Clitheroe Castle

After the Norman Conquest in 1066, the Anglo-Saxon hundred of Blackburnshire was part of a fief given to Roger de Poitou, and the Domesday Book of 1086 shows he had given it to Roger de Busli and Albert de Gresle. Clitheroe is not mentioned by name, and it is assumed that Blackburn had previously been the administrative centre. However some time during the reign of William Rufus, Poitou gave Blackburnshire and the Bowland area, north of the River Ribble (under Craven in the Domesday Book) to the Baron of Pontefract, Robert de Lacy. When de Poitou lost his English holdings in 1102, Henry I not only allowed de Lacy to keep these lands, but added to them with the vills of Chipping, Aighton and…

The Historic England scheduled monument record classifies Clitheroe as an enclosure castle, the principal defence being the wall surrounding the site. It was essentially a motte-and-bailey layout, with a natural outcrop utilised as the motte. The keep is the second smallest surviving stone-built keep in England. It is thought that, as the keep was so small, other essential buildings such as the great hall may have been located on the site where the education suite now stands. A 1602 survey mentions Mr Auditor's chamber, the hall and buttery, and there would likely also have been stables and lodgings for any stationed soldiers. The southwest corner of the site next to the Steward's house was…

The first-floor arrow loop on the southeast side has today widened, most likely the result of natural decay. There is an ancient local legend that the Devil once gathered rocks in an apron, and threw a boulder aimed at the castle, from a place on Pendle Hill called Apronful. However the apron broke, dropping a pile of stones and causing the shot to land near the church in Pendleton. The guidebook to the castle relates this local tale, "they always said that the hole in the side of the keep was made by Cromwell in the Civil War. It's only a story but they say that he attacked the castle and fired at it with a cannon from the top of Pendle Hill – it must have been a good cannon for the time…