Description

SE 57 SE CRAYKE CHURCH HILL
2/16 (north side)

28.2.52 Crayke Castle
(formerly listed as
Crayke Castle and
17.5.60 ruins in grounds of
Crayke Castle)
GV
I

Tower house with attached kitchen range to rear on which the vaulted undercroft
alone survives and ruins on a further range - 'The New Tower'.
Main range: Early C15 with C18 and C19 alterations and additions, it was built
before the kitchen range which is documented to 1441-50. New Tower: probably second
half C15. For the Bishops of Durham. Dressed sandstone. Roof of main range
concealed, lead roof to kitchen. Main range: rectangular block 70 ft 9 ins x
28 ft 4 ins. Four storeys, each being set back slightly. Bands to floor levels and
battlements. Tall, narrow chamfered square headed windows. The entrance to the
south side is an C18 alteration, the original entrance being by an external
staircase range on the north-east side (now disappeared) to the principal room at
1st floor level. The blocked doorways are 2-centred with hollow chamfers. C19
range attached to north-east. Interior is now subdivided but the moulded
cross-beamed ceilings are intact. Fireplaces to ground and 1st floors. C18
features: a cut-string staircase with 2 turned or twisted balusters per tread and
curtail with turned newel.
Kitchen range: The west wall is partly rebuilt in later materials but has a
corbelled-out embattled round turret for spiral staircase to the north-west corner.
Chamfered doorway with key block. Interior: tunnel vaulted with 13 heavy unmoulded
transverse arches or ribs. Now subdivided. (The undercroft is at ground floor
level.)
The New Tower: Completely detached building, now ruinous. Once a 3-storey L-shaped
block (ground plan 1566-1570). All that remains are the barrel-vaulted undercrofts,
stairs to 1st floor level and the walls of the porch.
To rear of kitchen remains of foundations of a building that was described as The
Old Hall in 1441.
Stands on site of Norman Castle. Dismantled in 1647. In the C18 the main range was
used as a farmhouse. Pevsner, N., Yorkshire, North Riding, 1966, p 131. Victoria
County History, North Yorkshire, Vol II, 1923, p 119 ff.

Listing NGR: SE5590970680

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Crayke Castle at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q5183045

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Wiltshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: West and the Weald: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: North East and East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Liverpool: Pevsner City Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)