Chapter XII: Of the Edwardian or Concentric Castles (14)

The small door of the west wall of the same floor seems to have led upon the rampart of the adjacent curtain, here only 11 feet from the keep. There is such a door at Arques and at Rochester, and also at Helmsley and Adare. This keep contains no fireplace nor garderobe, nor ornament of any kind.

The lower ward has been so altered for domestic purposes, and is so built over, as to be very obscure. It was at least eight or ten times the area of the upper ward, and descended 280 feet down the slope, with an extreme breadth of 150 feet. The modern dwelling-house is built upon the south-east curtain, and no doubt represents, and probably contains, part of the old domestic buildings. Buck gives a view of the southern front of this ward, and shows a large round tower upon one of the angles not now seen.

A convenient ascent skirts the foot of the west curtain, or rather of the cliff upon which it stands, and enters at the upper end of the lower ward, just below the keep. This, however, is probably modern. The old way seems to be represented by the road from the town, which rises on the other or eastern side.

About a furlong to the south of, and much below the castle is a steep straight bank of earth with an exterior ditch, probably an outwork covering the foot of the hill.

The castle is the property of the Duke of Buccleuch, whose steward for the Honour of Clitheroe resides here, and allows visitors to enter the keep unchallenged. The chief rents and royalties of the Honour are vested in the Duke, and are said to be valuable. All is neatly kept, and is in as substantial repair as becomes a ruin; but his Grace’s most commendable zeal does certainly a little obscure the fabric it preserves, and it is to be regretted that the new work was not made more clearly distinguishable from the old.

The name of Clitheroe, though evidently old, and said in part to be British, does not occur in Domesday. Whittaker is of opinion that the place is included in Bernulfeswic, now Burnoldswick, a parish about six miles north-east of the castle, and that it is referred to as the Castelry of Roger of Pictavensis or of Poictou. It is stated that “in Bernulfeswic Garnel held twelve carucates, paying geld to Berenger de Todeni. The manor is in the Castelry of Roger the Poitevin.” Usually Roger is identified with the Castle of Lancaster, but at that time Lancaster Castle was not built, and that lordship did not belong to Roger. Roger was a large tenant in chief in the shires of Chester, Derby, Notts, and Lincoln. In Yorkshire and Lancashire he then held but little. The mesne lord, De Todeni, was one of the family who had Belvoir; Dugdale says, the son of Robert de Todeni, who built it. He does not again appear in connexion with this part of England.

Roger is thought to have granted the fee to Roger de Buisli, from whom, or from Albert Greslei, it came to the De Lacys of Pontefract, lords of Blackburnshire, of whom Robert de Lacy is said to have held it under De Buisli. This De Lacy, whose history belongs to Pontefract, is the reputed founder of Clitheroe keep in the reign of Henry I., and certainly the building is not of later date. From that time Clitheroe shared with Pontefract the honour of being the seat of the De Lacy power, and so remained until their estates merged in the earldom and duchy of Lancaster, and this again in the Crown. The founder probably also endowed the chapel of St. Michael within the castle, probably in the lower ward, and which is mentioned in the reign of Henry I. A claim, however, to represent this chapel is set up for the parish church, though this building could never have been within the castle.

Clitheroe, like other strong places in Lancashire, was held for the king in the Parliamentary struggles, and in 1649 the castle was ordered to be dismantled.

Charles II. granted the castle and honour to General Monk, whose son, Christopher Duke of Albemarle, left it to his wife, Lady Elizabeth Cavendish, who again left it to her second husband, Ralph Duke of Montague, from whom it has descended to the present owner.

THE CASTLE AND BARONY OF CLUN, SHROPSHIRE.

The church, village, and castle of Clun are situated near the centre of a spacious amphitheatre of lofty but fertile hills, the summits and upper slopes of which are covered with young and luxuriant plantations, while in the lower parts are occasionally single trees, chiefly oak, elm, and beech, of vast size and great age, the reliques of an ancient demesne, and still standing out and to be distinguished amidst the denizens of the hedgerows, which, though often of large size, all belong to the period of enclosures and cultivation. Across this rich and smiling land, amidst hamlets, churches, manor-places, farmhouses, and cottages, with frequent orchards and gardens, green pastures and root crops, and waving corn-fields, the river Clun pursues its sinuous course, giving life and fertility to the scene, which, indeed, is throughout imbued with an aspect of peace and—perhaps rather indolent—prosperity.

The ancient forest of Clun covered a large tract of upland, extending, with a radius of about five miles, to the north and west of the seat of the barony. Its border is that of the county of Salop, and runs along the elevated ridge which, from Bishop’s Moat, on the east, to Castell-cefn-fron, on the west, divides that county from Montgomery, and the water-shed of the Clun from that of the Hafren or Upper Severn. From this latter river the ridge is distant about five miles, and the intervening country is mountainous and broken. The natural division is, in part, strengthened by an artificial work, known as Saeson bank, and placed considerably to the west of Offa’s Dyke, which, here very perfect, runs north and south about three miles west of Clun, and thus bisects the forest and the barony. Which of these earthworks is the earlier is doubtful, but probably the Dyke. Connected with the Saeson bank, and at right angles to it, are two short spurs, the age and object of which are not very evident.

