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Description: | The date of the castle is exactly known. It was built by Henry de Blois, Bishop of Winchester, in 1138 on a strategic site defending Winchester. It had a short active existence, slighted in 1155 by order of Henry II after the wars of King Stephen's reign. For the next 300 years the castle served as one of the palaces of the Bishop of Winchester. After years of disrepair the building was all but demolished in 1441, most of the remains being reused at Wolvesey Palace.
As seen in the print, the site was marked by a fine circular earthwork surrounded by a deep ditch, with traces of a second line of banks outside. A remnant of the curtain wall (7 feet thick) remains on the south.
The medieval earthworks themselves lie in the middle of an Iron Age hillfort.
Reference:
Peach, D Len. 1995 (2nd edition). Merdone: the history of Hursley Park, p. 15-22. | Format: | image/jpeg | License: | http://www.sopse.org.uk/ixbin/hixclient.exe?a=query&p=gateway&f=generic_sitetext%2ehtm&_IXFIRST_=1&_IXMAXHITS_=1&cms_con_core_subtype%3acms_con_text_what=copyright&%3acms_sys_group=%22sopse%22 | Subjects: | building Merden Castle King Henry II earthwork Merdon Castle castle Henry de Blois Bishop of Winchester Wolvesey Castle Iron Age hillfort | Temporal: | start=1785-01-01; | Source: | Sense of place SE | Creator: | S Sparrow; S Hooper | Identifier: | http://www.sopse.org.uk/ixbin/hixclient.... | Language: | en-GB | Format: | image/jpeg | Go to resource |
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