Page:VCH Herefordshire 1.djvu/308

 A HISTORY OF HEREFORDSHIRE

summit being unusually pointed. There is no fosse between the mount and its base-court.^^ The base-court, or bailey, is strong, and has remains of ancient stone- work on the north side. The outer inclosure, probably never of great strength, is now protected by little more than a slight escarpment, and its defences are destroyed for the greater part. The entrance to the keep mount was probably from the walls of the court as at Eye, Suffolk, and elsewhere. It will be noted that the whole position was protected by the stream and natural fall of the land on the north and west. KiLPECK Castle. — This stronghold, situated 7 miles south-west of Hereford, is a typical example of early Norman defensive work, depending originally wholly on earthen entrenchments and timber walls, such as we describe at the commencement of this section. The material of which the mount is formed having little tendency to slip, the slopes are steep, and the same retentive power may have enabled the builders to substitute stone for timber earlier than was usuallv the case. But the fragments of masonry of a shell-keep which remain appear to be of the 13th century, and prob- ably the timber lasted till then. The plan shows the arrange- ment of the castrametation — the conical truncated mount, with its surrounding fosse, varying from 20 ft. to 30 ft. in depth below the summit of the mount, and from 5 ft. to 9 ft. below the level of the adjoining base-court on the east — the base-court protected by a rampart some 18 ft. above its outer fosse, and the second, or outer court, now, owing to modern destruction, retaining only a portion of its rampart in addition to its fosse. An inclosure adjoining the fosse of the mount on the west side will also be noted; it retains its rampart and fosse on the north, but shows now only a scarp on the south and west. There are traces of a platform 1 20 ft. north-west of the castle which may have been a defended inclosure of oval form, 300 ft. by 150 ft., but the tangible evidence is slight.^* Immediately west of the castle is a stream in a deep hollow which no doubt added to the protection of the site. Traces of dams across the hollow indicate either fishponds or, as G. T. Clark thought, a means of creating a series of long and deep lakes rendering approach from the Welsh borders difficult and hazardous. ^° KiNGSLAND Castle. — At a distance of a little over 3 miles north- west of Leominster is the parish church of Kingsland ; 300 ft. west of the '' We are inclined to thinlc the absence of a fosse between mount and court indicative of a comparatively late date of origin of the earthwork, or of an alteration of the original plan. " See plan and description in Trans. Woolhope Field Club (1886-8), 144. " Mediaeval Military Architecture (1884), iii, 163. 240 '<- H '■'♦him''* ^"Z % N. 5.1 5?^- KiLPECK Castle