216 Early Annals of Trowbridge. 
built the castle at Trowbridge, for, as it sustained a siege in 1139, the 
year after his decease, there was no time for his son to have built it. 
Judging from the few notices that have been left to us of the castle— 
its “seven great towers,” fragments of which were standing when 
Leland visited Trowbridge in the middle of the sixteenth century and 
“its impregnable works by which it was fortified ”—it must have 
" been a work of time and of expense. In that castle-building age, when 
each baron thought it needful, if not for his security at least for his 
dignity, to erect large fortressessurrounded with strong walls and deep 
moats, nothing would be more probable thanthat Humphrey de Bohun 
II. should thus inaugurate his accession to his estates here, through 
his marriage with the daughter of the richest land-owner in Wilts, 
A word or two must be said about the siege of the castle by King 
Stephen. On the decease of King Henry I. in 1135 in Normandy, 
there followed an interval of anarchy and confusion. A few years 
previously, King Henry, being without a son who might inherit 
his throne, sought to perpetuate.the succession in his own family by 
settling the crown on his daughter Matilda, who had married Henry 
YV., Emperor of Germany, and apparently obtained tie consent of 
the prelates and principal nobility to this arrangement. The crown 
however was seized by Stephen the late King’s nephew. Then en- 
sued civil war; the cause of Matilda being taken up by her half- 
brother, Robert Earl of Gloucester, and Milo Earl of Hereford, 
and, (through the influence probably of the latter whose daughter 
he had married) by Humphrey de Bohun. Hence in due time King 
Stephen appeared before Trowbridge with his forces to batter down 
the castle-of the disaffected baron. But though he could say of 
Trowbridge, “I came, I saw,” he was not able to add, “I conquered,” 
for, after a vain attempt to take it, he had to beat a retreat. The 
whole account of the siege is given us in the work called “ Acta 
Stephani.” The portion which especially relates to the attempt on 
the castle is as follows :—‘‘ Meanwhile the king arriving at Trow- 
bridge, and finding the place carefully fortified, and the garrison 
prepared for all extremities, nor likely to surrender without a des- 
perate struggle, set to work to construct engines with great toil, 
that he might press the siege with vigour. But his efforts were 
