One of England’s most magnificent castles
The vast medieval fortress of Kenilworth Castle is one of the largest
historic visitor attractions in the West Midlands and one of the most
spectacular castle ruins in England.
Kenilworth is best known as the home of Robert Dudley, the great love of
Queen Elizabeth I. Once boasting the finest architecture in Elizabethan
England
Kenilworth Castle stands on a low hill that was once at the heart of a
1,600 hectare (4,000 acre) park and surrounded by a vast man-made lake.
The spectacular ruins, built mostly from the local red sandstone, reveal
much of its medieval and Tudor past.
First built in the 1120s and a royal castle for most of its history, it
was expanded by King John, John of Gaunt and Henry V. In 1563 Elizabeth I
granted it to Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, who converted
Kenilworth into a lavish palace. The castle’s fortifications were
dismantled in 1650, and the ruins later became famous thanks in part to
Walter Scott’s 1821 romance Kenilworth.
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| Geoffrey de Clinton’s great tower, with original Norman round-headed
windows on the ground floor, and Elizabethan windows inserted into
12th-century apertures on the first floor |
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| Kenilworth Castle from the south, looking across the site of the mere to
the outer curtain wall and the ruins of Leicester’s Building |
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Elizabethan Garden
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| John of Gaunt's great hall, built between 1373 and 1380. The hall itself
was on the first floor, entered through the arch on the left |
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| Leicester’s Gatehouse, which was converted into a house after the Civil War |
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| The great tower of Kenilworth Castle, seen from across the recreated Elizabethan garden |
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