Ewloe
Ewloe is another Welsh castle, viz Carndochan, Dolbadarn,
Dolwyddelan I, Dolwyddelan II, etc etc, about which virtually nothing
is known historically. Sadly what is ‘known' on the
internet is mostly free of any original facts, but not free
from much 'creative' thinking. To scrimp these ‘non-facts' off Wikipedia, the keep would appear to be early
thirteenth century as ‘Llywelyn
the Great built a similar D shaped tower at Castell y Bere... in the
1220s'. The twin falsehoods of both statements are dealt with
in the associated links.
What can be shown as fact is that Ewloe castle lies south of the Wepre
brook, which was obviously regarded as the frontier between Chester and
Gwynedd at some times in the Middle Ages. In the 1260s border
commissions between England and Gwynedd met there to arrange terms of
truce and adjust any infringements of prior agreements. If
this is the case, then these meetings may have been taking place at
Ewloe castle, a convenient meeting place. The name Ewloe was
first recorded in 1284 when goods were taken from Ewelawe wood for
the royal garrisons in the area. Again Ewelowe wood was
used for the local garrisons needs in 1301 with the specific mention
that this wood belonged to the princes of Wales. No mention
of a castle is made until the year before 7 July 1311 when an
inquisition was held to find the king's rights to the manor of
Ewloe. This recorded many things, the gist of which was that
Prince Owain Gwynedd (d.1170) of Wales held Ewloe as demesne.
After him it was held by his son, Dafydd ab Owain
(d.1200/03) and then by Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (d.1240). On his
death Dafydd ap Llywelyn (d.1246) held Ewloe until his death when King
Henry III (d.1272) occupied it with the Four Cantrefs in Wales.
He then made Roger Mohaut (d.1260) his justice of Chester and
he attached Ewloe to Hawarden
(Haurthyn)
and Moldsdale (Mouhaldesdale),
to which it had never before belonged. Further he made a park
in Ewloe
wood and held them until Llywelyn ap Gruffydd recovered the Perfeddwlad
from Henry III. By doing this Llywelyn ousted the Roger from
Ewloe and restored (affirmavit/iafferma) a castle in the corner of the wood. This
fortress 'was in great part standing at the time of the inquisition'.
Obviously the inquisitors had not remembered their history quite
correctly, or at least what they remembered does not coincide with what
was recorded contemporaneously with the events they recall.
Certainly the Perfeddwlad (Four Cantrefs) passed from Owain Gwynedd
(d.1170), to his son, Dafydd ab Owain (d.1200/3), who lost them to
Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (d.1240) in 1197. Their first major
error is that Dafydd ap Llywelyn (d.1246), died seized of the
Perfeddwlad and Ewloe, for he lost them to Henry III in 1241.
Roger Mohaut was only justiciar of Chester from 27 May 1257 until 29 September 1259 and Llywelyn ap
Gruffydd is said by the Welsh Chronicles to have gained all the
Perfeddwlad except for the two castles of Dyserth and Degannwy in November
1256. Quite obviously one of these sources is wrong and most
likely it is the fourteenth century chronicles, rather than the
fourteenth century inquisition. It would therefore seem
likely that Roger held Ewloe as a hunting preserve until his death
about 24 June 1260 at Castle
Rising in Norfolk. As he only held Ewloe for 3 years at the most and half a year at the minimum, it is
unlikely that he did anything to Ewloe castle, especially as he held Hawarden castle only 2 miles
SE and Mold itself 5 miles to the west. Henry's two Welsh
castles, Dyserth and Degannwy,
fell in 1263 and Hawarden is
reported as having been captured and destroyed by Llywelyn in
1265. On 28 June 1260 the king seized the estates of the
recently deceased Roger and also those of his widow, Cecily
Aubigny. That same October the king allowed Roger's will to
be executed. At this point Roger's son, Robert Mohaut
(d.1275), must have been a minor as his parents had only married a
little before November 1243, making Robert about 16 at the
most. He certainly married either this year or the next, so
was at liberty. Whatever the case, he soon attacked Prince
Llywelyn for in 1267 the treaty of Montgomery delivered him from
Llywelyn's
custody. Robert died young, aged no more than 32 in September
1275 and so did not see the reconquest of the Perfeddwlad in 1276/7 by
Edward I, who, after refusing the Mohaut claim, became lord of Ewloe by
right of conquest and escheat from the prince of Wales. Ewloe
then remained a royal estate. Quite obviously the only people
likely to have built Ewloe castle in the second half of the thirteenth
century would have been Llywelyn ap Gruffydd (d.1282), but the
inquisition stated quite clearly that he restored it, not built
it. However, the assumption that this must have been in
1257 is clearly wrong as Llywelyn would probably not have been secure
enough in Moldsdale
until after the death of Roger Mohaut in 1260 and quite possibly until
after
the fall of Hawarden in 1265. He would then have held Ewloe in
reasonable security until 1276 when the Marchers attacked his lands in
force.
