Croft Castle
Croft Castle is a castle in the village of Yarpole in the English county of Herefordshire . Next to the manor there is a chapel and a garden.
The property is now owned by the National Trust and is open to the public.
Location
The property is located in the village of Yarpole , 8 km northwest of Leominster . It is surrounded by 600 hectares of light forest, agricultural land and parkland.
The Mortimer Trail , a long-distance hiking trail, leads past it.
lock
The Croft family had lived in a building on the estate since the 11th century . This family was closely related to the neighboring Mortimer von Wigmore and later Ludlow families . The Battle of Mortimer's Cross took place in 1461 on the Crofts lands nearby. The current building is based on a castle from the 14th century that has been rebuilt several times since then. There lived John Croft , who married one of Owain Glyndŵr's daughters. In the 15th century, the Croft family adopted the Welsh wyvern - Helmkleinod , a wounded black dragon, which was seen as a fine allusion to their Glyndŵr origins. After its razing in the English Civil War , Croft Castle was rebuilt. It then consisted of a rectangular castle with small, crenellated round towers on all four corners and a small, angular tower on the north side. Today the manor is under the management of the National Trust and members of the Croft family still live in parts of the building.
The rectangular castle is built around an inner courtyard. North and south wings are not parallel. The outer walls date from the 15th century. The four round towers are too slim to perform defense tasks. The north wing is built in Elizabethan style , while the other wings were built after 1746 in Georgian style . The building originally had a parapet that was later torn down. The sliding windows were installed later. The vestibule, flanked by parapets, is also Georgian, although it is believed to have replaced an earlier gatehouse .
The property was the home of the Croft family for nearly 1,000 years. It is already noted in the Domesday Book that the family lived there. In 1746 Richard Knight bought the property. In 1923 the Croft family bought it back.
On November 8, 1956, English Heritage listed Croft Castle as a Grade I Historic Building. In its appearance it resembles Treago Castle .
chapel
The chapel is dedicated to the Archangel Michael and dates from the 13th century.
It contains the grave of Richard Croft and his wife Eleanor . Eleanor was the daughter of Sir Edmund Cornwall , Baron of Burford in Shropshire and widow of Sir Hugh Mortimer of Kyre Wyard and Martley in Worcestershire , who died on December 30, 1460 at the Battle of Wakefield .
garden
The property has an enclosed garden with a vineyard , an orchard and a greenhouse from 1908. There are also Georgian-style stables.
On the grounds there is an avenue of Spanish chestnut trees , oaks and beeches .
Wallburg
Parkland are the remains of a hill fort from the Iron Age , the Croft Ambrey is called.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Croft and Yarpole: Croft Castle . Herefordshire Council. Archived from the original on March 18, 2012. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
- ↑ Croft Castle . CastleUK.net. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
- ↑ Croft Castle . Castle Wales. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
- ↑ Plantagenet Somerset Fry: The David & Charles Book of Castles . David & Charles, Newton Abbott 1980. ISBN 0-7153-7976-3 .
- ↑ a b c d e f Croft Castle and Parkland . National Trust. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
- ↑ a b c d e f Adrian Pettifer: English Castles: A Guide by Counties . Boydell & Brewer. Pp. 95, 102. 2002. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
- ↑ Croft Castle . Historic England. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
- ↑ Martley: The Mortimers . Retrieved March 3, 2016.
Web links
Coordinates: 52 ° 17 ′ 5.5 " N , 2 ° 48 ′ 33" W.