Complete View of the Manners,
Customs, Arms, Habits & Co of the Inhabitants of England, 1774, by Joseph
Strutt.
Essex references
10. Rayleigh
Page 93
Rayleigh Castle: Plan |
“On plate 30, fig 1 & 2,
is the plan and perspective view of an old fortification at Raleigh in the
county of Essex (1). At A on the plan is
the evident remains of the barbican or fortified breast work of the castle,*
yet very perfect. B is a Norman keep,
divided from the base court C, both which antiently (in the time of the Saxons)
were one entire keep or hill. # The
communication here between the keep and base court is not over a bridge, (as is
usual in the castles entirely of Norman construction) but over a narrow neck of
earth, left in the dividing of the former castle, which spared them the trouble
of digging it quite through, and answered all the purposes of a bridge. We never find the keep and base court thus
joined, but where the Normans occupied and rebuilt the castles of the Saxons.”
Rayleigh Castle: Perspective |
“Footnotes: * Some suppose these fortified banks to be
the remains of the fortifications of the Romans; but I have no doubt but that
in the present case they were only what were called the barbicans; though at
Plusly [Pleshey] in Essex the Norman castle actually stands in the midst of a
Roman entrenchment, which is of great circumference, but even there the
barbican is (though much defaced) to be distinguished.
# I have often in the course of this work made
use of the word keep, both in the description of the Saxon as well as Norman
entrenchments: when I applied it to the Saxons, I mean by it, the whole extent
on the ground work of the castle, exclusive of the ditch. By the Norman keep I would be understood to
mean only the hill constantly raised at one end of the castle, which is mostly
small and high; and though it seems not in the least to bear any analogy to the
ground work of the Saxon castles, yet I will not deny that the Normans may have
been to them indebted for the first hint, making their keep smaller and higher,
and adding an extensive base court; thinking by this double fortification to
render themselves much more secure.”
[Plate 30] Ground plot of Rayleigh castle, see p.93. Perspective of ditto. 3, St Botolph’s Priory, see p.102. 4, St John’s Abbey gate, p.103. |
Reference: (1) See Morant’s
Hist. of Essex.
Supplementary Note: Raleigh Mount in now in the care of the National Trust.
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