MM098

Trecastle motte and bailey  

01/03/1950  

Designated  

Monmouthshire  

Raglan  

345185  

207033  

Defence  

Motte  

Medieval  

The following provides a general description of the Scheduled Ancient Monument. The monument comprises the remains of an extensive motte and bailey castle, a military stronghold built during the medieval period. The site is located within Trecastle Farm, with the bailey largely built over by farm buildings. The motte is large for the region, rising over 6m to a flat summit 15m in diameter with a steep sided ditch on the north which peters out at the W and E sides. On the S side the base of the motte has been truncated by a modern retaining wall. To the S of the motte, separated from it by buildings and a drive, is a substantial bank 1m high on the N side and 3m high on the S side, which forms part of the original bailey defences.The bailey extended beyond the scheduled area to the S and W, encompassing the fine later farmhouse and with traces of a further enclosure on the lower ground to the W. Several small assembalges of medieval pottery and traces of structures have been revealed in watching briefs for service trenches. The monument is of national importance for its potential to enhance our knowledge of medieval fortifications and settlement. It forms an important element within the wider medieval landscape and is a good example of the continuity of a high status residence and administrative centre from an early castle and probable village, and a late and early post-medieval gentry house. The site has been demonstrated to contain buried structural remains and associated deposits, the wet ditches potentially retaining waterlogged remains and environmental evidence. The scheduled area comprises the remains described and areas around them within which related evidence may be expected to survive.