England Guide
The Northwest
Lancaster Castle
Opening time: Daily: tours every 30min 10.30am–4pm
Price: £5
Website: www.lancastercastle.com
The site of Lancaster Castle has been the city's focal point since Roman times. The Normans built the first castle here in around 1093 in an attempt to protect the region from marauding Scots armies, and it was added to throughout medieval times, becoming a crown court and prison in the thirteenth century, a role it still fulfils today. Currently, about a quarter of the battlemented building can be visited on an entertaining hour-long tour, though court sittings sometimes affect the schedules. The tour begins around the back in the grandiose eighteenth-century Shire Hall, and then moves on to the eight-foot-thick walls of the thirteenth-century Adrian's Tower, which encircle a room hung with manacles and leg-irons. You may also see and hear something of the hangman's art: public executions were carried out at the castle until 1865.