THE city of Carlisle appears first early in the ninth century, in the history of Nennius, as Cair-Luadiit, or Luilid, or the Castra Luguballia, one of the “octo et viginti civitates ... cum innumeris castellis ex lapidibus et lateribus fabricatis,” enumerated by that respectable authority. The fame of Carlisle, however, is due neither to this early mention, nor to the subsequent gift of the place by King Ecgfrid to St. Cuthbert, but rather to its name as a centre of the early cycle of Arthurian romance, well supported by its subsequent celebration in Border tales and ballads. Indeed, whether in fable or in fact, Carlisle enjoys no mean reputation. It played a part in the British, Roman, Saxon, and Danish occupations of the island, and, after having been held as a frontier fortress, by the Scots against the English, became, in its turn, the great stronghold of northern England against the Scots, and the scourge of the wild tribes of the debatable land.

City and castle are naturally strong. The castle occupies a bluff, projecting towards the north, in a position which no doubt created its early, and caused its long-continued importance. Across its front flows the deep and rapid Eden, here seven miles from the sands, and a score from its final disappearance in the Firth of the Solway. Above the city, and covering its eastern flank, the Petterill comes down to reinforce the Eden, which river, close below the city and beneath its walls, receives, by two branches, the waters of the Caldew, which thus covers the flank of the post towards the west.

The city, so protected on the three sides on which it was most liable to be attacked, is built upon ground about 60 feet above the Eden, and which, slightly rising, terminates to the north in the prominence occupied by the castle, and which no doubt is the site of the “Caer,” whence, whether of British or Roman origin, the city derives the first half of its name.

Luguballia, or Caer Luel, does not stand upon, but about a mile within, the line of the Roman wall. This great work, coming from the direction of Wallby, and in the line of Linstock and Drawdykes, passed by Stanwix, across the river, to terminate on the Solway, at Dykesfield, near Burgh-upon-Sands.

The castle occupies the northern, highest, and strongest part of the city, about 60 feet above the river. It is built upon the New Red Sandstone rock, and to the east, north, and west the slopes are very steep towards the meads, which fringe to a considerable breadth the left bank of the Eden, and the right of the Caldew. In plan the castle area is nearly a right-angled triangle, of which the right angle is to the south-west, and the long side, somewhat convex, and 256 yards in length, is presented towards the north and east. Of the other sides, that towards the city on the south is 200 yards, and that to the west 143 yards in length. The space within the walls is rather under three acres.

The outer defence towards the city is an artificial ditch, 240 yards long, 30 yards broad, and about 10 yards deep, cut across the high ground from slope to slope, and stopped at each end by the wall connecting the city with the castle, which thus, though an independent work, is made to form part of the general enceinte. Between the castle and the city is an open space, about 78 yards broad, which contains the ditch and a broad glacis, and which, with the castle, lies outside the municipal boundary. On the west side, about 45 yards within this boundary, is Irishgate Brow, the site of the Irish gate of the city. The Scottish gate stood on a somewhat similar position on the east side; and the third or English gate, guarded by the citadel, was at the opposite or south end of the city.

The castle is composed of an outer and an inner ward, the keep standing in the latter. The inner ward forms the eastern end or apex of the area, of which it occupies about a fifth, and it is divided from the outer ward by a cross wall, 90 yards long, upon the low salient of which is the inner gatehouse. The other sides of this ward are the east, 96 yards, and the south, 73 yards. The keep stands in the south-west angle, about 20 feet from the two adjacent curtains, of which the south is thrown out about 18 feet to gain space, and to form a shoulder flanking the outer gate.

The main entrance is from the city in the middle of the south front, 40 yards west of the keep, through the great gatehouse. The drawbridge across the ditch was removed in the last century, and is replaced by a bridge of stone, which crosses the ditch and leads up to the gatehouse, called John de Ireby’s or Irby’s tower. It opens into the outer ward.

The plan of this gatehouse is peculiar. It may be conveniently described as a plain structure, 44 feet square and of 20 feet projection in front of the line of the curtain. It is composed of a basement and upper floor, but the entrance, instead of passing, as usual, through the centre of the building, is at its east end. The south-east angle of the building is hollow, forming a nook or recess of 18 feet each way, the two outer sides being walls 6 feet thick, and about half the height of the main building. These walls are provided with parapets, front and rear, so as to form a covered way, which communicates with the east curtain. In front of this inclosure is the outer gate, of 11 feet opening, with a drop-pointed arch, placed in a sunk square-headed panel, intended to lodge the drawbridge when lifted. This entrance leads into an open chamber 12 feet square, commanded by its outer walls. It is, in fact, a barbican, niched in a hollow angle of the gatehouse, with outer walls the height of the curtain. The barbican leads to a second archway, with a portcullis in a square groove, and a gate. Then follows a vaulted passage ending in another gate which opens into the ward. In the passage, on the left, is a lancet doorway opening upon a rising well-staircase, and beyond it a drop-arched door opening into the lodge. On the right hand is a shoulder-headed door, which leads, or did lead, into a staircase. In the front wall of the gatehouse are two corbels, which seem to have carried a small oriel or bartisan, commanding the approach. Appended to the east side of the gatehouse, but entirely within the ward, is a smaller building, fitted on obliquely, as though an addition.

