Category Castles
Catching up on castles and stuff – #amwriting
Gosh, it’s been a while since I posted. I have a wonderful excuse – I wrote a book. Well, that’s a little bit of a cheat. I wrote the first draft of it years ago, but it wasn’t right. So now that I’m learning the art of editing, I ditched half of it, totally re-wrote […]
Chirk Castle – how to survive a civil war
A family trip to Chirk Castle cleared up a mystery that’s sat around in my head for a while. I’ve often wondered why the castle survived intact into the modern era when so many others are ruined and stripped of their stone following the English Civil War when Parliamentarians opposed King Charles and the country […]
Twisted perceptions – Chepstow Castle and Tintern Abbey
I had it the wrong way round. I had a memory of Chepstow Castle being gigantic and lots of walls to climb. Perhaps it was huge for a small child, but visiting it again, it seemed less than what I recalled. On the other hand, Tintern Abbey, which I remember as lacking much turned out […]
By the river
Another trip down memory lane. This time it is due to Goodrich Castle. So much has changed since my last visit over 30 years ago. I wrote a little about that during the A-Z blogging challenge. Back then there was no entrance fee, you could walk right into the ruin. The ground was grassy and […]
Location, location – Carreg Cennen Castle
When it comes to property, location is everything. We all want something to see out of the window, rooms with spectacular views. What is rare for a humble dwelling, is guaranteed for a fortified castle. Whereas houses are constructed on the plateau of fields or pastures, castles are mounted on bedrock. Cliffs are advantageous, rivers […]
The river bend castle, an old gate and cliffs
Although I’ve finished the A to Z blogging challenge for this year, I don’t want to end my exploration of British castles. For some letters I was spoilt for choice. C in particular gave me lots of options and I’m going to a pick a few of them. My first extra C is Chepstow castle […]
Ashby-de-la-Zouch #AtoZchallenge
So to the last day of the A-Z challenge and I’m fortunate to have the perfect castle for my choice of theme – Ashby-de-la-Zouch – the name even looks AtoZ ish. Ashby is a small town in Leicestershire, the county of my birth. The manor house was given to the Zouch family in return for […]
York: a castle in a car park
The urban castle is a different breed to the rural one. It’s been assaulted not by weapons, but by its surroundings and that includes how society changes around it. Ruins have a beauty about them and with light and shadows, they transform the hard rock into architectural sculptures. However, castles were built for a less […]
The Xylo castle #AtoZchallenge
And so arrives the dread X. It so happens xylo is a Greek word related to wood and this leads me to building materials. As I’ve mentioned in a few posts, castles weren’t always made with stone. The early ones utilised wood and lots of earthworks. Even though stone was popular with the Romans, the […]
Warwick: A real attraction #AtoZchallenge
I began with Alnwick, a castle that has stayed in one family for 700 years and near the end of the alphabet I reach Warwick, which has had 36 different owners and during a period as crown property, seven monarchs oversaw its ownership. Warwick began life in William the Conqueror’s time as a wooden motte […]
The Quiet Writer 