Nunney Castle
We had never planned to stop at Nunney Castle, but as we had decided to move both Glastonbury Tor and the Abbey to Sunday and make an entire final day of it, we opted to dot about Somerset and see some other castles within our area to get the full feel of the place.
This was another property which was damaged during that pesky Civil War and has remained in a ruined state ever since due to Royalist support and Parliamentary sieges. The inhabitants held out against the Parliamentarians until canons breached the north side forcing surrender two days later.
Despite the damage to Nunney Castle, it was still inhabitable, being made ready to receive French prisoners but there is no record of them having ever arrived. The castle escaped slighting due to the damage being caused by the canon, but as Richard was forbidden to return, the castle fell to ruin.
Still a quite spectacular ruin, the north side completely fell and restorations had to take place to stop the castle falling completely as the ivy covering it destroys as it grows. When we visited the bridge crossing the moat had become unsafe due to natural wear and tear and was being repaired as funds were being raised for it.
Nunney Castle is located in the little village of Nunney and while completely free to the public (so no gift shop) entry was closed due to bridge repairs so we could only walk the circumference of the building which took about 10 minutes. While it was beautiful, naturally we couldn't spend a great amount of time here so had to look up another place pretty sharpish. We do however agree with Nikolaus Pevsner who said Nunney Castle was the most aesthetically pleasing castle in Somerset.
This looked properly like something you'd see knights leap out of ready to battle, of course we would have loved to have seen the inside to properly get the scope of the place but it has just given us an excuse to come back one day. The exterior of the castle looks pretty intact and is very picturesque. It's exactly the sort of castle you'd expect to be on a tea towel with a lovely village surrounding it. The ducks quack lazily and float around the moat and you just want to hunker down and set up a picnic on the grass surrounding it. We'd imagine that this is probably a little haunted spot, but as we only walked the moat we couldn't tell you. We'd like to imagine ghostly happenings in the middle of the village around the castle, and we can only picture how grisly the setting really is when it rains! It's one of those which are so beautiful in the sunshine but would be so stern in the darker weather.
We cant wait to find another excuse to drop into Somerset again to revisit, as its not too far away we could probably do it in a weekend!
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