Kenardington

Description

"Below the hill on which Kenardington Church stands and adjoining to it south-east, are the remains of some ancient fortifications, of earth with a breastwork thrown up, and a small circular mound; and in the adjoining marsh below it is another, of larger size, with a narrow ridge or causeway seemingly backing from one to the other" (Plan AO/62/41/7) (Hasted).
Kenardington, Kent, is listed as the presumed site of a shell keep, the evidence for which is imperfect. The remains of Kenardington camp are poor; of its eastern side there remain 600 ft but it evidently extended southward into the adjoining arable fields, where it has been ploughed out, while the piece still visible is no more than an eight foot scarp on the slope towards the valley. Hasted's mounds and 'causeway' are thought to be later than the stronghold, and possibly part of a dam used in "inning" the marshland. The northern arm, about 550 ft in length, is better preserved, but it is not evident how much further it extended towards the west, as the scarping on that side may be comparatively recent work, and the opening in the rampart on the north, though it appears an original entrance, may have been made for farm purposes. Perhaps this camp was never completed, and it may possibly be the Saxon work which the chronicle says was stormed in AD 893 by the Danes, who found only a half-constructed fastness in which a few countrymen were stationed (Clark; Sands; VCH).
The surviving earthworks are as shown on the OS 25". They are simple scarps, three on the north more pronounced than those on the east, and appear to be no more than old field boundaries (F1 ASP 08.03.63). (PastScape)

Below the hill on which the church stands, and adjoining to it south-east, are the remains of some antient fortifications, of earth, with a breast-work thrown up, and a small circular mount; and in the adjoining marsh below it, is another, of a larger size, with a narrow ridge or causeway seemingly leading from one to the other. These works seem to have been thrown up during the wars between king Alfred and the Danes, perhaps about the year 893, when a division of them failed up the river Liment, or Rother, and entrenched themselves in the adjoining parish of Apledore. (Hasted)

This is stated by G. T. Clark in his Medieval Military Architecture, vol. i., p. 146, to have had a shell keep, but his authority for such a statement, or that there was ever a castle there at all, remains unknown. ... The Manor of Home (alias Kennardington) was held of the constable of Dover Castle by castle guard tenure in capite, which may, as in the instances of Borne and Ferle in the adjoining county of Sussex, have given rise to the mistaken idea that there was formerly a castle here, but as the place is not mentioned in Domesday this is uncertain. (Sands, 1903)

Comments

This could be the manorial centre of the DMV of Kenardington. Hasted's history can probably be dismissed but the old description of mounds suggests the current earthworks have been seriously damaged.