The chapel, which could be entered from the hall either through the ante-chapel or round it by a mural passage, has but one original door, which is in its north wall. A second door has been opened, in the early English period, in the west wall. The chapel is 13 feet east and west by 14 feet, and has a flat timber ceiling. The southern side has a deep recess, let into the wall of the keep, and in it are the remains of a triple window, probably formed of three loops. In the two jambs of this arch are side recesses. High up in the north wall are the two hour-glass loops from the ante-chapel. The chapel has been much injured; but there are remains of a handsome arcade with detached shafts upon the lower half of the west and north walls, and in the south is what seems to have been a coupled window. In the east wall is a handsome arch of 7 feet 6 inches span, with shafts in front of the piers with carved caps. This opens into a sort of chancel, 5 feet deep by 9 feet wide, with nook-shafts. It is vaulted, groined, and ribbed. There is no boss, but about the intersection of the ribs is some rude carving, from which a lamp seems to have been suspended. There is a window to the east, now broken down, but which was probably composed of three coupled lights, and in the south wall is a recess with a loop. An attempt has been made, apparently in the Tudor period, to insert a fireplace in the north wall.
From the first floor the south-west well-stair leads to the roof only; but the north-east stair, in its way to the roof, has two side openings, of which the first, 2 feet 4 inches wide, leads by a narrow passage up fourteen steps towards the ramparts of the vestibule tower. This is now blocked by the inserted vault, with which that building is covered in. Eight steps above this lower opening a second leads into a gallery in the east wall. Above this opening, seventeen more steps lead to the ramparts of the keep, which are 22 feet above the level of the first floor. The eastern gallery is vaulted, and 32 feet long. From one side of it a door enters the second floor of the forebuilding tower, and beyond it, also in the east or outer side, is a loop. In the west side are two openings, already described, which open into the gable end of the hall roof. At its south end this gallery makes a turn at right angles, and ends in a small bedchamber, 18 feet by 14 feet, which is over the chapel, and has a window to the south. As the parapets are gone, and the ramparts not accessible, the roof above the kitchen cannot be examined; but there does not appear to have been any second floor in that quarter.
The forebuilding is a very perfect and a very good example of this peculiar appendage to a Norman keep. It is composed of three parts,—a lower staircase, an upper staircase, and a vestibule tower. At its south end is the outer gateway, at the ground-level, in line with the southern face of the keep. The portal is full-centred, and flanked by two columns beneath a plain abacus, from which springs the arch with a bold roll-moulding. There is no portcullis. The door opened inwards, and was strongly barred. The wall is 6 feet thick, and the vaulted passage through it, inside the doorway, is segmental and groined. Within, the passage is 8 feet wide, and contains the lower staircase of fifteen steps. In the inner face of the wall, over the doorway, is a large, deep recess, probably to lighten the weight on the entrance arch. On the right or outer wall, high up, is a loop, and on the left, at the fourth step, a large door, already mentioned, opens into the southern chamber. It seems to be of late Decorated date, and probably represents an original loop, or it may be a doorway. At the head of this first staircase is the middle or second doorway, of 5 feet opening, also full-centred, with flanking columns. The head, also, has a bold roll-moulding. The wall in which it is placed is 4 feet thick, and the landing 5 feet deep. The portal is recessed, and in the soffit in front of it is an opening, 2 feet broad by 6 inches deep, a shaft or meurtrière from the top of the wall, where is a walk. This seems to have had high parapets, and a loop looking down the staircase. The opening was for the defence of the portal. This door also was barred. Within it rises the second staircase, in the same line, of nineteen steps, 8 feet wide, and ascending to the upper and inner doorway, the door of the vestibule. On the right is a second loop, on the left a clumsy doorway ascending to the hall, already mentioned, and evidently an insertion. The staircase is solid, containing no vault or chamber below. It was roofed with timber, at two levels, of a low pitch, divided by the wall of the middle gate, and leaning against the keep wall.
