The keep, chapel, and gatehouse are the only remains of Norman masonry at present seen above ground. The inner ward must have contained domestic buildings on a large scale, fit for the reception of royalty, but the foundations which remain on the south of the keep seem very late, probably of the Tudor period. They are said to be those of the constable’s lodgings. There is no trace of masonry of any kind in the two outer wards.
The parish church, standing in the village of Castle Rising, is a fine example of the late Norman style. Its west front, especially, is very rich, and it has a good central tower. The chancel is rather later. The font is very massive. Its square bowl is covered with carvings of an early character, and it stands upon a plain cylinder, properly copied from the original support. The bowl is said to have come from the castle.
Rising, or rather Snettisham, in which manor it is contained, was a part of the estate of Edwyn, a Dane, and a follower of Canute. So says Dugdale. In Domesday it is entered as a “bervite” of the manor of Snettisham. “Huic manerio jacet una bervita Risinga.” It had belonged to Archbishop Stigand, and, on his forfeiture, William gave it to Bishop Odo, then Earl of Kent. After Odo’s fall, Rufus granted it to William d’Albini, the royal “pincerna,” or butler, son of Roger, and whose younger brother Nigel was ancestor of the great house of Mowbray. The son of William was “William with the Strong Hand,” the celebrated Earl of Arundel, and Lord of Buckenham, in Norfolk, who married Adeliza of Louvaine, the Dowager Queen of Henry I., and is the reputed builder of the keep before 1176.
Their son, a third William, died 1190, leaving a fourth William, who died 1221, and whose eldest son, a fifth William, died childless in 1224, when Rising came to his brother Hugh, who left four sisters, co-heirs, of whom Cecily had Rising, and married Roger, Lord Montalt. Their eldest son, John Montalt, died childless, and was followed by his brother Robert, who died 3 Edward I., leaving Roger, who died childless 25 Edward I., and Robert, who succeeded. This Robert de Montalt was a very considerable person, both as a warrior and a statesman. He is locally celebrated for the winning of a very important law-suit against the corporation of Lynn for the tolls of that port and market in the reign of Edward II. Having no issue, he, in 1 Edward III., sold the reversion of Castle Rising to the Crown, for the benefit of Queen Isabella, the “She-Wolf of France,” with remainder to John of Eltham, the king’s brother. In 1331 Isabella came into possession, and here lived in retirement to within a year of her death, which occurred at Hertford in 1358. Edward, with his queen, here visited his mother, in the fourteenth year of his reign.
John of Eltham having died childless, the castle came to the Black Prince, and became part of the duchy of Cornwall, and so descended to Richard II., who exchanged it with John, Duke of Bretagne, who held it in 1397, and occasionally resided there. It was afterwards recovered by the Crown, and granted to Edmund of Langley, Duke of York, from whom it passed to Edward IV., who again annexed it to the duchy, but the castle was probably then in a ruinous state. In the time of Henry VII. it seems to have been repaired. The roof of the keep was then covered with tiles, with great gutters of lead. In the reign of Henry VIII. it was again in decay, and the keep and gatehouse were roofless, and it would seem that the constable’s lodging was the only habitable part. Finally, the king exchanged the castle manor and chase of Rising with Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, and in 1693 it came to another Thomas Howard, ancestor of the Earls of Suffolk and Berks, one of whose descendants still holds it. As late as the 31st of Elizabeth there was a curtain-wall upon the bank which was in danger from the burrowing of the conies, and there was also a gatehouse and a bridge 90 yards long and 7 yards broad. Under the castle, by the tenure of castle-guard, were held the manors of Hunstanton, Reydon, and the Wottons.
CHÂTEAU-GAILLARD, ON THE SEINE.
CHÂTEAU-GAILLARD, though a French castle, is here introduced as being the work of an English king, and a very remarkable example of the military architecture of the close of the twelfth century.
Château-Gaillard, the “Saucy Castle” of Cœur-de-Lion, the work of one year of his brief reign, and the enduring monument of his skill as a military engineer, is in its position and details one of the most remarkable, and in its history one of the most interesting of the castles of Normandy. Although a ruin, enough remains to enable the antiquary to recover all its leading particulars. These particulars, both in plan and elevation, are so peculiar that experience derived from other buildings throws but an uncertain light upon their age; but of this guide, usually so important, they are independent, from the somewhat uncommon fact that the fortress is wholly of one date, and that date is on record. Moreover, within a few years of its construction, whilst its defences were new and perfect, with a numerous garrison and a castellan, one of the best soldiers of the Anglo-Norman baronage, it was besieged by the whole disposable force of the most powerful monarch of his day; and the particulars of the siege have been recorded by a contemporary historian with a minuteness which leaves little for the imagination to supply, and which, by the help of the place and works, but little changed, enables us to obtain a very clear comprehension of the manner in which great fortresses were attacked and defended at the commencement of the thirteenth century.
Château-Gaillard crowns the almost precipitous head of a bold and narrow promontory of chalk, which, isolated on either hand by a deep valley, stands out from the broad table-land of Le Vexin, at a height of 300 feet above the deep and rapid Seine, which washes and has for ages threatened to undermine its base.