Subscribe to our quarterly newsletter<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n With origins as a ringwork castle, Leybourne was later \u2018fortified\u2019 in masonry, rather lightly, to become a rectangular courtyard house somewhat awkwardly superimposed upon the earlier earthwork. The masonry comprises a twin-towered gatehouse attached to a large, rectangular storeyed building \u2013 now gone \u2013 that may have been a chapel or, perhaps more likely, a chamber-block. The latter appears to have been connected by a passage to a third D-shaped tower at the southeast corner. This tower lies opposite a smaller, rectangular building at the southwest corner, that may represent a service-block and overlying chamber, with a Great Hall formerly lying east-west between them. The remaining side of the castle, to the west, was defined by a lowish wall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Subscribe to our quarterly newsletter<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Stylistic evidence suggests all the masonry at the castle belongs to one overall campaign, centering on the years 1305-25 and showing influence from the Welsh borderlands \u2013 probably via associations between the Leybourne lords and two Marcher families, the Valences and the Cliffords. The evidence for its dating and affinities is fairly precise, and can be summarised as follows \u2013<\/p>\n\n\n\n Subscribe to our quarterly newsletter<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n During the period 1305-25, Leybourne Castle appears to have been in the sole possession of a woman \u2013 Alice de Leybourne (n\u00e9e<\/em> de Toeni). She received the castle and manor on the death of her husband Thomas de Leybourne in 1307, and all evidence suggests that she held it, in her own right, until her own death in 1324. She was the only beneficiary when her brother Robert died in 1310, providing the necessary resources. Under her tenure, Leybourne appears to have retained its status as the caput of an extensive Kentish lordship, and it is likely that the gatehouse represented accommodation, and administrative space, for its officials. Alice may therefore join the list, currently very short, of women castle-builders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A number of other results have emerged from the present study. I suggest that a significant amount of work was undertaken by the Leybourne family at Leeds Castle, Kent, before it was acquired by Edward I\u2019s queen Eleanor in c<\/em>.1278, that this work included the creation of the lakes for which the site is celebrated, and that they may have been the inspiration for the lakes at Caerphilly Castle. It is also possible that the extensive work from c<\/em>.1300 at Brough Castle, Westmorland, was undertaken by another woman \u2013 Alice\u2019s aunt, Idonea de Leybourne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Subscribe to our quarterly newsletter<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n To see the full report please go here: Leybo<\/a>urne, Kent | Castle Studies Trust<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Please note Leybourne Castle is privately owned and not open to the public.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In the second half of 2024, Heneb’s Phil Poucher with the support and expert analysis of Neil Ludlow did the first ever detailed modern survey of the privately owned castle of Leybourne Castle, Kent, which has often intrigued castellologists as a key stepping stone in the development of gatehouses. Here Neil Ludlow explains what they … Continue reading Leybourne Castle, Kent: a monument to female patronage?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[474,9,1],"tags":[522,524,163,521,523,520,22,507],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2410"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2410"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2410\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2492,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2410\/revisions\/2492"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/castlestudiestrust.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Fig-3-Leybourne-reconst-plan-936x1024.jpg\")
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