Harlech Castle

“ Harlech is a concentric castle of the Edwardian type, and of that type a simple and excellent example. It is composed of a central four-sided ward contained within four lofty curtains, and capped at each angle by a drum-tower of three-quarter projection. In the centre of the landward or eastern side is the great gatehouse; opposite to which, built against the curtain, are the remains of the hall and domestic buildings; and contiguous to them, against the north side, is the chapel. ”

“ Harlech Castle is about 10 miles from the pleasant town of Barmouth in North Wales. The name implies "on the rock," and every year it is a great attraction to the many visitors to Wales, because of the fine mountain and sea view obtained from this commanding height. Like many other Welsh castles it owes its origin to Edward I. after his conquest of Wales. Owen Glyndwr or Glendower, a Welsh prince and a descendant of Llewelyn, had rebelled against Henry IV. in consequence of repeated injustice done to him by Lord Grey de Ruthin, who had appropriated his estates. ”

“ Looking across the fourth hole
Small wonder if the visitor falls in love with Harlech at first sight, for no golf course in the world has a more splendid background than the old castle, which stands at the top of a sheer precipice of rock looking down over the links. Wherever we go it is never out of sight, and though we may glance away at the hills with Snowdon in the distance, we always come back to the castle with a never-satisfied longing. It is so obviously splendid that we might imagine that we should in time grow tired of it, but we never do. ”

“ The principal apartments are on the eastward, or entrance, side of the inner court. The banqueting hall is opposite; the windows of which look out upon the green surface of the sea; and, on the right of the court, there formerly stood a small chapel; the ruins of which are still visible, the pointed windows remaining entire. It is impossible to conceive a finer view than is obtained from the towers of Harlech Castle. With a clear atmosphere, the monarch of the Welsh mountains may be distinctly seen, towering above his subject hills. ”

“ It is said that this siege gave rise to the favourite Welsh air known as the "March of the Men of Harlech." The castle stands high, is square, with a round tower at each corner, and gives one the impression of massive proportions and enormous strength. The main entrance to the inner ward is between two huge round towers, and the passage was defended at one end by two, and at the inner extremity by a third, portcullis. The ascent to the top of the walls is made by a stair from the courtyard. There is a well-protected walk on the battlements. ”

“ The continual variety of light and shadow, with which the mountains are alternately robed, the freshness of the air, and the solemn majesty of the ruined fortress, form altogether a volume for the mind to peruse with intense and unwearied interest.
HARLECH CASTLE.
The present castle was built by Edward the First in 1283, upon the ruins of one erected by Maelgwn Gwynedd, Prince of North Wales, in 530. It was seized by the Welsh hero, Owen Glyndwr, during his struggle for freedom against Henry the Fourth, and p. ”

“ As to Harlech, you gentlemen of the jury well know what Harlech is. A bathing place on the coast, not far from Harlech, I mean Barmouth, is said to have a little resemblance to Gibraltar; a very little, I think: but, as to Harlech, I can assure you that it has none at all: it is as unlike Gibraltar as it is possible for any castle to be--whether as to fortifications or garrison. The fortifications run more hazard every month from treasonable west winds than ever they did from me ”

“ The question you have to decide upon, I understand to be this; whether I did or did not levy war upon his Majesty's garrison of sixteen firelocks and his castle of Harlech. Since the date of the Harlech war I have been present in South America in so many enterprises, even more desperate, that I cannot pretend to recal every circumstance: I am apt to confound them with one another. But the general fact of this expedition against Harlech I think the witnesses for the crown have established tolerably well. ”

“ During the last twenty years of the twelfth century, lessons learned by the Crusaders from the traditional methods of fortification employed in the Eastern empire exercised a profound influence upon the military architecture of France and England; and the application of these lessons during the thirteenth century entirely altered the defensive scheme of the castle, until the plan of masterpieces of fortification like Caerphilly and Harlech presented an entire contrast to the plan of defensive strongholds like Norham and Scarborough. ”

