Bledisloe Tump was a castle in the village of

Awre Awre () is a village, civil parish and electoral ward in the Forest of Dean District of Gloucestershire, England, near the River Severn. Both the parish and the electoral ward include Blakeney, Etloe, Gatcombe, Viney Hill, and Two Bridges. ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

History

The first castle on the site was built in the 11th or early 12th century and was a simple

timber Lumber is wood that has been processed into uniform and useful sizes (dimensional lumber), including beams and planks or boards. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, window frames). ...

structure.National Monuments Office website
, accessed 19 December 2010. The site was chosen because it occupied a natural high point overlooking the

River Severn The River Severn (, ), at long, is the longest river in Great Britain. It is also the river with the most voluminous flow of water by far in all of England and Wales, with an average flow rate of at Apperley, Gloucestershire. It rises in t ...

.Steane, p.26. A later mound, 60 ft wide and 7 ft high was also constructed on the site, and it is suspected that this may have been an unfinished

motte A motte-and-bailey castle is a European fortification with a wooden or stone keep situated on a raised area of ground called a motte, accompanied by a walled courtyard, or Bailey (castle), bailey, surrounded by a protective Rampart (fortificati ...

. It is possible that this was built during the period of

the Anarchy The Anarchy was a civil war in England and Duchy of Normandy, Normandy between 1138 and 1153, which resulted in a widespread breakdown in law and order. The conflict was a war of succession precipitated by the accidental death of William Adel ...

in the 12th century, and one theory is that the castle was destroyed by

Henry II Henry II may refer to: Kings * Saint Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor (972–1024), crowned King of Germany in 1002, of Italy in 1004 and Emperor in 1014 *Henry II of England (1133–89), reigned from 1154 *Henry II of Jerusalem and Cyprus (1271–1 ...

after the conflict as part of a wider programme of castle denigration in Gloucestershire during the 1150s.Amt, p.44. The site was later used for meetings of the local

Hundred 100 or one hundred (Roman numerals, Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 (number), 99 and preceding 101 (number), 101. In mathematics 100 is the square of 10 (number), 10 (in scientific notation it is written as 102). The standar ...

of Bledisloe, and another theory for the creation of the mound is that it was specifically made to support these meetings. A manor house, Bledisloe Manor, was later built on the site, and the remaining earthworks were destroyed during the 1970s.

References

Bibliography

*Amt, Emilie. (1993)
The Accession of Henry II in England: royal government restored, 1149-1159.
' Woodbridge, UK: Boydell Press. . *Steane, John M. (1985)
The Archaeology of Medieval England and Wales, Volume 1985, Part 2.
' Beckenhem, UK: Croom Helm. . {{coord, 51, 46, 16, N, 2, 27, 36, W, scale:10000, display=title Castles in Gloucestershire Awre

History

See also

References

Bibliography