Entering the outer ward, the well is seen at 40 yards’ distance. The buildings within the ward are modern, of various degrees of ugliness, and painfully substantial. Some are detached and harmless; others are built into the old curtain, so as to conceal and more or less injure it. The curtain, which is extremely curious, and most of it original, is best seen from the outside. Besides the gatehouse, it carries but one mural tower,—an original one, open in the gorge, in the centre of the west front.

The gatehouse of the inner ward is placed upon the salient and central point of the cross curtain. It is called the Captain’s Tower. It is rectangular, or nearly so, about 32 feet each way, with a projection from the curtain of 18 feet. There is one floor above the portal, which is central. The gateway is a low drop arch, flanked by a pair of buttresses. The passage is vaulted, and has a door at each end, and at the inner end also a portcullis. Over the outside of the inner gateway is a ring of tracery, unusual, but effective. Much of this gatehouse is Decorated, but the buttresses seem Norman.

There was originally a ditch in front of this wall, and a gate with a drawbridge, all now gone. In later days, a small half-moon battery was thrown up about 8 yards in advance of this gate, and protected by a ditch of its own. This battery was connected by a light field-work, which extended from it to the outer gatehouse, laid in a zigzag form, so as to cover and protect a communication between the two gates, supposing the outer ward to have been breached and entered from the north-west side. These works have been removed and the ground made level.

The cross wall of the inner ward is original, strong, and well built, and backed by a ramp of earth and masonry, containing casemates, one of which has a Perpendicular doorway. These were no doubt added, perhaps by Henry VIII., to enable the wall to carry cannon. In the front of this wall, a little north of the gatehouse, is a large pointed arch of late Norman aspect, now walled up, and which may have been the original entrance.

The Keep is rectangular, 66 feet north and south, by 61 feet east and west, and at present only 68 feet high. It is very plain. There is the common high and stepped plinth, from which rise pilasters, 12 feet broad and 1 foot projection, two on each face, meeting at and covering each angle, which is solid. The walls do not batter, but are reduced slightly by one set-off, at a different level on each face. The window-cases, though in the original positions, are not original. The parapet has been removed, and the summit thus lowered, vaulted and converted into a platform for guns laid en barbette. The south wall is 8 feet thick, the west rather more, and the east and adjacent part of the north wall, 15 feet. The interior contains a basement and two upper floors. It is divided by the usual cross wall, laid north and south. The presumption is greatly in favour of this wall being a part of the original design; it has, however, been so much altered that it is difficult to speak positively as to its age or original height. The entrance is at the ground level, at the north end of the east face. It has a portcullis, probably the work of Edward I.; from its jamb on the left, a straight stair ascends in the east wall to the south-east angle of the first floor, as at Chepstow and Ludlow. The basement has been subdivided into four compartments, which are vaulted in stone. One is a passage against the north wall, terminating in a well-stair in the north-west angle. This stair, now disused, is original, and led to the first floor, but probably no higher. From the passage doors open on the left into two vaults, parted by the cross wall of the building. The east vault is one chamber; the west subdivided by a cross wall into two, the inner entered through the outer. The vaulting is a plain pointed barrel, very evidently an insertion. In the smaller vaults are late stone seats. One of the doorways is of Perpendicular date. These vaults were evidently prisons, intended no doubt for the custody of Border reivers, and probably a late addition. In the north wall is a recess connected with the well.

The first floor, about 16 feet high, is vaulted in modern brick, and used as a mess-room. In its north side was a very large fireplace, flanked by Norman columns; but this is now walled up. This floor is now entered solely from the south-east angle, but formerly had also a door near the north-west corner, from the well-stair. There is also a door near the south-west angle, which opens into a second well-stair, which probably led to the upper floors and the battlements. This is now closed, and there is no direct way from the first to the upper floors.

The second floor is reached, at this time, by an exterior door in the west wall, approached by an exterior stair on the north face, and from the rampart on the east. This door is not original, and has been broken through at the place of a recess, probably looped, which led from the second floor into a mural chamber and garderobe in the east wall, and which are seen on the right hand of the door on entering. This second floor is about 16 feet high, and has a timber ceiling. In the east wall, over the present entrance door, is a mural chamber, on the walls of which are some curious carvings by prisoners. One represents the Percy crescent and fetterlock, and another a coat of arms. From this floor a ladder leads through a trap into the upper floor—a modern arrangement.

