Crossing the centre of the earthwork, the way into the castle reaches and traverses the main or inner ditch by a modern causeway of earth, replacing the ancient drawbridge, and reaches the base of the hill between two thick and lofty walls, parallel, and 10 feet apart, like those at the entrance to Berkhampstead. The cross walls which connected them at each end, and were perforated by the portal arches, are gone. The gatehouse thus formed had probably a timber covering, and perhaps an upper floor above the entrance passage, with an embattled platform above all. The lateral walls are, or have been, continued up the hill. That on the left on entering was carried straight up the slope till it abutted upon, and was united to, the curtain of the inner ward. The wall on the right hand springs from a small, solid, round turret which flanks the inner end of the gatehouse. It is carried obliquely up the slope, gradually approaching the upper entrance, which it reaches at a right angle towards the middle of the southern front. This wall protects the roadway from the lower to the upper gate; and is itself commanded from the curtain wall above. It may be said to traverse the Middle Ward, if that term be applied to the slope of the hill between the ditch and outwork below and the containing wall of the inner ward above. It is, in fact, the glacis of the inner line of defence.
Of the Inner Ward there is at this time no trace of an exterior gatehouse. Probably the entrance was a mere archway in the curtain, as at Bridgenorth and Kenilworth, or Cardiff, flanked in addition by a projecting shoulder of the wall which still remains. An exterior gatehouse, though not an unknown, was not an essential feature in a Norman castle. Entering the inner court, the wall to the left shows abundant traces of buildings attached to it. It is evident that here, right and left, were the principal structures for domestic purposes, as the hall, kitchen, and probably the chapel, attached to and with walls bonded into the curtain. The rectangular space between these buildings, 14 feet by 24 feet, may have been, as it was at Tickhill, a gatehouse with a portal opening into the inner ward.
PILASTERS AS SEEN FROM OUTSIDE.
The inner ward is somewhat of an oval figure, but contained within a wall of many straight lengths, in fact a very irregular polygon, fitted to the natural outline of the ground. The older part of this curtain is, in substance, of good coursed rubble, from 6 feet to 7 feet thick, and from 30 feet to 35 feet high. The outer face was of ashlar, and much of it remains, either perfect, or with marks showing where the stones have been stripped off. The angles were quoined with ashlar blocks inside and outside, and there are several exterior pilasters, locally called “pillars,” broad, of slight projection, and with one or two sets-off, being of a late Norman character. In the north-west angle, high up in the wall, is a round-headed arch which probably opened into a tower, capping the angle, but now gone. A part of the west wall seems to have been rebuilt when a new hall and kitchen were required, and in it are the remains of a large fireplace, and corbels either for a lean-to roof, or for an upper floor. The battlements are everywhere gone. The north and west walls are tolerably perfect, and much remains of the east, but towards the south the wall is broken down. This part seems the latest, and to have been rebuilt in a slovenly manner. Upon the wall are five small half-round turrets, solid, like those at Knaresborough. The curtain has no bond into the keep, which has been built into its line, so as to form a part of it. At this part, the north-east of the enceinte, in a salient of the curtain, is a small staircase and passage in the wall much blocked with rubbish. King calls it a postern, but it was very evidently a garderobe. The area of this inner ward has been cleared out and the buildings removed, all except the keep. The only traces of walls in the court are along its north, west, and south sides, showing that there were buildings against the curtain 310 feet in length by 22 feet in breadth.
DETAIL OF THE BASE OF ONE OF THE BUTTRESSES OF THE KEEP.
CONISBOROUGH CASTLE.—VIEW OF THE KEEP AS AT PRESENT.
The Keep is the glory of Conisborough, and though inferior in size to Cæsar’s or Beauchamp’s Tower at Warwick, is more than their equal in its masonry, and more complete, inasmuch as it is a keep, and those are subsidiary towers. It stands nearly at the north-east extremity, and at the highest part of the inner ward, actually upon the line of the curtain, of which two of its buttresses and the intermediate wall form a part. It is constantly described as standing upon an artificial mound, which is certainly not the case. Indeed, no artificial mound could bear so concentrated a weight. It stands upon the natural surface, here a rock. It has no special ditch, and the ground shows that it never had any. There was, indeed, no need of the usual ditch, which was represented by the natural steep, and the exterior ditch at its base.