“ Thus at Dunstanburgh and Llanstephan, castles in which the system of defence was not founded upon the concentric plan, but relied upon the strength of an adequately flanked curtain, gatehouses which are worthy of Caerphilly and Harlech, and stand upon the outer line of defence,330 reverted to the condition of keeps. The possible use of a keep as an ultimate refuge never ceased altogether to have weight with castle-builders. ”

“ But the castles of the keepless kind are not invariably concentric; those built by Edward I. at Conway, Carnarvon, and Flint are not so. [1198] Instead of a dark and comfortless keep, the royal or noble owner is provided in this type of castle with a palatial house. In England this house is frequently attached to the gateway, forming what we may call a gatehouse palace; good examples may be seen at Beaumaris, Harlech, and Tonbridge. [1199] The gate [Pg 376] way itself is always defended by a pair of massive towers. ”

“ Finally, although the stern necessities of war did not admit of the banded shafts, lofty vault, or woven window-tracery of Tintern, or Fountains, or many a less distinguished church, the ornamentation of the richer castles, as Dover, Rochester, Hedingham, Newcastle, Knaresborough, Castle Rising, and Coningsborough, is marked by a chastened fitness peculiar to such works; and of the ruder and less ornate castles, the ruins of very many present a savage grandeur which few who have visited Caerphilly, Harlech, or Scarborough, can fail to appreciate ”

“ We never are told by English chroniclers that Harold built any castles, though we do hear of his fortifying towns. The present [Pg 139] writer would answer this question, tentatively indeed, and under correction, by the theory that the castrum constructed or repaired by Harold was the present outer rampart of Dover Castle, which encloses an area of about 34 acres, and may have enclosed more, if it was formerly complete on the side towards the sea. ”

“ Lo, yon castle—ye have no such in England. See its vawmures and fosses!"
"A noble pile," answered Harold. "But pardon me that I press for—"
"Ye have no such strongholds, I say, in England?" interrupted the Duke petulantly.
"Nay," replied the Englishman, "we have two strongholds far larger than that—Salisbury Plain and Newmarket Heath! [199] —strongholds that will contain fifty thousand men who need no walls but their shields. Count William, England's ramparts are her men, and her strongest castles are her widest plains." ”

“ Ever since the historic period, and doubtless long before the era of recorded things began, there existed a castle, or a fortified post, on this lofty cliff-top, where the shattered ruins of Hastings Castle still stand, few and almost formless—the long superannuated warden of the town that has grown so great and has now absolutely no defences against the foreign foe. ”

“ This includes the lighthouse tower, and is therefore called the Roman ditch, but there is nothing about it of a Roman character, and it is far more probable that it was the work of the English, and formed the inner defence of the castle which Harold undertook to surrender. The space between this and the great earthwork forms the outer ward of the Norman castle; the inner work has been divided into two parts. That to the south, containing the lighthouse, forms the middle ward; that to the north contains the keep, and is the inner ward. ”

“ With this fierce “Black Dog of Arden,” whose teeth were so sharp, the architectural history of the Castle becomes clear. He repaired and strengthened it, after the rough handling it had received in the Barons’ War, in the reign of Henry the Third; but to Thomas de Beauchamp, his grandson, is due Cæsar’s Tower, about 1360, and it was his son Thomas, who built Guy’s Tower, named after the mythical giant, about 1394.
It costs two shillings to see Warwick Castle. I believe if you happen to be a resident of Warwick or Leamington, there is a reduction of fifty per cent. ”

“ MARKET HARLING is one of those towns, more than half medieval in aspect and atmosphere, which are still to be discovered in certain corners of England. It lies on the southeast slope of a shelving hill, on the heights of which rises an ancient castle, grim and formidable as when it was built seven hundred years ago. The Marquis of Harling, when he happens to be at home in that castle, and looks from any of its hundreds of windows, can truthfully say that he is monarch of all he surveys. ”

