. The fireplaces also are good, and the two larger ones of magnificent character and dimensions. These ornaments belong to the Decorated style of architecture, and correspond with the known date of the building, the first half of the fifteenth century. The walls rise from a plain plinth, and are terminated by strong corbels, 2 feet apart, and about 2 feet deep, between each of which was a “meurtrière,” and outside it a low parapet, now removed. As usual with Scottish towers, at each angle was a three-quarter low bartisan resting on the corbels, and probably rising no higher than the parapet. Also, the three high-pitched roofs of the body and wings rise above and within the walls, being set back from 6 feet to 8 feet. The chimneys, where they remain, are tall and handsome, and the three well-staircases opening on the roof were housed in cylindrical turrets with conical roofs, of which one remains, wanting only its finial.

The basement is on the ground level, which is about 5 feet below the exterior ward. Above it is a first floor, which in the body is occupied by the great hall, above which is a second floor containing the chapel and upper hall. Above this is a third floor. The divisions of the wings are less lofty. The north contains six floors, the south five. There are five well-staircases in different parts of the building. Two ascend from the ground level to the first floor and there stop. Two others commence at that floor and ascend to the roof, supplying the intermediate floors, and another commences half-way up the height of the hall, threads two walls as a gallery, and finally rises as a well-stair to the roof. There was thus a ready access from the first and upper floors to the battlements in case of danger.

_Basement._—In the body are three chambers placed crossways, east and west, side by side, all 23 feet long, the central 14 feet wide, the others 15 feet. The vault springs 14 feet from the floor, and in each, at the east end, is a large arched recess, high up, narrowing to a loop. At the springing line of each vault is a row of strong corbels, evidently to support a floor, a sort of windowless entresol. These lower chambers communicate by doors, and in the south wall of the most southern is a recess or cupboard. The outer doorway, 6 feet wide, at the level of the ground outside, is in the north wall, and is closed by a stout door, within which the passage descends eight steps. In the same wall is a well-stair, which ascends from the basement to the first floor, and there stops. In this, half-way up, is a door into the entresol over the northern chamber, from which level the stair is continued to the first floor. The entresols over the other two chambers were reached by ladders. The whole range clearly was intended for stores, in case of a siege.

From the north and south chambers doors open into the basements of the two wings, also vaulted. The north, the prison, is 18 feet by 12 feet, with a high and narrow loop to the west. In its upper part is also a small door, from the adjacent entresol, which may have opened upon a similar floor above the prison, or may have been an opening to look down into it.

In the left wing is a vault 20 feet long by 12 feet 6 inches broad, and only 8 feet high. This was reached from the adjacent chamber in the body, and contained the well. From this chamber, opening in the south wall, is a well-stair, which rises 10 feet to an entresol, and thence proceeds to the first floor. This entresol, also vaulted, was 18 feet by 12 feet. There is a fireplace and cupboard in the north wall, and in the south a small loop, a mural garderobe, and the door of entrance. From it a rise of 14 feet leads to the first floor, which is thus 24 feet above the basement.

The _first floor_ contains the great _hall_,—a noble chamber, 51 feet by 24 feet, with walls from 12 feet to 14 feet thick. It is covered by a pointed barrel vault, quite plain, but, with the walls, of excellent ashlar. The height to the crown is about 30 feet. It occupies the whole breadth of the building. In the north end is a mural chamber, 8 feet 6 inches by 7 feet 10 inches, which contains the head of the well-stair from below. This has a door into the hall and another into the entrance passage. This is the passage of the main entrance, 4 feet 7 inches broad, and 14 feet long, having a door at each end, but no portcullis. It is the main entrance to the tower. Outside, it seems to have been approached by a stone arch of about 8 feet span, of which the springing-course is seen under the door-sill. In the vaulted mural passage are the opposite doors, one mentioned already upon the stair-head, the other leading to the kitchen, which occupies the north wing.

At the other extremity of this northern end of the hall a door opens into a well-stair, 7 feet 10 inches in diameter, which here commences, and supplies the upper floor and the roof. The east side of the hall is pierced by two windows, square headed, in deep-splayed arched recesses of 7 feet opening, and 22 feet apart. Besides these, towards the north end is a small light, a mere loop, in a recess of 2 feet 7 inches opening.

