The first floor contains two rooms, 22 feet 10 inches by 16 feet 6 inches, and 21 feet 6 inches by 16 feet 6 inches, and 13 feet high. In its inner end are two closets.
The second, upper, or principal floor, was formerly of two rooms, but has recently been converted into a handsome hall, 47 feet by 16 feet 6 inches, with an open roof. It has five windows and a fireplace, and is entered on the level from the lower ward by a doorway, which seems an insertion of the date of Henry VIII., and which has the head of the well-stair on one side, and beyond, on each side, a closet. The windows of the gatehouse are mostly of two lights, divided by a transom into four, with the upper lights cinquefoiled and in the head quatrefoiled. The summit is embattled, and at the four angles are turrets, of which the two to the outer or front face are apparent only.
The shields on the exterior panel are, in the upper line, 1. Luttrell with crest and supporters. Below, in the next line, 2. Luttrell impaling Courtenay; 3. Luttrell impaling Beaumont of Sherwell; 4. Luttrell impaling Audley; 5. Luttrell impaling Courtenay of Powderham. In the lower row, 6. Luttrell impaling Hill; 7. Luttrell impaling blank; 8 and 9 blank. The Luttrell supporters were two swans chained and collared, derived from Bohun through Courtenay. The date of this gatehouse is uncertain. It has been thought to be the “novum ædificium castri de Dunster,” with the construction of which the accounts show Henry Stone to have been charged in the 9th of Henry V., but the lower part is of the style prevalent under Richard II. The door from the lower ward into the lobby is scarcely earlier than Henry VII. or VIII.
It is probable that the gatehouse was for some time used in combination with the gateway by its side, until the latter was closed. The approach and entrance, however inconvenient, were strong, and almost precluded any regular attacks by battering-machines, or even by escalade.
The history of Dunster commences with Domesday, in which it is recorded that William de Mohun holds Torre, and there is his castle. Aluric held it in the time of King Edward. “Ipse [Willielmus de Moion] tenet Torre. Ibi est castellum ejus. Aluric tenuit T.R.E.” These words are very appropriately inserted over the great chimney-piece in the hall. The Exeter Domesday also confirms the holding both of Mohun and Aluric. Who Aluric was is unknown. That he was a considerable Englishman none can doubt, but the name was common, occurring sixty-four times in Domesday, as does Alric, probably the same name, twenty-six times.
Mohun no doubt found the tor strongly fortified, after the English manner, for not only was it a frontier fortress against the western Celts, but it must have been exposed to the piratical invasion of the Northmen, who gave name to the opposite islands of the Holms, and the not very distant port of Swansea. The place was, in fact, a natural burh on a large scale, such as Æthelflæd and Eadward the Elder were wont to throw up artificially on a smaller scale in the early part of the tenth century. There was the conical hill with its flat top for the aula or domus defensabilis, and the courtyard below for the huts and sheds of the dependents and cattle.
William de Mohun was no mere adventurer. He was a great baron of the Cotentin, having the castle of Moion in la Manche. He fought at Hastings with a knightly following, and received from the Conqueror from sixty to seventy manors in Somerset, Devon, Dorset, and Wilts. These manors were in his time, or in that of his successor, combined into an Honour, as was the case with those attached to the chief seats of Plympton, Totnes, and Barnstaple. Dunster became the caput honoris.
The Honour of Dunster was one of about eighty-six in England, though in what they differed from baronies is not precisely understood. The nucleus of either was almost always an estate held before the Conquest, added to largely by the Norman who conquered it. In all cases it extended into more than one county, and was held of the king in capite by homage, fealty, and military service. By the laws of Henry I., every lord could summon his liegemen before the court, “et si residens est ad remotius manerium ejusdem honoris unde tenet, ibit ad placitum, si dominus suus summoneat eum.” The Honour is not a jurisdiction mentioned in Domesday, unless it be in a passage relating to Cornwall where it is recorded, “Hæ terræ pertinent ad honores chei;” chei being a place. The term is said to have been first used by the Conqueror in his charter to the Abbot of Ramsey. Most of the Honours seem to have fallen into disuse by the alienation of the manors composing them, as was the case with Dunster, although the records show that for many centuries the rights were maintained by the lord of the castle in full rigour.
To what extent the Mohuns were content with the earlier defences of the castle is unknown, but it is remarkable that no mouldings or fragments of Norman ornament have been dug up in or about the building, although there is original Norman work in the parish church. From the configuration of the ground the lines of the old fortress must have been where they still are, so that there would be no reason for pulling down the earlier works to enlarge the area; and yet it is difficult to suppose that works as durable as was the case with those of the Norman period could have fallen to decay by the reigns of Henry III. or Edward I., the date of the oldest extant parts. However this may be, it is certain that the castle of the Mohuns was one of the most important of the western fortresses; and in the lawless days of Stephen it was held for the empress against the king, during the great revolt of 1138, its lord being then William de Mohun, the second baron.
William, indeed, was not content with passive resistance. He is described as the “Scourge of the West,” ravaging and plundering the country up to the gates of Barnstaple, where he was held in check by Henry de Tracy. He is said to have been created earl either of Dorset or Somerset, or both, by the empress in 1140; but this creation rests on very uncertain authority, and has never been admitted as valid. The earldoms of that period were very irregular, and some were afterwards set aside. This lord founded the Augustine Priory of Brewton, in Somerset, and, according to the Black Book of the Exchequer, he held forty-four knights’ fees. It is not improbable that to him is due the circular or polygonal keep, which was common at that time where a castle possessed a mound, and which is known to have stood on the summit of the tor.