“ My amiable guides directed my attention to various objects—some far and some near, and all with names familiar to history, or song, or romance. Yonder mass of dun and dismal ruins was Craigmillar Castle, once the residence of Queen Mary. Nearly in the same direction, and not remote, is the cliff, above whose bosky sides peer out the massive ruins of Roslin Castle; further south are glimpses of Dalkieth Palace, the sumptuous seat of the Duke of Buccleuch ”

“ On the way from Old Town to New, passing a flagrant music-hall and the hideous stucco semicircle of Pelham Crescent, you perceive, up aloft, on the craggy cliff’s edge, the ragged ruins of the old Norman Castle of Hastings, whose grey and mouldering walls are craggy as those chalk cliffs themselves. ”

“ The military works of Sir Hugh were in their turn remodelled, for the purpose of converting the castle into a residence, rather than a fortress, 219by George Luttrell, in the first years of the seventeenth century. Much of the Renaissance decorative plaster-work, particularly that of the Hall, belongs to this period. The havoc wrought by the siege of 1646 was fully repaired, and the Castle yet again remodelled as a residence, by Francis Luttrell. The grand staircase, elaborately and beautifully carved in oak with representations of hunting scenes, is of this period. ”

“ A pile of buildings beyond, wholly modern in the exterior, is now inhabited as a seminary, or college. There are some circular arches within, which shew that these buildings belonged to the original structure.—Altogether the castle is a noble ruin. Though the keep is destitute of the enrichments of Norwich or Castle-Rising, it possesses an impressive character of strength, which is much increased by the extraordinary freshness of the masonry. The fosses of the castle are planted with lofty trees, which shade and intermingle with the towers and ramparts ”

“ The Saxons called it their "Hill-tower." Its picturesque mass of buildings is of various dates, but much more modern than their early day, most of the present structure having been built in Queen Elizabeth's reign. The castle was held for King Charles in the Civil War, and besieged by the Parliamentary troops, whose commander sent this bloodthirsty message to its governor: "If you will deliver up the castle, you shall have fair quarter: if not, expect no mercy: your mother shall be in front to receive the first fury of your cannon." ”

“ On the highest point of the ruin is an iron machine like a kibble, which serves as a beacon. A large tar-barrel is placed in it and set on fire. It burns like a flaming torch the night through. The Castle stands on a projecting rock, which rises to the height of a hundred and fifty or two hundred feet perpendicular from the sea. Around the Castle its summit is like a bowling-green. ”

“ Harrington, a man of power thereabouts, and friend to the Lord Ros. Whereupon the Lord Hastings came thither another time with a strong power, and upon a raging will spoiled the castle, defacing the roofs, and taking the leads off them.—Then fell all the castle to ruins, and the timber of the roofs uncovered, rotted away, and the soil between the walls at the last grew full of elders, and no habitation was there till that, of late days, the Earl of Rutland hath made it fairer than ever it was."—Leland. ”

“ Take all thy fainthearted mercenaries with thee to their native Bretagne! I will stay with Sir Hoël and defend this castle, which the earl gave into my charge. The late earl, thou said'st? Methinks thou art wondrous quick to make so certain of his death! Methinks all these gallant gentlemen who have galloped back to the safe walls of Blauncheflour in such hot haste, scarce waited to see if he was wounded or slain! For me he will never be the late earl. On earth or in heaven he is my husband still, and I will hold his castle, hoping, perhaps selfishly, that he will come to claim it. ”

“ The wooden donjon on the mount took the form of a square tower surrounded, at the edge of the mount, by a palisade, and approached, as has been described already, by a steep wooden bridge, which crossed the ditch into the bailey. But it is obvious that the existence of a castle in any given place as a permanent centre of royal influence must lead to the abandonment of wooden defences in favour of defences of more lasting material. ”