Rochester Castle
| Rochester Castle | ||
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 Rochester Castle taken from the courtyard. In the background Rochester Cathedral. |
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| Creation time : | 11th century | |
| Conservation status: | ruin | |
| Geographical location | 51 ° 23 '21.7 " N , 0 ° 30' 4.6" E | |
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Rochester Castle is a ruined castle in the Borough of Medway in Great Britain . Classified as a Grade I cultural monument and protected as a Scheduled Monument , the ruin is considered to be one of the most impressive and best-preserved examples of Norman military architecture in England. The strategically important castle was of great importance during the conflicts between the early medieval kings and the nobility.
history
The exact origin of the castle is unknown. It is believed that shortly after the Norman conquest of England in 1066, the first royal castle with earth and wood fortifications was built on episcopal grounds in the southwest corner of the fortified city of Rochester . The castle is first mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086.
Siege of 1088
During the rebellion of 1088 against the new King William II , the king captured the nearby Tonbridge Castle . There he learned that Bishop Odo of Bayeux , one of the leaders of the rebels, was on his way from Rochester to Pevensey , a castle owned by Robert of Mortain . The king reacted quickly and was able to capture his two uncles Robert and Odo. Odo had to swear that he would get the crew of Rochester Castle to surrender, and the king sent him to the castle with a small force. When they asked the citizens of Rochester to open the gates, the castle crew made a mounted sortie, overpowered the royal soldiers, and entered the town in triumph with the freed Bishop Odo. The enraged King immediately began the siege of Rochester. In May 1088 he built two fortresses that blocked the access roads to the city. After several weeks of siege, the castle garrison with Bishop Odo, Eustach von Boulogne and Robert of Bellême had to surrender. The rebels were allowed to leave England with their horses and weapons, but they lost their English possessions and titles.
Expansion into a stone fortress
After the conquest, King William II commissioned Bishop Gundulf of Rochester to rebuild the castle as a stone fortification. Gundulf used parts of the city wall from Roman times for the construction. In 1127 King Henry I gave the castle to William of Corbeil , Archbishop of Canterbury. The archbishop was ordered to expand the castle and began building the large keep . The castle remained in the possession of the Archbishops of Canterbury in the 12th century, who administered and developed the castle for the kings.
Siege of Rochester Castle 1215
When, in the autumn of 1215, despite the recognition of the Magna Carta by King John Ohneland , tensions arose between the rebellious barons and the king, a force of the rebels occupied the castle in an advance from London in late September or early October. The Constable Reginald of Cornhill , once a loyal follower of King John, opened the gates to them. The rebels left a strong garrison of 95 knights and 45 men-at-arms under William d'Aubigné in the castle and then withdrew to London. This occupation is considered to be the beginning of the Barons' War .
King John was in Dover in September 1215 , where he expected foreign mercenaries to reinforce his army. Upon learning of the occupation of the castle, he immediately moved with a small force to Rochester and began the siege of the castle in early October. Royal troops first attacked the old bridge over the Medway , but were repulsed. In a surprise attack, they were able to capture the city on October 11th, whereupon the rebels retreated into the castle. The bridge over the Medway was captured and destroyed by royal troops on October 12th, cutting the castle off from reinforcements from London. King John began a bitter siege of the castle, which he directed from Boley Hill , southwest of the castle . The royal troops quickly captured the courtyard and began to bombard the keep with five siege engines .
A relief army of the barons from London under the leadership of Robert FitzWalter tried to reach Rochester on October 26th, but withdrew at Dartford before the overwhelming force of the royal troops. The castle's crew had only limited supplies, which is why d'Aubigné had wounded or sick members of the garrison thrown from the keep. Allegedly King John had their hands and feet chopped off. The mighty Keep, however, withstood all attacks, which is why the king had him undermined . On November 25, he ordered his legal advisor Hubert de Burgh to bring him 40 fat pigs. The cavity at the end of the tunnel was filled with the pigs' fat as fuel and set on fire. The wooden supports of the tunnel burned, whereupon the southeast corner tower of the keep collapsed. The defenders withdrew to the northern part of the keep and continued their resistance. However, since they had insufficient supplies, they surrendered on November 30th.
The angry king wanted to hang all knights and barons among the captured defenders. His mercenary leader Savary de Mauléon was able to dissuade him, as he feared retaliation by the rebels on captured royal castle garrisons. The king allegedly had only one crossbowman hanged, who had served him since his youth but had now defected to the rebels. The captured knights, including Cornhill and d'Aubigné, were incarcerated in Corfe Castle . The siege, which was carried out with extraordinary violence, and the conquest of what was then the second strongest castle in Kent shocked numerous observers and destroyed confidence in the stability of the fortifications of many castles. However, the conquest of the castle was only a stage victory for the king. He moved his army to northern England and Scotland in December. After the French Prince Ludwig landed with an army in England in May 1216 , he occupied the castle. Only after the Peace of Lambeth in September 1217 did the castle fall to the new King Henry III. back.
