Kirby Muxloe Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

West of Leicester, Kirby Muxloe preserves one of the finest examples of a late medieval brick castle in England, left unfinished. It was begun in 1480 by William, Lord Hastings, chamberlain to Edward IV, on the site of the family manor house, itself built on the site of an earlier moated manor of the Pakeman family. The plan provided for a quadrangular residence surrounded by a wide moat, with a gatehouse and four corner towers. The arrest and beheading of Hastings at the Tower of London in June 1483 abruptly interrupted the works, which continued on a small scale until September 1484 and were then abandoned. The surviving building accounts offer exceptional evidence of how a building site of the period was organised. What remains is the almost complete gatehouse and the south-west tower, in local red brick enhanced with stone and patterns of dark bricks: the initials WH, the Hastings heraldic maunch and a ship. The site, owned by the State, is managed by English Heritage and opens on selected dates for guided visits.