The fan-shaped chamber was probably an outlet for those who, having used the foot-bridge, did not wish to go out by the sally-ports but to ascend into the barbican. The steps are no doubt inconvenient, but the whole passage was certainly only meant for occasional use, and is in no part particularly commodious. Probably the means of egress from the stair-head into the barbican were stairs of timber. The whole arrangement is very peculiar, and it may be doubted whether the safety proposed was worth the considerable expense bestowed upon it. As the whole of this bridge arrangement is clearly an addition, it is probable that though the original entrance was at this point, it was by an ordinary drawbridge, of which the lateral curtains of the spur-work, which are old, would be the protection.
Of the exterior earthworks there is little to be said. On the south-east side of the fortress the outer bank is cut through, as though for an entrance. If so, this must have been carried laterally along the ditches of the place until it reached the barbican.
Hawarden seems to present traces of at least three periods of construction, the oldest being that of the earthworks, which, like some similar ones in England, may be as early as the tenth century.
The keep, the curtain of the main ward, the hall, and perhaps the curtains of the spur seem to be of one date, the material employed being substantially the same, and the workmanship not unlike.
Spur-work enclosing the main entrance.
Hawarden Castle. North-east side.
The range of storehouses in the main ward, the offices projecting from it towards the north-east, and the whole of the buildings of the foot entrance are of later date, and of different design, material, and workmanship. The material is a greenish sandstone, and the workmanship ashlar of the most expensive kind, dressed on every face, and laid in thin joints, with but little mortar. This excellence has proved fatal to the structure; for, as the stones needed only to be lifted from their beds and laid, without any adaptation, into any new work, the temptation has proved too strong, and most of this later work has been carefully removed by hand, and not, like the older work, overthrown by gunpowder. In fact, the lower walls that remain have much more the appearance of an unfinished than of a partially-destroyed building.
There is a paper by the late Mr. Hartshorne in the fifteenth volume of the Archæological Journal, which, though it touches but lightly upon the topography of the castle, enters at some length upon the history of the Barons of Montalt, long its owners. From thence, and from other sources, it appears that Hawarden belonged, from a very early period, to the Earls of Chester, some of whom probably constructed it, but no doubt occupied it before the completion of the structure. In their line it remained till the death of Ranulph de Blundeville, the last earl, in 1231, when, with Castle Rising and the “Earl’s Half,” in Coventry, it came to his second sister and co-heir, Mabel, who married William d’Albini, third Earl of Arundel. Their second son, Hugh, who inherited, died in 1243, when the estates passed to his second sister and co-heir, Cecilia, who married Robert de Montalt.
The Barons de Monte-Alto, sometimes styled de Moaldis or Mouhaut (Mold, where the mound of the castle remains), were hereditary seneschals of Chester and lords of Mold. Roger de Montalt, grandson of Robert and Cecilia, inherited Hawarden, Coventry, and Castle Rising. He married Julian, daughter of Roger de Clifford, justice of North Wales, but dying childless, in 1297, his lands passed to his brother, Robert, the seventh and last lord, who died childless, 1329, when the barony became extinct. Robert de Montalt signed the celebrated letter to the Pope in 1300, as Dominus de Hawardyn. [P. Writs, I. 743.] He bequeathed his estates to Isabella, the queen of Edward II.
The entries concerning Hawarden in the public records are few. In 1265, 49 Henry III., the king granted to Llewelyn-ap-Griffith, Prince of Wales, the Castle of Hawardin, to him and the heirs of his body, Hereford, 22nd June [N. Fœd. I. 457], but in 1267, 51 Henry III., by a letter by the legate Ottoboni, Prince Llewelyn is at once to restore to Robert de Otto Monte the lands of Ha Wordin, but Robert is not to build a castle there for thirty years. Montgomery 3 Kal. Oct. [Ibid. p. 474.]