Henry VIII gate, Windsor Castle (BR-HEN03)

Clients: Royal Household Property Section

Authors: Elizabeth Howe and Stewart Hoad

Site supervisor: Stewart Hoad

The Royal Household Property Section commissioned MoLAS to monitor excavations for the installation of new security bollards at the Henry VIII gate of Windsor Castle. The castle is a Scheduled Monument as well as a Royal Palace.

The gate was built in 1509, the first year of the reign of Henry VIII, to provide an entrance into the Lower ward of the castle. The gateway comprised two imposing towers separated by an arch, with holes above for pouring boiling oil. The gateway was decorated with Henry VIII's symbol: the portcullis, the fleur-de-lis and the combined roses of Lancaster and York. Access to the gate was via a bridge leading across the moat. Thomas Sandby's views, c 1760–75, show a solid cobbled carriageway flanked by stone parapet walls with two pillars at the splayed entrance to the bridge (the easternmost one topped by a Queen's beast) and a further two pillars closer to the Great Gate (illustrated in Jane Robert's Views of Windsor (1995;1997) pl 1, 2 and 24). However, it is clear from Hollar's c 1660 bird's eye view (reproduced in W H St John Hope, 1913 Windsor Castle an architectural history, I, pl xxxii) that, while the carriageway between the four pillars was solid, the moat ditch north of the northernmost pair of pillars was still traversed by a timber drawbridge. The ditch was obviously infilled during the ensuing 100 years.

The Elizabethan bridge to the Henry VIII gate was buried and the parapets demolished c 1852, when the houses to the west were destroyed and a new bridge built with parapet walls of heathstone.

The excavations were monitored by a Senior Archaeologist between 13 and 18 Feb, 2003. The watching brief revealed chalk footings or buttresses, supporting ashlar walls on either side of the causeway to Henry VIII's gate. Brick walls, which splayed outwards parallel to the existing modern walls to the east and west, abutted these ashlar walls. Further buttress walls located on the exterior of the causeway walls were also recorded. These structures are thought to be the remnants of the Elizabethan stone bridge. Later dump deposits recorded along the length of the trench were interpreted as make-up layers, to bring the ground surface up to the modern day level, for the creation of the existing causeway to Henry VIII' s gate.

Finds recovered during the watching brief included Chinese porcelain, dating from the mid 18th to the mid 19th century, a redeposited, re-used tile dating 1225–1375, a fragment of clay tobacco pipe stem and a button of post-medieval date.

This site report is extracted from MoLAS 2003: annual review