Newton St Loe Castle

Newton St Loe Castle stands in the village of Newton St Loe in Somerset. It was once a fortified manor house surrounded by Newton Park, a medieval deer park. The surviving parts are a fourteenth-century keep and a fifteenth-century gatehouse, both Grade I listed. The castle was built by the St Loe family in the twelfth century and later enlarged in the fourteenth century. In 1375 it passed to Elizabeth St Loe and her husband William, Baron Botreaux. Sir Walter Hungerford added the gatehouse in the fifteenth century, complete with turrets, machicolations and an early gunport. The castle is best known for its links to King John, who was reportedly held there by William de Sancto Laudo. The site was later landscaped in the nineteenth century to form a country house and gardens. Only the keep and gatehouse remain from the original structure. A nearby mound marks the position of one of the fourteenth-century corner towers. During the 1970s and 1980s the castle housed Bath College of Higher Education’s Religious Studies department. Today the keep and gatehouse belong to Bath Spa University. The keep is a rectangular building with four corner towers, protected by a ditch on three sides. The gatehouse features defensive details including machicolations and an early gunport. Visitors can view these historic structures within the grounds of the university. The surrounding parkland retains traces of its medieval layout. The castle’s Grade I listing recognises its national importance.