Wark on Tweed Village Defences (The Gatehouse Record)

In the civil parish of Carham.
In the historic county of Northumberland.
Modern Authority of Northumberland.
1974 county of Northumberland.
Medieval County of Northumberland.

OS Map Grid Reference: NT82043875
Latitude 55.64207° Longitude -2.28691°

Wark on Tweed Village Defences has been described as a probable Urban Defence.

There are cropmark/slight earthwork remains.

Comments

It is unclear what Bond meant. Is this a reference to some earthworks around the modern village east of the castle or to an area west of the castle outer ward which contained St Gile's Chapel (at given map reference) which was used by the villages as a chapel of ease.
Regardless of where the medieval villagers houses where the large western ward of the castle could certainly have worked as a refuge for villages and their livestock if needed.
A footpath running north from the modern road to the river on the eastern boundary of the modern village lies in a gully. Is this a hollow way of a now defunct crossing of the river or a 'defensive' ditch?

Sources of information, references and further reading

Further information may be available from the holder of the county Historic Environment Record.

Books
- Creighton, O.H. and Higham, R.A., 2005, Medieval Town Walls (Stroud: Tempus) p. 270
  Brown, R.Allen, 1989, Castles from the Air (Cambridge University Press) p. 221-2
  Bond, C.J., 1987, 'Anglo-Saxon and Medieval Defences' in Schofield, J. and Leech, R. (eds) Urban Archaeology in Britain (CBA Research Report 61) p. 92-116 online copy
  Vickers, Kenneth H. (ed), 1922, Northumberland County History (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) Vol. 11 p. 16, 30-1 online copy
Periodical Articles
- Carlton, Richard, 2012, 'Wark-on-Tweed: Wark Castle Access and Community' Archaeology in Northumberland Vol. 21 p. 46-7 online copy
  Bond J., 2001, 'Earthen Castles, Outer Enclosures and the Earthworks at Ascott d'Oilly Castle, Oxfordshire' Oxoniensia Vol. 46 p. 67-8 (Appendix: Earthwork castles with attached village enclosures) online copy

Most of the sites or buildings recorded in this web site are NOT open to the public and permission to visit a site must always be sought from the landowner or tenant.
It is an offence to disturb a Scheduled Monument without consent. It is a destruction of everyone's heritage to remove archaeological evidence from ANY site without proper recording and reporting.
Don't use metal detectors on historic sites without authorisation.

The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

Data >
Maps >	Streetmap	NLS maps	Where's the path	Old-Maps
Data/Maps >	Magic	V. O. B.	Geology	LiDAR	Open Domesday
Air Photos >	Bing Maps	Google Maps	Getmapping	ZoomEarth
Photos >	CastleFacts	Geograph	Flickr	Panoramio