DINERTH, CASTELL ALLT CRAIG-ARTH

Site Details

NPRN
303844
Map Reference
SN46SE
Grid Reference
SN49496237
Unitary (Local) Authority
Ceredigion
Old County
Cardiganshire
Community
Dyffryn Arth
Type of Site
CASTLE
Broad Class
Defence
Period
Medieval

Site Description

A complex earthwork castle occupying a steep-sided narrow promontory above the confluence of the Arth and Erthig streams.
The castle covers an area of some 90m east-west by at most 24m and opens onto a small plain fringed by wooded slopes on the east. The entrance negotiates a swathe of double ramparts and ditches set across the neck of the promontory, the inner rampart rising some 7.2m from the base of its ditch.

There are two adjacent steep-sided flat-topped mounds on the north side of the promontory. The first faces the entrance across a ditch. It is 7.2m high and some 30m in diameter, with a near rectangular summit some 10m across, presumably the site of a tower. The second mound is rather smaller, some 5.4m high, and lacks a ditch, but is otherwise similar and presumably also supported a tower. The remainder of the earthworks comprise a series of ledges, or platforms about the south side of the mounds. These are probably the site of the buildings of the castle court, including a hall.

The site is identified with a documented castle, first recorded (as destroyed) in 1137, whose demise is noted in 1207-8.

John Wiles, RCAHMW, 3 October 2007