Podington Motte (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Puddington Manor Farm

In the civil parish of Podington.
In the historic county of Bedfordshire.
Modern Authority of Bedfordshire.
1974 county of Bedfordshire.
Medieval County of Bedfordshire.

OS Map Grid Reference: SP943629
Latitude 52.25607° Longitude -0.62029°

Podington Motte has been described as a certain Timber Castle, and also as a probable Masonry Castle.

There are earthwork remains.

Comments

Lowerre (2005) rejects this as a castle based on his definition of early Norman castles. The opinion of Gatehouse is that his definition is far to narrow to be useful and would, if applied nationally, exclude the vast majority of castles.
The suggestion by Pevsner that the motte and bailey type castle had 'an outer enclosure large enough to circumscribe the whole village' has been dismissed.
Although the earthworks are eroded it seems likely this was never a particularly strong castle, with a low mound and relatively slight baileys.

Sources of information, references and further reading

Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 347151.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 81.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- Wikipedia entry
Books
- Petre, James Scott, 2012, The Castles of Bedfordshire (Lavenham: Lavenham Press for Shaun Tyas) p. 72-3
  Lowerre, A.G., 2005, Placing Castles in the Conquest. Landscape, Lordship and Local Politics in the South-Eastern Midlands, 1066-1100 (Oxford: John and Erica Hedges Ltd: BAR British Series 385) p. 222
  Salter, Mike, 2002, The Castles of The Thames Valley and The Chilterns (Malvern: Folly Publications) p. 15
  Pettifer, A., 1995, English Castles, A guide by counties (Woodbridge: Boydell Press) p. 4 (slight)
  King, D.J.C., 1983, Castellarium Anglicanum (London: Kraus) Vol. 1 p. 6
  Pevsner, Nikolaus, 1968, Bedfordshire and the County of Huntingdon and Peterborough p. 135
  Wadmore, Beauchamp, 1920, The Earthworks of Bedfordshire (Bedford) p. 165-7
  Page, Wm (ed), 1912, 'Parishes: Podington and Hinwick' VCH Bedfordshire Vol. 3 p. 83 online transcription
  Harvey, Alfred, 1911, Castles and Walled Towns of England (London: Methuen and Co)
Periodical Articles
- Baker, D., 1982, 'Mottes, Moats and ringworks in Bedfordshire: Beauchamp Wadmore revisited' Château Gaillard Vol. 9-10 p. 35-54 (plan)
  Dyer, J.F., 1962-3, 'Bedfordshire Earthworks VIII, The Castles: Part One' Bedfordshire magazine Vol. 8 no. 63 p. 348
  Clark, G.T., 1889, 'Contribution towards a complete list of moated mounds or burhs' The Archaeological Journal Vol. 46 p. 197-217 esp. 199 online copy
  Clark, 1880, The Builder Vol. 38 p. 250
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Lowerre, A.G., 2004, Placing Castles in the Conquest. Landscape, Lordship and Local Politics in the South-Eastern Midlands, 1066-1100 (PhD thesis: Boston College) p. 462-3

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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.
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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.

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