CANTERBURY CASTLE

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Castle built as a royal castle circa 1085-1125. It was used as a prison from circa 1293 but by 1335 the castle was largely in ruins. Walls and gates were demolished in 1792. The square keep and bailey wall of circa 1085 is the only part still standing. Other sections of the castle have been located by recent excavations. Canterbury Castle stood in the south of the town just within the city wall, which formed the south boundary of its inner bailey. The other defences consisted of a rectangular curtain wall with angle turrets and a ditch, entered through two gates. The approximate alignment of the bailey defences can be seen here as a break in slope of the ground surface behind oast houses south of Gas Lane. In 1977-8 a survey of upstanding remains of the keep was carried out.

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TR 1454 5743: Canterbury Castle [NR]. (1)

The remains of Canterbury Castle consist of the ruins of a square Norman keep standing two storeys above ground level. Scheduled. [See plan GP/F/54/82/8 (4)]. (2-4)

The remains of the Castle, as described, are in good condition. On the east side the site of the unique Edwardian gatehouse with its symetrical drum towers(a) is marked by a stone wall in the turf. GP/AO/65/61/1. (5)

Canterbury Castle, Castle Street. The remains of a square Norman keep. 2 storeys above ground level (it was reduced in height in 1817) built in bands of flint and Caen stone blocks. There were originally 4 arched windows to each side. The interior has 2 cross walls and the remains of spiral staircases in the east and south-west wall. Remains of fireplaces of rubble set in a herringbone pattern. The keep measures 87 by 75 feet externally and the walls are 9 feet thick. Scheduled as an ancient monument.(6)

Canterbury Castle stood in the south of the town just within the
city wall, which formed the south boundary of its inner bailey. The other defences consisted of a rectangular curtain wall with angle turrets and a ditch, entered through two gates: one from the city to the north and from the south through the Roman Worthgate. The bailey walls and the gates were swept away in 1792 and the
medieval topography was gradually destroyed. Only the keep and a small portion of the bailey wall running along the north side of
Rheims Way now survive, although the ditch and wall were observed at the south end of Castle Street by J Pilbrow 1868.
A castle at Canterbury mentioned in Domesday may be this castle or the motte and bailey at Dane John (TR 15 NW 264). The keep, of standard Norman pattern, originally had a first floor entrance via a forebuilding. On its east side a later, probably 13th to 14th century forebuilding, with two round towers, leading to a ground floor entrance was excavated by G Webster in 1939. (5a above)
In 1971 excavations by the Canterbury Archaeological Society on
the west side of the keep located the foundations of a rectangular gatehouse central to the keep wall. In 1976 the Castle ditch was
located during excavations at Rosemary Lane car park by the CAT. The approximate alignment of the bailey defences can be seen here as a break in slope of the ground surface behind oast houses south of Gas Lane. In 1977-8 a survey of upstanding remains of the keep was carried out by CAT. The castle almost certainly dates from the post-Conquest period. Indirect evidence for the date of the keep suggests circa 1085-1125. It was used as a prison from circa 1293 but by 1335 the castle was largely ruinous (see illustration card for plans). (7-21)

SOURCE TEXT

( 1) Annotated Record Map

OS 1/2500 1957

( 2) List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest

MHLG 944/11/A Mar 62 13

( 3) Ministry of Works 1961 Ancient monuments in England and Wales : list prepared by the Ministry of Works, corrected to 31st December 1960

1961 Page(s)59

( 4) Royal Archaeological Institute The archaeological journal

1930 plans, illustrations (G Horne) 86 Page(s)243-7

( 5) Field Investigators Comments

F1 FGA 19-DEC-1965

( 6) List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest

DOE (HHR) Dist of City of Canterbury, Kent Sept 1973 Page(s)53

( 7) by Hugh Braun 1936 The English castle

1936 (H Brown) Page(s)35, 38

( 8) R Allen Brown, H M Colvin and A J Taylor 1963 The history of the King's Works, volume 2 : the Middle Ages

1963 (RA Brown HM Colvin AJ Taylor) 2 Page(s)588-90

( 9) Royal Archaeological Institute The archaeological journal

1875 32 Page(s)490-494

(10) Archaeology

1782 (E King) 6 Page(s)298-310

(11) Archaeology

1777 (E King) 4 Page(s)390-92

(12) by John Newman 1983 North east and east Kent

The buildings of England Buildings of England 1983 (S Newman) Page(s)246

(13) by Sidney Toy 1953 The castles of Great Britain

1953 (S Toy) Page(s)72-74

(14) Canterbury Archaeological Trust annual report

1978-79 (T Tatton-Brown) 3 Page(s)18

(15) Kent Archaeological Society Archaeologia Cantiana : being contributions to the history and archaeology of Kent

1972 (L Millard) 87 Page(s)205-8

(16) Royal Archaeological Institute The archaeological journal

1969 Plan (DF Renn) 126 Page(s)238-9

(17) Kent Archaeological Society Archaeologia Cantiana : being contributions to the history and archaeology of Kent

1976 (T Tatton-Brown) 92 Page(s)248

(18) Medieval archaeology : journal of the Society for Medieval Archaeology

1972 (LE Webster and J Cherry) 16 Page(s)181

(19) Kent Archaeological Society Archaeologia Cantiana : being contributions to the history and archaeology of Kent

Excavations at Canterbury Castle 1982 (P Bennett SS Frere & S Stow) 1 Page(s)236

(20) by Joan Counihan 1986 Mrs Ella Armitage, John Horace Round, G T Clark and early Norman castles

Anglo-Norman Stud 1912 Page(s)116-21, 396

(21) by A Hamilton Thompson 1912 Military architecture in England during the Middle Ages

1912 (AH Thompson) Page(s)46, 120, 128

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