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mode expenses on the Vineyard were paid in the same year, and the wages of horse and foot soldiers keeping guard, for the former at the rate of 74d. and the latter 3d. per day. Similar charges run continuously through the Liberate Rolls up to the 13th year of the reign. In the 21st, the office of constable was united in the person of Hugh de Bolebeck, sheriff of Northumberland, to the custody of Newcastle-on-Tyne, the writs for payment being addressed to the barons of the exchequer, in consequence of his official position, and the salary raised to 200 marks per annum.

In the 23d of Edw. I. it was granted to John de Warenne, Earl of Surrey.* I do not trace the custody after 37 Hen. VI., the office being saved 34 Hen. VI. to John Heron by the act of resumption.

The Liberate Rolls give the following notices of repairs and incidental expenses during the reign of Henry III.

In the 10th year, writ for Roger de Hodesac to cover the tower with lead; 12th, reparations of breech; 13th, erection and reparation of a windmill; 17th, repairs of gate; 21st, repairs of bridges, grange, and bakehouse. In the 28th year Magister Gerardus is mentioned as the Ingeniator or engineer. In the 33d, reparations to the nount of forty marks. During this year there is the following writ to the sheriff of Northumberland: "Precipimus tibi quod balistas et quarellas nostras in castris nostris de Bamburg et de Novo Castro qui indigent reparacione reparari et atiliari facias.” This is perhaps the earliest instance we have on the Rolls of the use of the word printed in italics, from which the English term "artillery" has been derived. It seems evidently of English origin, the most ancient authorities for its adoption being adduced by Du Cange, from this language. He, as usual, with his continuator Henschel, is copious in illustrations of it.

But to resume the notices on the Liberate Rolls. In the 34th year the tower of St. Edmund and the barbican before the gate of St. Oswald were repaired. The hall repaired in the 35th year. In the 37th, the great tower, and three gates within the castle, with their hinges, fastenings, and bindings, and the great drawbridge outside the great gate on the south side. In the 40th, repairs of a general character.

*Rot. Pat. sub anno, m. 5.

CHAPTER XII.

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION OF PRUDHOE CASTLE.

IT has been already stated, under the history of the barony of Prudhoe, that the castle was erected by Odonel de Umframville. The precise year of building it has not been recorded, but it was probably within the first twenty years of the reign of Henry II.; it was certainly completed at the latter time, since in 1174 it sustained a vigorous siege. The position was appropriately selected, beng a considerable elevation above the Tyne, which flows on the northern side; it was also well fortified by a deep fosse in the other direction. It consisted of a keep of lofty but unusually narrowed proportions, an inner and an oer baly, a gatehouse and barbican. A survey was made of Prudhoe Castle in 1586 by Stockdale, which furnishes so good a description, that it will be unnecessary to offer another account of its arrangements.

Yet it may be desirable to mention a few particulars that have escaped his observation. Commencing with the barbican, which is the latest portion of the structure, it may be assumed, from the character of the masonry, as well as from the marks on the stones themselves, that this part was built at the close of the reign of Edward I. by Gilbert de Umframville, second Earl of Angus; at all events, if it be not his work, it must have been done very early in the reign of Edward II., since there is evidence in the mason's marks that the same workmen were employed here who laboured at Dunstanborough and Alnwick. That would make it the erection of his nephew Gilbert, the third earl. But there is this superior presumption, that the first of these Gilberts constructed it, inasmuch as he caused another work to be executed in the 28th of Edw. I., by converting

the chamber over the gateway into a chapel, and obtaining a license to constitute it a chantry,* under the title of the chapel of St. Mary, where mass might be sung for himself

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and successors for ever.

Where the work is very rude and

mouldings are wanting, it is extremely difficult to assign the exact age of a building. Such is the case here. Ön the one hand, there are only the stonecutters' marks connecting it with the same band of operatives who worked at

Gilbert de Umframvill, Earl of Angus, has permission to give two tofts, 118 acres of land, and five acres of meadow, with appurtenances in Prudhow, to

a chaplain to celebrate mass in the chapel of St. Mary, in the castle of Prudhow, and his successors for ever.

Inquis. 28 Edw. I. no. 86.

two other castles betwixt 5 and 8 Edward II. (1312 and 1315), and on the other, the probability that a person who had been engaged in repairing the castle,* and founding a chantry over the gateway should have also executed this portion.

The chapel is singular from being the earliest instance

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of an oriel window we are acquainted with. The room not being large enough to contain an altar, a portion of the east end was carried out on corbels to give the requisite

space.

The string-course on the south front of the gatehouse indicates two periods, whilst the insertion of lancet windows above the arch is referable to the year 1300, when this portion was converted into a chapel. The shoulder-headed doorways observable in the curtain-walls also belong to the same time.

Marks of this may be seen in the shoulder-headed doors in various parts of the encircling wall.

The double-headed corbels under the entrance-gate have a moulding that from its purity is almost classical. It is

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unusual to see two heads side by side in a corbel, though in the cathedral of Durham the fashion is not unfrequent.

STOCKDALE'S SURVEY OF PRUDHOE CASTLE. 1586.

There is an old ruinous castle, walled about, and in form not much unlike to a shield hanging with one poynte upwards, situate upon a high moate of earth, with ditches in some places, all wrought with man's handes as it seemeth, and is of all the scyte, with a little garden platt, and the banckes by estimacon iij acr.

The said castle hath the entrey on the south, where it hath had two gates, the uttermost now in decay, and without the same is a litle turnepyke; and on the weste parte a large gate-towre, where there hath been a passage into the lodgeings there scituate without the castle (as is sup

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