page_title: Ravensworth
section_title: Early settlement
hierarchical_section_title: Ravensworth / History / Early settlement
caption_attribution_description: English: Ravensworth Castle, near to Ravensworth, North Yorkshire, Great Britain.
context_page_description: Ravensworth is a village and civil parish in the Holmedale valley, within the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England. It is approximately 4.5 miles north-west from Richmond and 10 miles from Darlington. The parish has a population of 255, according to the 2011 Census.
  Ravensworth was historically situated in the North Riding of Yorkshire, and has been a part of North Yorkshire since 1974, following the Local Government Act 1972. The village has ancient origins dating back to the time of Viking settlement. The village contains the remains of the 14th century Grade I listed Ravensworth Castle, the ancestral home of the FitzHugh family. After the cessation of the FitzHugh line the castle was abandoned, and it began to be dismantled from the middle of the 16th century. although the gatehouse remains almost wholly intact. There are a number of listed buildings situated around the village green, mostly dating from the eighteenth century, many of which were constructed using raw materials from the castle.
  Today, Ravensworth is primarily a commuter village, and the historically important agricultural sector now employs only a small number of people.
context_section_description: The earliest archaeological find in the Ravensworth area is a coin from the early Roman period. There has also been a number of finds from the Anglo Saxon era.
  The Lord of the Manor in 1066 was Thorfin. The Lord of the Manor owned the surrounding demesnes, and the villagers were tenants of his land. The village is documented in the Domesday Book of 1086 as having 21 households, which was then quite large for a settlement. There was also a church and a priest. By this time, Alan Rufus had allocated the lands to his relative Bodin of Middleham. Bodin later relinquished his lands in order to become a monk, and the estate was passed to his brother, Bardolph, from whom the FitzHugh line is descended. Bardolph's son, Akarius Fitz Bardolph, donated lands for a monastery which were later to become Jervaulx Abbey.
  A fortress was built during the reign of Henry II as the ancestral home of the Fitzhugh family, who purchased the land from the nuns of Marrick Priory. The fortress would have offered protection to the local population during Scottish raids from north of the border. King John was entertained there in 1201. The Fitzhughs were appointed barons on 15 May 1321. Ralph de Greystoke, 3rd Baron Greystoke, was born in the castle, home of his uncle Henry, Lord Fitzhugh, on 18 October 1353. Henry FitzHugh, 3rd Baron FitzHugh was appointed Lord Chamberlain of the Household by Henry V. Henry Fitzhugh built the now Grade I listed Ravensworth Castle in 1391 on the site of a previous fortress from the 11th century, and also received licence to enclose 200 acres of land around the castle to make a park. Robert FitzHugh became Bishop of London in 1431. After the end of the Fitzhugh male line in 1513, ownership of the castle and estate was passed through the female line to Sir Thomas Parr. Following his death, it passed to his son, a minor, William Parr, 1st Marquess of Northampton by which time it was ruined, largely as a result of being quarried for local building materials. It passed to the Crown Estate in 1571 after Parr died without issue. The castle began to be pulled down in the middle of the 16th century, shortly after the visitation by the antiquarian John Leland, however almost the entirety of the gatehouse remains intact. In 1629 the estate was conferred from the Crown to Edward Ditchfield. In 1633 it was sold to the Robinson family, who later sold it to Thomas Wharton, 1st Marquess of Wharton in 1676. It then passed to Wharton's son Philip Wharton, 1st Duke of Wharton, before passing through his sister to Robert Byerley. By 1779 the estate belonged to the Legard Baronets.
caption: Ravensworth Castle
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