WHILE of the rectangular keep there remain many, and some very perfect, examples both in England and Normandy, the SHELL KEEP, though once the most common of the two, has rarely been preserved, and is seldom, if ever, found in a perfect or unaltered condition. There is a difference of opinion as to the date of the introduction of these keeps, whether a little before or a little after the other type. The shell keep, being invariably connected with early earthworks, might be supposed to be the older form; and Arundel, the only castle mentioned in Domesday as existing in the time of the Confessor, has a shell keep; but a tolerably close examination has failed to discover, either at Arundel or elsewhere in England or in Normandy, any masonry of very early character, probably none that can safely be attributed to the eleventh century. The fact seems to be that the early timber structures, which are known to have been erected originally on the moated mounds, were found to be very defensible, and so were retained by the Norman lords until they were able to replace the timber by masonry. The rectangular keeps were either on new sites, or on sites not defended by very strong earthworks, so that their construction, from the first, was in masonry, and thus it came to pass that the shells of masonry, though always connected with the older sites, were of later date than the solid towers. Even at Durham, a castle recorded to have been built by the Conqueror, and of which the keep must always have been on the present mound, though the chapel and connected buildings may be his work, the shell keep contains no Norman masonry; and if, as is to be supposed, there was once a Norman shell, it was probably the work of one of the Conqueror’s sons, or even of Henry II.

A shell keep is always placed upon a mound, either natural or artificial. Of those on natural hills, the most considerable are Belvoir, Durham, and Lewes, but the masonry of the two former is not original, though built upon the old lines. Dunster, the Tor of the early Lords Mohun, has been examined, and the only trace of its keep is a fragment of a drain. Montacute, where the hill is wholly natural, has also been cleared of masonry. But by far the larger number of these mounds are either wholly artificial, or of a mixed character.

In plan and dimensions these keeps are roughly governed by the figure of the mound on which they stand. Most are polygons of ten or twelve sides, not always equal. Some are circular, others polygonal outside and circular within. Others are slightly oval, others more complex in plan. York, for example, approaches to a quatrefoil, 64 feet by 45 feet, and this seems to have been the plan of the long-since destroyed keep of Warwick. Their diameter is rarely less than 30 feet, and seldom exceeds 100 feet.

The wall was usually 8 feet to 10 feet thick, and, as a security against settlement, was generally placed 2 feet to 3 feet within the edge of the mound. Sometimes, as at Lincoln and Tickhill, the walls were strengthened by flat Norman pilasters, but more commonly they were of plain rubble with plinths and angle quoins of ashlar. Cardiff, though without a plinth, has angle quoins, and probably dates from early in the twelfth century. The walls of these keeps were 20 feet to 25 feet high to the rampart walk, which was reached by open interior staircases either of wood or stone. Traces of the latter were visible a few years ago at Cardiff. Such a shell is well suited to be placed upon made ground, which would not have supported a solid mass. At Cardiff, where a heavy tower was long afterwards added, it slipped and fell. The interior of the larger keeps was an open court, around which were placed the buildings—sometimes mere sheds—against the ring wall. Where the keep was large and the castle important, these buildings were permanent, though even in the greater keeps, such as York, timber was largely used. Windsor, before the alterations, contained an open court, as still does the keep of Ledes Castle, which is peculiar in standing upon a small island, completely occupied by it. The present round tower at Windsor, though modern, is built upon the lines of the Edwardian tower, which again was built upon those of a late Norman keep, the foundations of which were laid open by Wyattville, and found to rest upon an artificial mound. Durham keep is said to have been originally open, but to have been closed to accommodate the bishops, who were forced, by the disturbed state of the country, to reside within it. The keep at York, known as Clifford’s tower, is rather Early English than Norman, and probably succeeded a timber structure. It much resembles some of the French keeps built by Philip Augustus. It has a well in the court, turnpike stairs to the ramparts, and a chapel over the entrance, much altered in the Decorated period, and which, as is not uncommon, serves as a portcullis chamber. At Hawarden, a small and close, but very curious keep, the oratory is over the entrance.

