Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

The eastern defences of Dover Castle facing a higher area of chalk downland, form an important aspect of the castle’s defences and are largely medieval in origin, although greatly altered in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Avranches Tower, located at the north western end of the Avranches traverse is a remarkable survival of part of a sophisticated 12th-century defensive system. (location accurate to the nearest 1m based on available information)

Monument Types

• TOWER (Altered, Medieval to Post Medieval - 1190 AD? to 1800 AD?)

Full description

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The eastern defences of Dover Castle facing a higher area of chalk downland, form an important aspect of the castle’s defences and are largely medieval in origin, although greatly altered in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Avranches Tower, located at the north western end of the Avranches traverse is a remarkable survival of part of a sophisticated 12th-century defensive system.

The Avranches traverse is part of the original medieval construction which was likely completed by c. 1190 and likely follows the line of the Iron Age Hillfort. The surviving C12th works are located to the east of Fitzwilliam’s gate as far as Avranches Tower where the primary circuit then turned south (across the probable Iron-Age entrance), in a length sweeping the south-eastern ditch of the Avranches Flank. It was designed to defend as well as to block the original entrance to Dover Castle and is probably the eastern extent of Henry II’s building campaign. Avranches tower is a remarkable polygonal tower with two tiers of arrow loops covering the re-entrant angle where the northern stretch of the outer curtain ‘kicks back’ to the southern section. The tower is semi-octagonal, set at a near right angle to the ‘flank’ on its north, with a turret on the north-west side, containing a spiral stair, and at one or more levels a garderobe with a drain emptying into the east ditch. It is built of ragstone, with ashlar quoins and two offset corbel tables, and ashlar in the battered plinth. The lower chamber, approached through a brick-lined passage, is vaulted (with 18th-cent brickwork), and has longer loops in all four outer faces again above the offset, but stepping up on each face from E to W. To the rear of the tower are the remains of what was presumably a lodging; this still contains the base of a medieval fireplace, but the inside walls are lost. (summarised from sources) (1-3)

<1> D. F. Renn, 1969, Archaeologia Cantiana: The Avranches Traverse Dover Castle (Article in serial). SKE52130.

<2> Johnathan Coad, 1995, English Heritage Book of Dover Castle and the Defences of Dover (Monograph). SKE52106.

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

Sources and further reading

Related records