Weobley Castle
| Weobley Castle | ||
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 Weobley Castle with the mouth of the River Loughor and Burry Port in the background |
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| Alternative name (s): | Castell Weble | |
| Creation time : | 14th Century | |
| Conservation status: | partially preserved | |
| Geographical location | 51 ° 36 '45 " N , 4 ° 11' 58.4" W | |
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Weobley Castle ( Welsh Castell Weble ) is a 14th century fortified manor house on the Gower Peninsula in Wales. The mansion, classified as a Grade I cultural monument and protected as a Scheduled Monument , is located about 1.8 km west of the village of Llanrhidian on a wooded ridge on the north coast of the peninsula. The manor overlooks the salt marshes to the north of Gower and the mouth of the Burry into the River Loughor .
history
The property is first mentioned in 1304 as the seat of David de la Bere , the steward (administrator) of William de Braose, 2nd Baron Braose . Presumably, David de la Bere had the main buildings still preserved today built in two phases. In 1403 the property was captured and devastated by Owain Glyndŵr during the rebellion , with the owner John de la Bere believed to have been killed. In the following decades it changed hands several times and at times belonged to the Mansel family and the Herbert family . Towards the end of the 15th century, the house was owned by Rhys ap Thomas , a close follower of Henry VII , who built the porch to the hall and had some minor alterations made to the chapel and the east wing. After the death of Rhys son Gruffydd ap Thomas, the property served as the widow's residence of his wife Catherine St John. Since her son Rhys ap Gruffydd was executed for treason in 1531, Weobley Castle fell to the Crown after Catherine's death in 1553 and was sold to William Herbert in 1560 . In 1666 it was bought by Edward Mansel of Margam . The former manor house was leased as a farm from that time. Parts of the property were subsequently not inhabited or used and fell into disrepair. In 1911 Emily Talbot , the eldest daughter of Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot , gave it back to the state. The modern farm buildings within the former manor house were demolished, the medieval walls were restored. Today the manor belongs to the Cadw and can be visited from the end of March to the end of October.
investment
The buildings of the slightly fortified manor house enclose a small inner courtyard. The facility was built in two construction phases. The oldest components are the hall, the mighty southwest tower, the smaller southeast tower and part of the eastern wall. Before the southeast tower was completed, the building plans were changed significantly and the mansion was completed in a simplified and reduced form, renouncing the defensive capacity. In this construction phase, the residential building as the north wing, the simple gatehouse as the west wing and the chapel adjacent to the south-west tower were completed. The western main facade has a gatehouse, but it is only protected by a shallow ditch and has no loopholes or casting holes. The southeast tower and the east wing were not completed. Only a few changes were made to the building in the next few centuries, the biggest change was the addition of a two-storey porch as a new, more representative entrance to the hall under Rhys ap Thomas.
Despite its reduced design, the house was very comfortably furnished for the time with heatable living rooms, guest rooms and several latrines. Of the buildings, the south wing and the south-west tower are now only preserved as ruins, while the north and west wings, which once contained the hall, the kitchen, the private apartments and the gatehouse, are still well preserved. In the former private rooms there is a small exhibition on the history of the castle.
Immediately to the east of the castle are the remains of a lime kiln that was used to produce the mortar used to build the property.
South of the manor house is a farm with the remains of a late medieval barn and other modern buildings.
literature
- Diane M. Williams: Gower. A Guide to ancient and historic monuments on the Gower peninsula. Cadw, Cardiff 1998. ISBN 1-85760-073-8
- Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments in Wales: An Inventory of the Ancient Monuments in Glamorgan , Vol. 3, 2000, ISBN 978-1-871184-22-8 , pp. 380-403
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ British Listed Buildings: Weobley Castle, Llanrhidian Lower. Retrieved June 26, 2013 .
- ↑ Ancient Monuments: Weobley Castle. Retrieved February 20, 2014 .