The third or upper floor is vaulted in modern brick to support the gun platform above. This platform is formed of large slabs of stone, laid down in 1812, which may also be the date of the vault. The walls above are 11 feet thick all round.

The well of the keep is reputed to be Roman, though this is quite as likely to be true of the larger one in the outer ward. When the keep was built, the well, whether new or old, was included within the north wall, between the doorway and the north-east angle, and its pipe was carried up in the wall, no doubt with a lighted chamber at each floor, as indicated by a line of loops still seen in the wall. To make the well available when the keep was shut up as a prison, a hole was cut in the outside of the north wall, near the ground level, into the pipe of the well, and through this the water is still drawn up. The well is 78 feet deep, and its present cill is 92 feet above the sea level.

A curious external stair, probably Edwardian, has been built against the north face of the keep, and leads up, by the well, to the ramparts of the curtain, and so to the door of the second floor of the keep. No doubt its original use was to lead to the ramparts only.

The keep, though much disfigured to make it carry artillery, and much obscured by its conversion into prisons, a mess-room, and store-rooms, is for the most part original, and if cleared, as it should be, of the vaultings of the upper floors, would be a tolerably perfect specimen of a Norman keep, with a full share of mural chambers and appendages.

The hall and other domestic buildings, including what was called Queen Mary’s Tower, most of which were standing at the close of the last century, were ranged at the south-east angle, upon the adjacent walls, as shown in Grose’s view. All are now gone save a fragment of panelled work, part of the shell of a grand staircase of early Edwardian date, which led to the chief apartments.

It appears that in the east wall, near its south end, and, therefore, under the midst of these apartments, was, in the last century, a Norman postern with chevron mouldings and a portcullis groove, leading from the inner ward into the field, independent of the city. These details are shown in some of the late views of the castle. Grose, in 1774, shows, obscurely, the position and size of the gateway, and the Norman pilasters by which the adjacent wall was strengthened. The upper part of this curtain seems to have been Early English. All about this angle is now modern.

The space between the keep and its adjacent curtains has been filled up with earth, kept off from the keep by a sort of area wall, and thus the ramparts here, as well as along the cross wall, are made wide enough for cannon. The upfilling is modern, and should be cleared out.

A walk, called the “Castle Walk,” or Castle Bank, has been laid out at the foot of the curtain outside, whence its details may be conveniently studied. The south-east angle, as has been said, is modern, but proceeding north and westward the old Norman part comes into view, and on the north side of the inner ward the Norman pilasters are seen rising from a plinth, but partly concealed by six enormous stepped buttresses of great projection, and Decorated or Perpendicular date, no doubt a great support to the wall and very curious, but, in a military point of view, very much in the way.

From near the centre of the north front there was a spur work, composed of a strong curtain wall, carried down the slope and ending in a round tower. This was of course intended to annoy the enemy should he attack on the west side. The whole is now removed: possibly it was an Edwardian addition. The north face of the curtain and its north-west corner have been much restored in the Decorated period, but most of the west wall is original. Near its centre is a small tower, like the Alnwick Garret Tower, 28 feet broad by 18 feet deep, and about 9 feet projection, and open at the gorge. It is wholly Norman, of the date of the keep. It has a stepped plinth about 10 feet high, with six sets-off of 2 inches each, and on the front face is a central pilaster, dying into the wall at the base of the original parapet. In its north face, high up, is the shoot of a garderobe flush with the face of the wall, and lower down a stone water-spout. About 10 yards south of this tower are traces of a small postern. The wall connecting the castle with the city on this side is of Norman origin; but has some buttresses apparently Edwardian, in one of which is a garderobe shoot, similar to that of the garret tower. Upon this wall, south of the ditch, is King Richard III.’s, or Tile Tower, 26 feet broad by 20 feet deep, of no internal projection. This looks Edwardian, but probably is altered from Norman. It stands about 30 yards north of the city boundary. It is said that a few years ago a subterranean passage was discovered between this tower and the keep, and was at once closed up. This is stated in the “History of Carlisle, 1838,” and should be true, but it seems improbable, for the passage must have dipped deep to pass under the ditch.

The south wall of the castle is for the most part original, the Norman pilasters being seen east and west of the gatehouse. East again of these, as far as the keep, the wall seems Edwardian, but beyond that, where it belongs to the inner ward, it is Norman.

The wall between the south-east angle of the castle and the city, about 90 yards long, is mixed Norman and Edwardian, and as it crosses the ditch it makes a zigzag or shoulder, in which is a large round-headed postern gateway, either original or in the place of an original opening, intended, probably, to allow of cattle being driven on to the esplanade and ditch from the meads on the approach of an enemy. Probably there was a way from this gate along what is called the Lady’s Walk, at the foot of the south wall, as far as the great gate. South of this postern, near what is called the city stone, are traces of a large bastion, probably a part of the city defences. The postern is now walled up, and a bank of earth raised against it behind.

