Holme Lacy earthworks (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
manerio de Hamme; Home Lacy

In the civil parish of Holme Lacy.
In the historic county of Herefordshire.
Modern Authority of Herefordshire.
1974 county of Hereford and Worcester.
Medieval County of Herefordshire.

OS Map Grid Reference: SO567347
Latitude 52.01017° Longitude -2.63034°

Holme Lacy earthworks has been described as a Timber Castle although is doubtful that it was such.

There are earthwork remains.

Description

It has been suggested that the earthworks to the north of St. Cuthbert's Church represent those of 'a motte and bailey castle and later moated platform containing the manor house' (HAN, 70, 3). However, the church is said to occupy the site of an old abbey and it contains some ancient stalls. (Shoesmith)

The hollows in this area appear to be drainage ditches. The land is the flood plain of the River Wye, very flat, and it is doubtful whether a village could have existed here without a great risk of being constantly flooded. (PastScape 110332 undated comment but likely predating the HAN assesment.)

Comments

It should be noted that the risk of constant flooding did not prevent the construction of a church. People have and do live in areas were there is risk of occasional and even regular seasonal flooding particularly if the flooding provides rich agricultural land.
The foundation charter for the abbey of Premonstratensian canons dates from the early years of Henry III although it does not seem the abbey was ever built. The church is recorded in Domesday. This would not exclude the existence of a manor house of any form since manors were the bases of grants to found such houses and this seems to have been a manor of Walter Lacy somehow come into the hands of William fitz Warin (and surplus to his needs). However the earthworks clearly are not significant enough to have caught the attention of earlier writers and surveys and this must make the site somewhat doubtful. That said this would be a typical location for a small motte and later manor and the location in the flood plain of the River Wye is an erosive one suggesting the earthwork were once rather more substantial.

Sources of information, references and further reading

Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 110332 (DMV).
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 6464 (DMV); 6778 (church).

Books
- Shoesmith, Ron, 2009 (Rev edn.), Castles and Moated Sites of Herefordshire (Logaston Press) p. 162
Periodical Articles
- 1999, Herefordshire Archaeological News Vol. 70 p. 3 (plan)
  Halliwell, P.R., 1997, 'Correspondence re Stirling-Brown' Transactions of the Woolhope Naturalists' Field Club Vol. 49.1
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, William (Caley, J., Ellis, H. and Bandinel, B. (eds)), 1817-30 (originally pub. 1655-73), Monasticon Anglicanum (London) Vol. 6.2 p. 935-6 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.

Data >	PastScape	County HER
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