The plan of the castle—a headland converted into a detached camp by a cross ditch—may be British or English, but the general outline of the masonry, which follows the line of the earthworks, is Norman. The Norman engineer evidently built the enceinte wall along the edge of the slope, and planned the inner and outer ward, and the keep. The castle is generally attributed to William Rufus, who was here in 1092, when Carlisle, from a Scottish, became an English frontier place. The see was created by Henry I., and the first bishop consecrated in 1133, when probably the city wall, of which a part may still be seen below the deanery, was built. Carlisle was taken by the Scots, and besieged by Stephen and by John. The latter sovereign was here four times in the years 1201–6-8, and 1212. In 1204 the constable of Chester was ordered sixty marcs for fortifying the castle. In 1205 certain grass cut in the neighbourhood was to be stored there. In 1215 Robert de Ros was custos of the castle, but in 1216 Robert de Vipont seems to have been in charge of the repairs and the garrison.
In 1222 Henry III. ordered the houses within the castle to be repaired, and two ballistæ of horn and two of wood were to be sent there. Walter Mauclerc was in charge. In 1222 the garrison was continued, and in the king’s pay.
Edward I. used Carlisle in the Scottish wars, and was here in 1293, after the great fire, which much injured both city and castle in the preceding year. Between 1293 and 1307, he was here seven times, often for many days. He kept his last birthday here in 1307, and went forth hence to die in the immediate neighbourhood. To his reign are to be attributed most of the Edwardian additions, repairs of the wall and keep, the gatehouses, and the domestic buildings, of which only traces remain. In 1302, Bishop Hatton, then governor, expended £275. 4s. 11d. in works. The Great Hall, supposed to have been then erected, needed repairs in 1344.
Camden says that Richard III. repaired the castle, and the six marvellous buttresses may be of that date, though they look earlier. Henry VIII. appears to have much altered the castle, probably to make it carry artillery. He built a block-house or citadel at the south end of the city, and armed it with cannon, and he repaired the city walls. His work was probably done in haste, for, in 1563, the whole was in great decay, as appears from a survey made by the queen’s order, printed by Grose. Three sides of the keep were in a dangerous state. The Captain’s Tower wanted parapets, as did much of the inner curtain, and all the glass of the great hall and great chamber was decayed. In the outer ward was an open breach, 70 feet long, where the wall had fallen in 1557. The result of this survey was the building a chapel and barrack, and no doubt the reparation of the wall and keep.
Mary Queen of Scots found some sort of accommodation here when she fled from Scotland, and gave name to the lodgings lately pulled down. The castle suffered somewhat during the great rebellion, but escaped being dismantled. It was battered from the west, and taken by the Duke of Cumberland in 1745.
Probably the greatest and most destructive changes are those of modern date. The hall was taken down in 1827, and the chapel and other buildings in 1835.
There are traces of two light field-works in the meads north of the castle, the smaller in the rear of the other, evidently prepared for the reception of the Scots, in 1745, as they approached over the brow at Stanwix.
The castle is far too confined and too much a part of the city for the purpose to which it is applied. The military should be removed, the modern buildings cleared away, the keep restored, and the area laid out for the pleasure of the people of Carlisle, and so as to show off the remains to the greatest advantage.
In the neighbourhood of Carlisle are other military works deserving notice. Such is, at Hayton, Castle Hill, a mound 12 feet high, and 100 feet diameter at the top. Linstock Castle was built before 1133, but is now little more than a farmhouse, into which it was converted in 1768. Scaleby Castle was built by Robert de Tilliol, who had licence to crenellate it in 1307. It was largely repaired in 1596, but retains much of its original character, and has always been inhabited. Naworth Castle was the chief seat of the English Barony of Gillsland, at the Conquest granted to Hubert de Vaux, from whom it descended through the Dacres to the Howards. The present structure was the work of Ralph Lord Dacre, in 1335, and is a good example of the quadrangular castles of that date. Rose Castle was in the Barony of Dalston, and is attributed to 1336, when Bishop Kirby had a licence to crenellate. It was also a moated quadrangle. Highhead Castle, on the Ive, is drawn by Buck. Here was a castle in 1326, but the licence is dated in 1342. The castle was rebuilt in 1714. Dalston Hall is a castellated house, probably of the middle of the fourteenth century.
The Roman wall may be traced at various points, both east and west of the passage of the Eden. It is well seen in a field close to Drawdykes, a stiff, square farmhouse, built on the site of a Roman Castellum. The inscription “Diis Manibus,” built into its walls, is said to have been dug up in Carlisle, near the old citadel.