March 27, 1869.]
THE
ARCHITECT.
DOVER CASTLE. (By Albert Hartshorne.) ' Therfor a c«utel has the king made at hla dciya, That thar never drede aasaut of any enemje.' Giiosteste's Chatteau tfAmonr. HE very imposing appearance presented by Dover Castle naturally leads the observer to speculate upon the ages and uses to which its numerous walls and towers are appropriated. All conjecture, however, on the subject will receive but unsatisfactory solution, for the buildings being occupied either by troops, or used as storehouses, converted into maga zines or prisons, or else rendered serviceable for modern defensive operations, it will be _ immediately understood that any detailed account of them in their present condition would be alike difficult and impolitic. Indeed, without the assistance of numerous plans and illustrations, it would be impossible to make the various changes that this fortress has undergone, through a long course of centuries, in any way intelligible ; and again, it is more than doubt ful whether the information afforded would be commensurate with the trouble of its perusal. Under these circumstances it will be our endeavour in reviewing the architecture of Dover Castle to confine our remarks more especially to its early history, and by the help of authentic documents and architectural evidences to throw more light upon those ancient towers and buildings which we observe at the present day. A few general remarks will be sufficient to note the subsequent changes the Castle has undergone, the injuries it has sus tained from prisoners, and the havoc and mutilation at has suffered at the hands of the various architects who in their turns have been per mitted to disfigure this noble fortress. The Pharos and Church. There can be no doubt that the Romans held a favourable position on the eminence where the present Castle stands. Their camp was oval in form and mainly adapted to the nature of the ground ; within the entrenchments were the buildings they usuallye'rected, with the uncommon addition in the present instance of a pharos or beacon. This was, in all probability, the very first building raised in England by the Roman conquerors. In constructing the pharos they followed their usual method of laying a certain number of courses of ashlar alternated with two courses of Roman bonding tiles. Finding the Kentish rag too small and shapeless, and no other materials being within easy distance, they laid their foundations upon blocks of cal careous tufa brought from Normandy, to the depth of 7 feet 4 inches ; below this they placed a single course of tile, and a stratum of con glomerate, a foot-and-a-half thick, resting upon yellow clay mixed with flints. The rules laid down by Vitruvius were accurately fol lowed, and an analysis of the mortar proves that his precepts in that respect were as carefully adhered to. This building, in its original condition, is said to have resembled the curious lighthouse at Bou logne, attributed to Caligula, and which was destroyed in 1044. The old facing of the walls is almost entirely gone, but on the south side some of the Roman bricks still remain, with grooves and projections to dovetail into each other. One of the original entrances still exists, with the voussoirs of the arch formed alternately with pieces of traver tine and double tiles : it bears a strong resemblance to arches of an aqueduct near Luynes, at Lillebonne, Pompeii, and other places. The Pharos is octagonal without and square within, and the walls are 10 feet thick ; in ite present state it is 40 feet high, but has had a much later portion imposed upon it, though at the present day this addition may be considered ancient This was probably the work of Richard de Grey, Constable of the Castle in the beginning of the fourteenth century, whose arms appear upon a small square stone ; but it was again altered at a later time by William de Clinton, Earl ofHuntingdon, and constable. The Pharos is called the tower of Julius Caesar in documents of 15 Edward I. (1287), and appears at that time to have been used as a bell-tower ; and in the following reign repairs of the great bell ' in turri Casar ' are mentioned. In the beginning of the last century 'a pleasing peal of bells' was removed from hence to Portsmouth, since which time it has been suffered to go to ruins. Whatever other buildings there were of the Roman age exist no longer, but in their stead we find a church of the late Saxon period, cruciform in plan, with a central tower, and built irregularly, like Brixworth, in great part of Roman brick, or as Leland calls them, 'great Briton brykes,' and in imitation of Roman architecture. The brickwork is mixed with flints and Kentish rag, and this gives the building an air of antiquity that is very likely to mislead superficial inquirers, who generally suppose the Pharos and church to be of the same age ; the fact is, that at Dover as well as at Brixworth, in the