The siege and conquest of the castle in 1215 is one of the best-documented sieges in English history. She contributed significantly to the widespread image of the keep as the last refuge for the defenders.
Siege of 1264
Under King Henry III. the keep was rebuilt between 1221 and 1231. During his reign, the royal court stayed in Rochester several times, which is why a new hall and additional residential buildings were built in the courtyard. During the Second Barons' War , the castle was besieged again, this time by the rebellious barons. The royal garrison was led by Constable Roger of Leybourne and by John de Warenne, 6th Earl of Surrey , John FitzAlan and the king's nephew, Henry of Almain . The siege began on April 17, 1264 after Gilbert de Clare, 6th Earl of Hertford , marched from his Tonbridge Castle against Rochester and attacked the city from the southwest. On hearing of Gilbert's approach, the city's occupants burned down the suburbs and, for reasons that cannot be explained today, the royal hall in the courtyard. Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, supported de Clare with an army with which he attacked the city from London from the north over the bridge over the Medway.
The first two attacks by Montfort were repulsed, but in the third attempt, his troops made the breakthrough on April 18 when they attacked under the cover of the smoke of a boat loaded with flammable substances . A simultaneous attack by de Clare from the south was also successful, so that Montfort and de Clare met in the city. The rebel army plundered the city, even in the cathedral, residents of the city who fled there are said to have been murdered by the soldiers. The next day, the rebels succeeded in conquering the castle courtyard, so that the royal garrison fled to the keep. After a break in fighting on Easter Sunday, the attack began on Easter Monday with siege engines that bombed the castle for a week. Presumably the besiegers began to undermine the keep, following the example of King John, as it withstood the bombardment. However, when the rebels learned that King Henry III. Together with his son Eduard and a strong army came for relief, they broke off the siege. Only a few weeks later, however, the occupation surrendered after the king's defeat in the Battle of Lewes .
The lesser-known siege of 1264 is also extremely well documented. In addition to the contemporary chronicles, documents from the treasury are also preserved, which prove the consumption of food by the occupation.
The castle in the late Middle Ages
The damage to 1264 had a lasting effect. The main hall and royal apartments were not rebuilt and the castle began to slowly deteriorate. In 1281 the ruins of the burned-out buildings were completely demolished. In 1314 Elizabeth de Burgh , the English captive wife of the Scottish King, was briefly imprisoned in the castle. In 1363 the castle was considered badly neglected, so that King Edward III. decided to completely renovate the facility. Between 1367 and 1370 the castle was renovated and the two towers on the eastern curtain wall were built for £ 2262. A new stone bridge was built over the Medway between 1383 and 1393. To secure the bridge, King Richard II had a bastion-like tower built in the north-west of the castle, which cost a further £ 500.
Decay in the early modern period
In particular, the history of the castle between the 15th and 17th centuries has only been handed down in gaps. The castle had lost its military importance and fell into disrepair. In 1599, Queen Elizabeth I allowed parts of the curtain wall to be torn down so that the stones could be used to reinforce the coastal fortification of Upnor Castle . In 1610, King James I sold the castle to Sir Anthony Weldon. 1621 Keep was last for a negotiated one Assis Court used. In contrast to many other castles, Rochester Castle no longer had any military significance during the English Civil War and therefore escaped demolition after the end of the war. Presumably, however, the Keep was destroyed by fire before 1660, even if there is no evidence of this. When Samuel Pepys visited the castle in 1665, he describes it as dilapidated and destroyed.
The ruin since the 18th century
The ruin of the keep has served as a motif for many paintings since the 18th century. Leased in 1870 and in 1884 the City of Rochester bought the ruin from its then owner, the Earl of Jersey . A public park, the Castle Gardens, was created in the former courtyard. The ruins were restored by 1904. In 1965 the Ministry of Works took over the management of the keep, which was given to English Heritage in 1984 . The City of Rochester , which became part of the Borough of Medway in 1998, has managed the entire castle complex since 1995 .
location
The castle is located on the right, eastern bank of the River Medway at the point where Watling Street, used since Roman times, crossed the river. The castle was built in the southwest of the former fortified Roman city of Rochester. To the east of the castle, Rochester Cathedral was built in the late 11th century . It is disputed whether the location of the castle influenced the sometimes unusual structural design of the cathedral, such as the layout of the no longer preserved cloister south of the choir instead of south of the nave . The close juxtaposition of Rochester castle and cathedral is a powerful symbol of the juxtaposition of nobility and royalty and the church, the two pillars of medieval society. This arrangement can also be found in other English cities, especially in Lincoln , but also in other European countries.
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investment
The irregular system was enclosed by a circular wall, which also included the keep. To the south and across from the medieval city to the east, there was a wide moat, the west side was protected by the river. In the north of the facility was the bridge over the river. The main entrance to the castle was from the northeast. The medieval castle was ruled by the keep at the southeast corner of the courtyard. The castle courtyard has only been partially archaeologically examined to this day. It is probably several meters above the level of the Roman and early Anglo-Saxon city, especially on the east side. Probably under the ramparts of the Norman castle lie the remains of an Anglo-Saxon settlement from the time before the Norman conquest. No evidence of a castle hill of the first castle from the 11th century has been found so that this complex probably only consisted of a ring wall .
