1 OKEHAMPTON-OSWESTRY 179 stand the remains of a castle of the motte-and-bailey pattern. On the motte, which is high and steep, are the ruins of a keep of late character, probably of the 14th century. The oval bailey covers an acre, and the whole castle is surrounded with a very deep ditch (filled up now on the east side) which is in part a natural ravine. The usual ditch between the motte and the bailey is absent here. This castle appears to have continued always in private hands, and therefore there is little to be learned about it from the public records. The value of Okehampton manor had increased since the Conquest from £8 to £10. As there is no burgus mentioned T. R. E., but four burgenses and a market T. R. W., Baldwin the Sheriff must have built a borough as well as a castle. Otherwise it was a small manor of thirty ploughs. OSWESTRY, Shropshire. - Mr Eyton's identification of the Domesday castle of Louvre, in the manor of Meresberie, Shropshire, with Oswestry, seems to be decisive. The name is simply L'Euvre, the Work, a name very frequently given to castles in the early Norman period. Domesday Book says that Rainald de Bailleul built a castle at this place. He had married the widow of Warin, Sheriff of Shropshire, who died in 1085. The castle afterwards passed into the hands of the Fitz Alans, great lords-marcher on the Welsh 1 The late Mr Worth thought the lower part of the keep was early Norman. He was perhaps misled by the round arched loops in the basement. But round arches are by no means conclusive evidence in themselves of Norman date, and the size of these windows, as well as the absence of buttresses, and the presence of pointed arches, are quite incompatible with the early Norman period. The whole architecture of the castle agrees with a 14th century date, to which the chapel undoubtedly belongs. 2 Eyton, Antiquities of Shropshire, vol. vii. 3 "Ibi fecit Rainaldus Castellum Luure." D. B., i., 253b. Rainald was an under-tenant of Roger, Earl of Shrewsbury. border. As the Welsh annals give the credit of building the castle to Madoc ap Meredith, into whose hands it fell during the reign of Stephen, it is not impossible that some of the masonry still existing on the motte, which consists of large cobbles bedded in very thick mortar, may be his work, and probably the first stonework in the castle. A sketch made in the 18th century, however, which is the only drawing preserved of the castle, seems to show architecture of the Perpendicular period.' But probably the keep alone was of masonry in the 12th century, as in 1166, when the castle was in royal custody, the repair of the stockade is referred to in the Pipe Rolls. No plan has been preserved of Oswestry Castle, so that it is impossible to recover the shape or area of the bailey, which is now built over. The manor of Meresberie had been unoccupied (wasta) in the days of King Edward, but it yielded 40s. at the date of the Survey. Eyton gives reasons for thinking that the town of Oswestry was founded by the Normans. 3 OXFORD (Fig. 25). This castle was built in 1071 by Robert d'Oilgi (or d'Oilly), a Norman who received large estates in Oxfordshire. Oxford was a burgus in Saxon times, and is one of those mentioned in the Burghal Hidage. Domesday tells us that the king has twenty mural mansions there, which had belonged to Algar, Earl of Mercia, and that they were called mural mansions because their owners had to repair the city wall at the king's behest, a regulation probably as old as the days of Alfred. The Norman castle was placed outside 1 This sketch is reproduced in Mr Parry-Jones' Story of Oswestry Castle. Leland says, "Extat turris in castro nomine Madoci." Itin., v., 38. 2 "In operatione palicii de Blancmuster 27. 6s. 8d." XII., 124. Oswestry was known as Blancmoustier or Album Monasterium in Norman times. 3 Abingdon Chronicle and Osney Chronicle, which, though both of the 13th century, were no doubt compiled from earlier sources. |