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absence of better materials, the builders availed themselves of those they found on the spot. St. Mary's Church has the dis tinctive Saxon features of doorways with straight jambs, windows splayed equally iuside and out, aud arches with the narrow brick pilasters carried round them. It may, however, be questioned whether the transepts are not of considerably later date than the body of the church ; tho Pharos is united to the nave at the west end. The church was much altered towards the end of the twelfth cen tury, and the character of the Early English work then introduced is extremely good ; it bears so marked a resemblance in its details to the work in the chapel of the keep, that they are doubtless both from the same hand, and it is the opinion of a high authority that both are the work of William the Englishman, the second architect of the choir of Canterbury Cathedral. There are also Early English remains of about thirty years later in date, consisting chiefly of a sedilia and piscina in the south-east angle of the nave ; and there is an entry on the Clause Rolls in 122;1, in which Henry IH. orders the church to be repaired at the same time as the castle. These repairs may be distinguished from the Early English of the first period by being worked with the claw-tool instead of the plain chisel. The same difference of tooling niny be observed, though in a stronger degree and of an earlier time, at the junction of tho old and new work of the choir of Canterbury. An inventory of the contents of the church was taken in 1343, when it contained the following effects :—A silver cup, a thurible, and divers vestments, two missals, ono pontiforium, one antiphonal, one book of the legends of the saints, one graduale with a troper, two psalters, two tropers (or collections of versicles to be sung at festivals), one processional, o silver feretory covered with relics, a copper candle stick, gilt, three iron candelabra, an iron pole for supporting the wax lights, one copper crucifix on a staff, silver spoons and fiols, and a picture of the Holy Trinity. To these may be added, from an inven tory of 1361, an ivory bust of our Saviour, and a large quantity of costly vestments of all kinds. St. Mary's church appears to have been dismantled early in the lost century, and has since been turned into a coal depot for the use of the castle. In 1860 it was entrusted by the Government to Mr. Scott for restoration, and the difficult task of restoring a church reduced almost to ruin has been well performed. The excavations inside revealed two ancient floor levels, the Early English, and below it the original Saxon. This latter, under the central tower, consisted of blocks of chalk of about six inches thick, laid upon concrete. Among the many architectural fragments dis covered during the repairs were several of the Early English vaulting ribs, which were found to be portions of Saxon balusters, one side of which retained their original form at the back of the Early English mouldings. The Castle. In considering the protection of Dover Castle at the Saxon period, we have now nothing definite left to guide us beyond the earth works which marked the defence of the fortress at that time. The Castle appears to have been comprised within the oval of the Roman earthworks in the vicinity of the Pharos and church, and the buildings probably extended towards the west. At the present day, however, there exist no traces of any Roman or Saxon architecture in con nection with those earthworks, and it will therefore be irrelevant to speculate much upon them ; in all probability they were not very extensive architecturally, or some fragments at least would have remained to the present day incorporated into later work. But it is evident that there was a stronghold of some kind here when tho Conqueror marched against the place immediately after his first battle, for it is recorded that it was burnt by his followers. It may fairly be assumed that William availed himself of this important position, and that either he or his immediate successors re-erected some sort of fortress, for we have mention, on the Great Roll of the Pipe in 1160, of the Castle being victualled with com, salt, bacon, and cheese, besides notices of repairs and additions to other build ings then in existence. A great architectural movement took place throughout the wbolo of England during tho reigns of Stephen and Henry II. The number of castles erected from the time of the Conqueror to before the death of Stephen is said to have amounted to eleven hundred and fifteen ; but their increasing power gradually made them distasteful to the sovereign, many of the later erections were razed before Stephen's death, and on the accession of Henry IL in 1164 many more were destroyed. It was during this period that all the most important Norman keeps were erected. Their type was first introduced by the building of the White Tower by the Conqueror, and this appears, naturally enough, to have been derived in its turn from buildings of a similar kind in Normandy. The castles of Falaise, Chauvigny, Loches, Domfront, and many others not only preceded the construction of our principal English fortresses, but are all built after the same model. The keep at Dover, both from its size (which is 123 feet x 108 feet square), as well as from its imposing situation, may be compared with that at Bamborough, which is the largest in England. Dover keep differs but slightly from the usual plan. It will be seen from the woodcut that, like nearly all Norman keeps, it is quadraugular. It is divided by a wall, and has a staircase entered from a separate tower which reaches to the second storey. The walls are of great thickness, and are pierced with passages, galleries, and cham bers ou every floor. There is a well, mult in the thickness of the