Tamworth, rather an Early English than a Norman structure, was long the actual residence of a considerable family. It is still inhabited, and contains some crowded and curious buildings, an open court, and a well. Connected with the keep is an earlier curtain-wall with some herring-bone work. The approach to the keep lies along the rampart of this wall. The actual entrance is a small, plain, pointed doorway. At Lincoln the keep is a mere Norman shell. It is nearly circular, and has two original doorways, one (the larger) opening from the castle area, the other opening upon the outer ditch. The mound stands upon the enceinte line of the place, and at the points at which the two curtains abut upon the keep are two mural chambers, which appear to have been garderobes. At Clare the shell was a polygon of fourteen faces, and at each angle was a buttress, triangular in plan, and of three stages, dying into the wall. The shell was 52 feet internal diameter, and the walls 6 feet thick and 25 feet high, with four tiers of putlog holes. The foundations of this keep are of the unusual depth of 6 feet. There is said to have been an underground chamber, which may be doubted. The material is flint rubble, with ashlar buttresses and dressings, but the actual masonry, though, no doubt, generally on the old lines, does not look later than Edward III., if so old. The mound is 53 feet high, and on the enceinte, and traversed by the curtain. The base is about 870 feet in girth, of which about 600 feet are outside, and 270 feet within the area.

At Alnwick the whole inner ward is a shell keep built upon a natural knoll. The main buildings, being the lord’s lodgings, are built against and form part of the wall, and the centre is an open court. The gatehouse is Norman, and part of the foundations of the wall, but most of the superstructure has been rebuilt twice over, though upon the old lines. There is a well in the wall, probably original, but encased in late Norman masonry. Alnwick being a sort of Castle Dangerous, and always open to sudden attack, the lord habitually lived within the keep, which was far more commodious than usual. Tickhill keep was a decagon, of which the foundations remain, to the top of the plinth, with the base of a flat pilaster capping each angle. The entrance was by a small door, just within which was the well. The mound stands on the enceinte, and the curtain runs up it on each side. About a quarter of the girth is within the castle area, and the rest outside. Part of Pickering keep is standing; it is late and polygonal. Here the mound is central, and stands on the line of a curtain which divides the area into two parts. At Ewyas-Harold, Builth, and Berkhampstead are traces of the foundations of the keep. At Kilpeck part of the wall is standing, and the well was within it, and is probably older than the masonry. Farnham keep is part of an inhabited dwelling, and has not been examined. At Oswestry is a fragment of the masonry, and at Whittington are traces showing that the mound was revetted, and also, in Decorated times, strengthened by four or five large mural drum towers.

The foundations of Tonbridge keep show it to have been a slightly oval polygon, 86 feet by 76 feet, with fifteen external pilasters at the angles, and walls 11 feet 6 inches thick. This is attributed to Bishop Odo, but the noble gatehouse and walls below are later. The mound covers an acre, and is on the enceinte. Arundel has a good plain Norman doorway from the castle court, and an entrance by a gallery in the curtain from the gatehouse. Here is a chapel on the first floor, at the junction of the curtain with the keep, and near it is the well-chamber. The well is outside, and probably older than the keep wall. In the wall is a turnpike stair leading to the ramparts, and near its foot a small subterranean chamber, but both are later than the keep, and insertions. At Oxford the mound contains a crypt, an addition; but here, as at Wallingford, Hinckley, Leicester and Caerleon, the walls are gone, as at Bedford, so celebrated for its siege by Henry III. The mound at Quatford, having been the seat of Earl Roger, was, of course, fortified, though whether by masonry is unknown. There is, however, a deep well, which must have been within the keep. A tunnel and later flight of steps have been cut, and descend through the skirts of the hill from the outer ward. This passage strikes the shaft a few feet above the water level.

Berkeley, on many accounts one of the most interesting castles in England, has a very curious shell keep, built round a mound, which thus fills up the lower stage. The wall, the lower part of which is thus a revetment, is strengthened by three half-round mural towers, one of which contains the well, and above it the chapel. This keep is also remarkable for the forebuilding covering its entrance, which contains a tower over the lower or outer gate, at the foot of the staircase. This castle is known to have been built soon after the accession of Henry II., and, though Norman, is, of course, late in the style; Orford and Chilham, Norman keeps of a peculiar character, also have forebuildings. The keep at Pontefract is very peculiar. The castle covers the table-top of an oval knoll, natural, with precipitous sides of rock. At one end, on the edge of the cliff, is placed the mound, now encased partially in masonry. The masonry begins at the foot of the cliff, as a sort of half-round tower, or rather a cluster of roundlets, built as a retaining-wall. Above, the circle of masonry is completed, includes the mound, and forms the shell keep. The base is honeycombed with passages and chambers, cut in the rock, and partly lined with masonry. In its present condition this keep exhibits masonry of both Decorated and Perpendicular date, but its substance, as also some of its adjacent masonry, is evidently late Norman.