The great feature of the hall, after its fine pointed vault, is a grand fireplace, 9 feet broad and 3 feet deep, with a projecting hood of stone, which dies into the wall about two-thirds of the way up, and is supported by two double half-shafts, with bases and carved caps and a flowered band above, all in the Decorated style. This occupies the centre of the south end, and on each side of it, high up, are recesses of 5 feet opening ending in loops of 1 foot. The hood is broken down and the fireplace in decay, but its remains are very striking. Along the west side of the hall are various openings. In the centre is a window recess, 5 feet 10 inches broad and 9 feet deep, from which a side opening leads into a vaulted serving-room, 5 feet by 11 feet, which again opens into the kitchen. In the south end of this side a door opens into the withdrawing-room, and another door into a well-stair, which here commences, and communicates with the upper floors of the south wing, and the roof. Near the north end of this side a low arch or buttery-hatch opened direct into the kitchen. Besides these openings, there are two ornamental recesses. The one a niche in the north wall for a statue, about 5 feet high, with a handsome groined and floriated canopy and a base resting upon a half-shaft, probably for a statue of the patron saint of the family. Also in the west wall, near the fireplace, is a sort of sedile, 4 feet broad, with an ogee canopy, containing on a shield the three cinquefoils, the Borthwick arms. The walls of the hall seem to have been either painted or covered with devices, one of which, “Ye Temple of Honour,” was recently to be seen. Here and in the staircases are many masons’ marks. Two of the doors have heads as of three sides of a hexagon, something like the Berkeley arch.

The _Kitchen_ occupied the first floor of the north wing. It is 16 feet by 22 feet, and is spanned by a large flat arch, throwing the western half into a stone hood, under which the principal culinary operations were carried on. There are three recesses with loops in the north and west sides, one of which is blocked by a later oven. There is also a small fireplace. The entrances are from the main door of the hall and from the serving-room, and between is the buttery-hatch.

The _Withdrawing-room_ occupies the south wing, and is 19 feet by 14 feet. It was entered from the hall and from the well-stair, and has recesses and small windows towards the south and west, besides wall cupboards. The south wall contains, in a vaulted chamber, the head of the staircase from the well-room and its entresol; and in this wall also is a mural chamber, 8 feet by 7 feet, with two doors, a window, and, in its flat slab-covered roof, a shaft, probably for a stove chimney. This is called Queen Mary’s room, and was probably her bed-chamber when she visited Borthwick. This and the larger room are plugged for panelling, and the contiguous doorways from the stairs and the hall had a wooden porch shutting them off in the corner of the room, so that there was a passage either from the Queen’s room or the staircase into the hall without entering the withdrawing-room.

Above the hall, a corresponding space, 51 feet by 24 feet, is divided by a cross-wall into an upper hall and a chapel. The _upper hall_, 27 feet by 24 feet, has a large fireplace, with a stone hood and flanking shafts, and near it a window, both in the east wall. In the north wall is a large recess and window and a door into the north-eastern staircase. In the west wall is a window in a recess, and a door which leads by a mural passage into the north wing, and into a garderobe in the north wall.

The _Chapel_, 24 feet by 21 feet, has a recess of 9 feet wide, in which is the east window, a piscina, and an almbry. It had also two south windows, and between them a small fireplace. In its west wall is the entrance-door from the well-stair, and a door, 2 feet above the floor, from the south wing, which probably opened into a raised seat for the lord. Both chapel and upper hall had a flat timber roof, and were 14 feet high.

The room next above these, the third floor of the body, was of the dimensions of the great hall. It had three windows to the east and one to the north, south, and west. It was entered from the well-staircase in the north-east corner, and that of the south wing, and it had a door direct into the north wing. This room has a long, full-centred barrel vault, which rises about 6 feet above the walls, and is, therefore, to the crown, about 15 feet high. It is probable that this great chamber was broken up by partitions, but it contains no fireplace.

Corresponding to these floors in the body are, in the south wing, five,—the first being the withdrawing-room already described, and 13 feet high. The second has two windows, a fireplace, and a mural garderobe, and is about 11 feet high. The third, the same, and is 8 feet high; the fourth has the same arrangements, and, in addition, a door into the private seat of the chapel. It is 17 feet high. The fifth floor has two windows only, and is about 15 feet high to the crown of its vaulted roof. All the chambers in this wing are of the same size, and one over another.

The chambers in the north wing are over, and of the same size with, the first floor or kitchen, the hood and chimney-shaft of which, built against the west wall, passes up through each floor, tapering as it rises. In this wing there are six floors, most having two windows and some a fireplace. The second floor—that over the kitchen—is entered from the eastern well-stair, whence, at 12 feet above the floor of the hall, a mural passage threads the north wall and its window recess, and leads into the chamber. Hence, ascending in the west wall of the hall 10 feet, it reaches the commencement of a well-stair, which leads to the upper floors and the roof. The uppermost and sixth floor is in the vault of the roof, and is lighted by orifices in its gables.

Besides these chambers in the two wings there are small mural chambers at two levels in the west wall, which are reached from the south stair, and look into the recess on the west front of the tower.