The forest was never very thickly wooded in its upper and more exposed parts, but that it was always scantily inhabited is evident from the fact that it contains but one parish church, that of Mainstone, which stands on the very line of the Dyke, about six miles north of Clun, on the edge of a small brook—the Ffridd. From its singular position may be drawn the inference that it is later than the Dyke.

The water-courses of the forest contribute to form four rather considerable streams, which finally unite to become the river Clun, which thence descends eastwards down a deep and rather narrow valley, by Clunton, Clunbury, and Clungunford, to Leintwardine, where, after a course of about twelve miles, it joins the Teme, the river of Ludlow, and of Tenbury.

The Barony of Clun, called also the Honour and the Hundred, was more extensive than the forest, and included lands of a more settled character to the east and south. Obley, Pentrehodre, Hobendrid, Hobbaris, Larkenhope, Eileston, and Manulton, were members of the manor of Clun, which was co-extensive with the Hundred; and in the “Welshery” attached to it were the hamlets of Aderdely and Bickton, Hodicote, and Newcastle. It appears, in the twelfth century, to have contained five vills and sub-manors, the borough town of Clun, and the manor of Tempsett. Clun was also an ecclesiastical centre. Its noble parish church of St. George was set over the chapels of St. Thomas of Clun, St. Mary of Waterden, St. Swithun of Clunbury, St. Mary of Clunton, St. Mary of Opperton, and the chapels of Edgton and Sibdon. The whole were attached to the great abbey of Wenlock. Many of these chapelries have become independent parishes, and the Hundred of Clun has disappeared as a county division, being absorbed in that of Purslow. In 1837, 8,600 acres of the old forest were enclosed by Act of Parliament, and in 1869, 1700 more.

About a furlong below the point at which the collective waters from the forest combine to form the Clun, that stream, there of considerable volume, makes a sharp and sudden bend, in the hollow of which, upon its left or convex bank, is placed the castle. The space thus partially enclosed and protected by the river is about 600 yards in length, and is occupied by a cluster of knolls or tumps of a soft, friable rock, which has been carved and scarped for the purposes of defence, so as to present, with its decomposed and grass-grown surface, much of an artificial aspect. Amongst these knolls stands out one higher and of even a more artificial appearance than the rest. It forms a conical mound, about 40 yards in diameter at its table top, with very steep sides, and in height above its surrounding ditch about 60 feet; and the ditch, again, is about 30 feet above the bed of the river. The ditch covers the mound upon its southern and eastern sides, but to the north and west the slope descends direct to the river level, presenting a very formidable appearance. The more exposed part is further protected by three works in earth, beyond the ditch; of which the larger, to the south-west, is of irregular figure, and about 40 yards deep by 70 yards broad, having four irregular sides, of which the inner is concave, and forms the counterscarp of the main ditch. Towards the river this platform is scarped towards the mound and the adjacent platform; its protection is a ditch, about 7 yards deep by 16 to 18 yards broad. The top is level, save that along the edges of the three outer sides is a narrow bank—a sort of parapet, on which was probably a stockade. At one point, where the platform approaches the mound, is a small spur, as though the ruin of the pier of a bridge, and which was evidently the main entrance to the keep or principal mound. The road to this bridge ascended the platform from the village on the south.

To the east of this is a second platform, of the same height, and about 14 yards deep by 30 yards broad, its larger face being concave, and applied to the main ditch. Its top is level, and has no trace of bank or parapet.

The third earthwork, of no great size, stands to the east of the keep mound, and abuts upon its ditch to the west, and on the river to the north. These two sides are prolonged, and the fork or hollow angle between them is occupied by a depression, formerly a large pool, having a sluice-gate towards the river. Between the bank of this pool and the southern platform is a ditch, which seems to have been used as a hollow way leading to the river front of the mound.

Between the mound and west platform and the river are two lunated patches of meadow about 90 yards deep, the one 70 yards and the other 140 yards long; they were probably employed as a safe pasture in ordinary times for the garrison cattle, which, in case of attack, could readily be taken up the platforms, or driven along the castle ditches into the precincts of the town.

Such are the earthworks as they are now seen, and in general features much, no doubt, as they were seen when the Norman Picot took possession of his dangerous grant. They belong to the class known as burhs, or moated mounds, and date from the ninth or tenth century. By whom they were thrown up, or, rather, carved out, is unknown; but it may safely be asserted that they represent the chief residence of one of those Englishmen who invaded and settled upon the Welsh territory, and whose duty it was to defend the western and often-attacked border of the Mercian kingdom. The occupant of such a position must have been a bold and powerful leader; though whether he lived before or after the formation of Offa’s Dyke is doubtful. Possibly a careful examination of the Saeson bank ridge, where it is crossed by the Dyke, might throw a light upon this point, and the researches should extend to Crugyn or Castle Hill, on Bishop’s Castle racecourse, to Bishop’s Moat, Caer-din, Tomen, Castell-cefn-fron or Bryn Amlwg, and some other camps and tumuli on each side the border. Besides these are others, both camps and tumuli, and a remarkable upright stone or maenhir within the forest, all, no doubt, of British date. It must be borne in mind that Clun, though an exposed part of the Mercian territory, was covered to the north-west and north by the English settlements along the Upper Severn, of which there are ample traces from Kerry to Welshpool, on both sides of the Dyke. Looking at the extension of the barony of Clun, westward of the Dyke, to a natural boundary, it seems probable that the barony was founded when the Dyke was no longer the Mercian border, and the English had pushed their settlements up the valley of the Severn. This also would be more consistent with the figure of the earthworks of Clun and of the adjacent district, which resemble those thrown up by Æthelflæda and Edward the Elder early in the tenth century, and of which Wigmore is a recorded example.

