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 A HISTORY OF WARWICKSHIRE The extant remains of the castle consist primarily of a flat topped oval artificial mound surrounded by a ditch, covering altogether an area of about 2 acres ; a raised bank of earth crossing the ditch to the south- west connects this moated ' keep ' with its accompanying courtyard. At 250 feet distance beyond this entrance another ditch runs across the flat top of the hill from north-west to south-east ; this appears to have formed a division between two courtyards, an outer and an inner one. The defences which formerly encircled these courts are now barely traceable, for the earthern ramparts have in the course of ages gradually been demolished and the ditches become filled ; indeed, so far back as ^>/nm^ ' Path, :// BEAUDESERT SCALE or FEET 100 ZOO 250 years ago Dugdale wrote : ' The Trenches themselves, notwith- standing their great Depth and Widenesse, are so filled up, as that the Plough hath Sundry Times made Furrows in every part of them to the Great Advantage of the industrious Husbandman whose Pains through the Ranknesse of the Soil hath been richly rewarded with many a plentifull Crop.' There are now no signs of stonework to be seen, though Dug- dale's words that ' there is not only any one Stone visibly left upon another' would seem to imply that in his day there were some remnants of masonry extant upon the mount. 1 The limits of the present article do not admit i Dugdale's Wane., pp. 559-65 ; Burgess in Brit. Arch. Assoc. Journ. (1873), p. 41 ; Turner'sS^/. Land, p. 191 j Timmins's Wane. p. 235 ; Hannett's forest of Arden (1863) p. 158. 356