TRETOWER CASTLE

Brecknockshire

Tretower Castle features two main periods of building.  The first, a square keep with a hall attached was built in the mid-12th Century.  The remains of the hall are to the right of the tower in this picture.  Much of this work was demolished the following century by John Picard who built the superb round keep which dominates the Castle today and has survived in very good condition.  It was strong enough for the English nobleman Sir James Berkeley to hold the Castle against Owain Glyndwr, although he did take his anger out on the nearby house which he completely demolished.

The Castle was obviously never very comfortable because a house always seems to have existed nearby and when the Castle passed to Sir Roger Vaughan soon after the Glyndwr rebellion he built a new house on the site of the one destroyed.  This was Tretower Court which is now better known than the Castle.  Sir Roger's son, Thomas, enlarged the Court in the 1480s, but what remains is still one of the oldest examples of domestic architecture in Britain.

In the 17th Century Henry Vaughan, the poet, lived at Tretower Court.

Both the Court and the Castle are owned by CADW (Welsh Heritage) and are open to the public throughout the year.

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2001