The First Field Trip: Warwick Castle

Warwick Castle was the seat of power for the Earls of Warwick for about 800-900 years. The fortress would have started life as a motte and bailey--a wood fort on a hill. But in the 1300s it started to be much more impressive and by the 1400s, it looked like this on the outside. The earl in the 1970s sold it off, and it is a fairly interactive tourist attraction now. I suppose that the upkeep on a castle must be pretty stiff, what with no serfs to do the work.

If you go up on the end opposite the entrance and stand on what was the original motte, here's what the inside of the place looks like.

They even put in a mill wheel way back when. By the end of the 1800s, they made their own electricity.

Here's the thing. Just as with you and me (well, not exactly), if you live in a place for eight or nine hundred years, you naturally add on and remodel as you go. The present operators have put one section of the place back to what it looked like in the Middle Ages, complete with wax figures. Another part back to the 1500-1600s. A third part back to a weekend party in 1897. All very, very cool. Here's the medieval part, with one of the earl's soldiers ready to go to war.

Here's another of the earl's warriors, clearly not ready to go to war. (Metal hats are heavy, by the way.)

When the going got muddy, and if you were an aristocrat and thus had actual shoes, you tied these wooden elevated thingys on to protect your little pointy leather shoes.

More warriors. I've deserted by this picture.

The Great Hall, the biggest room in any castle. In the Middle Ages people spent a lot of quality time in here with the big fireplaces, hoping to avoid frostbite in the winter--the windows had no glass back then. Here these rooms are decked out as they would have been in the 1500-1600 period.

Rooms as they would have appeared in 1670.

My personal favorite. A big section restored to a weekend in 1897, with the Warwick's aristocratic guests. The Earl and Duchess were strictly A-List entertainers. Future King George V near the fireplace talks to Winston Churchill's father in the Smoking Room.

The Ladies' Boudoir with the Duchess of Sutherland and Lady Sackville West--and of course, the footman Sidney. Yes, they all dressed like that.

Another bedroom.

The nursery.

Houseguest Consuelo Vanderbilt. Her mommy wanted her to marry the Duke of Marlborough. Locked her in her room for three days to make it happen. She produced an "heir and a spare" (like Diana) and then later split. The Duke got the modern equivalent of $250 million in the deal. There were lots of rooms set up like these. I loved it.

And, yes, the castle had a dungeon--for real. They didn't have jails--for most crimes, they just killed you or cut off some body part or branded you with a hot iron. They used the dungeon for political enemies or to hold people for ransom. It was a really sad place.

The castle has some really nice gardens, including the Peacock Garden which is full of, guess what? peacocks.They obligingly pose for the tourists.