The position and estate of Clun, like those of many similar domains in England and within the Marches, were at once taken possession of by the Norman followers of the Conqueror, and held by Picot de Say as a military fief dependent upon Roger de Montgomery at Shrewsbury. Whether De Say or his immediate successors fortified the mounds with masonry after the manner then coming into use in Normandy, or whether they contented themselves with such defences, probably of timber, as they found ready to hand, is not known, but if they had at once built a keep and walls in the Norman manner, it is exceedingly improbable that no trace of works usually so substantial should even now remain, and still more so that they should have been decayed by the middle of the twelfth century, which is probably the date of the older part of the masonry now standing, and which it will be proper next to describe.

The _Keep_.—This is a large rectangular tower built on the lower edge and up the eastern slope of the mound, and therein resembling Guildford. Its dimensions are 42 feet north and south by 68 feet east and west, and the walls at the base are about 11 feet thick, and rise to about 6 feet at the summit. It is of three stages; the first resting on the basement, with its sill about 5 feet below the top level of the mound. The floors are of timber, resting upon sets-off in the side walls. The whole tower is about 80 feet high, its base being about 30 feet above the river. The west wall is entirely gone. The two eastern angles are capped each by two pilasters, 14 feet broad and 1 foot projection, meeting at a solid angle, and carried up without break or diminution to the summit, where they may have supported square turrets. The eastern curtain, between them, has a battering base, and a plain cordon at the first-floor level. The walls are perfectly plain, of coursed masonry, the stones probably hammer dressed; but, being of a perishable character, they are much blistered and decayed. The basement, 40 feet by 45 feet, has a floor about 20 feet above the outer ground level, now covered up with rubbish. There is a small window to the south, and a small square air-hole to the north, high up, as from a dungeon. In the same side, near the middle, is a full-centred doorway, 2 feet 2 inches broad, once closed by a stout door, and opening upon the slope of the mound. It leads into a passage 3 feet 6 inches broad, which entered the chamber, but had on its left a mural staircase of sixteen steps, which led to the first floor. Many of the steps remain, but the inner wall, and most of the hanging arches of the vault, are gone.

The first floor, 23 feet by 45 feet, had two windows to the south, one to the east, and to the north two, with a fireplace between them. The windows are broken into mere apertures, but the recesses are 5 feet to 6 feet broad. The fireplace has a round back and a vertical tunnel. The hood is broken away. There are no mural chambers, but outside, on each face of the eastern angles, are two sham loops.

The second floor has also five windows above, rather larger than those below, and a fireplace in the same position. In each jamb of the east window recess is a small door, which, by a passage, leads into a mural chamber in the two eastern angles. Each, on each of its two outer faces, has a small window.

The third floor has two windows to the north, one to the east, and two to the south, but here the position of the fireplace is between them. From the east window recess are two passages, opening into two chambers, each with two small windows above those of the second floor. The second floor was the stateroom, and the third apparently bedrooms belonging to it. The staircase may have been in the west wall. Of the window recesses, some have arches obtusely pointed, others are segmental. No doubt there was a door in the west wall, opening from the mound. The recesses of the windows of the second and third floors had each an ashlar rib, the only sort of ornament now visible. The keep, though of large size and substantially built, suffers in appearance from the badness of the material, its rough workmanship, and the very sparing use of ashlar in its details.

The summit of the mound was encircled by a curtain wall, of which the upper part of the keep formed a part, so that with the rectangular seems to have been combined a sort of shell keep, a most unusual arrangement. Of this shell there remain two fragments; one, a considerable one, towards the north-west, is composed of two nearly half-round towers, or rather bastions, with their converse faces outwards, and a short curtain connecting them, which seems to have been the end of a hall, and to contain some later insertions. The bastions are, no doubt, later than the keep. The other fragment is to the south-west, about 12 feet long by 6 feet thick, and 20 feet high. This also formed part of the general _enceinte_, but connected with it is a small circular mound, thrown up on the edge of the greater one, and wholly artificial. It is about 21 feet across at the top, and 12 feet to 13 feet high, and possibly carried a small tower; near it a depression seems to indicate the position of the well. The whole surface of the mound is rough and scarred, as though the area had been covered with buildings, as at Tamworth, and of which the foundations had been dug up.

The entrance to the mound could only have been on the western side ascending from the south-west. All the other sides are absolutely impracticable, and this has been so cut about that every vestige of a road is gone. On the platforms are no traces of walls. They may have had gatehouses of some sort, but the outer defences were probably always of timber.

