Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Arthur's Hall, adjacent to the north-east wall of the inner bailey of Dover Castle, was built in the late 1230s and was a building of significance until the 17th century. The building has undergone many phases of alteration (most recently in the C18th when it was refaced and a second floor was added for barrack accomodation). Despite this there are the remains of medieval building material in all of its walls, with numerous features which highlight its former uses. (location accurate to the nearest 1m based on available information)

Monument Types

• GREAT HALL (Medieval to Post Medieval - 1230 AD? to 1740 AD?)

Full description

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Arthur’s Hall was built in the late 1230s, although building fabric evidence, in the south-east wall, indicates that the remains of an earlier phase are incorporated within it. Although the form of this earlier building is unclear, the floor in the north-east corner of the hall is interrupted as if to accommodate a substantial stair up to the ramparts of the Inner Bailey. Arthur’s Hall retains service doors at its lower end and scar evidence in the side wall where the doorway into the cross passage survives. At the upper end, in the southwest wall, there are remains of a tall doorway from the front of the dais out into the Inner Bailey and there is evidence for the dais at the upper end. Stratigraphic evidence in the front wall suggests that the floor level had been raised, perhaps twice, by the 16th century. Arthur’s Hall remained a significant building until the 17th century, but its current appearance is a result of a programme to create barracks in the 1740s. Arthur’s Hall was investigated as part of the Dover Great Tower Project, in support of the re-interpretation and presentation of the Keep and Inner Bailey. (1-2)

The upper end of the hall was to the north-west of the building, and clear evidence exists for a dais here. At the lower, south-east, end of the hall there is also evidence of service rooms and a cross passage. The floor appears to have been raised at some time before the 16th century. (1)

In 1284/5 there are references to repairs to the King’s Garderobe next to the Old Hall and the King’s Chamber next to the Old Hall. When these descriptions of the location are combined with references to the new hall, the most obvious interpretation is that the King’s Chamber lay to the north-west of Arthur’s Hall, with the Old Hall to the north-west of the chamber. In 13th century documents there are references to the ‘Old Hall’, ‘New Hall’ and the ‘Great Hall’, and in the detail of the documents they sometimes seem to be referring to what becomes known as Arthur’s Hall in the 14th century. Arthur’s Hall may have begun to be considered as the Old Hall by the late 13th century following the creation in the mid-13th century of a room designed to look like a hall within the Great Tower, on the east side of the first floor. Some of the fabric within Arthur’s Hall seems to predate the principal phase of construction in 1238-40. The south-east wall has a blocked arch that predates the service doors of the mid-13th century. There is also the footprint of what seems to have been a large stair up to the ramparts of the Inner Bailey in the north-east corner of Arthur’s Hall, and excavations in 2008 suggest that there may have been a small piece of wall projecting just into the area of Arthur’s Hall, ‘coincidentally’ located where the front of the dais was situated in the 1238-40 hall. (2)

This building is a former accommodation block for enlisted men within the mid-18th century barrack complex. It was constructed on the ruinous Arthur’s Hall, the former heart of the early 13th century complex of buildings that were constructed within the inner bailey during the reign of Henry III. The current building contains substantial elements from Arthur’s Hall and is a fine example of 18th century re-use of medieval structures as well as containing evidence on the earlier phases of the castle. When the barracks were constructed a uniform external finish was employed in which joints in the fabric were treated with galleting. Where the external face of the wall was new, usually coursed stone was employed, but where older fabric was being employed without being refaced, the existing rubble was tidied up. The south west façade of this building exemplified this twin-track approach with the north western end having rubble while the refaced section of the wall was coursed. In the 1740s a floor was inserted within the hall to create two storeys and present roof structure. The first floor was converted in the 19th century into one large barrack room. (3)

Bereblock’s view shows the pentice between Arthur’s Hall and the Great Tower (4)

<1> English Heritage, 2011, Arthur's Hall, Dover Castle, Kent, Analaysis of the building, historic building recording (Unpublished document). SKE31740.

<2> English Heritage, 2010, Inner Bailey, Dover Castle, Kent; Historic Buildings Report (Unpublished document). SKE31743.

<3> English Heritage, 2014, Dover Castle Conservation Management Plan Volume 2 Gazetteer (Unpublished document). SKE52105.

<4> John Bereblock, 1570, John Bereblock's view of Dover Castle (Cartographic materials). SKE52107.

Sources and further reading

Related records