It seems likely that Bigod built a simple wooden motte and bailey castle at Framlingham, but it was left to his second son, Hugh, later the first Earl of Norfolk, to replace that structure with one of stone. That fortification was ordered dismantled by Henry II about 1175, but it was rebuilt by Hugh's son Roger, the Second Earl of Norfolk, about 1190. It is largely Roger's work that visitors can see today.
So strong were the towers built by Roger Bigod that a central keep was considered unnecessary for the defences.
However, the castle had not been in existence long before it did indeed fall to besiegers. That occurred when Roger Bigod supported the baron's resistance to King John that resulted in the Magna Carta. John was not the forgiving sort, and he besieged Framlingham in 1216. The castle garrison held out only two days before surrendering, however, King John did not have long to live, and Framlingham was restored to the Bigods following the king's death.
The castle changed hands several times over the ensuing centuries until it finally came to the Howard family. Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, added much of the Tudor brickwork in the late 15th century. Finally, in 1635 the castle was sold to Sir Robert Hitcham.
Following Hitcham's death the castle was used as a poorhouse, and later, to house victims of the Plague. Over the intervening centuries, the castle has been used variously as a courthouse, drill hall, meeting hall, workhouse, and a fire station, before finally passing into the hands of English Heritage, whose work it has been to preserve the castle.
Though the interior of Framlingham Castle offers little to recall its days of power, the exterior, including the curtain wall and towers, offer a very enjoyable day out.
A couple of images of the castle from the other side of the Mere.
Two large lakes, called meres, were formed alongside the castle by damming a local stream. The southern mere, still visible today, had its origins in a smaller, natural lake; once dammed, it covered 9.4 hectares (23 acres) and had an island with a dovecote built on it. The meres were used for fishing as well as for boating, and would have had extensive aesthetic appeal. It is uncertain exactly when the meres were first built. One theory suggests that the meres were built in the early 13th century, although there is no documentary record of them at least until the 1380s. Another theory is that they were formed in the first half of the 14th century, at around the same time as the Lower Court was constructed. A third possibility is that it was the Howard family who introduced the meres in the late 15th century as part of their modernisation of the castle.
Sir Robert Hitcham died in 1636 leaving the castle and the manor to Pembroke College in Cambridge, with the proviso that the college destroy the internal castle buildings and construct a workhouse on the site instead, operating under the terms of the recently passed Poor Law.
After the collapse of the power of the Howards, the county of Suffolk was controlled by an oligarchy of Protestant gentry by the 17th century and did not play a prominent part in the English Civil War that occurred between 1642–6. Framlingham Castle escaped the slighting that occurred to many other English castles around this time.
(Slighting? - Slighting is the deliberate destruction, partial or complete, of a fortification without opposition, to render it unusable as a fortress - so now we know!)
Hitcham's bequest had meanwhile become entangled in the law courts and work did not begin on the workhouse until the late 1650s, by which time the internal buildings of castle were being broken up for the value of their stone; the chapel had been destroyed in this way by 1657.
The workhouse at Framlingham, the Red House, was finally built in the Inner Court (as shown above) and the poor would work there so they were eligible for relief; it proved unsatisfactory and, following the mismanagement of the workhouse funds, the Red House was closed and used as a public house instead.The maintenance of the meres ceased around this time and much of the area returned to meadow. In 1699 another attempt was made to open a poorhouse on the site, resulting in the destruction of the Great Chamber around 1700. This poorhouse failed too, and in 1729 a third attempt was made – the Great Hall was pulled down and the current poorhouse built on its site instead.Opposition to the Poor Law grew, and in 1834 the law was changed to reform the system; the poorhouse on the castle site was closed by 1839, the inhabitants being moved to the workhouse at Wickham Market.
The castle continued to fulfill several other local functions. During the outbreak of plague in 1666, the castle was used as an isolation ward for infected patients, and during the Napoleonic Wars the castle was used to hold the equipment and stores of the local Framlingham Volunteer regiment. Following the closure of the poorhouse, the castle was then used as a drill hall and as a county court, as well as containing the local parish jail and stocks.
View of the inner court.
The Lower Court (l) and Postern gate (r)
A number of carved brick chimneys dating from the Tudor period can be seen around the Inner Court, each with a unique design; all but three of these were purely ornamental, however, and historian R. Allen Brown describes them as a "regrettable" addition to the castle from an architectural perspective. Two of the functional Tudor chimneys make use of original mid-12th century flues; these two chimneys are circular in design and are the earliest such surviving structures in England.
