Raised on a cliff overlooking the Wye, on the border of Wales and England, Chepstow Castle is one of the oldest stone castles in Britain. In Tudor times, this Norman border fortress knew a second life: that of a great house of prestige, remodelled by a powerful family of courtiers.
The arrival of the Somersets
In 1508, Chepstow fell, by marriage with a Herbert heiress, to Sir Charles Somerset, future 1st Earl of Worcester. This great figure was one of the major courtiers of Henry VII: come from Brittany with Henry Tudor before Bosworth, he had shared the future king's exile. Become master of Chepstow, he undertook the first great refitting of the castle since the Middle Ages: the lower bailey was transformed into a fashionable 'Great Court', given wide rectangular sixteenth-century windows — a sign of the new comfort and taste.
From fortress to residence
Chepstow's destiny follows that of the Welsh border. After the Laws in Wales Acts (1535-1542) of Henry VIII, which fully integrated Wales into the kingdom of England and abolished the turbulent Marcher lordships, the military function of the border castles faded. Chepstow ceased to be a place of war to become a great house: the Somersets pierced windows there, arranged apartments, while keeping the imposing medieval silhouette. The castle thus illustrates the pacification of the border and the reconversion of fortresses into houses of prestige. To see: the twelfth-century wooden doors (among the oldest in Europe), the Tudor windows of the lower bailey, the great Marten's Tower, the ramparts over the Wye.
Did you know?
Chepstow keeps the oldest castle doors in Europe still in existence: two twelfth-century wooden leaves, studded with iron, that guarded the entrance for more than eight centuries before being replaced by copies (the originals are now kept sheltered). These doors, contemporary with the first Plantagenets, were already four hundred years old when the Somersets were piercing their Tudor windows — a living memory of the very long history of the border fortress.
Notes
Chepstow Castle lies at Chepstow, Monmouthshire, on the bank of the Wye; a castle run by Cadw, open to visits. Seasonal hours to check.
Quiz
- Who remodelled Chepstow from 1508?
- Sir Charles Somerset, 1st Earl of Worcester
- Owain Glyndŵr
- Cardinal Wolsey
- What did the Laws in Wales Acts (1535-1542) bring?
- The integration of Wales and the end of the Marcher lordships
- A Spanish invasion
- The Dissolution of the Monasteries only
- What very old thing does Chepstow keep?
- The oldest castle doors in Europe (twelfth century)
- A Roman treasure
- A mummy