Risinghoe Castle
Risinghoe Castle , sometimes Goldington Castle called, is an Outbound castle in the former village Goldington in the English administrative unit Borough of Bedford . The village of Goldington is now incorporated into Bedford . The mound of the former castle is on the north bank of the Great Ouse , about 5 km east of Bedford Castle and about 1.6 km west of Renhold Castle .
Details
It is uncertain whether the earthworks that have been preserved actually belonged to a castle. Risinghoe Castle was likely a wooden moth that was built sometime after the Norman conquest of England in 1066. It is said to have belonged to Hugh de Beauchamp , the largest landowner in Goldington in 1086. As early as the end of the 12th century, the castle was called "old". Presumably they coincided with the grange of Risinghoe and the basic rule of Puttenhoe to the Warden Abbey and then after the dissolution of the monasteries to Sir John Gostwick transmitted. It then fell to John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford, along with the rest of their Goldington lands .
There is no visible evidence of a courtyard or other elements of a medieval castle, although this may be due to the extensive clay mining on the site in Victorian times . A number of authors stated that excavations were carried out on the 6-meter-high mound in 1943, but no primary sources appear to exist about these excavations and they are not mentioned in the report of the 1943 Annual Meeting of the Bedfordshire Natural History and Archaeological Society . Another version, told by the inhabitants of the former village, says that the mound was dug up in 1940 to build an air raid shelter and nothing was found. If this second version is correct, then professional excavations have never been carried out there.
Beauchamp Wadmore, in his 1920 book The Earthworks of Bedfordshire, feeds further doubts about the status of Risinghoe Castle. Wadmore's research suggests that the mound may have been built as a memorial to a 9th-century victory over the Danes in connection with nearby Gannock Castle . Wadmore also argues that there should have been a second, smaller mound prior to the damage to the site from the clay mining. But an early Ordnance Survey map indicates the site as the previous location of a castle.
The mound of Risinghoe Castle is now on the property of a private company and is not open to the public. However, you can see the terrain from a nearby street.
Sources and web links
- Risinghoe Castle . CastleUK.net
- Parishes: Goldington . British History Online.
- Beauchamp Wadmore: The Earthworks of Bedfordshire . Bedfordshire Standard, 1920.
- Bedfordshire Archaeologists Activities . The Bedfordshire Times (October 15, 1943)
Coordinates: 52 ° 8 ′ 44.4 " N , 0 ° 24 ′ 29" W.