Talk:Bodiam Castle

Bodiam Castle is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.

This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on September 15, 2011.

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Date	Process	Result
January 30, 2010	Featured article candidate	Promoted

Military history: Fortifications / Technology / British / European / Medieval / Early Modern

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Dimensions

What are the dimensions of the castle, its rooms, and its walls? Why are these dimensions generally not listed for castles in introductory information? I am interested in building a reproduction of a castle in Virginia. Anyone involved in this type of work please respond ([email protected]) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.215.28.167 (talk • contribs) 21 January 2007

I'm not involved, but I've added co-ordinates to the artile so you can look on Google Earth. I don't know how accurate their measurements are but the castle is roughly 47m x 42m. (155.43 ft x 141 ft).

Chrisfow 18:36, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Edward Dallingridge?

Isn't his name Edward Dallyngrigge not Edward Dallingridge. I'm not sure myself but most websites spell his last name as Dallyngrigge. I changed it to Dallyngrigge. If anyone knows how his last name is really spelled you can change it back. But according to what I found so far I think it should be left as Dallyngrigge. Here is one website that spells it Dallyngrigge. Bishr the Great (talk) 21:08, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hey On all the websites I've been on its that as well so it is right. (and I've been on like 20!!) Well done for noticing!! xx —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.151.181.145 (talk) 18:49, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Spelling

The spelling of Dallingridge's name was, like much orthography during the medieval period, highly inconsistent. If you browse old Sussex documents of , you'll see it spelled many different ways. I suppose the 'Dallynrigge' is as good as any. The name apparently derives from a ridge near Dalling. Even on this one page from an 1885 volume the name isn't spelled consistently.[1] The Sussex Archaeological Society addressed the derivation of the name here.[2]Regards,MarmadukePercy (talk) 16:24, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Deleted entry

Anonymous IP here, deleted an "It's so cool" entry. Best Regards, Wikipedians, you're the best. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.224.74.250 (talk) 20:51, 8 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

"... Dalyngrigge joined the company of Sir Robert Knolles, a notorious commander who was reputed to have made 100,000 gold crowns from such exploits." What exploits? --Malleus Fatuorum 18:52, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting exploits. When he passed through villages, the charred gables of the destroyed houses he left in his wake became known as "Knollys' mitres". I'll go and add that to the Knollys article... Nev1 (talk) 19:00, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Parliament confiscated his lands in 1643 and 1644 ...". Parliament confiscated them twice? --Malleus Fatuorum 19:13, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Funny phrasing, but not all of them were confiscated in 1643, so Parliament came back for more. Nev1 (talk) 19:16, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I expect there will be some objection raised to the monetary conversions to present-day value, as there was with the Gunpowder Plot. Might be worth while taking a look at the compromise we reached there rather than have the discussion at FAC with this article. --Malleus Fatuorum 19:24, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, I have occasionally seen Fifelfoo's comments on inflation before but this is the first time I've read them through properly. I can understand his stance, but feel that he is too hardline and is depriving the reader of a useful tool. I was thinking of adding "about" before the conversions so as not to give the impression that the conversions are concrete but this could get repetitive. In this case, "highly dubious" data would be of much more use to the read than none at all; if it comes with a health warning, that should be enough. The information comes from MeasuringWorth.com as it did in the Gunpowder Plot article so I'll take the lead from that article and add the footnote. Nev1 (talk) 20:29, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"John Tufton was a supporter of the Royalist cause during the English Civil War, and led an attack on Lewes, and at Haywards Heath." An attack on Lewes, but at Haywards Heath seems strange. What was he attacking at Haywards Heath? --Malleus Fatuorum 19:31, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Lewes was attacked, but from the source it seems that Haywards Heath wasn't the intended target of the second battle, it was just the site. Hopefully [978-0812242232 this] bypasses that problem. Nev1 (talk) 19:39, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Military historian describes the approach as formidable, and considers it the equal of ...". Should this be "military historians", or are we talking about one specific military historian? --Malleus Fatuorum 19:46, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've now given the name of the specific historian. Nev1 (talk) 20:14, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"The main entrance on the north side of the castle is today connected to the north back by a wooden bridge ...". Should that be "bank"? --Malleus Fatuorum 19:52, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, it should be bank. Nev1 (talk) 20:14, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can't make sense of this at all: "As well as the in the surrounding landscape, work was done on the castle's interior. A well was discovered when the basement of the south-west tower." --Malleus Fatuorum 20:46, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like an aborted sentence, I've simplified it. Nev1 (talk) 21:01, 15 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Modern equivalents to medieval financial sums...