Restormel is rather a round castle than a shell keep, and more Early English than Norman. On the whole, however, it may be classed with the shells. It occupies a natural knoll, and its ring-wall crests the steep slope; against it are the buildings, and within is an open court. Launceston, also, though Early English, belongs to the shell type. It has a central round tower, and a concentric wall much lower, a sort of chemise, the space between the two having been covered in with a flat roof. Possibly Montacute, built by the same lord, may have been after the same pattern; but of Montacute even the ruins have long since perished.

The approach to these keeps seems, in its simplest form, to have been by a wooden bridge over the ditch on the side within the castle, and thence by steps up the mound, as at Lincoln, where, however, they are modern, and the ditch is partially filled up. At Tickhill, and at Hawarden, there is a flight of steps just within, and built against the curtain. At Cardiff recent excavations have disclosed the piles of a timber bridge, which crossed the ditch, and may be older than the remains of the Norman keep. Cardiff, however, thanks to the same excavations, affords an excellent example of the more elaborate approach to a Norman shell keep. Here a thick curtain-wall traversed the court of the castle, and crossing the ditch of the mound was continued up its slope; just within the curtain was a drawbridge across the ditch, beyond which a direct flight of steps led up to the keep. Here, as at Wallingford, the well was on the slope of the mound, just within its ditch. Usually the actual entrance to the keep was by a mere door in the wall, as at Arundel, Lincoln, Tickhill, and Tamworth. At York is a regular gate-house, a part of the shell, which was reached by a very steep bridge, crossing a very formidable wet ditch.

It has been mentioned that these shell keeps, and the mounds on which they stand, are usually upon, and form a part of the enceinte or line of the outer defence of the castle, though isolated from it by their proper ditch, of which the main ditch of the place is commonly a part. This is well shown in the old plans of York Castle, and may be actually seen at Arundel, and many other works both large and small, and in other mounted mounds, such as HÊn-Domen, near Montgomery, and Brinklow, which have never been defended by masonry. It was, of course, necessary to carry the palisade, and afterwards, if constructed, the curtain, across the ditch and up the slope of the mound to the wall of the keep, and even where the mound was central, as at Pickering and Cardiff, it was upon the division line of the two wards, and, therefore, on the line of a curtain. At Berkhampstead the keep seems to have been, not upon, but outside the line of defence, and to have formed a sort of spurwork connected with the main curtain by a single but very thick wall. Arundel, Durham, Lincoln, Tamworth, Tickhill, Tonbridge, Windsor, and Wallingford, are, or were, good examples of shell keeps on the line of the enceinte wall.

Besides any other approaches, it is evident that the curtain was always made use of as one way to the keep, and at Arundel and Tamworth is still so used, the parapet in front and rear protecting the rampart walk. As, however, it was a fundamental rule in Norman castles that the keep, the final retreat, however many its approaches, should have as few entrances as possible, the curtain usually stopped at the top level of the mound, and was continued only as a parapet, so that those who came along the wall had, on reaching the keep, to pass along its outside a greater or less distance before they reached the doorway. This is well seen at Tamworth. At Arundel the wall is raised to the full height of the keep, as at Lincoln, but this is not usual. At Hawarden the curtain is continued 10 feet or 12 feet high, and so abuts upon the keep, but the rampart walk does not communicate with it.

The position of the well in these keeps has already been noticed. At York and Tickhill it is within the area. That at Arundel is in a tower outside the wall, but a part of it. That at Berkeley is also in a tower, a part of the wall. Those of Alnwick and Kilpeck are in the wall itself; those of Cardiff and Wallingford at the foot of the mound, just within the ditch.