The greater part of the borough, town, or rather village of Clun, is placed to the east—that is, in the rear of the castle; but there are houses on both banks of the river, which is spanned by an ancient bridge of five ribbed arches, with recesses above over the projecting piers. In this direction, a furlong from the castle, is the fine and mainly Norman church of St. George, with a western tower, strong enough to stand a siege, and in pattern resembling those of More and Hope-Say. About a hundred yards beyond or south of the church is a very remarkable ravine, natural, but which has, at that point, been scarped, and the earth thrown inwards to form a bank. This ravine commences some way above the church, and, becoming deeper and more steep, conveys a considerable brook into the Clun, a little below the town. This ravine adds immensely to the strength of the place.

Clun is a borough by prescription, having two bailiffs and a recorder. Recently it possessed a Hundred court for the recovery of small debts, and a court leet. The bailiffs also held a civil court. The Fitz-Alan charter, recognising its prescriptive rights, dates from the reign of Edward II. In the town is an ancient almshouse, founded by Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton, in 1614; and below it, upon the river, the traces of a very considerable millpool, now dry.

Clun is entered in Domesday as held by Picot. Edric had held it. Picot held large possessions (twenty-seven mansions) in the then Hundred of Rinlau, besides Conodovre, Basecherc, and Lentevrde, under Earl Roger de Montgomery. It appears from Mr. Eyton’s researches that Picot was a to-name, and that the grantee, as Robert de Say, with Adeloya his wife, and Robert and Henry, his sons, is named in a charter relating to St. Martin of Seez, of the probable date of 1060, and is there described as “Robertus de Sai qui cognominabatur Picot.” Sai was a vill near Exmes, the chief seat of the Norman viscounty of Earl Roger, who was the patron of the house of Seez.

That which in 1060 was a cognomen, in 1086 had become a nomen. In 1074 Odericus refers to him simply as Picod, one of the five whom Earl Roger placed over his new earldom of Shrewsbury, and again as Picot de Sai, when, in 1083, the Earl vowed to found Shrewsbury Abbey. Edric, Picot’s predecessor at Clun, was, without doubt, the Edric Silvaticus, or the Wild, so well known on the Welsh marches. Picot lived till about 1098, and was succeeded by his son, Henry de Say, who flourished in the reign of Henry I., and seems to have been alive as late as 1129-30. In his time, or that of his successor, and probably son, Helias de Say, Clun and Obley were eliminated from Ringau, and erected into an independent Hundred and Honour; becoming, in fact, a marcher lordship, such as Oswestry. Helias left a sole child, Isabel de Say, Lady of Clun, who married—first, William Fitz Alan; second, Geoffrey de Vere, when the barony contained 11¾ knights’ fees; and third, William Boterell, in whose time it seems to have been that the castle was stormed and burned by Llewellyn and his Welshmen.

William Fitz Alan was the son of Alan, son of Flaald, who obtained from the Conqueror the manor of Oswaldestre or Blancminster, which in 1148 had belonged to Meredith ap Blethyn, a somewhat singular instance of a Welsh landholder so far to the east of Offa’s Dyke. Meredith built a castle there, which, on Fitz Alan’s death in 1160, was in the custody of the sheriff, who sank a well there, and provided it with stores and palisades for defence. William Fitz Alan’s next brother, Walter, was ancestor of the House of Stewart. William’s first wife was a niece of Robert Earl of Gloucester. His second was Isabel de Say, by whom he left—

William Fitz Alan, who inherited Clun and Oswestry. He obtained an annual fair from King John for Clun. It seems probable that the Castle of Clun burned by the Welsh was the timber structure inhabited by Edric, and that it was replaced by works in masonry, including the existing keep, by this William, who, dying, 1210, left

William Fitz Alan, who died at Clun about 1215, and was succeeded by his brother,

John Fitz Alan, Lord of Clun and Oswestry, who held the barony but not the castle of Clun, and who died about 1243, leaving a son,

John Fitz Alan, who acquired Arundel Castle from his mother, and died 1267, leaving—

John Fitz Alan, Lord of Clun and Oswestry, and Earl of Arundel, who died 1272.

It was upon his death that an inquisition was ordered into the condition of Clun Castle, which was reported to be small, but pretty well built. The roof of the tower wanted lead, and the bridge to be repaired. Outside the castle was a bailey, enclosed with a fosse, and a gate not yet finished. In the bailey stood a grange, stable, and bakehouse. In the town were 183 burgages. The tenants held by castle guard, each finding a serviens and horse for forty days at 4½d. per day. The burgesses were to provide twenty men when the lord hunted.

In 1293, Richard Earl of Arundel received £200 from his Welsh tenants in Tempsett for a charter. At his death in 1301, Clun Castle was worth no more than the expenses of its maintenance, or £20 per annum. There were two water-mills.

Clun continued to be held by a long succession of Fitz Alans, few of whom were likely to have resided, until, the male line failing, Mary, daughter and co-heir of Henry Fitz Alan, married Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, and carried the earldom of Arundel and the barony and castle of Clun into that family in the person of her son, Philip Earl of Arundel, who died 1595, under an attainder. Thomas, his son and successor, was restored in blood, but only partially in property, so that, though titular lord of Clun and Oswaldestre, he never possessed the estates, which were granted by King James to his grandfather’s brother, Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton, who founded the almshouse at Clun. From Henry Howard, Clun and Oswestry passed by will to his nephew, Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk, whose younger son, Sir Robert, has a monument in the church of Clun, and by whose descendants the property was sold.