Ref my last edit, there's been extensive discussions about the difficulties in producing modern equivalents for medieval financial figures - worth checking Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Kenilworth Castle out for some of the discussion here. Happy to discuss further of course. Hchc2009 (talk) 20:49, 17 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Henry VII - House of Lancaster?

I thought Henry was House of Tudor (this is supported by his Wiki article) but might have missed something. Does this need changing? Coatgal (talk) 21:35, 6 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No, it's just a confusing period! Have a look at the War of the Roses, which will give you some more background to this; it's correct to say that Henry was either a Lancastrian or the first of the Tudor dynasty. Hchc2009 (talk) 06:08, 7 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Please Clarify

Bodiam Castle was built on a fresh site. - The sentence is vague and the article is unclear about this. Could this be rewritten in a more general tone, or be further explained? --293.xx.xxx.xx (talk) 09:17, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fresh means it had not been built on before. How would you phrase it? Nev1 (talk) 17:14, 19 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fleet?

Article says: "In 1385, a fleet of 1,200 ships – variously cogs, barges, and galleys – gathered at Sluys; the population of southern England was in a state of panic." Was this an English fleet? For what purpose? An attacking enemy fleet? Can it be clarified? --Dweller (talk) 12:38, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I would have thought given the context of the Hundred Years War, as explained in the article, it would have been obvious that it was a hostile French fleet. Nev1 (talk) 16:36, 18 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps it was the use of the verb "gathered", which implies it was English, rather than an arriving-type verb. Hence the puzzlement, why an English fleet would cause a panic. Is there an article about this event? --Dweller (talk) 20:21, 18 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

An invasion fleet takes a lot of putting together. Its gathering at one place (Sluys, which was on the far side of the English Channel, so in the right place to load troops onto the ships in preparation for the crossing) would have been taken as a possible indication that an invasion was planned. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 20:35, 18 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Bodiam's status as a genuine castle

There are two veiled hints in the text, one the unexplained "ostensibly" in the Lead and a suggestion regarding the moat that Bodiam is not a true castle, ie built for military purposes, as opposed to a status symbol.

It's been some years since I did any serious research on castles at all, never mind Bodiam, but I do seem to recall that Bodiam is now suspected to have been the latter, rather than the former and it was the physical embodiment on the landscape of a self-made man wanting to appear as powerful as his peers or Peers.

This narrative is missing from the article, even as a discounted theory - aside from the two hints I mention above. Is it because my memory is incorrect? --Dweller (talk) 12:47, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I notice there's a picture caption which goes further than the moat comment and says: "its defences are now considered more ornamental than practical". I think there seems to be a notable omission in the article. --Dweller (talk) 14:48, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Have a look at the bit that goes "In the 1990s, Bodiam Castle was at the centre of a debate in castle studies over the balance between militaristic and social interpretations of such sites..." - it's in the "Picturesque ruin" section. Hchc2009 (talk) 18:17, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

OK, that's great stuff, well-written, balanced and referenced. In totally the wrong place. It could go in the architecture section? A subsection all of its own might be overdoing it. One last thing - the "In the 1990s" bit implies that the theory has subsequently been discounted. It might need a tweak. --Dweller (talk) 08:18, 16 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I seem to remember seeing a tv programme where the actor Robert Hardy, a huge fan of both Bodium Castle and of archery, demonstrated the ineffectivemenss of the castle as a defensive structure by using a longbow to effortlessly fire arrows over the walls from the raised ground to the west of the moat. I can't find the programme at the moment, but I'll keep looking. AndrewJFulker (talk) 12:04, 16 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I found a copy of Castle by Marc Morris which raises these doubts in some detail (most of a chapter devoted to Bodiam). It's hardly the most scholarly of works, but it qualifies as RS. It's the book associated with a Channel 4 programme, which may be found somewhere on the net I suppose. --Dweller (talk) 13:05, 16 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Watch it here. All this is timely - I just rescued Morris' article from a prod deletion. --Dweller (talk) 13:17, 16 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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Muddle in Dalyngrigge Lewknor section

The Sir Thomas Lewknor who married Philippe Dallingridge did so before 1417, and she died in 1421, after which Sir Thomas married Elizabeth Echyngham, and died in 1452. There is, therefore, something wrong with the account given in this article. Eebahgum (talk) 18:39, 14 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I have introduced data and refs to elucidate what was imprecisely expressed. Eebahgum (talk) 20:57, 14 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]