And so to Orford castle, in the village of Orford, Suffolk, located 12 miles (20 km) northeast of Ipswich, with views over the Orford Ness. It was built between 1165 and 1173 by Henry II of England to consolidate royal power in the region. The well-preserved keep, described by historian R. Allen Brown as "one of the most remarkable keeps in England", is of a unique design and probably based on Byzantine architecture. The keep still stands among the earth-covered remains of the outer fortifications.
So here we have Framlingham Castle with no keep, and Orford with a magnificent keep and no outer walls, within a few miles of each other.
Again, a huge history - (Wikipedia). Prior to the building of Orford Castle, Suffolk was dominated by the Bigod family, who held the title of the Earl of Norfolk and owned key castles at Framlingham, Bungay, Walton and Thetford. Hugh Bigod had been one of a group of dissenting barons during the Anarchy in the reign of King Stephen, and Henry II wished to re-establish royal influence across the region. Henry confiscated the four castles from Hugh, but returned Framlingham and Bungay to Hugh in 1165. Henry then decided to build his own royal castle at Orford, near Framlingham, and construction work began in 1165, concluding in 1173.
The Orford site was around two miles (3.2 km) from the sea, lying on flat ground with swampy terrain slowly stretching away down to the river Ore, about half a mile (0.8 km) away.
The design of the keep was unique, and has been termed "one of the most remarkable keeps in England" by historian R. Allen Brown. The 90-foot-high (27-metre) central tower was circular in cross-section with three rectangular, clasping towers built out from the 49-foot-wide (15-metre) structure. The tower was based on a precise set of proportions, its various dimensions following the one-to-the-root-of-two ratio found in many English churches of the period.
The keep was surrounded by a curtain wall with probably four flanking towers and a fortified gatehouse protecting a relatively small bailey; these outer defences, rather than the keep, probably represented the main defences of the castle.
The Merman of Orford
In London. the athletic and active Henry II sits on the throne of England, plotting an invasion of Ireland that will lead to nearly a thousand years of pain. In Canterbury cathedral Thomas Beckett is the Archbishop, asserting an independence for the church that will one day cause his death. In Oxford a group of scholars, recently expelled from Paris, arrive and settle down.
In Orford, on the Suffolk coast, the world is the sea. What comes out of it, how it behaves, what goes into it; all these are the concerns of Orford people.
On one day in 1167, a group of men are fishing in the sea a mile off Orford Ness, their small boats rising and falling on the swell. Suddenly, one of their nets is pulled and twisted with great ferocity. With practised expertise the fishermen begin to pull it in, only to find that they have not caught a dolphin or a seal, as they had suspected, but a wild looking man.
Ralph Coggeshall, the Abbott's chronicler, takes up the story:
'Men fishing in the sea caught a wild man in their nets. He was naked and was like a man in all his members, covered with hair and with a long shaggy beard. He eagerly ate whatever was brought to him but if it was raw he pressed it between his hands until all the juice was expelled. He would not talk, even when tortured and hung up by his feet. Brought into church, he showed no signs of reverence or belief. He sought his bed at sunset and always remained there until sunrise. He was allowed to go into the sea, strongly guarded with three lines of nets, but he dived under the nets and came up again and again. Eventually he came back of his own free will. But later on he escaped and was never seen again.'
Belief in mermaids and mermen has existed since earliest times; most commonly they are represented as having the head and body of a woman or man and a fishtail instead of legs. While mermaids are often described as having great beauty and charm, which they used to lure sailors to their deaths, mermen (of which there are far fewer stories) are generally considered uglier and less kindly, although encouraging sailors to drown doesn't sound too friendly. Most tales suggest mermen have no interest in mankind, although they have been cited as being instrumental in the production of huge storms and the sinking of ships in revenge for man’s mistreatment of a beloved mermaid.
The story of the Orford Merman is still much talked about today, a memorial to him hanging in the market square - used as the logo for The Butley Orford Oysterage. It has now been put to music in a wonderful new composition by Joanna Lee, composer in residence to the Aldeburgh Music Club. The music was performed by the Aldeburgh Music Club choir as part of their 60th anniversary celebrations in 2012.