COCKERMOUTH CASTLE, CUMBERLAND.

This castle occupies the point of a steep and, in part, rocky knoll which intervenes between the confluence of the Derwent and the Cocker, two rivers of Cumberland, the one, on the north, flowing immediately at the foot of the rock, the other, on the south and west, separated from it by an irregular strip of land from 50 yards to 70 yards broad, of uneven surface, and covered by a part of the town which shares its name with the castle. It is not until 120 yards below the castle that the actual meeting of the waters takes place. Two of the sides of the position are thus fortified by nature; the other, the root of the promontory, has no such protection. It seems to have been covered by an artificial ditch, connecting the cliff of the Derwent with the sloping bank of the Cocker. This, however, has been filled up, and all that remains of it is a tradition, confirmed by slight depression in the soil.

The castle, following the outline of the rock, is triangular in plan. Its north and south sides face towards the Derwent and the Cocker, and are in length 110 yards and 120 yards. They crest the slope at about 36 feet above the level of the water, and are connected by a base line of 76 yards, in which is the entrance, facing towards the east. The castle commands much of the town, and is placed outside of it to the north and east. The parish church stands within the town upon a height opposite to, and south-west of, the castle, the Cocker in its narrow valley flowing between them.

The curtain within which the castle is contained, is about 30 feet high, and is capped at its western or acute angle by a half-round tower, and at the two angles of the base are two rectangular towers, that to the north-east being the gatehouse. Between them is a small buttress turret, solid, and 8 feet square. There are also two rather large buttresses, additions upon the south curtain near the east end, and three small flat ones upon the older front of the wall, at the west end. On the exterior of the north wall are seven buttresses of various dimensions and dates.

The triangular interior of the castle is subdivided by a cross line of buildings, about 60 yards from the base, into two wards, the lower or eastern, four sided, being the larger, and the upper or inner being a small triangle. Where the cross wall unites at its south end with the curtain is, upon the latter, a small square tower, called the “Bell Tower,” and at the north end a much larger tower, containing the kitchen. Between these, on the cross wall, is the inner gatehouse. The level of the upper ward is about 6 feet above that of the lower. This gatehouse is not central, being 34 yards from the north, and 19 yards from the south curtain. It is rectangular, or nearly so, and in plan a capital =⟙=, the outer portal being in the centre of the cross head, the inner one in the foot, and a large chamber in the stem between them. The head is 36 feet broad, with a projection of 18 feet, and the gatehouse is 60 feet deep. The cill of the outer entrance being 6 feet above the outer ward, must have been approached by some kind of bridge or inclined plane, of which all traces are now gone. The outer arch is lofty and segmental, of 9 feet opening. It supports a screen parapet, embattled, behind which is an opening or machecoule 9 feet broad and 4 feet deep. Behind this is an equilateral arch opening into a passage 10 feet deep, vaulted and ribbed from the four angles, the ribs meeting at the centre with two ridge ribs, the central point of the eight being without boss or circle. Beyond the passage is a second arch of 8 feet opening, and beyond it a sort of vaulted passage or vestibule splayed and 9 feet deep, opening into the interior of the gatehouse at the first-floor level. Beyond and right and left of this inner vestibule are two doors of 2 feet opening, one segmental and one shoulder headed. These open each into a small acutely vaulted prison, about 8 feet by 16 feet, lighted by a small loop. From each there opens, in the outer wall, a small door into a mural garderobe. In the centre of each prison is a small square trap, which is the only entrance into the lower prison or dungeon, which is of the size of and vaulted as the upper one, but without any other opening. Two holes in the upper vaults seem intended to carry a horizontal bar from which a prisoner or his food might be lowered through the trap. These prisons are placed on each side of, and parallel to, the gateway, in the thick cross head of the =⟙=.

The basement of the gatehouse-chamber, 21 feet broad by 29 feet deep, and about 10 feet high, is quite plain, and without loops. It is entered in the west wall, from the upper ward, by a flight of twelve steps, beneath a lancet doorway. The covering of this room was the timber floor of the gatehouse. The first floor, also 21 feet by 29 feet, has in its side walls two doorways, of 3 feet opening, and acutely pointed, which led into the lateral chambers. In its west wall, but near the north end, is the inner gateway, piercing a wall 9 feet thick, and opening into the upper ward. This passage is vaulted. It has no portcullis, and but one rebate for a door. In the north side of the passage a narrow, shoulder-headed door leads into a small vaulted lodge, looped towards the upper ward.

Entering this ward, on the left, is the door descending to the basement, and further on, right and left, are two doors, each lancet, and at the top of flights of twelve steps, which descended into the basements of the lateral chambers. The gatehouse had an upper floor, now mostly gone.

