For Dad: the last ever license to crenellate.

Back in t’day, before we had electricity or the wheel or shoes or modern medicine, I was in school studying for my GCSEs. I got off to a great start in my (somewhat stalled) dream of being a celebrity historian and did fantastically in History. I did ok in everything else (except Technology, but let’s not talk about that), but History was the one I really cared about.

The main part of the coursework element (I love coursework!) was a study of castles (I love castles!). I think it was only meant to be about 1000 words long but mine ended up being a small book, dedicated to all things historically nerdy. It was great. While I was putting together this beautiful piece of academia, my dad mentioned that he’d once been asked when the last license to crenellate had been granted and I was stumped. I decided to challenge myself to find out the answer.

Crenellations are the fun uppy downy bits on the top of a parapet wall. In the medieval period if you wanted to defend your abode, you needed a license to crenellate from either the King (or if you lived in the mid to late 12^th Century and weren’t massively fond of King Stephen, from the Empress Matilda), or the Bishops of Durham, the Earls of Chester, or the Dukes of Lancaster.

Theoretically the power to grant licenses to crenellate ensured that the King (and the other magnates mentioned above) could control who had strong castles and would mean that enemies of the crown would be at a significant disadvantage if they wanted to partake in nefarious shenanigans against the crown. The license could also have been a sneaky way for the crown to get some extra money in. However, it never really quite worked like that. I’m not aware of any license requests that were refused (but I’d love to hear from anyone who knows of any) and in times of peace crenellations were more of a decorative status symbol to make your manor house look more impressive than your neighbours’.

(Carlisle Castle has some pretty good crenellations. They weren’t just for decoration – for centuries the castle changed hands between England and Scotland like it was going out of style)

Over the years, I have regularly forgotten the challenge I set myself. But it pops up every so often, like during the days spent pouring over twelfth century grants and charters at university and when I’m touristing it up around old castles. It wasn’t until a discussion at work when I was trying to explain the fun and games of the reign of Stephen to my colleagues that I remembered that I really should find the answer.

So...

Utilising the powers of the interwebs, I have found out the answer. So for Dad, about a decade late, I can officially let you know that the definitive answer to the age-old question of “when was the last license to crenellate granted?” is...

Probably Eastwell Manor in Kent. Or Millom Castle in Cumbria. But we can’t really be sure.

Eastwell was granted a license to crenellate on June 5^th 1589 to Sir Moile Finche – a member of parliament and Baronet of Eastwell from 1611.

Millom Castle is an interesting oddity. The current list of surviving licenses is by no means complete or accurate. The earliest document comes from 1141 and pertains to earlier licenses of which we have no record. A great deal of later licenses also do not seem to exist in physical form any more and their existences is only noted as references in other documents. This was the case with the Millom license (March 10^th 1622 to Ferdinand Huddleston) and has since been rejected by historians.

Its a shame though. I kind of feel like it would be nice if Millom was the holder of the last license to crenellate. I’m sure that Eastwell is a lovely place, but as Millom is only about an hour’s drive from Kendal, it’s somewhere I can actually go and scout out if I have a spare afternoon.

If anyone’s interested, the Castles Studies Group have a brilliant article on the subject which can be found here.