Motte

Motte means man-made mound. Here at the top of the motte you can get a sense of how formidable the castle once was. The first castle was built around 1108 by the Norman lord, Robert Fitzmartin, and had a wooden tower on top of the motte. This was replaced by a fine stone tower (‘keep’), built by the Lord Rhys. You can see the remains of this tower, which was made of carefully shaped slate that was held together by clay. This was a Welsh building technique to compensate for the lack of limestone in this area. The motte was uncovered during an archaeological dig in 2009 and conserved and made safe in 2010.