Castle Quest - Reply to Topic

Forum:	Individual Castles
Topic:	looking for castle name

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T O P I C R E V I E W
rhewi I am looking for the name of the castle that is in the midlands area. The castle is in a town and is mostly ruins, but it has an underground dungeon. I think it's call the bell dungeon or bottle dungeon, by the shape of it. You enter it by going down through the neck and it opens out and is fairly deep. Any help would be great. Thanks
Erik Schmidt Can't help you on the castle name, as I'm not well aquainted with British castles.
The type of prison cell(dungeon) you describe was relatively common. They were usually built into the base of a tower.
Peter Depends how you class the 'Midlands', that could cover a lot of ground.
The ruined castle of Pontefract has such a dungeon. This is accessed through a trap-door in the middle of the castle green. There are step stairs cut into the sandstone (I think its sandstone), which lead you down to an area which held prisoners in the Civil-War.
rhewi I don't think it's Pontefract Castle. The one I am thinking about was not too far from Nottingham. I remember going there on a day trip with school. Most of the castle was underground and I remember this dungeon being very deep. Going down into it, you used wooden stair that was put there for the tourists. In the past, they lowered the poor buggers down by rope. Anyway, thanks for trying.
AJR The most famous castle for having a bottle dungeon is St. Andrew's Castle. However, this is in Fife, Scotland.
Knaresborough Castle has a large dungeon, but is in North Yorkshire (closer than St. Andrew's, but probably not close enough).
Newark Castle is the only other major castle in Nottinghamshire.
See http://www.newarkadvertiser.co.uk/notts/tourism/castle.htm
Nothing about a bottle dungeon though.
Another possibility is Peveril or Peak Castle, in Derbyshire. See http://www.cressbrook.co.uk/hopev/peveril.htm
[This message has been edited by AJR (edited 03-08-2002).]
A Knight The castle in question appears to be Newark - the 13th Century North Tower contains a bottle dungeon according to Adrian Pettifer's English Castles p.202 and Hugh Braun's article in Transactions of the Thornton Society of Nottinghamshire of 1935 shows it in both plans and section.
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Andy Knight
rhewi Fantastic. Newark is the one. My family and I will be traveling to England from Canada in December and is now on our itinerary. I remembered visiting the castle when I was very young on a school outing. Thanks a million
Peter Blast !
Never gave Newark a thought, which I should have done. Visited there a few years ago the the Castle Studies Group.
They have been doing some work on the castle, and the dungeon is not always open.