Dover Castle is a Grade I listed mediaeval castle located in Dover, Kent, England. It was established in the 11th century, and because of its defensive importance throughout its timeline it has been called the — Key to England. It is reportedly the biggest castle in England, a claim that Windsor Castle also makes. Before the Roman invasion in AD 43, this site may have been fortified with earthworks during the Iron Age or earlier. This is hypothesised based on the unique layout of the earthworks, which does not seem to fit the mediaeval castle perfectly. Iron Age occupancy in the area of the castle has been revealed by excavations, but it is unclear whether this is connected to the fort on the hill. The location is also home to one of the two Roman lighthouses or pharoses of Dover, the highest and most comprehensive standing Roman building in England and one of the just three Roman-era lighthouses that are still in existence today. It is also touted as being the oldest standing structure in Britain. The five-level, eight-sided tower, which was constructed in the first century, was layered with red bricks, Kentish ragstone and tufa. After being transformed into a belfry in the Saxon era about 1000 A.D., having a new upper tier erected around 1430 A.D. and being largely renovated in 1913–1915, the castle lighthouse has endured the test of time. On the opposite Western Heights, across from Dover, are the meagre remnants of the other Roman lighthouse, also known as the Bredenstone. William the Conqueror and his troops proceeded to Westminster Abbey for his crowning in October 1066, following the Battle of Hastings. They travelled in circles, passing via Romney, Dover and Canterbury. Dover has been a founding member of the Cinque Ports from its founding in 1050; it Is possible that it was this that originally caught the eyes of William and earned Kent the title of Invicta. Eight knights were chosen on a tenured basis in 1088 to protect Dover Castle. The castle started to take on a distinctive shape during the era of Henry II. This period is represented by the great keep, the inner and outer baileys, etc. The keep was constructed by Maurice the Engineer. The King invested approximately £6,500 in the castle between 1179 and 1188, a significant sum given that his annual income was probably in the neighbourhood of £10,000 at the time. A group of insurgent lords encouraged the future Louis VIII of France to claim the English throne in 1216, during the First Barons War. Although he made considerable progress in penetrating the defences of the castle, he ultimately failed. It was maintained for the king during the English Civil War but was later seized by Parliamentarian supporters in 1642 without a single fire being shot. Dover Castle served as a key observation post for the cross-Channel sightings of Anglo-French Survey, which linked the Royal Greenwich Observatory and the Paris Observatory using trigonometric computations. During the Napoleonic Wars at the end of the 18th century, there was extensive renovation. For the extra forces and their gears, Dover needed barracks and storage spaces as it transformed into a garrison town. To the south of the castle, brand-new quarters for the officers were built between 1856 and 1858. The tunnels were transformed first as an air-raid shelter and then into a military control station and an underground hospital after the Second World War began in 1939. Dover Castle is still protected from unsanctioned changes as a Scheduled Monument, making it a Nationally Important historic structure and archaeological site. [Information and Image Credit : Dover_Castle, Wikipedia] [Image : An Aerial View of the Castle; Author: Chensiyuan, Wikipedia] [Image Availed Under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International (Kindly Relate to Individual Source Image URLs for More Usage Properties)] [License-Link :
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[Source Image URL : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1_dover_castle_aerial_panorama_2017.jpg ] #Architecture
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