More information : SE 7544 8930. Castle Mound (NR).
SE 7548 8930. Cropton Hall (NR) (site of). (1)
Cropton Castle consists of a much reduced motte (2) 20ft high x 50yds diameter (3) with a triangular bailey covering some three acres to the east (4). Mentioned in 1334 but ruinous by 1349. Within the bailey are well-defined foundation mounds of domestic buildings including a rectangular great hall with smaller apartments at each end (2) probably erected c1290-95 (4). (2-4)
As described. Published Survey (25") Revised. (5)
SE 7550 8929. Cropton Hall Garth: a motte and bailey castle including later medieval manor house, a medieval trackway and a pond. Scheduled RSM Number 20528. (6)
Listed by Cathcart King. (7)
This timber motte and bailey castle was built in the late 1080s or early 1090s by Robert de Stuteville. In circa 1290-5 it was replaced by the manor house. The latter continued to be inhabited until at least the 1600s, but the date of its abandonent for a plot within the village, is unknown.
The motte was erected on the tip of a spur; the circuit of its ditch was seemingly never completed and reliance for defence was instead placed on the steep natural scarps of the promontory and on the earthworks of the surrounding bailey. The soil for raising the motte must therefore have been derived from the defensive landscaping of the promontory to make the bailey, and this therefore presumes that the work on the two went hand in hand.
The whole of the promontory was evidently considered too large an area to defend, so its southern part was omitted from the bailey circuit and instead the edge of the bailey followed a more gentle scarp a little to the north. The main defensive element in the bailey circuit involved the artificial steepening of the natural slopes by cutting them back. An indentation (`A' on the survey) on its south side may indicate a change of plan. The natural defensive position meant that only part of the bailey was provided with an internal bank and external ditch. The entrance appears to have been on the east side, (C,D) but has been obscured by a later building platform.
The construction of the manor house clearly rendered the motte obsolete. This L-shaped building was positioned on an artificially raised platform which partly filled the old motte ditch; one larger room was presumably the hall. Other building sites within the bailey (H,J) and on is perimeter (E,F,G) may belong to this phase.
On abandonment, the manor house was robbed and the area reverted to pasture. Several small banks (P,R,L,M) overlying the ruinous building appear to have divided the promontory up into small compounds, possibly for stock.
The church, a chapel of ease until 1844, probably overlies the castle chapel. Incoherent undulations in the churchyard may suggest that the mediaeval village of Cropton once extended right up to the castle. (8) |