The doorway at the stairhead much resembles those below. It is set in a deep recess, has flanking shafts, and a roll-moulding round the head. There is no portcullis. The doorway opens into a chamber 14 feet by 15 feet, which is the vestibule to the main entrance of the keep, and at the level of its first floor. It has two windows to the north, two to the east, and to the south the staircase door and a window, which rakes the exterior of the outer wall of the staircase. These windows seem to have been of 12-inch opening, but have been enlarged. They are placed in deep recesses, as in an arcade. In the west wall is the great entrance—a noble archway—deeply recessed, and flanked with four shafts on either side. The exterior arch is 10 feet span, the doorway itself 6 feet. The plinths are unusually high, being 3 feet. The caps are fluted and cushioned. The outer arch is full-centred, the actual doorway segmental. The arch bands are worked in chevron and other mouldings. Close north of the great entrance a plain narrow door opens into the adjacent well-stair, but this is clearly an enlarged loop, which was intended to light the staircase. The original covering of this room, like its present floor, was of timber, but this has been replaced by an ill-executed vault of the early Decorated period. It is arranged in two bays, the dividing rib springing from pilasters let into the north and south walls. Each bay is crossed diagonally by two ribs, springing from corbels of half-octagon figure. The vaulting obscures and spoils the old Norman details of this very handsome chamber.
Below the vestibule is the ground floor, probably a prison, a mere pit, 14 feet by 16 feet, and 21 feet high, aired by two loops very high up in the east wall, and possibly by a third in the south wall. In the west wall, the wall of the keep, is a lofty recess beneath the keep entrance, within which a hole has been broken. At present this chamber is entered by a door at the ground-level in the south wall, but this is certainly an insertion. The original entrance must have been by a trap and ladder from the vestibule floor.
The second floor of the vestibule tower was 16 feet square, and had four round-headed windows of 2 feet opening, now converted into shoulder-headed windows. There are two in the north, two in the east, and one in the south faces, each in a plain flat-sided recess, 3 feet broad. In the west wall, where is the entrance from the mural gallery, is a recess, 12 feet broad and 2 feet deep, above the grand entrance of the keep. Its angle is replaced by a nook-shaft, the particulars of which show that though the walls and the position of the windows are original, the floor-level has been raised, and a fireplace inserted in the south wall. Like the vestibule, this room has had its flat timber roof replaced by a high-pitched vault in two bays, groined and ribbed, and with a dividing rib. All the ribs spring from semi-octagonal piers inserted into the old walls. This vault appears outside in the form of a high-pitched roof. It is of the age of that below.
The material of this keep is, in substance, flint rubble, coursed, but it is faced largely with ashlar; and far more attention has been paid to ornamentation than is usual with military buildings. The forebuilding is faced wholly with ashlar, and richly ornamented. Over the outer portal are broad bands of hatched and chevron work, filling up an arcade of two arches, above which is a circle, with a centre carved as a head. The south-eastern angle is occupied by a nook-shaft. The east front, the wall of the staircase, is even more richly wrought. Here are two arcades at different levels, corresponding to the level of each staircase roof, and above is a line of circles, with centres carved as heads. There is a notion that the mural passage over the middle doorway ended in a postern high up in this wall, whence a ladder could be dropped; but there seems no ground for this improbable opinion. Had there been such a postern, the two loops on the stair would have been arranged for its defence; whereas they are too high up to be used, save for light and air. It is curious that the forebuilding should be so much more ornate outside than the keep; whereas at Dover and Rochester, where also it contained a chapel, its outside is remarkably plain. The subordinate staircases, that is, those at the two angles, are clumsily arranged, and there is no arrangement by means of a landing to suit the steps to the level of the floors supplied. No doubt the main stair was that chiefly in use. The keep bears a close resemblance to that of Norwich, especially in the position of its kitchen, north gallery, and chapel. The forebuilding also is on the same plan. The arches generally are full-centred, though a few of the doorways are segmental. Where the mural galleries are at all expanded in breadth, and in the door recesses of the cross-wall and of the outer entrance, the vaulting is lightly groined; and this, which occurs also in the Tower of London and at Rochester, produces a good effect, and takes off from the sameness of the barrel-vault. In the kitchen are piled up a heap of fragments of carved stones found in or about the castle. They are in all the styles—Norman, early English, Decorated, and a few Perpendicular. Probably some came from the chapel of St. Nicholas; many of them can scarcely have belonged to the keep. If Castle Rising was built by the architect of Norwich keep, it must be early Norman, for Norwich was besieged 1076, at the revolt of Earl Guader, and Harrod supposes the present keep to have been then standing; but the ornamentation of Castle Rising looks much later, and on the whole there is no reason to refuse assent to the tradition which attributes it to William d’Albini, who died 1176. As usual, there are no subterranean chambers. Though the three doorways of the forebuilding had not, as at Dover, each a tower, each had a distinct defence, the outer from the battlement over the portal, the middle also from a battlement pierced by a shaft, and communicating with the keep, and the inner as a part of the vestibule tower.
