Norham

Area 1, Sub-Area A Up The River Tweed

L74 and L75 P451 NT906475 11 km, 6 3/4 miles, south-west of Berwick

Capital of Norhamshire and Islandshire, the greater part of the Durham Bishops' County Palatine or northern territory. The village's Anglian name had been Ubbanford and, as this suggests, it was situated at the southern end of a ford across the River Tweed, the first above the tideway and thus of immense strategic importance.

The Bishops probably chose it as their 'northern home' because of this communication convenience, perhaps forgetting that fords could be used by the ungodly as well as the godly. The Bishops also held land north of the river, extensive estates which the Scots saw as remarkably like stepping stones to English domination in Scottish Church affairs. Rather cleverly, they removed this threat by having the estates transferred to the see of Glasgow in 1120.

This territorial loss alarmed Ralph de Flambard, bishop from 1099 to 1128. Would there be an attempt to rob him of his south bank estates as well? To prevent such an outrage, and also to try to deter an increasing number of Scottish raiders from using the ford, he built a small fortification on high ground a few yards downstream from the village.

The chosen site was naturally strong, with precipitous drops to the river on the north and to a tributary on the east. Only a limited amount of spadework would have been required to make moats on the other sides, yet the fortification which Flambard started in 1121 took seven years to finish; it would seem that he had in mind something superior to the usual motte and bailey, perhaps something faced in stone. Whatever it was, it failed to stop King David on at least two occasions in 1137 and 1138 when he used the ford to invade England.

King Henry II ordered the building of several castles along, or close to, the Border in 1157 to prevent further Scottish aggression, and Bishop Hugh de Puiset was persuaded to start building a strong stone castle at Norham to replace what was left of Flambard's fortification.

The majestic ruins to be seen today represent a mix of dates, for the castle was repaired, altered or partly rebuilt several times during its long career. It is difficult to pick out traces of the original, but it seems fairly certain that it started as it meant to go on, as a typical Norman keep and bailey castle, made specially strong by massive walls. Nothing remains of the garrison accommodation; the keep, what is left of a three storey building, is mainly thirteenth and fifteenth century work.

Norham became the focus of much attention in 1291 as the place where the Competition to find a new Scottish king was held. Bishop Anthony Bek, or his predecessor, must have had a premonition as the castle had recently been extensively modified. It had become almost impregnable, with a 90 foot high tower, inner and outer wards, each with massive walls, a deep moat with a drawbridge, turrets on the outer wall and gates on the west and south sides guarded by flanking turrets. In addition, a splendid hall house, residence of the constable or his lord bishop but fit for a king, had been built in the inner ward.

This was where King Edward 1 stayed while hearing the claims of the thirteen competitors taking part in the 'Great Cause'. There is speculation, however, about where exactly the arbitration took place, for obviously the castle was too small. Upsettlington and Ladykirk across the river are possible sites, while Norham Church is favoured by many historians. One place which has not been given much consideration is Blount Island, in the middle of the river below the castle. It was convenient, within sight of trouble-watchers posted on the castle walls, easily accessible from both banks, large and flat enough to accommodate all the claimants and their retinues, and the irony of using a halfway house between his own country and the country he coveted would not have been lost on Edward.

Norham castle was continually manned during the Scottish War of Independence, when Sir Thomas Grey did frequent duty as its constable and Norhamshire's sheriff. After Bannockburn Robert Bruce besieged the castle on three occasions but never managed to gain an entry, thereby earning for Grey the Scottish leader's grudging respect.

A little light relief came to Norham in 1319 in the shape of a young knight called Sir William Marmion. His story has been well publicised by Sir Walter Scott, but for some unknown reason he set the lad's exploits against the backcloth of the Battle of Flodden which took place nearly two hundred years later. The real Marmion, it seems, attended a party in Lincolnshire with his girl-friend, a high-flyer of her time, who gave him a most conspicuous helmet with a "rich crest of gold". She told him that if he wanted her hand he must first prove his gallantry by bringing honour to the helmet in the most dangerous place in the kingdom.

Sir Marmion did want the hand and everything else that went with it, so off he went to Norham where, with Sir Thomas Grey's good humoured connivance, he was dressed in armour, helmet and all, set on a horse and sent out to meet a small raiding party. The Scots have a sense of humour too, but on this occasion they were perhaps stunned by the Belisha beacon careering towards them for, instead of killing him, they merely knocked him off his horse and left him for Grey to pick up later. That, unfortunately, is as far as the story goes; we are left to wonder whether he received a hero's welcome when he returned to his girl-friend, or whether he found her married to someone else.

A near miss in 1327 is on record. It was the night of King Edward Ill's coronation and the Scots expected the castle's garrison to be celebrating, too inebriated to notice a small party of rock climbers scaling the battlements, intent on opening the gates to their main force. The garrison was certainly in jubilant mood, but the sentries had remained sober and watchful. The scaling party was caught and the ingenious plan failed.

The Scots and their French allies made frequent sorties across the Border during the next century, but their strength was never sufficient to worry Norham castle unduly. The garrison did its policing job well but was not always successful. In 1355, for example, Sir Robert Ramsay of Dalhousie set fire to the village of Norham, causing the castle's constable to rush out straight into an ambush.

The fourteenth and fifteenth centuries saw many changes made to the castle to improve its resistance to the sophisticated siege machines used by the Scots and French, and to render it a more comfortable place for the Durham bishops to visit.

During the Wars of the Roses Norham favoured the Yorkists at first and thus attracted the attention of King Henry VI's army, which lay siege to it in 1463. Lord Montagu relieved it after eleven days, but after he had gone the castle's constable voluntarily changed sides, backing the Lancastrians - a strange thing to do in the circumstances and Montagu came back to investigate. On the way he was stopped by a Lancastrian army led by the Duke of Somerset and Sir Ralph Percy. They had a set-to on Hedgeley Moor from which Montagu emerged the winner; he chased Somerset's men back to Hexham where the Red Rose withered terminally so far as Northumberland was concerned. Norham quietly surrendered to the Yorkists.

During the second half of the fifteenth century the castle's fabric and provisioning system were thoroughly overhauled. Improvements were made which probably saved it when King James IV attacked it in 1496 during an invasion which he claimed was to support Perkin Warbeck, a pretender to the English Throne, but was really to create a second front against the English and thereby take some of the sting out of their French campaign. James bombarded the castle with French artillery for a fortnight but the garrison held on until the Earl of Surrey brought relief.

1513 saw the same king invade England again, and again he attacked Norham. This time he had even bigger cannon, including the famous Mons Meg, yet it took five days of incessant bombardment to breach the castle walls and to force the garrison to surrender. This did not do James much good for he went on to his death, and his army's defeat, at Flodden, but it did serve to show that massive castles were obsolete, that masonry alone was no match for the new generation of ordnance. Immediately after the Battle of Flodden the Durham Bishop realised this and put in hand a quadrangular bastion called Clapham's Tower which was shaped so as to offer the minimum target to besiegers. Some smaller bastions, all with gun-ports, were built along the wall to replace gun turrets. Repairs were completed and the castle operational by 1515, but the new work was not finished until 1527.

The bastions were never given a full-scale test. The Crown took possession of the castle in 1559 when Bishop Tunstall forfeited his territory and Norhamshire and Islandshire became part of County Durham. The following year Queen Elizabeth signed the Treaty of Edinburgh which ended the Scottish and French 'Auld Alliance', so she saw no good reason for maintaining a defensive post at Norham, especially as she was paying so much for her ramparts at Berwick.

In 1571 the Queen granted the castle to Henry Carey, Lord Hunsdon, the Lord Warden of the Eastern March. It was not a gift Carey appreciated very much and he complained to Lord Cecil that it was uninhabitable and failing to bits. After the Union of the Crowns the castle had a succession of owners until, in 1923, it was given to the nation. English Heritage care for it now, and they invite visitors to its still impressive keep, gateways, walls and moats, all clearly indicating the essentials of a true Norman castle.