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201 results for Castle Rising Castle
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Piers Gaveston, Hugh Despenser and the Downfall of Edward II
The short reign of Edward II is commonly seen as a disastrous period in English history. Edward, faced military defeats, political crises and civil war. The king’s downfall was due in part to his reliance on his ‘favourites’, Piers Gaveston and Hugh Despenser, who were rumoured to be his lovers.
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Prisoners of War at Portchester Castle
Prisoners have always been taken in war, and during the wars between Britain and France in the late 18th and early 19th centuries castles like Portchester were used to hold them in growing numbers. Find out what life was like for the prisoners held there.
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Dover Castle commands the Strait of Dover, the shortest sea crossing between England and continental Europe, a position of strategic importance throughout history.
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This 15th-century gatehouse was the entrance to the former Tanfield Castle, the defended riverside manor house of the knight John Marmion.
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Thomas Becket, Henry II and Dover Castle
On 29 December 1170 Archbishop Thomas Becket of Canterbury was murdered in his cathedral by four of Henry II’s knights. Ten years later, Henry II embarked on a massive rebuilding of Dover Castle. How were his actions, and Becket’s murder, connected?
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Seven garden features that trick the senses
Gardens have always been designed to inspire surprise and wonder to their visitors. Discover some of the ways they play with perspectives as we explore some of our glorious gardens at English Heritage sites.
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Read about Dover Castle’s transformation into a permanent barracks and artillery fortress in the Georgian era and the conflicts that prompted this.
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Walter Hungerford and the Buggery Act
In 1533 Henry VIII’s government introduced the ‘Acte for the punishment of the vice of Buggerie’. It remained a capital offence until 1861. Less than ten years after the inception of the so-called ‘Buggery Act’, Walter Hungerford, the owner of Farleigh Hungerford Castle in Somerset, became the first man to be executed under its terms.
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Our senior historian, Paul Pattison, has worked with the genealogists at Findmypast to uncover more of John Glasson Thomas' story.