For a long time it was assumed that the earthworks on Boley Hill southwest of the castle were the first location of the castle and also evidence of a fortification from the time of the Viking raids in the 9th century. However, excavations carried out in the courtyard in the 1970s proved that the first Norman castle was built on the current location. Whether Boley Hill was an outbuilding of the 11th century ramparts or an outer castle courtyard that was only laid out in the 13th century is still a matter of dispute. The deep moat and rampart on the south side were used in the 13th and 14th centuries as a fortification to protect the southern access to the city of Rochester.
Curtain wall
The eastern and western sides of the curtain wall surrounding the castle courtyard have been preserved. Parts of the western wall still come from the first stone fortification built by Bishop Gundulf after 1088. Adjacent to it is a part of the wall with the outer wall of one for King Heinrich III. in the 1220s erect two-story residential building. Under Henry III. the round southeast tower was also built not far from the keep. On the eastern wall there are two rectangular towers that were built to strengthen the castle in the 1370s. The D-shaped tower in the north-west of the castle, preserved as a ruin, dates from the 1380s.
Castle Gardens
The Castle Gardens take up the entire area of the former castle courtyard. The entrance to the northeast is near the site of the medieval main gate of the castle. Today the complex consists mainly of a flat lawn, which was created instead of the more elaborate gardens of the Victorian era . Although numerous buildings in the castle courtyard are mentioned in medieval evidence, their exact locations are unknown today. The castle courtyard was at times divided into a larger northern and a smaller, southern part by a wall running in an east-west direction. The western course of this wall has not yet been reconstructed.
Keep
The keep of the castle is an architectural masterpiece. With a height of 38 m, it is the highest preserved keep in Europe, and it was certainly one of the highest European castle towers of that time. It is already admired as an extraordinary building in contemporary reports. The outer walls of the tower on an almost square floor plan are 21 m long and up to 3.6 m thick. The outer walls are mainly made of irregular limestone ( Kentish ragstone ), but the corners and window frames are made of carefully carved Pierre de Caen from Normandy . Even if many window openings have been destroyed today, it can be seen that the windows on the upper floors were larger and decorated with stone carvings. The Keep has four corner towers, of which the southeastern one is round in contrast to the angular towers at the other corners. It was rebuilt in the 1220s after being destroyed in 1215. Access to the keep was on the first floor and was made through a rectangular porch on the north side. An outside staircase was reached through a door into a vestibule from which a by a portcullis led secured door into the main part of the Keeps.
The interior of the tower has been a vast, roofless ruin since it was destroyed in the 17th century. The interior is divided into two halves by an intermediate wall; there was also a well on the intermediate wall, so that the tower had its own water supply. Holes in the beams indicate the positions of the former false ceilings, and the remains of windows, chimneys and latrines can still be seen in the outer walls. The northeast and southwest corner towers contained spiral staircases that connected the individual floors.
The Keep once had four floors. In the basement there were storage and storage rooms, above there was a floor with two rooms, which probably served as accommodation for the castle crew. The main living rooms were on the second floor. This main floor was divided by an elegant arcade with round columns and stone carvings. Similar to the Keep of Hedingham Castle or Norwich Castle, there is a gallery on this floor in the surrounding outer walls. It runs higher in the southeast corner than on the other sides, so that there was probably a raised stage for the king's table at this point. There was a small chapel on the north wall, which was decorated with wall paintings. The architectural decoration on this floor is simpler than in the contemporary cathedrals or abbey churches, but despite the partial destruction it still shows today that Norman castles could also be elegantly furnished. On the floor above, under the roof, there were probably the living quarters of the king. A battlement ran around the roof.
The castle in literature and in film
Rochester-based author Charles Dickens mentioned the Keep in his novels The Pickwickier and The Secret of Edwin Drood . The siege of 1215 served as the template for the 2011 film Ironclad - Until the Last Warrior . The castle was also used as a backdrop for several films, including Hamlet and Henry VIII .
Web links
- English Heritage: Rochester Castle
- Visit Medway: Rochester Castle
- The National Heritage List: Rochester Castle
- Rochester Castle at PastScape
Individual evidence
- ^ English Heritage: Significance of Rochester Castle. Retrieved April 12, 2015 .
- ↑ Castles Abbeys and Medieval Buildings: Rochester Castle Kent England. Retrieved April 12, 2015 .
- ↑ Magna Carta 800th: William D'Albini. Retrieved April 14, 2015 .
- ↑ Wilfred L. Warren: King John . University of California Press, Berkeley, 1978, ISBN 0-520-03494-5 , p. 247
- ^ English Heritage: Significance of Rochester Castle. Retrieved April 12, 2015 .
- ↑ Visit Medway: Rochester Castle. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on April 25, 2015 ; Retrieved April 12, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Internet Movie Database: Location Rochester Castle, Rochester, Kent, England, UK. Retrieved April 12, 2015 .
