On Tuesday 25th June, Cherry Class visited Lewes Castle to enhance their history learning and to help answer their topic question:
“Do you need a castle to conquer?”
They began the visit by watching a film to learn about Lewes through the ages, then visited the museum to see artefacts, some of which included Anglo Saxon spearheads that might have been similar to the ones used in the Battle of Hastings!
The children then had a tour of the 900 year old castle with a guide who showed them the different parts of the castle and shared lots of interesting facts about it.
They learned that Lewes Castle is a ‘motte and bailey’ castle. Motte is the French word for a big mound of mud and they were lucky enough to walk up the steps to the top of the motte. When the castle was built, there was likely a small rope ladder to climb up which would have been used to protect the motte because an enemy who tried to climb up it would surely have been knocked back down by the people above.
On the motte was the keep that would originally have been built out of wood and later in stone, in order for it to be as strong and as protective as possible. The keep was built to be a very safe place where you would be able to see enemies approaching for miles. Being so high also meant that you could attack the enemy from above. In the event of an attack, you would be protected and self-sufficient because animals were reared there, vegetables were grown and there was even a well reaching down to the sea.
That meant the people would be able to live happily and safely.
Cherry Class went into the keep and saw the guard room. When the guards saw an enemy approaching they would shout ‘Enemy approaching!’ to alert others. The guard room had no windows, only arrow slits. The reason for this was that arrows could be shot out but arrows couldn’t easily get in.
Later they walked to the castle entrance near the Barbican. The Barbican was the outer defence that could cut off the enemy by using a portcullis. The portcullis was particularly useful to pull down for protection and to poke the enemies with spears! The children were so impressed to see sword and axe marks still visible on the surrounding walls!
To finish off a great day they got to try on medieval clothes inside the Barbican and act out different scenarios!
Cherry Class had a great time learning all about Lewes Castle and the children recalled lots of facts learned from school and made great links to their learning.
