Page:Medieval Military Architecture in England (volume 1).djvu/88

 72 MedicBval Military Architecture in England, other by its rectangular Norman keep. The Hall at Win- chester, though of very early English date, is after the Norman type, having three aisles. The castle was the prison of Archbishop Stigand in 1066. Before its gates, in, 1075, Earl Waltheof was beheaded. Here, in 1 102, was tried the memorable dispute for precedence between York and Canterbury. In 1141 it was defended by the Empress Maud, and here Henry H. held several Parliaments, and Coeur de Lion paused when in the adjacent cathedral he was a second time crowned on his return from captivity in 11 89. Scarcely second to Winchester in strength, and its equal in undefined antiquity, is Old Sarum, a hold of mixed but uncertain origin, where the concentric lines of masonry, girdling and crowning the central mound, included the cathedral of the diocese, and to which, according to the historians of Wiltshire, King Alfred caused an exterior bank and palisade to be added. In Wilts was also the Devizes, reputed the finest castle on this side the Alps. " Divisse quod erat Salesberiensis Episcopi castellum, mirando artificio, sed et munimine inexpugnabili firmatum," but of which there now remains little besides the gigantic mound and profound ditches. Of Marlborough the burh alone remains, while of Malmesbury, an encroachment of the secular upon the lands of the regular clergy, all traces are removed. Over the Hampshire border is Old Basing, where the Saxons were worsted by the Danes in a pitched battle in 871, which became the " caput " of the fifty-five lordships held by Hugh de Port in " Domesday," and afterwards of the St. John's oldest barony. Even in the time of Henry II. it was called the old castle, and in a rather later reign Robert, Lord St. John, had a licence to fix a pale along the base of his mote at Basing, and to maintain it so fortified during the king's pleasure. The original circle of earthwork is nearly all that now remains. At no great distance is Odiham, once a possession of the see of Winchester, where is an early tower, stripped of its ashlar, and surrounded by marshy ground once famous for its forest sport. Castle Coombe was a famous and very early Wiltshire castle, now reduced nearly to an earthwork, and Warblington, a stronghold of the Montacutes, and the castle of Cirencester are both gone, the latter de- stroyed by Henry III. Still further to the west are the castles of Dorset and Somerset, Devon and Cornwall. Wareham, the ancient Frome-mouth, placed between the Frome and the Piddle, once marked the limits of Poole harbour, and was a place of great strength and fame. As early as 876 its west side, the