Goodrich Castle - Architecture

Architecture

Goodrich Castle stands on a high rocky sandstone outcrop overlooking the River Wye. It commands a crossing of the river, known as Walesford or Walford, Ross-on-Wye, about 26 kilometres (16 mi) from Hereford and 6.4 kilometres (4.0 mi) from Ross-on-Wye. The castle guards the line of the former Roman road from Gloucester to Caerleon as it crosses from England into Wales.

At the heart of the castle is an early Norman square keep of light grey sandstone, with Norman windows and pilaster buttresses. Although the keep had thick walls, its relatively small size – the single chambers on each floor measure only 5.5 by 4.5 metres (18 by 15 ft) internally – would have made it more useful for defence than for day-to-day living. The keep originally had a first-storey door for safety, this was later turned into a window and the entrance brought down to the ground floor. The keep would originally have had an earth mound built up against the base of it to protect against attack, and the stone work remains rougher in the first few courses of masonry.

Around the keep is an essentially square structure guarded by three large towers, all built during the 1280s from somewhat darker sandstone. On the more vulnerable southern and eastern sides of the castle, ditches 27 metres (90 ft) long and 9 metres (28 ft) deep have been cut into the rock, exploiting a natural fissure. These towers have large "spurs", resulting from the interface of a solid, square-based pyramid with the circular towers rising up against the walls. This feature is characteristic of castles in the Welsh Marches, including St Briavel's and Tonbridge Castle, and was intended to prevent the undermining of the towers by attackers.

The castle's fourth corner forms its gatehouse. Here the classic Edwardian gatehouse design has been transformed into an asymmetrical structure, with one tower much larger than the other. The gatehouse included portcullises, murder-holes and a drawbridge. Beyond the gatehouse lies a large barbican, inspired by a similar design of the period at the Tower of London and possibly built by the same workmen, designed to protect the causeway leading to the gatehouse. The barbican today is only half of its original height, and includes its own gate, designed to trap intruders within the inner defences. The gatehouse and barbican are linked by a stone causeway.

The gatehouse's eastwards-facing tower contains the chapel, an unusual arrangement driven by a lack of space, with a recently restored east window of reset 15th-century glass designed by Nicola Hopwood, which illuminates the priest's seat, or sedile. The 15th-century window frame itself replaced an even taller, earlier 13th-century window. The chapel's west window is modern, and commemorates British servicemen who died between 1936–76 in radar development. The altar itself is particularly old, possibly pre-dating the castle.

The bailey was designed to include a number of spacious domestic buildings. These include a great hall, a solarium, kitchen, buttery and pantry, with a luxuriously large number of gardrobes and fireplaces. The large towers provided additional accommodation. The design of the domestic buildings was skilfully interlocked to support the defensive arrangements of the bailey. The great hall for example, 20 by 9 metres (66 by 30 ft), was placed in the strongest position overlooking the river Wye, allowing it to benefit from multiple large windows and a huge fireplace without sacrificing defensive strength. Water for the castle was originally raised from the courtyard well, but was later piped in from a spring across the valley; the castle kitchens had acquired running water by the beginning of the 17th century. The design of the buildings ensured that the servants and nobility were able to live separately from one another in the confined space of the castle, revolutionary at the time.

Beyond the main bailey walls lies the stable block, now ruined but with a visible cobble floor. The stables and the north and west sides of the castle were protected by another, smaller curtain wall, but this is now largely ruined. Accounts suggest that the original stables could hold around 60 horses, although by the 17th century they had been expanded to accommodate more.