Book 2.—THE PERIOD FROM THE NORMAN CONQUEST TO THE DEATH OF KING JOHN 1066—1216.
Chapter 1.—Chapter I.—Regal and Baronial Antiquities.
Section 4.—Carlisle Castle
Figures:
The Castle of Carlisle was founded by William Rufus. He was the
restorer of the city, after it had remained for two centuries in ruins
through the Danish ravages. The Red King was a real benefactor to the
people at this northern extremity of his kingdom. He first placed here a
colony of Flemings, an industrious and skilful race, and then encouraged
an immigration of husbandmen from the south, to instruct the poor and
ignorant inhabitants in the arts of agriculture. We must not consider that
these Norman kings were all tyrants. The historical interest of Carlisle
belongs to a later period, and we shall return to it. So does the Castle
of Alnwick (Fig. 382). But
we here introduce the noble seat of the Percies, for it was a place of
strength soon after the Norman Conquest. In the reign of Rufus it was
besieged by Malcolm the Third, of Scotland, who here lost his life,
as did his son Prince Edward. Before the Norman Conquest the castle
and barony of Alnwick belonged to Gilbert Tyson, who was slain fighting
against the invader, by the side of his Saxon king. The Conqueror gave
the granddaughter of Gilbert in marriage to Ivo de Vescy, one of his
Norman followers; and the Lords de Vescy enjoyed the fair possessions
down to the time of Edward I.
The Castle of Bamborough, in Northumberland, carries us back
into a remoter antiquity. It was the palace, according to the monkish
historians, of the kings of Northumberland, and built by king Ida, who
began his reign about 559. Roger Hoveden, who wrote in 1192, describes
it, under the name of Bebba, as “a very strong city.” Rufus
blockaded the castle in 1085, when it was in the possession of Robert de
Mowbray, earl of Northumberland. The keep of Bamborough is very similar
in its appearance to the keeps of the Tower of London, of Rochester,
and of Dover. It is built of remarkably small stones; the walls are
eleven feet thick on one side, and nine feet on three sides. This castle,
situated upon an almost perpendicular rock, close to the sea, which rises
about one hundred and fifty feet above low water mark, had originally no
interior appliances of luxury or even of comfort. Grose says, “Here
were no chimneys. The only fire-place in it was a grate in the middle of a
large room, supposed to have been the guard-room, where some stones in the
middle of the floor are burned red. The floor was all of stone, supported
by arches. This room had a window in it, near the top, three feet square,
possibly intended to let out the smoke: all the other rooms were lighted
only by slits or chinks in the wall, six inches broad, except in the
gables of the roof, each of which had a window one foot broad.”
One of the most remarkable objects in this ancient castle is a draw-well,
which was discovered about seventy years ago, upon clearing out the sand
and rubbish of a vaulted cellar or dungeon. It is a hundred and forty-five
feet deep, and is cut through the solid basaltic rock into the sandstone
below. When we look at the history of this castle, from the time when
it was assaulted by Penda, the Pagan king of the Mercians, its plunder
by the Danes, its siege by Rufus, its assault by the Yorkists in 1463,
and so onward through seven centuries of civil strife, it is consoling
to reflect upon the uses to which this stronghold is now applied. It
was bought with the property attached to it by Nathaniel Lord Crewe,
bishop of Durham, and bequeathed by him to charitable purposes in
1720. The old fortress has now been completely repaired. Its gloomy
rooms, through whose loop-holes the sun could scarcely penetrate, have
been converted into schools. Boys are here daily taught, and twenty poor
girls are lodged, clothed, and educated till fit for service. The towers,
whence the warder once looked out in constant watchfulness against an
enemy’s approach, are now changed into signal stations, to warn the
sailor against that dangerous cluster of rocks called the Fern Islands;
and signals are also arranged for announcing when a vessel is in distress
to the fishermen of Holy Island. Life-boats are here kept, and shelter
is offered for any reasonable period to such as may be shipwrecked on
this dreary coast. The estates thus devoted to purposes of charity now
yield a magnificent income of more than eight thousand a year. Not only
are the poor taught, but the sick
Figure spread at pages 100 and 101:
