Page 30 - John Barber's Oakham Castle and its archaeology

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Oakham Castle
Great Hall

1

North
Trench outline

Features exposed

Probable building line

Fig. 40. Diagram A – the Trench Plan showing trenches 1, 2 and 3.
Based on a drawing prepared for John Barber by L R Revell.

Para 7: ‘ONE KITCHEN’
In the 1340 inquisition no mention is made of the buttery or pantry, but I feel sure that both must have existed
and that my excavations have shown the whereabouts and dimensions of both. Perhaps they were deemed of
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too little importance or too obvious to include as separate items.
Therefore under the heading of ‘kitchen’ I shall consider not only the kitchen itself but also the buttery, the
pantry and the associated passageway. At this point I feel bound to emphasise once more that my excavations
were conducted a long time ago, and that what I remember of them should be taken more as a pointer to what
lies beneath the ground at the east end of the hall than a full and definitive account. All this should be studied in
conjunction with diagrams A, B, C, D and E, which were drawn, from my own measurements and sketches, by
Mr L R Revell, at that time a junior in the County Surveyor’s office, and now working in a more senior
capacity in Oxfordshire. To him I am greatly indebted. The excavations were limited in scale, and the work
force was unskilled and not always available in the strength required.
Nonetheless the work done was sufficient to indicate what there was to be found, but was not on a large
enough scale to vitiate a full and detailed enquiry in the future, if ever time and money allow.
Three main trenches were dug, each one four foot wide, but each had lateral extensions to facilitate the
answering of certain cogent questions. I will consider each trench separately and what it revealed:

1. Trench No.1 (Diagram C):
This was some seventy foot long and its western edge was fifteen feet from the east wall of the hall: it extended
beyond the line of the north and south walls of the hall, and was dug in the summer of 1956. It was laid out to
try to determine the north and south dimensions of the Castle to the east of the east wall of the hall, whether
there were any walls in line with the buttresses, and into what the three blocked up doorways led. The findings,
not all fully understood it must be admitted, are shown in diagram C. The walls marked 11 and 13 are both
earlier walls, and may relate either to an earlier phase of the existing castle or to an altogether earlier edifice
(see Para 4).

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This area was reinvestigated as part of the Time Team project in 2012 (Good & Mepham 2013); see also Hill 2013.
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