Rhuddlan Castle
| Rhuddlan Castle | ||
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 View across the River Clwyld to the inner castle |
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| Alternative name (s): | Castell Rhuddlan | |
| Creation time : | 1277-1285 | |
| Conservation status: | ruin | |
| Geographical location | 53 ° 17 '21.1 " N , 3 ° 27' 52.7" W | |
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Rhuddlan Castle ( Welsh Castell Rhuddlan ) is a ruined castle in Denbighshire , Wales . The ruin, classified as a Grade I cultural monument and protected as a Scheduled Monument , is one of the castles that the English King Edward I built to secure the conquest of Wales from 1277 onwards .
location
The castle was built at the last ford over the River Clwyd before it flows into the Irish Sea . In the Middle Ages, the Clwyd, which is now channeled and diked, formed a natural border between the highlands of North Wales and the Anglo-Saxon or English Cheshire . Today the ruin lies on the eastern bank of the Clwyd in the middle of the town of Rhuddlan .
history
At the beginning of the 10th century, King Edward the Elder of Wessex built a Burh at the mouth of the Clwyd , an Anglo-Saxon castle with earth and wood fortifications to protect against attacks by the Vikings . The exact location of this fortress is unclear, perhaps the earth walls in the southeast of today's city are the remains of this burh, according to other information the original location of this fortification was lost due to coastal erosion in the sea. Probably the Welsh prince Llywelyn from Seisyll built a palace called Twthill around 1015 instead of the old fortification . His son and successor Gruffydd ap Llywelyn undertook raids from here to the Anglo-Saxon settlements of Oswestry and Wrexham . In response, the Anglo-Saxon Earl Harold Godwinson captured Rhuddlan in 1063 and burned the palace down.
In the course of the Norman conquest of North Wales , Robert of Tilleul built a moth in the north of Cantref Rhos in 1073 instead of the burnt-down palace , after which he is also called Robert of Rhuddlan . Under Robert and his cousin Hugh d'Avranches , the Earl of Chester, a small English settlement developed under the protection of the castle. Over the next two centuries, the castle and town changed hands several times. As early as 1075 there was an unsuccessful attack by Gruffydd ap Cynan , king of Gwynedd , on the castle. However, the castle remained in Norman hands until about 1140 when it was conquered by Owain Gwynedd . During his first campaign in Wales , King Henry II pushed forward to Rhuddlan in the summer of 1157 and fortified the castle again, but in 1167 it was conquered again by Owain Gwynedd after three months of siege. The castle served as the center of the reign of Owain Gwynedd's son Dafydd from Owain between 1175 and 1194 . Apart from a brief conquest under King John between 1211 and 1213, it remained in the possession of Llywelyn from Iorwerth , the prince of Gwynedd, until King Henry III. captured it after Llywelyn's death during his 1241 campaign. The king had the wooden fortifications renewed, but he built the new Dyserth Castle near the castle , which, together with Deganwy Castle, was to serve as the main bases of the English against Gwynedd. In 1267 Rhuddlan was re-conquered by the Welsh during the campaigns of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd . During his first campaign against Gwynedd , King Edward I reached Rhuddlan on August 22, 1277, where he moved his headquarters on September 12. According to the Treaty of Aberconwy , the defeated Llywelyn ap Gruffydd had to pay homage to the king in Rhuddlan in November .
As early as September 1277, construction began on a completely new castle northwest of the old Norman Motte. The first plans were drawn up by Master Bertram , who was in the service of King Henry III as early as 1248. was kicked. However, he was replaced in 1278 by the younger James of St. George , who presumably created the final drafts. The construction work proceeded rapidly so that the still unfinished castle was able to repel the attacks of Dafydd ap Llywelyn in March 1282 . The castle formed the basis for the king's campaign to finally conquer Wales . After the successful campaign, the further construction was pushed ahead rapidly, so that the castle was already completed by 1285. The cost of construction was over £ 9,200 . In 1284 the king issued the statute of Rhuddlan in the castle , which declared the conquest of Wales over. At the beginning of the 14th century, minor alterations and extensions were made, after which the castle was not changed.
