En un regard
Le château en bref
Ardley Castle now survives only as an earthwork hidden in Ardley Wood, about a hundred metres south-west of Manor Farm, south-west of the village of Ardley in Cherwell district, Oxfordshire. Historic England classifies it as a moated ringwork: a sub-rectangular fortified enclosure without a motte, typical of the earliest Norman lordly fortifications.
The enclosure measures about 66 m north to south and 40 to 50 m east to west. It is surrounded by a ditch about 7 m wide, still more than 2 m deep, crossed by a single causeway entrance at the north-east corner. An internal bank, surviving only in sections on the north-west and south-east sides, probably once carried a timber palisade or a wall. Several internal platforms may correspond to living quarters and stables. The site appears to have been reoccupied in the Middle Ages as a lordly residence surrounded by a dry moat, giving it a dual character, between fortification and moated manor.
No document firmly establishes its date of construction or its owners; local traditions linking the site to the Anarchy (1135-1154) remain to be corroborated. A Scheduled Monument since 1951, the earthwork is considered well preserved, although quarries border it to the south and west. It lies on wooded land and is not set up for visitors.