There were two lateral chambers on each side of the gatehouse, parted by an east-and-west cross-wall, now destroyed. The large spaces thus formed are not quite rectangular. That on the north averages about 26 feet east and west by about 35 feet north and south; and that on the south is a mean square of about 35 feet. Of the four chambers by which these spaces were occupied, the basements of the two next the gatehouse were covered with a pointed vault. Except these, the floors above were timber. The walls of the southern rooms are mostly destroyed, those of the northern are tolerably perfect, and show the windows and fireplaces of a first and second floor, with small mural chambers in the north-east angle. The southern chamber abutted upon the curtain, in which is seen a rude round-headed arch, now a postern, but which has a Norman aspect, and looks as though intended originally for the recess of a loop. The small square bell-turret, of about 18 feet by 10 feet, at the south-west angle of this chamber, stands upon and slightly projects from the exterior of the curtain. The basement looks of the age of the curtain; the superstructure, of that of the cross buildings and inner gatehouse.

At the other or north end of the cross buildings is the kitchen tower, a very remarkable structure. In plan it is nearly rectangular. It is composed of a basement and a first floor. The basement is reached from the upper ward by fifteen descending steps, down a vaulted passage in the wall, at the head of which is a round-headed door of Decorated date. The chamber is about 30 feet square, having a central octagonal pier without base or cap, whence spring eight ribs meeting eight other ribs which spring from corbels in the angles and form responds in the centre of each face. Each of the four bays thus formed is again spanned by ribs springing diagonally from the responds. There are no ridge-ribs, and the vaulting spaces are filled up with rubble. The arches are pointed, and the vault about 20 feet high. In the two eastern spaces are square-headed loops, opening on the lower ward and now concealed by a modern building. In the north wall is a small water-drain. This chamber was probably a cellar, introduced and vaulted to place the stone floor of the kitchen on the level of the hall. It is called a chapel, but bears no indication of having been intended or ever used as such.

Above the cellar is the kitchen, the floor of which is level with that of the hall, and about 10 feet above that of the upper ward. In plan it is rather rhomboidal than rectangular. The two eastern angles are right angles, that to the north-west acute, and that to the south-west obtuse. The north and east sides measure 35 feet and 37 feet, and the opposite sides 29 feet and 38 feet respectively. In the south wall are two fireplaces, 11 feet broad by 2 feet deep, with remains of stone hoods, and with square vertical funnels running up a common shaft at the inner end of each fireplace. The funnels also receive those from the fireplaces in the rooms to the south, the whole forming one stack. Over these fireplaces, high up in the south wall, is a large long loop, square headed, and about 2 feet wide. In the east wall are two other loops of the same width, and about 24 feet long, crossed by a transom, square headed, but placed within shoulder-headed recesses. These openings are clearly intended to carry off the vapour. North of these loops is a small door, whence a narrow mural stair ascends 10 feet to a second door that opened upon a gallery along the north wall.

In the centre of the north wall is a bold pier, 7 feet wide by 4 feet deep, from which spring laterally two pointed arches, thus forming two recesses. The soffits are ribbed, one with two and one with three ribs, plainly chamfered. In each recess is a loop, square headed, and opening on the curtain, and above, 10 feet from the floor, is a string which supported the floor of a timber gallery, which ran along this north side, and was carried out in front of the pier, and thus overlooked the culinary operations. It was entered at the east end from the door already mentioned. In its west end was another door, opening into a mural chamber, not now accessible, but which may have communicated with the hall. Above the gallery were two other loops. At the gallery level the pier is pierced by two narrow passages, with round-headed doors, which lead to a small chamber in the curtain, probably a garderobe. Below, the lateral faces of the pier are hollowed, as for cupboards.

The west wall of the kitchen is now chiefly occupied by a large lofty arch, of 15 feet span, and about 30 feet high, evidently a modern insertion together with the wall above, and opening into what was the hall. On the south side of it are traces of a part of the old buttery-hatch. To the north is the only door of the kitchen, 4 feet broad, and shoulder headed, and which opened from the lower end of the hall. It is curious that so large a kitchen should have had no other outlet. Grose gives a drawing taken in 1774, which shows this west wall of the kitchen before the great arch was inserted. The wall contains an immense hole or gap, above which, on the outside, is the weather moulding of the high-pitched roof of the hall. The kitchen was very lofty, and had an open timber roof the corbels of the hammer-beams of which remain. Above was the parapet, one side of which belonged to the outer curtain.

Abutting from the west wall of the kitchen, in the rebuilding of which the moulding showing the pitch of the hall roof has been removed, was the east, or lower end of the hall, a building 30 feet wide by about 50 feet long, of which the curtain formed the north side. The south wall is levelled nearly to the ground, but its foundations show its exterior buttresses, and the place of the door in the basement near the east end of the wall. The western wall, dividing it from the withdrawing-room, is gone. The basement below the hall seems to have been about 10 feet high. It was covered by the timber floor. The entrance was in the south wall, close to the east end, probably by an interior stair. One jamb of the doorway remains, richly moulded in the Decorated style, though much decayed. The hall had three large windows in the north wall, which is strengthened outside by three buttresses, evidently added to the older wall when the hall was built. The windows are of the fashion so common in the halls of Decorated castles. They are of two lights trefoiled, with a transom, and in the head a quatrefoil. That next the east end has a stone window-seat, and the others may have been so provided. Outside, the windows have a good drip-stone. Probably the fireplace was in the south wall. In the east wall, near the south end, is a large plain trefoil-headed recess, not even chamfered, resembling a large piscina, with a stone shelf. It was possibly intended to place the dishes upon when received from the adjacent buttery-hatch. South of this a small door leads into a well-stair, which led to the roof, and is lighted by a small and very neat foliated circle. The cant or filling up of the adjacent angle of the kitchen is produced by this staircase. The hall had an open timber roof, some of the corbels of which remain.

