A scholarly exploration of the location of castles in East Anglia. The most populated part of medieval England had relative few castles, but these are often large earthworks, located to be highly visible and often part of wider designed landscapes. With the exception of the handful of early Royal castles Liddiard points out castles were located in poorer land with lower population because of the cost of buying out the many free tenants in East Anglia. A very different view from castles built by military men to impose Norman rule on Saxon England. "Reasons of historical geography, rather than any notions of a strategic defence, go some way to explaining why some parts of East Anglia saw the construction of castles and others did not."