Plan your visit to Warkworth Castle with North East Escapes. Explore the Percy stronghold and Hermitage, and find nearby Warkworth holiday homes. |
Visit Warkworth Castle, The Percy Stronghold Above the River Coquet
Warkworth Castle occupies one of the most beautiful positions of any ruined castle in England, sitting high on a promontory within a horseshoe loop of the River Coquet just inland from the Northumberland coast. The massive keep that dominates the skyline is among the finest surviving medieval great towers in the country, and the castle's associations with the Percy family and with Shakespeare's Henry IV plays give it a literary glamour to match its architectural grandeur. A visit to Warkworth, combined with a walk through the beautifully preserved medieval village below, makes for one of the most rewarding afternoons in Northumberland.
Warkworth Castle has Norman origins, but it was under the Percy family, the Earls of Northumberland, that it grew to its greatest extent and significance. The magnificent late medieval keep was built around 1390 to 1420 and is unusual in its cross-shaped plan, which allowed for a series of well-lit, comfortable private apartments while still presenting a formidable defensive aspect. Shakespeare set the conspirators' scenes in Henry IV Part I at Warkworth, and the castle appears twice in the play by name. The castle passed out of the Percy family in the seventeenth century and gradually fell into ruin, but the keep survives in remarkable condition and is managed today by English Heritage.
The keep is the highlight, with visitors able to climb through several of its stories and admire both the sophistication of its residential planning and the quality of its remaining architectural details. The lion badge of the Percys appears throughout the stonework. From the top of the keep the views over the Coquet estuary, the village and the coast are outstanding. A separate and uniquely atmospheric attraction is the Warkworth Hermitage, accessible by rowing boat from the riverside below the castle. Cut into the living rock of the riverbank, this extraordinary medieval hermitage chapel, still containing its stone altar and tracery windows, is one of the most unusual scheduled monuments in England.
Warkworth Castle is located at Warkworth, Northumberland, NE65 0UJ, in the centre of the village on the A1068. The castle and hermitage are managed by English Heritage. The castle is open daily from April through October and at weekends in winter. The hermitage boat operates on summer afternoons and must be arranged on arrival. The village of Warkworth is delightful, with a good pub and several places to eat.
North East Escapes has a selection of holiday homes near Warkworth, in this lovely corner of Northumberland where the Coquet Valley meets the coast. Staying near Warkworth gives you easy access to the castle and village, the beach at Alnmouth and Amble harbour, Alnwick Castle and Garden, and the Northumberland coast northward towards Seahouses and Bamburgh. Our Warkworth-area holiday homes are particularly popular with guests who want to combine coastal walking and beaches with the rich medieval history of this extraordinary part of England.