The rooms west of the hall extend to and include the western or angle tower. The room next the hall had two large Tudor windows in the curtain; they are flat topped, of three lights, with a transom, and within flat-arched recesses; they are evident insertions. The interior of the west tower is roughly four sided, and the gorge wall is gone. It had a basement with three loops, with large splayed and pointed recesses, and above were three floors, each with an excellent one-light trefoiled window of Decorated date; the two lower are towards the west; the upper, a marked feature in the view of the castle from the town, is towards the south. In the north wall a straight stair leads up to a mural garderobe, the opening of which is projected upon two corbels high up at the junction of the curtain with the tower. The lower part of this tower seems original; the upper part has been rebuilt, no doubt in the Decorated period. Twenty-two feet in the rear of the tower remains the base of a doorway which led into these chambers from the upper ward. The well was a yard or two from the entrance to the room below the hall. Its place is now marked by a pump.

The _Lower Ward_ is much obscured by the erection against the north curtain of a dwelling-house, and against the south, of stables, both modern. A building has also been placed against the east wall, connected with the gatehouse. The south-eastern angle is formed by the _Flag Tower_, 32 feet square, and projecting outwards about 9 feet upon the two curtains. It has a basement and two upper floors, each entered from the court, and the two latter by external separate stone stairs. A third stair, also exterior, ascends from the east curtain to the battlements. The arrangement is altogether peculiar. Moreover, the roof of the tower is high pitched, having the south gable stepped in the Scottish fashion, flush with the outer wall, while the north gable is set in about 3 feet so as to allow of a rampart walk along three sides of the tower. The tower is occupied, and locked up.

The tower corresponding to this, and forming the north-east angle of the ward, is the gatehouse. It is rectangular, 50 feet broad by 22 feet deep, and pierced by the gateway passage, with spacious rooms on each side and above, all inhabited. The outer gateway is round headed, and rather less than half a circle. The passage is vaulted, and has rebates for a central and two outer doors, of which that next the entrance seems to have been inserted to replace a portcullis. Over the front, beneath a long flat label, are five shields of arms: 1. What seems to have been a cinquefoil within an orle of crosslets flory, Umfranville. 2. Barry of 6, Multon. 3. Three luces haurient, Lucy. 4. A lion rampant, Percy. 5. A saltire, Nevile. The gatehouse has two floors over the gateway in the Perpendicular style, and later than the lower part, which is Decorated. To this has been added an upper story, built into the battlements of that below, which appear in the face of the wall.

The portal is flanked by two flat pilasters, which have been partially concealed by the addition of a _Barbican_, composed of two lateral walls of 18 feet projection, and 7 feet 6 inches thickness, terminating in square piers, which supported a cross arch of entrance, over which was a parapet, now gone. These walls were about 12 feet high, parapeted, and the ramparts reached by two lateral straight stairs niched in the wall. There was no doubt originally a drawbridge to the main gate, which may have been moved forward when the barbican was added. Grose’s drawing shows a sort of ravelin of earth in front of this outer entrance, which probably was thrown up during the Parliamentary struggles. All this front, outside the walls, has been levelled and converted into a garden and approach. Outside the north and south curtains, between the wall and the top of the slope, is a walk of about 9 feet broad.

The accounts of this castle claim for it a very remote origin, and describe the knoll upon which it stands as artificial. This, however, is not the case. The knoll is evidently natural, and the point of a tract of high land which is bounded by two rivers. The position is not the less strong, and is such as either Britons, Romans, or Saxons might very well have availed themselves of. There is, however, no positive evidence that they did so, and nothing now seen is of necessity older, or as old, as the Conquest. The foundations of the western tower, and of the greater part of its contiguous curtains, so far as they contain the upper ward, are probably Norman, and may be the work of William de Meschines, in the reign of Henry I. As the works could scarcely have been confined to so small an area as the present upper ward, it is probable that the whole of the present area was included in the Norman castle, and that the cross ditch was then excavated. How the area was then occupied, where was the hall, where the kitchen, does not appear; probably not on the present site, seeing that the windows are evident insertions in, and the buttresses additions to, the north curtain. Moreover, no part of the line of buildings dividing the upper from the lower ward shows any trace of Norman work. Whatever or wherever were the Norman buildings, they probably stood until the Decorated period, or early in the fourteenth century, when the present cross buildings, the kitchen and the hall, seem to have been erected, and much of the curtain rebuilt or strengthened.

The outer gatehouse and the south-eastern tower are not unlikely to be of the same date, though there have been large additions to, and alterations in, the former building, in the Perpendicular period, when the barbican was added. The Tudor windows in the upper ward are the only traces of still later alterations. The effects of the Parliamentary strife upon the building, beyond the removal of the roofs, do not appear to have been serious; and, as the gatehouse seems always to have been inhabited, no doubt some sort of attention was paid to it, and to the flag tower. More recently, a dwelling-house has been built within the area, within one window of which hangs a curious relic of the past, in the shape of an escutcheon of Percy and Lucy quartered, in old stained glass.