The gatehouse stands near the centre of the east side of the keep ward, in the earth bank which has been cut away to allow it to be built. It is 325 yards from the north-east angle of the keep, and of the same age. It is of the usual Norman pattern, a rectangular tower pierced by a passage, with an arch of 12 feet opening at each end, set in the walls, of which the outer is 6 feet, and the inner 5 feet thick. The arches are quite plain, without rebate or chamfer. The passage between the two is also 12 feet wide and 13 feet long, and had a flat timber roof, the floor of the chamber above, now removed. The outer arch has a portcullis groove, 3½ inches broad by 4½ inches deep, and square. In the north wall are two shallow recesses, of 4 feet span by 1 foot 10 inches deep. In the south wall is one similar recess, and a door of 2 feet 6 inches opening, which seems to have led into a well-stair in the south-west angle of the building. In front of the outer gateway the approach, 15 feet wide, lies between two walls, of which the southern still projects 15 feet. They probably protected the drawbridge, and between them was the bridge-pit. Beyond these walls is the great ditch of the place, here about 80 feet broad and 30 feet deep, crossed by a bridge in masonry, of two arches, of which the inner one is walled up. The open arch seems of Tudor date, but the piers look original. The outer end of the bridge rests upon the counterscarp of the ditch, about the centre of the eastern ward.
The gatehouse stood on the ground level, and, therefore, lower than the curtain of the enceinte, which was built on the crest of the earth bank. The original curtain, if one there was, as is probable, is entirely gone, and has been replaced by a brick wall of the age of Henry VII., also nearly all gone. Of this wall there remain, on the south side of the gate, about 12 yards. It is 2 feet thick, but within was lined by an arcade 3 feet thick, which carried the rampart walk, as at Southampton. These arches are 8 feet span, and four-centred, with piers 3 feet broad, and within each arch or recess was a loop. There remain three arches and a half. Besides this there is a fragment of curtain south-west of the keep, and traces of foundations along the bank.
In the central ward, a few yards north of the keep, is a well, and further north are the remains of the great chapel. This was composed of a nave, choir or presbytery, and apse. The nave is about 12 feet broad and 25 feet long. The arch into the presbytery was 5 feet broad, and across it is the base of a stone screen with a door of 3 feet. There was a south door and a north window. The font stood in the centre, near the west end. The presbytery was 8 feet long by 9 feet broad, with a loop to the south, and an arch of 6 feet opening into the apse. The apse was rounded, and 8 feet broad by 9 feet long, and had loops splayed internally to the north and east, and probably to the south. It is said that the very early Norman font, now in the parish church, came from hence. The masonry of what remains of this building is of a rude character, and it is probably older than the keep. This is supposed to be the chapel of St. Nicholas mentioned in the records. At present its remains are niched into the bank, and it has the appearance of being the older of the two, though this can scarcely be the case. The sand of the bank is liable to be shifted by the wind, and as late as the commencement of the present century the central ward was much encumbered with it, and the keep more or less buried, so that this is probably the cause of the half-buried condition of the ruins of the chapel.