Summary

Built in 1440 the building considered to be the Kitchens butts onto the bank of the inner moat, only the building foundations now remain as brick footings on the edge of the moat, about a metre in height.

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Monument Types

Description

Built in 1440 the building considered to be the Kitchen butts onto the bank of the inner moat, only the building foundations now remain.

The description has been amended from the 2008 Conservation Management Plan (see below).

Part of the late medieval additions to the castle included a range of service buildings behind the hall on the south side of the keep. The building is shown (though in the wrong location) on the Bucks’ 1726 view, and rather more clearly on Millecent’s view of 1727. All trace of the building had disappeared by the late 19th century, and the footings were excavated in 1912 when the moat was emptied [Curzon 150, 179, 206]. The remains of the kitchen wing are brick footings on the edge of the moat, about a metre in height. The ‘kitchen’, situated just south of the keep, consists of three elements: on the south (i) the footings of a brick tower on a stone base (containing a drain and a well), with (ii) a smaller brick extension at its north-east corner, and (iii) a smaller brick tower on a stepped base just south of the round tower by the keep. When excavated, the well was found to contain the remains of an oak pump, and the middle room (ii) had a garderobe drain. [Curzon 206] Former remains: Millecent’s view of 1727 from the west clearly shows these buildings immediately south of the keep. On the south is a large tower with windows to the outside and a turret in the north-east corner, which would seem to be the same as (i). A lower portion in the centre, with cross-shaped arrowslits may be a garderobe tower (ii). The northern part (iii) is shown as a separate tower with an arch and machicolations inside a large arched recess. While this may have been an internal wall, it almost has the look of a sallyport gateway. The Bucks’ view of the building from the east seems to add little (and confusingly depicts the kitchen at some distance from the keep). It does however show three separate elements, of which the southern part has a turret, and most importantly shows large fireplaces on the east face of the extended wall, as if the kitchen range was inside the inner ward, with the towers beyond it extending into the moat. This would certainly have been the most practical arrangement. (1)

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