Considering the above history, it is generally assumed that Llywelyn
must have built the round tower at the west end of the
castle. There is nothing illogical about this, but it has to
be admitted that the style of tower is archaic for the late thirteenth
century with its mural stair rising through the wall on the artillery
vulnerable south side, rather than a safer spiral stair vice to the
east which would have been protected by the inner ward.
Possibly then the tower was built in a hurry or when the builder could
not acquire or spend the time fashioning expensive stones to make a
spiral stair. To make a flight of curving steps was obviously
easier and quicker.
Although the round west tower appears integral with the outer ward
south curtain, indeed it can be said to be a part of it, not projecting
at all to the south, it is quite obvious that the northern curtain
which swings to the north side of the inner ward is of a different
build. This seems to leave Ewloe as a four phase
castle. The first element seems to be the revetment of the
inner ward into an irregular rock motte with a summit of about 100'
across. This ‘castle' had a hole in the wall
entrance to the NE. Then the D shaped tower was built as a
keep upon this ‘motte'. There is no reason why these two
events might not have been close together in time, although it would
seem unlikely that they happened simultaneously as the inner ward
revets the rock. Next the large round tower
with a diameter of about 40' was added 70' to the west of the inner
ward on its own crag and finally the outer curtain to the north with
its hole in the wall entrance was added. Judging by the
building styles at least a hundred years should be allowed between the
first work and the last.
However, a castle does not exist of stonework alone. The
ditching all around the castle is of the highest order and not what
would be expected at a Welsh castle where ditching is usually poor,
without English expertise, viz. Carreg
Cennen, Criccieth,
Dolbadarn, Harlech, Y Bere. There are
further earthworks to the south, perhaps to protect the castle from
artillery fire, but they are considerably less impressive than those at
Berkhamsted.
Prince Llywelyn only certainly built one other castle and that was Dolforwyn. This
has a large rectangular keep at one end, which was probably there
before ‘Llywelyn's castle' was built the enceinte between that and the round tower at the
other end of the site. In this it is rather mimics Ewloe. It is therefore possible that Dolforwyn, like Ewloe might
have a divided lordship. This is seen in Lincoln castle,
where two lords seem to have shared the castle, each having their own
quite different keep on a motte. The same form of castle can
be seen at Machen in
South Wales where there is a round tower and a rectangular tower on
separate rocky mottes.
The odd castle out in this is the twin mottes at Lewes, where
there is no record of a divided lordship. Regardless of the
layout of Ewloe there are plenty of similar sized round towers in Wales
and the Marches. A list of similar round towers serving as keeps
can be found in the description of Llanstephan castle and a general list of round keeps examined on this site is found under Dundrum.
For all the historical information (what little there is of it), it
really leads the historian no further to an answer of who built Ewloe
castle and why. It has been suggested that the castle being
so poorly sited and overlooked was to do with it being more of a
hunting lodge rather than a fortress. It has also been suggested
that the castle was built here in remembrance of the alleged defeat of
Henry II at this very spot in 1157. Both suggestions seem
unlikely considering the defensive ditches and towers, plus the total
lack of
facilities for hunting parties and the unsuitability of the site for
horses. The D shaped tower is obviously a status building,
being some 52' long by 36' wide. This had a basement and a
single storey above. It was entered at first floor level via
a later forebuilding. From the entrance doorway a mural stair
ran up within the south wall to the battlements above. At
first floor hall level there is a rectangular window to the south
which, although it was barred, is hardly defensible as would have been
expected at a real defensive castle. Internally it looks as
if the embrasure was equipped with seats and was therefore not designed
for crossbow use. Such a keep was hopelessly inadequate by
the thirteenth century when Llywelyn ap Gruffydd added the round tower
and the implication is that the keep and its inner ward should be seen
as twelfth
century. However, rather than attributing the initial castle
to
Owain Gwynedd (d.1170), it might be more sensible to attribute it to
Madog ap Maredudd (d.1160), a man who would have built a castle on the
south side of the Wepre if he was fortifying it against the men of
Gwynedd. This would certainly fit in with Powysian campaigns
to regain the Perfeddwlad in the 1150s. Further the castle is
more like Carndochan,
which also would appear to have a more Powysian origin than a
Venedotian one.
Why
not join me at other Lost Welsh Castles next Spring?
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Sojourns.
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Paul Martin Remfry