The remodelling of the Norman castle in the Decorated period was probably the work of Anthony de Lucy, who held the lordship from 2 Edward II. to 17 Edward III., and was an active soldier, a great military chief in the counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland, and likely enough to put into the best possible order a castle important both to his own estates and to the national frontier committed to his charge.

The Perpendicular additions, including the armorial shields over the gateway, must have been later than 22 Richard II., when Maud, the Lucy heiress, carried Cockermouth Castle to Henry Percy, who agreed to quarter her arms. The Umfranville shield commemorates Maud’s first husband, Gilbert, Earl of Angus. The Nevile shield is that of Henry Percy’s first wife, who was a daughter of Ralph Lord Nevile. As this Henry was a very considerable person, and survived till 1408, it is probable that he built or rebuilt the upper part of the gatehouse between 1388–9 and 1408.

Cockermouth Castle has but a scanty history, which perhaps accounts for the perfect condition of its outer walls. In 1221 Henry III. ordered it to be laid siege to, and, if taken, destroyed; but this fate it either escaped, or, if carried out, it was restored a century later with great completeness. It makes no figure in the Wars of the Roses, nor does it appear to what extent it shared in the vicissitudes of the house of Percy. The town seems to have been taken by surprise in 1387 by a band of Scottish marauders. Mary of Scotland rested here, no doubt on her way from Workington to Carlisle, after her landing in Cumberland. In August, 1648, the castle, held for the Parliament, was attacked by the Royalists of the neighbourhood, and held out a month, till relieved by the Parliamentary General Ashton. It seems to have been spared the usual fate of English castles of that period at the hands of one or the other party. In 1688, the only habitable parts were the gateway and the courthouse, probably the adjacent building.

DESCENT.

Cockermouth was the “caput” of the barony of Allerdale, usually called in the Inquisitions the Honour of Cockermouth. There is no collected list of the lands held of the Honour, but they seem to have been extensive, and are specified in divers inquisitions from time to time, with the names of their holders. The original grantee seems to have been William, brother of the well-known Ranulph de Meschines, Earl of Chester. He received, either from the Conqueror or from Henry I., the territory of Copland, between the Dudden and the Derwent, and was probably the founder of the castle of Cockermouth, as he was of the Monastery of St. Bees. His son Ranulph died childless, and his heir was Cicely, who married Robert de Romilly, Lord of Skipton. Cockermouth came to Alice, their third daughter and co-heir, who married William FitzDuncan, Earl of Moray, in Scotland, nephew to King Malcolm. Amabel, their second daughter and co-heir, had Egremont, and married Reginald de Lucy, living 20 Henry II.; while Cicely, the elder daughter, married William le Gros, Earl of Albemarle, who died 1179. Their second daughter, Hawise le Gros, married, first, William de Mandeville, Earl of Essex, and secondly, William de Fortibus, in her right Earl of Albemarle, and who (1215) had restored to him by King John the manor of Cockermouth, and (1216) certain confiscated lands held of the Honour. In February, 1221, King Henry ordered the Sheriff of Westmoreland to summon his forces to lay siege to, take, and utterly destroy the Castle of Cockermouth; but later in the year the manor was granted again to the Earl. It is said that this Earl held half the castle, which escheated to the Crown, and was granted in 1323 by Edward II. to Anthony, Lord Lucy, who held the other moiety. The descent, however, is exceedingly obscure. It appears that Richard de Lucy, Amabel’s son, had Egremont, and died about 15 John, leaving Amabel and Alice. His wife, Ada de Morville, married secondly, Thomas de Multon, and left issue, while Multon’s two sons by a former wife married—1. Lambert de Multon to Amabel; and 2. Alan de Multon to Alice, the co-heirs.

Lambert’s great-granddaughter, the heiress of Egremont, married Thomas de Lucy, and Alan’s son, Thomas de Multon, took the name of Lucy, and died 33 Edward I., and probably held the Castle of Cockermouth. He was followed by his sons, Thomas, who died childless, 2 Edward II., and Anthony de Lucy, a great baron and military leader in the Western marches. He died 17 Edward III., leaving Thomas de Lucy, who died seized of Cockermouth Castle and Honour 39 Edward III., having married his remote cousin, Margaret de Multon, the heiress of Egremont, and thus reunited the whole inheritance, the second moiety of Cockermouth having been acquired by his father.

Thomas and Margaret had Anthony de Lucy, aged twenty-four, 39 Edward III., and Maud. Anthony had Joan, who died young, 43 Edward III., seized of the castle and Honour, when Maud became the heiress. She married Gilbert de Umfranville, Earl of Angus, who died 4 Richard II. They had but one son, Sir Robert, who predeceased his father, childless. The earl died 4 Richard II., seized of the castle and Honour, and Maud then, 8 Richard II., married Henry de Percy, Earl of Northumberland. The inheritance, failing the heirs of her body, was settled upon the heirs male of her husband, who were to bear the arms of Percy and Lucy quarterly. This remainder took effect, and Cockermouth passed to the descendant of Percy by his first wife, Margaret, daughter of Ralph Lord Neville, whose arms appear over the gateway of Cockermouth, as do those of the Earl of Angus.