The enceinte wall of the castle, being built against the natural slope, is outside about 28 feet and inside 18 feet high. It varies from 8 feet to 10 feet thick.

The plan of the castle—a headland converted into a detached camp by a cross ditch—may be British or English, but the general outline of the masonry, which follows the line of the earthworks, is Norman. The Norman engineer evidently built the enceinte wall along the edge of the slope, and planned the inner and outer ward, and the keep. The castle is generally attributed to William Rufus, who was here in 1092, when Carlisle, from a Scottish, became an English frontier place. The see was created by Henry I., and the first bishop consecrated in 1133, when probably the city wall, of which a part may still be seen below the deanery, was built. Carlisle was taken by the Scots, and besieged by Stephen and by John. The latter sovereign was here four times in the years 1201–6-8, and 1212. In 1204 the constable of Chester was ordered sixty marcs for fortifying the castle. In 1205 certain grass cut in the neighbourhood was to be stored there. In 1215 Robert de Ros was custos of the castle, but in 1216 Robert de Vipont seems to have been in charge of the repairs and the garrison.

In 1222 Henry III. ordered the houses within the castle to be repaired, and two ballistÆ of horn and two of wood were to be sent there. Walter Mauclerc was in charge. In 1222 the garrison was continued, and in the king’s pay.

Edward I. used Carlisle in the Scottish wars, and was here in 1293, after the great fire, which much injured both city and castle in the preceding year. Between 1293 and 1307, he was here seven times, often for many days. He kept his last birthday here in 1307, and went forth hence to die in the immediate neighbourhood. To his reign are to be attributed most of the Edwardian additions, repairs of the wall and keep, the gatehouses, and the domestic buildings, of which only traces remain. In 1302, Bishop Hatton, then governor, expended £275. 4s. 11d. in works. The Great Hall, supposed to have been then erected, needed repairs in 1344.

Camden says that Richard III. repaired the castle, and the six marvellous buttresses may be of that date, though they look earlier. Henry VIII. appears to have much altered the castle, probably to make it carry artillery. He built a block-house or citadel at the south end of the city, and armed it with cannon, and he repaired the city walls. His work was probably done in haste, for, in 1563, the whole was in great decay, as appears from a survey made by the queen’s order, printed by Grose. Three sides of the keep were in a dangerous state. The Captain’s Tower wanted parapets, as did much of the inner curtain, and all the glass of the great hall and great chamber was decayed. In the outer ward was an open breach, 70 feet long, where the wall had fallen in 1557. The result of this survey was the building a chapel and barrack, and no doubt the reparation of the wall and keep.

Mary Queen of Scots found some sort of accommodation here when she fled from Scotland, and gave name to the lodgings lately pulled down. The castle suffered somewhat during the great rebellion, but escaped being dismantled. It was battered from the west, and taken by the Duke of Cumberland in 1745.

Probably the greatest and most destructive changes are those of modern date. The hall was taken down in 1827, and the chapel and other buildings in 1835.

There are traces of two light field-works in the meads north of the castle, the smaller in the rear of the other, evidently prepared for the reception of the Scots, in 1745, as they approached over the brow at Stanwix.

The castle is far too confined and too much a part of the city for the purpose to which it is applied. The military should be removed, the modern buildings cleared away, the keep restored, and the area laid out for the pleasure of the people of Carlisle, and so as to show off the remains to the greatest advantage.

In the neighbourhood of Carlisle are other military works deserving notice. Such is, at Hayton, Castle Hill, a mound 12 feet high, and 100 feet diameter at the top. Linstock Castle was built before 1133, but is now little more than a farmhouse, into which it was converted in 1768. Scaleby Castle was built by Robert de Tilliol, who had licence to crenellate it in 1307. It was largely repaired in 1596, but retains much of its original character, and has always been inhabited. Naworth Castle was the chief seat of the English Barony of Gillsland, at the Conquest granted to Hubert de Vaux, from whom it descended through the Dacres to the Howards. The present structure was the work of Ralph Lord Dacre, in 1335, and is a good example of the quadrangular castles of that date. Rose Castle was in the Barony of Dalston, and is attributed to 1336, when Bishop Kirby had a licence to crenellate. It was also a moated quadrangle. Highhead Castle, on the Ive, is drawn by Buck. Here was a castle in 1326, but the licence is dated in 1342. The castle was rebuilt in 1714. Dalston Hall is a castellated house, probably of the middle of the fourteenth century.

The Roman wall may be traced at various points, both east and west of the passage of the Eden. It is well seen in a field close to Drawdykes, a stiff, square farmhouse, built on the site of a Roman Castellum. The inscription “Diis Manibus,” built into its walls, is said to have been dug up in Carlisle, near the old citadel.