Hull Fair Rides Again

Photo by Margot K Juby

It's that time of year again when a car park in west Hull is taken over by the biggest travelling fair in the country. It's the week of Hull Fair again, just as noisy, bright and brash as ever, just as crowded as well. This year more folk than ever have crammed into the place, so many the police had to close the street off at one point last weekend. I don't much like the thing itself but, as Margot reminds me every year when I moan about going, it marks the passing of the seasons, autumn can begin now the Fair is here.

The weekend in black and white is here.

A Big, Beautiful Wall

Before we leave Castle Rising to its slumbers just one last gaze upon the earthwork ramparts that reach 120 feet in places and the ditch that surround the keep and the two external baileys.

Such defences might make you think the place was under threat and was somehow of military importance. It seems, however, the place had no strategic value and was just a vanity project, an expensive, over done hunting lodge. The ramparts were just meant to impress and they still do.

The Neighbours

Sticking this castle in the Norfolk countryside involved shifting an existing village slightly to the north. The village, known then as Risinga, gets a mention in Domesday as belonging in 1086 to Odo,  half-brother of William the Conqueror and bishop of Bayeux, who, as a cleric, could not shed blood so took to the battlefield wielding a club. There's an old church you can see poking out from behind the trees named after St Lawrence or Laurence if you prefer ( I'm a 'w' Lawrence man myself). St L it was who, it is said, calmly sat up during his martyrdom by grilling, and stated that he was cooked on one side and would they kindly turn him over and cook the other ...

This tree bears a memorial that it was planted by the Princess of Wales on December 28 1865, there's another nearby allegedly planted by her hubby. They must have been bored between Christmas and New Year and popped out for a spot of gardening.

After one thousand years the village of Castle Rising belongs to the Sandringham Estate, yes, that Sandringham which is just up the road, the road where the elderly Queen's consort had his accident earlier this year. And, on the subject of keeping things in the family, the castle, though run by English Heritage, is still owned by a descendant of  the guy who had it built, William d'Aubigny ...one lord Howard of Rising.

Open plan with potential for improvement

Now I need you to use your imagination... don't think what a wreck, what a ruin, think grand medieval chamber richly decorated, with a roaring fire, and sumptuous feasts as guests from the monarchy downwards loosened their stays, put up their feet and had a good old time. OK it's a stretch ...

This is the Great Chamber, or it was. You can just about make out where the floor was by the beam holes about half way up the picture. That's a throne niche, so I'm told, on the left hand wall.

The wooden roof was held by beams supported on decorative corbels.

This was, according to a sign, once the kitchen just off the chamber. Yes an indoor, upstairs medieval kitchen with wood burning ovens and so on; a health and safety nightmare which I read was solved by being moved outside at some later date. The kitchen was, of course, next to the garderobes for the guests' comfort as an informative sign puts it, and why not? Germs hadn't been invented back then.

The Vestibule

You, as a person of importance, would not tarry long in the basement of this keep. Instead you'd be shown upstairs to the reception or vestibule. An informative little sign tells us that this would originally have been a draughty place with no glass just wooden shutters. The 16th century saw mullions and glazing being added and also the main doorway into the great chamber converted into a fireplace which strikes me as an odd thing to do but then folks these days are converting their front gardens into car parks so maybe it was just a passing fancy ...

The tiles above the fireplace are a 19th century addition.

This little door became the main entrance into the Great Chamber ...

The Fixer Upper

As promised  here are some shots from the innards of Castle Rising. We'll start at the ground level and work up, more tomorrow or whenever.

All's well that has a well, I suppose, though I would fancy drinking the stuff that came out of that hole.

Trifles make the sum of life

I've shown the old Customs House, the Purfleet and St Nicholas' Chapel (that's the spire peeking out in the background) before but they're worth another viewing this time from across the river. So what can I add? Oh yes, I remember now ... there's a new film out, some dire comedy based on David Copperfield, and the Lynn papers and media folk (for they are ubiquitous, even in Norfolk) are in a tizz that some of the film features the Customs House and it gives them a quite a frisson. Then last night the local, as in Hull, BBC news had a report featuring the same film and how it has bits of Hull in  it and doesn't that give you all a thrill (we don't do frissons in Hull) ... Bury St Edmunds also stars but we don't want to talk about that ... Oh go on then here's the trailer.