It is much to be regretted that so few of these shell keeps remain, even in ruin, and very few, indeed, in a state at all approaching to their original condition, for, as the representatives of a very early form of fortification, and as the chief seats of very ancient estates, and of original English families, they possess a very peculiar interest. Nor are they, when of large size, at all wanting in a noble effect. It is true that upon level ground, as that occupied by the Tower of London, or upon such a ridge as Corfe, or such an elevated platform as Hedingham, the rectangular keep produces a very fine effect, but there are positions in which this is fully equalled by the keeps of the other type. At Durham, where the central tower of the cathedral is equal in grandeur and simplicity to a rectangular keep, it is eclipsed by the adjacent castle. The keep of Belvoir, which, though rebuilt and weak in its details, retains its original outline, would be ill exchanged for the towers even of Norham or Lancaster, and no other structure could be substituted to advantage for the keep of Windsor, crowning and completing its “tiara of proud towers.” Massive as is the rectangular keep, simple, uncompromising, and warlike its features, still, even when seen to its greatest advantage, as on the promontory of Dover or the bold impregnable rock of Bamburgh, it must be confessed to be inferior in grandeur and in completeness of outline to the stern round tower of other days, identified as it is with the early residences of the adventurous Northmen who laid the foundations of the English people.

• Bedfordshire.—Bedford, Clophill, Ridgemount (?), Toddington.
• Berks.—Reading (?), Wallingford, Windsor, Yieldon (?).
• Buckinghamshire.—Buckingham.
• Cambridgeshire.—Burwell (?), Cambridge, Ely.
• Cheshire.—Dunham-Massey, Kinderton (?), Malpas (?), Mold (?).
• Cornwall.—Launceston, Restormel, Trematon, Truro (?).
• Derbyshire.—Sheffield (?).
• Devon.—Barnstaple, Barnton, Plympton, Tiverton (?), Totnes.
• Dorset.—Dorchester (?), Shaftesbury (?), Wareham.
• Durham.—Durham, Elswick (?), Throston, (?), Tunstal (?), The Yoden (?).
• Essex.—Bures (?), Ongar, Plessy.
• Gloucestershire.—Berkeley, Gloucester (?).
• Hampshire.—Basing (?), Carisbrooke, Southampton, Winchester.
• Herefordshire.—Erdesley, Ewyas Harold, Hereford, Kilpeck, Richard’s Castle, Weobley, Wigmore.
• Hertfordshire.—Ansty (?), Berkhampstead, Hertford, Stansted Mount Fitchet, Stortford.
• Huntingdonshire.—Huntingdon.
• Kent.—Haydon Mount (?), Kenardington (?), Ledes, Newington (?), Tunbridge, Tong (?).
• Lancashire.—Gleaston (?), Halton, Penwortham, Robin Hood’s Butt (?).
• Lincolnshire.—Bourne, Lincoln, Stamford.
• Monmouth.—Abergavenny, Caerleon, Crickhowell.
• Northamptonshire.—Fotheringay, Lilbourne (?), Rockingham.
• Northumberland.—Alnwick.
• Oxfordshire.—Oxford.
• Rutland.—Belvoir.
• Salop.—Oswestry, Pulverbatch (?), Quatford, Shrewsbury, Whitchurch, Whittington.
• Somerset.—Castle Carey, Dunster, Montacute, Stoke Courcy.
• Staffordshire.—Chartley, Stafford (?), Tutbury.
• Suffolk.—Clare, Eye, Haughley, Thetford.
• Sussex.—Arundel, Chichester (?), Knapp, Lewes.
• Warwick.—Beldesert, Tamworth, Warwick.
• Wiltshire.—Castle Combe, The Devizes, Marlborough, Old Sarum.
• Worcestershire.—Worcester.
• Yorkshire.—Aughton (?), Pickering, Pontefract, Sandal, Skipsea, Tadcaster, Tickhill, York.
• North Wales.—Hawarden.
• South Wales.—Brecknock, Builth, Cardiff, Coyty.

Thus, of 119 presumed sites of shell keeps, there are set down 31 the evidence for which is imperfect, and 88 for the existence of which there is good evidence, and of these about 40 actually remain in a more or less perfect, or rather, imperfect, condition.