Horncastle Castle (The Gatehouse Record)

In the civil parish of Horncastle.
In the historic county of Lincolnshire.
Modern Authority of Lincolnshire.
1974 county of Lincolnshire.
Medieval County of Lincolnshire.

OS Map Grid Reference: TF258695
Latitude 53.20837° Longitude -0.11818°

Horncastle Castle has been described as a probable Fortified Manor House.

There are masonry ruins/remnants remains.

This site is a scheduled monument protected by law.
This is a Grade 1 listed building protected by law*.

Comments

Horncastle is a river crossing, and was a major Saxon town, with a mint. The manor house is within the Roman fortified town. The strength of the C3 walls in C12 is debatable, but they were still up to 4yds high in the early C18. There must be a possibility of some form of C11 or C12 defensive structure here based on the Roman walls. It is clear that the 'castel' mentioned by Leland was the Roman town but Camden was writing about structure being razed in the C12. Is it possible that the Roman walls were in such good condition that they needed no improvement in the medieval period and there are therefore no obvious medieval defensive works? The Bishop of Carlisle had a residential manor here, although only from the C13. This manor house was in the north-west corner of the circuit of the Roman wall. Horncastle was held by the de Condet family in the C12 who certainly had a residence here, probably in the same place. Given their baronial status it is entirely possible their manor house was defensible, although there is nothing to suggest it was isolated from the rest of the town by either a stone wall or significant earthworks.
See also Thorngate.

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Scheduled Monument Number 1005034, Legacy Scheduled Monument Number li44
National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1262720 , 1251668
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 43886 (medieval settlement).

Books
- Osborne, Mike, 2010, Defending Lincolnshire: A Military History from Conquest to Cold War (The History Press) p. 32
  King, D.J.C., 1983, Castellarium Anglicanum (London: Kraus) Vol. 1 p. 265 (reject)
  Renn, D.F., 1973 (2 edn.), Norman Castles of Britain (London: John Baker) p. 206
  Harvey, Alfred, 1911, Castles and Walled Towns of England (London: Methuen and Co)
  Walter, J.C., 1908, A History of Horncastle from the earliest period to the present time (Horncastle: W.K. Morton and Sons) p. 11-12 online transcription
Periodical Articles
- Corder, P., 1955, 'The reorganization of the defences of Romano-British towns in the fourth century' The Archaeological Journal Vol. 112 p. 38-9 online copy
Primary (Medieval documents or transcriptions of such documents - This section is far from complete and the secondary sources should be consulted for full references.)
- Dugdale, 1675, The Baronage of England Vol. 1 p. 39
  Foster, C.W. (ed), 1931, The 'Registrum antiquissimum' of the cathedral church of Lincoln (Hereford: Lincoln Record Society 27) Vol. 1 p. 287
Antiquarian (Histories and accounts from late medieval and early modern writers)
- Camden, Wm, 1607, Britannia hypertext critical edition by Dana F. Sutton (2004)
  Chandler, John, 1993, John Leland's Itinerary: travels in Tudor England (Sutton Publishing) p. 304
  Toulmin-Smith, Lucy (ed), 1910, The itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535-1543 (London: Bell and Sons) Vol. 5 p. 34, 35 online copy
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Historic England, 2016, Heritage at Risk East Midlands Register 2016 (London: Historic England) p. 24 online copy
  Historic England, 2015, Heritage at Risk East Midlands Register 2015 (London: Historic England) p. 25 online copy
  English Heritage, 2014, Heritage at Risk Register 2014 East Midlands (London: English Heritage) p. 24 online copy
  English Heritage, 2013, Heritage at Risk Register 2013 East Midlands (London: English Heritage) p. 25 online copy
  English Heritage, 2012, Heritage at Risk Register 2012 East Midlands (London: English Heritage) p. 39 online copy
  English Heritage, 2011, Heritage at Risk Register 2011 East Midlands (London: English Heritage) p. 36 online copy
  English Heritage, 2010, Heritage at Risk Register 2010 East Midlands (London: English Heritage) p. 30 online copy
  English Heritage, 2009, Heritage at Risk Register 2009 East Midlands (London: English Heritage) p. 39 online copy

Most of the sites or buildings recorded in this web site are NOT open to the public and permission to visit a site must always be sought from the landowner or tenant.
It is an offence to disturb a Scheduled Monument without consent. It is a destruction of everyone's heritage to remove archaeological evidence from ANY site without proper recording and reporting.
Don't use metal detectors on historic sites without authorisation.

The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

*The listed building may not be the actual medieval building, but a building on the site of, or incorporating fragments of, the described site.

Data >		County HER	Scheduling	Listing	I. O. E.
Maps >	Streetmap	NLS maps	Where's the path	Old-Maps
Data/Maps >	Magic	V. O. B.	Geology	LiDAR	Open Domesday
Air Photos >	Bing Maps	Google Maps	Getmapping	ZoomEarth
Photos >	CastleFacts	Geograph	Flickr	Panoramio