Knaresborough Castle and Court House Museum

Heritage listing

Details SE 3456 KNARESBOROUGH CASTLE YARD (south side) 8/92 Court House Museum GV II Courthouse, now museum and gardeners' store. Early C14 with late C16 and C18 additions and restoration 1830 and C20. Coursed squared magnesian limestone, brick, stone slate roof. 2 storeys, 5 bays with single-storey, 2-bay addition to rear. Bay 1: round-arched board door to right with hoodmould; small boarded opening to left. Board door in plain frame between bays 3 and 4 flanked by barred side-sliding sash windows with glazing bars. Between bays 2 and 3: external staircase, mid C20, rising to C20 board door in chamfered basket-arch surround. 1st-floor windows: 3-light to bays 1 and 4, 5-light to bays 2, 3 and 5; all double-chamfered with recessed mullions and stepped hoodmoulds. Kneeler and ashlar coping to left, hipped roof to right. Gritstone stacks to left end, to ridge between bays 4 and 5, and to rear of ridge at centre. Interior: rear wall is built largely of small red bricks in random bond. Ground floor, bay 3 - large fireplace of C14 type, covered in and details not seen at resurvey. Bay 4 - length of stone walling enters from rear wall and projects into the room at an angle. 1st floor supported on longitudinal beams supported by posts, 2 with straight braces. Much reused timber. 1st floor: bay 1 - C17 cupboards and door, restored and rooms divided mid C20. Bay 3 - benches and panelling of late- C16 courtroom retained as part of Museum display. The earliest parts of this building are part of a range of rooms built between the inner and outer bailey of the castle. It is thought to have been the "House of Records" mentioned in a survey of 1561 but appears to have been largely rebuilt c1590-1610, with an upper storey serving as the courthouse for the Honour of Knaresborough. The r

From the Historic England List Entry under OGL v3.