To the north of the castle, away from the old town and a monastery, Edward I founded a new town together with the castle, which was fortified with an earth wall, moat and palisade. The castle was attacked in vain during the uprising of 1294 , as well as during the Owain Glyndŵr rebellion in 1400. In this attack, however, the city was destroyed. After the Wars of the Roses , the castle had lost its military importance and fell into disrepair. During the English Civil War , the castle was occupied by a royal garrison, which had to surrender to the parliamentary troops under General Thomas Mytton in July 1646 . So that the castle could not serve as a base again for opposing troops, the castle was razed by the parliamentary troops in 1648 .
Today the castle is administered by Cadw and can be visited.
investment
The Norman moth rises southeast of the current castle. The castle hill has a diameter of 80 m at the foot and is 5 m high, and on the river side it is even 12 m high. There are no remains of the outer bailey north of the castle hill. In 1241 the fortifications and the buildings of the castle were still made of wood and half-timbered, so that no remains of them have survived today.
Edward I's castle rises on a hill on the east bank of the Clwyd. To the southwest the castle borders the river, on the other sides the castle is surrounded by a walled dry moat. In the south there was a landing stage so that the castle could also be reached by ships and supplied in case of siege. In order to enable seagoing vessels to access the castle, the king had the Clwyd diverted for over 3.5 km.
The concentrically laid out castle consists of a symmetrically laid out, strongly fortified core castle , which is surrounded on all sides by an outer, lower circular wall. Except for the south-western side sloping steeply towards the river, the outer ring wall lies close to the walls of the inner castle. Originally the castle had four, later three entrances. The main entrance was in the northwest, the outer gate was framed by two small, square towers. Another entrance, the Friary Gate in the southeast leading to the Dominican monastery , was closed around 1300. The other two entrances were from the river in the west and from the ship's landing stage in the south-west; the landing stage was guarded by the Gillot's Tower , a mighty four-storey tower on a square floor plan. The outer curtain wall has four small towers on the northwest side, which originally had access to the bottom of the trench. These entrances proved to be a weak point during the attack of 1282, so they were closed. The symmetrical, diamond-shaped core castle has a tower each in the north and south and a double-towered gate castle in the east and west. Compared to the later castles of Edward I, the two gates with two gates and a portcullis were only weakly fortified. The six towers of the inner ring wall were four storeys high and each had three octagonal residential floors above a round ground floor. Of the towers, the south tower and the western gatehouse are still well preserved, while the north tower is strong and the eastern gatehouse is largely destroyed. The Palas , the kitchen, more residential buildings and a chapel were attached to the inside of the inner ring wall. However, since most of them were probably built from half-timbered houses, only remnants of the foundations have survived. Other farm buildings such as a granary, a forge and other workshops were located in the outer courtyard, but hardly any remains have survived.
literature
- Adrian Pettifer: Welsh Castles. A Guide by Counties . Boydell, Woodbridge 2000, ISBN 978-0-85115-778-8 , pp. 76-79
- David James Cathcart King: The Castle in England and Wales. An interpretative history . Routledge, 1988, ISBN 0-918400-08-2 , pp. 113-114 .
- Wolfgang Metternich: The royal castles of Wales . Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 1984, ISBN 3-534-09545-6 .
Web links
- Internet presence of the castle near Cadw
- Clwlyd Powys Archaeological Trust: Historic Settlement Survey Denbigshire 2014: Rhuddlan
- Castles of Wales: Rhuddlan Castle
Individual evidence
- ^ British Listed Buildings: Rhuddlan Castle, Rhuddlan. Retrieved July 10, 2014 .
- ↑ Clwlyd Powys Archaeological Trust: Historic Settlement Survey, Rhuddlan. (PDF; 346 kB) Retrieved July 22, 2014 .
- ^ Adrian Pettifer: Welsh castles. A guide by counties . Boydell & Brewer, Woodbridge 2000, ISBN 978-0-85115-778-8 , p. 79
- ^ Adrian Pettifer: Welsh castles. A guide by counties . Boydell & Brewer, Woodbridge 2000, ISBN 978-0-85115-778-8 , p. 79