[223] See some excellent remarks on this subject in Mr W. St John Hope’s paper on “English Fortresses” in Arch. Journ., lx., 72-90.
[224] Only a very small number of mottes have as yet been excavated. Wells were found at Almondbury, Berkeley, Berkhampstead, Carisbrook, Conisborough, Kenilworth, Northallerton, Norwich, Pontefract, Oxford, Tunbridge, Worcester, and York. At Caus, there is a well in the ditch between the motte and the bailey. Frequently there is a second well in the bailey.
[225] The writer at one time thought that the ruins at the east end of the castle of Pontefract concealed a second motte, but wishes now to recant this opinion. Eng. Hist. Review, xix., 419.
[226] Thus Henry I. erected a siege castle to watch Bridgenorth (probably Pampudding Hill), and then went off to besiege another castle. Mr Orpen kindly informs me that the camp from which Philip Augustus besieged Château Gaillard contains a motte. Outside Pickering, Corfe, and Exeter there are earthworks which have probably been siege castles.
[227] Henry II. built a castle and very fine borough (burgum pergrande) at Beauvoir in Maine. Robert of Torigny, R.S., p. 243. Minute regulations concerning the founding of the borough of Overton are given in Close Rolls, Edward I. (1288-1296), p. 285.
[228] See Round, Studies in Domesday, pp. 125, 126.
[229] Neckham, “De Utensilibus,” in Wright’s Volume of Vocabularies, pp. 103, 104. Unfortunately this work of Neckham’s was not written to explain the construction of motte castles, but to furnish his pupils with the Latin names of familiar things; a good deal of it is very obscure now.
[230] See [frontispiece].
[231] Acta Sanctorum, 27th January, Bolland, iii., 414. This biography was written only nine months after Bishop John’s death, by an intimate friend, John de Collemedio.
[232] Guisnes is now in Picardy, but in the 12th century it was in Flanders, which was a fief of the Empire.