The Early Norman Castles of the British Isles.

by Ella Sophia Armitage

Corfe, Dorset.

Fig. 13.

Clifford, Herefordshire ([Fig. 13]).—It is clearly stated by Domesday Book that William FitzOsbern built this castle on waste land.[360] At the date of the Survey it was held by Ralph de Todeni, who had sub-let it to the sheriff. In the many castles attributed to William FitzOsbern, who built them as the king’s vicegerent, we may see an indication that the building of castles, even on the marches of Wales, was not undertaken without royal license. In the reign of Henry I. Clifford Castle had already passed into the hands of Richard Fitz Pons, the ancestor of the celebrated house of Clifford, and one of the barons of Bernard de Neufmarché, the Norman conqueror of Brecon.[361]

The castle has a large motte, roughly square in shape, which must be in part artificial.[362] Attached to it on the south-west is a curious triangular ward, included in the ditch which surrounds the motte. The masonry on the motte is entirely of the “Edwardian” style, when keepless castles were built; it consists of the remains of a hall, and a mural tower which is too small to be called a keep. There is also a small court, with a wall which stands on a low bank. Below the motte is an irregular bailey of about 2⅓ acres, with earthen banks which do not appear to have ever carried any masonry, though in the middle of the court there is a small mound which evidently covers the remains of buildings. The whole area of the castle, including the motte and the two baileys, is about 3½ acres.

The value of the manor had apparently risen from nothing to 8l. 5s. Clifford was not the centre of a large soke.

Clitheroe, Lancashire ([Fig. 13]).—There is no express mention of this castle in Domesday Book, but of two places in Yorkshire, Barnoldswick and Calton, it is said that they are in the castellate of Roger the Poitevin.[363] A castellate implies a castle, and as there is no other castle in the Craven district (to which the words of the Survey relate) except Skipton, which did not form part of Roger’s property, there is no reason to doubt that this castle was Clitheroe, which for centuries was the centre of the Honour of that name. The whole land between the Ribble and the Mersey had been given by William I. to this Roger, the third son of his trusted supporter, Earl Roger of Shrewsbury. One can understand why William gave important frontier posts to the energetic and unscrupulous young men of the house of Montgomeri, one of whom was the adviser and architect of William Rufus, another a notable warrior in North Wales, another the conqueror of Pembrokeshire. As it appears from the Survey that Roger’s possessions stretched far beyond the Ribble into Yorkshire and Cumberland, it seems quite possible—though here we are in the region of conjecture—that just as his father and brothers had a free hand to conquer as they listed from the North and South Welsh, so Roger had a similar commission for the hilly districts still unconquered in the north-west of England. But fortune did not favour the Montgomeri family for long. They were exiled from England in 1102 for siding with Robert Curthose, and in the same year we find the castle of Clitheroe in the hands of Robert de Lacy, lord of the great Yorkshire fief of Pontefract.[364]

The castle of Clitheroe stands on a lofty motte of natural rock.[365] There are no earthworks on the summit, but a stout wall of limestone rubble without buttresses encloses a small court, on whose south-west side stands the keep. It is just possible that the outer wall may be the original work of Roger, as limestone rubble would be easier to get than earth on this rocky hill. The keep is small, rudely built of rubble, and has neither fireplace nor garde-robe, nor the slightest ornamental detail—not even a string course. But in spite of the entire absence of ornament, a decorative effect has been sought and obtained by making the quoins, voussoirs, and lintels of a dressed yellow sandstone. The care with which this has been done is inconsistent with the haste with which Roger must inevitably have constructed his first fortification, if we suppose, as is probable, that he received the first grant of his northern lands on William’s return in 1070 from his third visit to the north, when he made that remarkable march through Lancashire to Chester which is described by Ordericus. It seems more likely that even if the outer wall or shell were the work of Roger, he had only wooden buildings inside its circuit. Dugdale attributes the building of the keep to the second Robert de Lacy, between 1187 and 1194, and it is probable that this date is correct.[366] The bailey of Clitheroe lay considerably below the keep, and is now overbuilt with a modern house, offices, and garden. It covers one acre. A Roman road up the valley of the Ribble passes near the foot of the rock.[367]

As the very name of Clitheroe is not mentioned in Domesday Book, it clearly was not an important centre in Saxon times. The value of Blackburn Hundred, in which Clitheroe is situated, had fallen between the Confessor’s time and the time when Roger received it. It is quite possible that he never lived at Clitheroe, as he sub-infeoffed the manor and Hundred of Blackburn to Roger de Busli and Albert Greslet before 1086.[368]

Colchester, Essex.—The remarkable keep of this castle has been the subject of antiquarian legend for many centuries, and Mr Clark has the merit of having proved its early Norman origin, by its plan and architecture. A charter of Henry I. is preserved in the cartulary of St John’s Abbey at Colchester, which grants to Eudes the Dapifer “the city of Colchester, and the tower and the castle, and all the fortifications of the castle, just as my father had them and my brother and myself.”[369] This proves that the keep and castle were in existence in the Conqueror’s time; the Norman character of the architecture proves that the keep was not in existence earlier. We see, then, that the reason there is no motte at Colchester is that there was a stone keep built when first the castle was founded. As far as we are aware, Colchester, the Tower of London, and the recently discovered keep of Pevensey are the only certain instances of stone keeps of the 11th century in England.