page_title: Dunstanburgh Castle
section_title: Architecture
hierarchical_section_title: Dunstanburgh Castle / Architecture and landscape / Architecture
caption_attribution_description: English: cMap of Dunstanburgh Castle
context_page_description: Dunstanburgh Castle is a 14th-century fortification on the coast of Northumberland in northern England, between the villages of Craster and Embleton. The castle was built by Earl Thomas of Lancaster between 1313 and 1322, taking advantage of the site's natural defences and the existing earthworks of an Iron Age fort. Thomas was a leader of a baronial faction opposed to King Edward II, and probably intended Dunstanburgh to act as a secure refuge, should the political situation in southern England deteriorate. The castle also served as a statement of the earl's wealth and influence, and would have invited comparisons with the neighbouring royal castle of Bamburgh. Thomas probably only visited his new castle once, before being captured at the Battle of Boroughbridge as he attempted to flee royal forces for the safety of Dunstanburgh. Thomas was executed, and the castle became the property of the Crown before passing into the Duchy of Lancaster.
  Dunstanburgh's defences were expanded in the 1380s by John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster, in the light of the threat from Scotland and the peasant uprisings of 1381.
context_section_description: Dunstanburgh Castle's buildings are located around the outside of the fortification's outer bailey, enclosed by a stone curtain wall, which enclose 9.96 acres (4.03 ha), making it the largest castle in Northumberland. Possibly from the very start of the castle, and certainly by the 1380s, the castle buildings formed three distinct complexes supporting the Earl's household, the castle's constable and the administration of the Embleton barony respectively. The inside of the bailey still shows the marks of former strip farming, which can be seen in winter.
  The southern and western parts of the walls were originally faced with a local ashlar sandstone with a core of basalt rubble; the sandstone was mostly quarried at Howick. The sandstone has since been stripped from the western parts of the wall, and the sandstone along the eastern end of the walls gives way to small limestone blocks, originally only laid 11-foot (3.3 m) high with a 4-foot 11 inches (1.5 m) parapet, but later raised in height with additional basalt boulders, probably during the Wars of the Roses. It is uncertain if the curtain wall originally extended above the cliffs along the northern edge of the castle.
  Moving counter-clockwise around the curtain wall from the north-west, the rectangular Lilburn Tower looks out across Embleton beach. The tower was named after an early castle constable, John de Lilburn, but may have been built under Thomas of Lancaster; it was intended as a high-status residence, 59-foot (18 m) high, 30-foot (9.1 m) square with 6-foot (1.8 m) thick walls, with a guardroom for soldiers on the ground floor. The rectangular towers at Dunstanburgh reflects the local tradition in Northumberland, and are similar to those at nearby Alnwick. Further along the wall there are the remains of a small tower, called Huggam's House by local tradition. Earthworks around the inside of the curtain wall suggest that there may once have been a complex of buildings stretching between Lilburn Tower and Huggam's House.
  On the south-west corner of the walls are the castle gatehouses. The most prominent of these is the Great Gatehouse, a massive three-storey fortification, comprising two drum-shaped towers of ashlar stone; originally 79-foot (24 m) high. This was heavily influenced by the Edwardian gatehouses in North Wales, such as that at Harlech, but contains unique features, such as the frontal towers, and is considered by historians Alastair Oswald and Jeremy Ashbee to be "one of the most imposing structures in any English castle". In the 1380s this gatehouse was further strengthened with a 31-foot (9.4 m) long barbican, of which only the rubble foundations now survive, around 2-foot 4 inches (0.7 m) high.
  The passageway through the gatehouse was protected by a portcullis and possibly a set of wooden gates. The ground floor contained two guardrooms, each 21-foot (6.4 m) wide, and latrines, with spiral staircases in the corner of the gatehouse running up to the first floor, where relatively well-lit chambers with fireplaces probably accommodated the garrison's officers. The staircases continued up to the second floor, containing the castle's great hall, an antechamber and bedchamber, originally intended for the use of Thomas of Lancaster and his family. Four towers extended above the gatehouse's lead-covered roof for an additional two storeys of height, giving extensive views of the surrounding area. This design may have influenced the construction of Henry IV's gatehouse at Lancaster Castle.
  Immediately to the west of the Great Gatehouse is John of Gaunt's Gatehouse, originally either two or three storeys tall, but now only surviving at the foundation level. This gatehouse replaced the Great Gatehouse as the main entrance, and would have contained a porter's lodge, defended by a combination of a portcullis and an 82-foot (25 m) long barbican. A inner bailey was approximately 50-foot by 75-foot (23 m by 15 m), defended by a 20-foot (6 m) high mantlet wall, was constructed in the 1380s behind John of Gaunt's Gatehouse and the Great Gatehouse. This complex comp
caption: Plan of the castle: A – North Sea; B – Rumbling Churn; C – gateway to Castle Point; D – Gull Crag; E – Lilburn Tower; F – Outer bailey; G – Grange; H – Postern Gate; I – Huggam's House; J – John of Gaunt's Gatehouse; K – Inner bailey; L – Constable's House; M – Egyncleugh Tower; N – Queen Margaret's Cove; O – Great Gatehouse; P – Constable's Tower
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