More information : (SJ 337078) Caus Castle (NR) (Remains of) (NAT).(1)
Caus Castle takes its name from the Pays de Caux in Normandy, the ancestral home of the builder Roger Fitz Corbet. It may have superseded a near-by pre-Conquest settlement, as well as an earlier ring-work, at Hawcocks Mount (SJ 30 NW 4). The original castle consisted of a motte and bailey aligned north-east to south-west with the motte at the south-west end. The transition from a timber to stone castle probably commenced in 1198 and by 1400 there were inner and outer baileys (see plan) with gates, towers, postern and barbican. The castle was occupied and kept in repair until the civil war, when after being garrisoned for the King in 1645, it was surrendered and demolished. Remains of a tower with sandstone dressings are extant on the motte and there are foundations of a curtain wall to the inner bailey with an ashlar-lined well in the ditch between the two. To the south-west of the bailey are the foundations of a rectangular building, 75 feet long and 25 feet wide, which was probably the great hall. At the north-eastern gateway of the bailey part of one of the D-shaped towers is still standing.(1-4)
(SJ 337 078). The motte is 15.0 metres high with a summit diameter of 14.0 metres and the bailey encloses an area of 1 acre. Building foundations remain on the motte and within the bailey. The well is still extant. The whole castle is defended by double banks averaging 3.0 metres high. Walling at the western entrance is probably the remains of a Medieval gateway.
Published survey 1:2500 revised.(5)
Castle Scheduled: Salop No.68.(6)
Caus Castle was originally built at the nearby Hawcock's Mount, (literally a corruption of `Old Caus Mound'. Barker suggests that the new site was originally an Iron Age hillfort, but cites no evidence to support that assumption. (7)
SJ 338 079. Cause Castle (sic). Scheduled. (8)
The Medieval motte and bailey of Caus Castle, and the adjacent earthworks of Caus Borough were seen as earthworks and mapped from aerial photographs during the Marches Uplands Mapping Project. Ridge and furrow field of probable Medieval date are visible within (and in the fields surrounding) the castle. Located at SJ 3363 0813, SJ 3404 0780 and SJ 3389 0797. (Morph No. MU.31.2-6)
(9-10)
General description and history. (11)
Listed by Cathcart King. (12)
SJ 3377 0789: The motte and bailey castle was constructed in the late 11th or early 12th century in the south eastern sector of an Iron Age hillfort . It is a small multivallate hillfort, rectangular in plan, situated south east of Long Mountain. Its defensive area is around 4.7 hectares and was originally probably the home of a large Iron Age settlement. Its defenses and entrances were redefined and strengthened during the medieval period and further altered by later stone quarrying activities. (see also SJ 30 NE 26 for documentary evidence of burh). The surrounding area within the hillfort was regarded as the outer bailey of the castle and it was here that the borough of Caus was established (see SJ 30 NW 9). Scheduled.(13) |