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Monument Types

• MOTTE AND BAILEY? (Medieval - 1067 AD? to 1539 AD?)

Summary

A possible Norman castle consisting of medieval enclosures and a mound 3-4m high and 35m in diameter.

Additional Information

Scheduled Monument description:
The monument at Shawell is situated 75m south of the church, between Lutterworth and Rugby, near the southern boundary of Leicestershire, and includes two protected areas.The motte comprises a circular, flat-topped mound and surrounding ditch. The mound is 3-4m high and 35m in diameter, with an area 10m in diameter on the top. The ditch measures 7m wide and 1.5m deep on the south side but is not visible north of the motte. Twenty metres to the south of the motte is a smaller circular mound, approximately 20m in diameter and 1m high, which is the only remaining feature of a series of defensive earthworks known to have existed in the vicinity of the motte castle.

A large mound c.30m in diameter with the remains of a wide ditch on the south side lies within presumably medieval rectilinear enclosures. It has been surveyed by RFH.

From its size and shape and position in relation to the church it is probably a Norman castle. (PL 27/02/87)

<1> Page, William (ed), 1907, The Victoria County History of the County of Leicester, Volume 1, p275 (Bibliographic reference). SLE1156.

VCHL describe it as a large prehistoric barrow.

<2> 1977-8, Transactions of the Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society, Volume 53, Vol 53 (1978) (Journal). SLE5951.

Cantor, "The Medieval Castles of Leics". Described as a castle mound.

<2> Hartley, RF, 2018, The medieval earthworks of south and south-east Leicestershire, p38-9 (Bibliographic reference). SLE5736.

"South of All Saints Church is the best-known earthwork in the village, a conical mound (m) surrounded by a series of rectangular enclosures (n, o, p, q, r) which could have functioned as the less defensible outer bailey. These features have been reconstructed from aerial photograph evidence as the field has been ploughed in recent times."

<3> Elkin, Kathleen (ed), 2015, Medieval Leicestershire: Recent Research on the Medieval Archaeology of Leicestershire, p138, "Medieval fortified sites of Leics & Rutland", Richard Knox (Bibliographic reference). SLE5149.

"A large mound c.30m in diameter, with remains of a wide ditch on the south side. Page (1907, 275) considered the mound to be a large prehistoric barrow, but Cantor (1978, 35), Liddle (note in SMR 1987), Creighton (1997, 30) and English Heritage all consider it to be a castle motte. There are no records of a castle at Shawell, however, and it may therefore be the same as the site of the documented castle of the village of Catthorpe nearby."

Sources

Associated Finds

None recorded

Designations

• Conservation Area: Shawell
• Scheduled Monument 1017549: MOTTE CASTLE AND ASSOCIATED EARTHWORK SSW OF ALL SAINTS CHURCH

Associated Images

Search results generated by the HBSMR Gateway from exeGesIS SDM Ltd.