Greasley Castle - what did it look like?

Greasley Castle - what did it look like?

The owners are in the process of surveying the remains of the castle so it will be interesting to see what new evidence comes to light. So far, the early 2021 work has "recorded the significant remains of a 1340s courtyard house contained within the farmyard buildings". The only previous survey and "Time Team" style architectural dig was done in 1933. This article looks at their findings.

The mock-up picture of the castle shows what it could have looked like had it survived and is based on the existing walls and moat and a floor plan of the castle unearthed during the 1933 dig. The tower location, moat and moat wall are correctly located. There was likely another tower at the near corner with the building having a more rectangular plan. The Great Hall (behind those tall windows) is also in the correct place and correct size but was turned around slightly more, running at 90 degrees to the main road. It was more of a grand, fortified manor house than a castle and would have looked something like a mix of its contemporaries of Stokesay Castle in Shropshire (which the mock up shows) and Haddon Hall in Derbyshire. Stokesay obtained its own "licence to crennelate" in 1291 so was built around 50 years before Greasley. Crenellate means to fortify a house by adding castle-style battlements to existing walls although a "licence to crennelate" was often granted after building just to confer the approval of the king. Stokesay is also roughly the same size as Greasley and has a similar square floor plan with central courtyard and similar-sized, large medieval banqueting hall.

Click the Play button to see Greasley Castle reappear from the mists of time....

Most guides and general histories of Nottinghamshire make mention of Greasley Castle. Many record little more than the grant of the licence to crenellate made by Edward III to Nicholas de Cantelupe in 1340. The licence to fortify Greasley came at a time when the building of castles was beginning to decline. The foundation of true castles was a comparatively rare thing in the 14th and 15th centuries, and in a number of crenellated houses the fortification was very slight, and at times little more than ornamental. The baronial castle was becoming an anachronism. That the invention of gunpowder was one reason for this decline can scarcely be denied, but the effect of this discovery was perhaps more gradual than was at one time supposed. Apart from the castle’s reduced effectiveness owing to the use of artillery, there was a tendency for it to decline in importance in the military organisation of the country. Changes in the art of war tended to give the military advantage to the side which could put into the field and handle effectively the largest masses of men-at-arms. Edward I, for example, had developed an infantry very efficient in missile tactics. This development gave to the king an advantage over the barons and played an important part in the suppression of rogue barons rendering the concept of the baronial castle out of date.

When, in the 14th and 15th centuries massive fortresses no longer served a useful purpose, men took the opportunity to escape the extreme discomfort which these castles inflicted upon their occupants. Earlier castles were sometimes altered to provide greater comfort, but where practicable, the fortified manor house was preferred to the castle. At Tretower in Wales the remains of a 14th century fortified house may be seen within a short distance of the ruined castle which it superseded. Although Greasley was dignified by the name of castle it was probably little more than a fortified manor house. The wording in the Calendar of Patent Rolls runs, “Licence to Nicholas Cantelupe to crenel-late his dwelling place of Gryseleye co. Notts. ...to strengthen or fortify his manor house, ...from this time it was called a castle.” As a 14th-century fortified house it is probably more important and interesting than it would have been as a castle; for although in one sense the beginning of the development of the larger type of English house lies in the Norman keep, the fortified house marks the earliest development of the truly domestic architecture. Viewed in this light, Greasley Castle takes on the character of an early example of a fortified manor house, and the starting point of the growth of the larger type of English house, a growth continued through Haddon Hall, South Wingfield Manor, Tattershall Castle, and Wollaton Hall, to name a few examples in Nottinghamshire and adjacent counties.

It was with the hope of discovering, among other things, something of the ground plan, that excavation was attempted in the summer of 1933. Although digging was carried out on two days only, the party was numerous. The two places at which excavation was undertaken are marked “A” and “B” on the accompanying plan. At each of these corners there are suggestions on the existing wall (almost 5 feet thick) of angle towers, and the first aim was to see whether angle towers had been a feature of Greasley or not. The first day’s digging, at “A,” produced no sign of foundations of any tower, even at a depth of nearly 6 feet.

The work on the second day produced more satisfactory results. The party working at “B” soon met with success and the base of a round tower some 20 feet or more in diameter had been uncovered to about one third of its circumference. The other end “A” again failed to give positive results. Although two trenches were made at “A” in an attempt to find a continuation of the existing wall, or the base of a tower, neither was found. But in spite of this it still seems probable that a tower did originally exist at this corner, for the projections on the wall at this end are very similar to those at the north-west corner where the existence of a tower was definitely established.

Is it possible from the evidence available to form any idea of the ground plan of Greasley? It must be stated at once that it is not possible to be definite. The best that can be done is to put forward a theory which seems to be justified by the information we have. In the first place it seems reasonable to suppose that Greasley was square or rectangular with angle towers. But this is not saying much, and no description of a medieval manor house is complete without reference to the hall, the kitchen and buttery, and to the solar and other family apartments. The hall at this period and for centuries afterwards was easily the most important room in the house. It has been said that the hall was not so much the heart of the house but the house itself. The tendency which has persisted to this day, to call the principal house of the parish “the hall” is not mere chance. At one end of the hall was the solar to which the lord might retire when he desired privacy; at the other end was the kitchen department, the headquarters of the servants. The entrance to the hall was placed at the servants' end, whereas the “high table” at which the lord and lady sat, occupied the upper or solar end, away from the draughty entrance. The discovery of the position of the hall, the solar and the kitchen at Greasley would be an important step in solving the problem of its ground plan.

In the wall at the back of what is now a stable are a door and a 14th-century square-headed window both built up (marked D and C respectively on the plan). It is not unreasonable to suggest that this door might have been the entrance to the hall from the courtyard. The finding of coal and charcoal, small bones and pottery intended for kitchen use at position “A” seems to point to the existence of the kitchens at this end. If the door “D” were the entrance to the hall its position would be in accordance with the general practice mentioned above. The window “C” looking into the courtyard would not present to an enemy an easy means of entering the house. If this suggestion is correct we might expect to find a hall about 33 feet wide, and of an unknown length. The hall of Oakham Castle, said to be the finest example in England of an early hall, is 65 feet long by 43 feet wide.5 The hall at Stokesay Castle (1240-1290) is 52 feet by 31 feet,6 that at Haddon 43 feet by 28 feet, 4 and that at South Wingfield Manor 71 feet 7 inches by 36 feet 5 inches.7

It is not easy to see at first, why Nicholas chose to build his castle at Greasley. It is by no means an ideal situation from a military point of view. The castle was overlooked by the church, built higher up on the slope of the hill, and by a hill on the opposite side of the modern road from Nottingham to Alfreton. It occupied no strategic position as the castles of Nottingham and Newark did. All this stresses the point already made, that defence and military strength were not the only things in the mind of its builder, when Greasley Castle was constructed. Why did not Nicholas chose his manor of Ilkeston for his fortified house? It seems to offer a better site. Close proximity to the castle of the Greys at Codnor (built 1224-58) also in Derbyshire, can scarcely have been the cause of the rejection of Ilkeston, as Greasley is nearer to Codnor than is Ilkeston. The reason seems to lie rather in the facilities which Greasley and the surrounding country offered to Nicholas in carrying out his twofold scheme of building monastery and castle after the fashion of earlier barons.

Sources: Full 1933 report is here: Herbert Green, Greasley Castle, Transactions of the Thoroton Society, XXXVIII (1934). 

2021 update here:  Triskele Heritage and the Castle Studies Trust 2021 

All of the other "Tales From Watnall Hall" in the series are available here