Pendragon Castle
Pendragon Castle is a ruined castle in Mallerstang Valley at Outhgill in the English county of Cumbria . The castle stands over a bend in the Eden River , dominated by the Wild Boar Fell in the southwest and the Mallerstang Edge in the east. English Heritage has listed the ruin as a Grade I Historic Building.
Legend
Legend has it that the castle was built by Uther Pendragon , King Arthur's father . He is said to have tried to split the river to create a moat, to no avail, as a well-known local two-liner mentions:
Let Uther Pendragon do what he can,
Eden will run where Eden ran.
(Eng .: Let Uther Pendragon do what he can,
the Eden will flow where it has always flowed. )
Uther Pendragon was - if he ever actually existed - possibly a 5th century chief who led the resistance against the invading Anglo-Saxons . Another local legend said Uther Pendragon and many other men died when the Anglo-Saxons poisoned the well (but another legend gives St. Albans as the place of death). There are many other places in Cumbria associated with Arthurian legend such as: B. King Arthur's Round Table at Penrith . Many names in the English Northwest, such as B. Penrith and Cumbria are of Celtic origin.
history
Contrary to legend (and the discovery of a Roman coin) there is no evidence of any pre- Norman use of this area. Ranulph le Meschin had the castle built in the 12th century during the reign of William Rufus . There are remains of a Norman donjon ; In the 14th century a toilet tower was added and in the 17th century several other buildings.
One of the most famous owners of the castle was Sir Hugh de Morville, Lord of Westmorland , one of the four knights who murdered Thomas Beckett in 1170 . A nearby peak of Mallerstang Edge is named after him, the Hugh Seat . Another owner was Lady Ideona de Veteripont , who after the death of her husband Roger de Lilburn lived in the castle for many years of the rest of her life until her death in 1334. Lady Ideona donated the nearby St. Mary's Church in the village of Outhgill around 1311 .
The castle was attacked by marauding Scottish soldiers in 1342 and again in 1541. After the latter attack it remained an uninhabitable ruin until it came into the hands of Lady Anne Clifford , who had it rebuilt in 1660 and added a brewery, a bakery, stables and a coach house. Pendragon Castle remained one of her favorite castles among her many castles until her death in 1676 at the age of 86.
Lady Anne's successor, the Earl of Thanet , had no use for the castle and had everything of value removed from it, including the leaden roofing. Until the 1770s, most of the building above the 2nd floor had collapsed and then fell into disrepair until the romantic ruin that can be seen today.
In recent years some of the rubble has been cleared, a securing of the crumbling walls has been carried out and limited excavations have been undertaken by the Archaeological Department of the University of Lancaster and the results published in 1996.
The castle ruins are now in private hands and are located on agricultural land. Due to the poor condition of the castle walls, it is not open to the public, but a sign at the entrance indicates that renovation work is being carried out and that access should then be allowed again.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Name: PENDRAGON CASTLE List entry Number: 1144890 . English Heritage. Archived from the original on August 8, 2014. Retrieved June 19, 2015.
- ↑ A Vitual Walk through Mallerstang. Part 2: North from Pendragon Castle. Pendragon Castle . Freewebs. ( Memento of August 27, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Retrieved June 19, 2015.
Web links
- A Vitual Walk through Mallerstang. Part 2: North from Pendragon Castle. Pendragon Castle . Freewebs.
- Map of Pendragon Castle . UK Attraction.
- Visit Cumbria website
Coordinates: 54 ° 25 ′ 2.9 " N , 2 ° 20 ′ 20.3" W.