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destroyed for the castle,' and this points to the probability, which is supported by some other evidence, that the castle was built outside the town. Warwick, of course, was one of the boroughs fortified by Ethelfleda, and it was doubtless erected to protect the Roman road from Bath to Lincoln, the Foss Way, against the Danes. Domesday Book, after mentioning that the king's barons have 112 houses in the borough, and the abbot of Coventry 36, goes on to say that these houses belong to the lands which the barons hold outside the city, and are rated there. This is one of the passages from which Professor Maitland has concluded that the boroughs planted by Ethelfleda and her brother were organised on a system of military defence, whereby the magnates in the country were bound to keep houses in the towns.

Ordericus, after the well-known passage in which he states that the lack of castles in England was one great cause of its easy conquest by the Normans, says: "The king therefore founded a castle at Warwick, and gave it in custody to Henry, son of Roger de Beaumont."4 Putting these various facts together, we may fairly assert that the motte which still forms part of the castle of Warwick was the work of the Conqueror, and not, as Mr Freeman believed, "a monument of the wisdom and energy of the mighty daughter of Alfred," whose energy was very much better employed

1 "Abbas de Couentreu habet 36 masuras, et 4 sunt waste propter situm castelli." D. B., i., 238a.

2 "Hæ masuræ pertinent ad terras quas ipsi barones tenent extra burgum, et ibi appreciatæ sunt." D. B., i., 238.

3 Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond, p. 189.

4 Ordericus, p. 184. "Rex itaque castellum apud Guarevicum condidit, et Henrico Rogerii de Bello Monte filio ad servandum tradidit." Mr Freeman remarks that no authentic records connect Thurkil of Warwick with Warwick Castle. N. C., iv., 781.

5 N. C., iv., 190.

in the protection of her people. Dugdale, who also put the motte down to Ethelfleda, was only copying Rous, a very imaginative writer of the 15th century.

The motte of Warwick is mentioned several times in the Pipe Rolls of Henry II.; it then carried wooden structures on its top. In Leland's time there were still standing on this motte the ruins of a keep, which he calls by its Norman name of the Dungeon. A fragment of a polygonal shell wall still remains. But there is not a scrap of masonry of Norman date about the castle. The motte, and the earthen bank which still runs along one side of the court, show that the first castle was a wooden one. The bailey is oblong in shape, the motte being outside it; its area is about 2 acres.

The value of Warwick had doubled since the Conquest.

WIGMORE, Herefordshire (Fig. 36).-We have already referred to the absurdity of identifying this place with the Wigingamere of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. We have the strongest indication that the Norman castle at Wigmore was a new erection, since Domesday Book tells us that William FitzOsbern built it on waste land called Mereston. This express statement disposes of the fable in the Fundationis Historia of Wigmore Priory, that the castle of Wigmore had belonged to Edric the Wild, and was rebuilt by Ralph Mortimer." Wigmore had only been

1 In operatione unius domus in mota de Warwick et unius bretaschie 51. 7s. 11d. Pipe Rolls, 20 Henry II. As domus is a word very commonly used for a keep, it is probable this expenditure refers to a wooden keep.

2 From information received from Mr Harold Sands. There appears to be no foundation whatever for the curious ground plan given by Parker. 8 See ante, p. 42.

"Willelmus comes fecit illud castellum in wasta terra quæ vocatur Mereston." D. B., i., 183.

Mon. Ang., vi., 349.

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WIGMORE-WINCHESTER

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a small manor of two taxable hides in Saxon times. Whereas it had then been unproductive, at the date of the Survey there were two ploughs in the demesne, and the borough attached to the castle yielded 77. Here we have another instance of the planting of a borough close to a castle, and of the revenue which was thus obtained.

There is a very large and high motte at Wigmore Castle, of oval shape, on a headland which has been cut off by a deep ditch. The earthen banks of its first fortification still remain, enclosing a small ward, but on top of them is a wall in masonry, and the ruins of a polygonal keep; also the remains of two mural towers. Half-way down the end of the headland, below the motte, is a small square court, which may have been the original bailey; below it, again, is a larger half-moon bailey furnished with walls and towers. But the whole area covered is only 1 acre. The masonry is none of it earlier than the Decorated period, except one tower in the bailey wall which may be late Norman.

WINCHESTER, Hants. Hants. We include Winchester among the castles mentioned or alluded to in Domesday Book, because we think it can be proved that the domus regis mentioned under Alton and Clere is the castle built by William outside the west gate of the city, where the present County Hall is now almost the only remaining relic of any castle at all. Under the head of "Aulton" we are told that the abbot of

2

1 This keep rests on a broad extension of the earthen rampart, similar to what is still to be seen in the mottes of Devizes, Burton-in-Lonsdale, and William Hill, Middleham.

2 Ordericus says: "Intra moenia Guentæ, opibus et munimine nobilis urbis et mari contiguæ, validam arcem construxit, ibique Willelmum Osberni filium in exercitu suo precipuum reliquit." II., 166. The intra mania is not to be taken literally, any more than the mari contigua. It is strange that Mr Freeman should have mistaken Guenta for Norwich, since under 1067 Ordericus translates the Winchester of the A.-S. C. by Guenta.

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