Gloucester Castle

It was probably constructed by the Anglo-Norman Roger de Pitres, the first post-Norman Conquest Sheriff of Gloucestershire, as a simple motte and bailey castle during the reign of William the Conqueror (1066–1087), when sixteen houses were demolished to make way for it.

Walter of Gloucester,[3] Sheriff of Gloucestershire, succeeded his father Roger de Pitres as Constable of the castle.

Before 1113 Walter built a new castle west of Barbican hill on a former garden of Gloucester Abbey, overlooking the River Severn.

[3] Part of the castle had been being used as a gaol by 1185 and it was probably then the official county gaol, as it certainly was by 1228,[3] and Eleanor of Brittany, niece of King John and cousin of Henry III with a better claim to the throne according to primogeniture and thus becoming a state prisoner, had been briefly imprisoned there during the reign of John, from 1222 to 1223, and from 1237 to 1238,[5] while in 1222 to accommodate her the castle temporarily moved all its prisoners elsewhere.

[3] In December 2015, the castle's foundations were uncovered by archaeologists who were investigating the Gloucester Prison site ahead of a new development.

The castle keep in use as part of the county gaol (jail) in the 18th century. (A later work said to be based on an 1819 original)
1610 map showing position of Gloucester Castle on the River Severn , with Gloucester Cathedral (centre, until 1541 Gloucester Abbey ) to its north-east
The Gloucester tabula set was found during an archaeological investigation of the Norman castle in 1983. [ 1 ]