As the English “Aula” was probably on this mound, while the ashlar exterior of its present wall is unquestionably later than the Conquest, it has been supposed that the heart of the wall is original, and that it was cased by the Norman architect. Of such casing there is, however, no appearance. The entrance from the curtain seems to have been cut through the wall, which has been thought there to show traces of early masonry. The wall, however, appears all of one date, and that probably late Norman, as is usual with shell keeps.
Bevis Tower stands upon the curtain and projects from its outer face only. It stands on the north counterscarp of the ditch of the mound, about 42 yards from the keep. It is square, and said to be, in substance, of the age of the gatehouse, but it is not allowed to be seen close. It is called a barbican, but its position scarcely justifies its having been so intended. It looks more like an ordinary mural tower. There is no communication from the keep with the curtain on this side. North of this tower the earthworks of the upper ward seem tolerably perfect, but a request to be allowed to visit them was evidently regarded as a sort of treason.
Besides the well attached to the keep was a second, now covered up, in the middle of the lower ward. The habitable part of the castle is mostly or entirely Howard work. Edward, the ninth duke, was a great builder. He rebuilt Worksop, which was burned soon afterwards, in 1761, and he founded Norfolk House in St. James’s Square. What he did here does not appear. The present domestic buildings which line the lower ward to the east, south, and west sides are, in substance, the work of Duke Charles towards the close of the last century, or 1791–1806, and have since been added to. They are what might be expected from the period, and better than the rather earlier work at Alnwick, lately removed. It is said that in the cellars, and built into the outer walls, are parts of the earlier structure, some of Norman date. The hall stood on the east curtain. It had a good Early English door, destroyed in the present century. The hall itself was ruined during the siege of 1643. The present grand entrance to the ward, to the south of the original one, is entirely modern, as are the approach to it and the outer gateway. So also is the Chapel of St. George, which stands along the west wall. The chapel which preceded it, and was taken down in 1796, was 40 feet long by 22 feet broad, and was endowed by Richard, Earl of Arundel, in 1375, with spoils derived from Crecy. The domestic buildings are said to have been augmented at the same time by wealth from the same source. The ecclesiastical endowment, shifted from the oratory of St. Martin to the Chapel of St. George in 1375, was, after about a century, again shifted to the Fitz-Alan Collegiate Church, without the walls.
Arundel is a castle where, if anywhere, traces of English masonry earlier than the Norman Conquest might be expected to be preserved, and no doubt it is just possible that such may be found about the foundations of the Norman walls. What is mainly remarkable about it is the resemblance to Windsor in its general plan; the oblong inclosure encroached upon from one side by the mound and its ditch, so as to divide it into two wards, in one of which are domestic buildings. The older part of the gatehouse, and parts of the curtain near it, may be regarded as Early Norman, the work probably of Earl Roger. The keep seems later, though also Norman. The additions to the gatehouse, the well-tower, and the oratory are probably Decorated. What is wanted is a correct ground-plan, which should include the outworks and the more distant earthworks. The older walls should be critically examined, and especially the basement of the domestic buildings.
HISTORY.
The Manor of Arundel, with others in this immediate neighbourhood, was given by Alfred, by will (885), to his brother’s son. It was held by Harold, and afterwards by William, who about or before 1070 granted to Roger de Montgomery the castle and honour of Arundel, with 84½ knights’ fees. Roger, who was of kin to the Conqueror, and commanded the Norman centre at Hastings, became Earl of Arundel and Shrewsbury, and held the Castle about twenty-three years, till his death. Domesday describes the Castle of Harundel as having, in the time of King Edward, paid annually for the mill, 40s.; for three “convivia,” or entertainments, 20s.; and “pro uno pasticio,” or pasty, 20s. There was also the church of St. Nicholas, or the parish church, and St. Martin’s, probably the chapel of the castle. There was also another mill which paid ten bushels of corn. The burgh, port, and shipping paid £12 or more.
It is curious that Arundel, Chichester, Shrewsbury, and the Norman Manor whence Roger derived his territorial designation, each possessed a mound. On William’s death in 1088, Earl Roger gave his support to Robert Curthose, whom he invited to land at Arundel. The Prince’s sluggishness alienated his English followers, and the Earl tendered his aid to Rufus. At Earl Roger’s death, in 1094, he bequeathed his Sussex earldom, called also “of Chichester,” to his younger son Hugh, the Hugh Goch of the Welsh, who held both Arundel and Shrewsbury, stood in opposition to William Rufus, and was slain while repelling pirates from the north Welsh coast in 1098. His successor in the English earldom was his eldest brother, who already held the family lordships in Normandy. This was Robert, Earl of Belesme in la Perche, who received at Arundel William Rufus on his arrival from Normandy in 1097.
Earl Robert, the wicked son of a wicked mother, was a bold soldier, and an able, though a very cruel man. He built with great rapidity the strong castle of Brugge or Bridgenorth, and that of Montgomery, called by the Welsh Tre-faldwin, from Baldwin, its early seneschal. His career in England was violent and short. Bridgenorth was besieged and taken by Henry I., who brought the wooden turret known as a malvoisin to bear upon its walls. The Earl went into exile in 1102, and died in 1118.
King Henry held Arundel till his death, when it passed in settlement to his widow, Adeliza, daughter of Godfrey of Louvaine, Duke of Brabant. The Queen Dowager married William d’Albini, a Norfolk noble, known to chroniclers as “William with the strong hand,” the royal dapifer. They received the Empress Maud at Arundel on her landing in 1139, with her brother, the Earl of Gloucester, and in consequence had to stand an attack from Stephen, to whom, it is said, Adeliza pleaded with success the duties of hospitality, and Maud was allowed to retire to Bristol. D’Albini, however, was, on the whole, a supporter of Stephen, though with great judgment. He advised the accord between Stephen and Henry in 1153, and signed the compact as “Earl of Chichester.” Henry, on his accession, acknowledged the service by a grant of the earldom of Arundel in fee with the third penny of the county of Sussex. Earl William died in 1176. By Adeliza, who died in 1151, he left a son, also William, the first of four generations of D’Albinis, and of five persons who held the earldom of Arundel, or, as they called it, of Sussex. They were buried at Wymondham, their own foundation. Earl Hugh, the eighth from the Conquest, died childless in 1243. Isabel, his sister, carried on the succession, and married John Fitz-Alan, whose son, on his uncle’s death, succeeded.
This John, head of the great house of Fitz-Alan, Lords of Clun and Oswaldestre, became the ninth earl, and died 1240. He was the first of fourteen earls of the name who held the castle for twelve generations. Of these, the elder line died out in the person of Thomas, fifteenth earl, who died childless in 1415; but the succession was continued by his cousin, Henry Fitz-Alan Lord Maltravers, who died 1580, leaving an heiress, Mary, who married Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk. The later Fitz-Alans lived much at Arundel, with which place they became closely identified.