REPORT OF THE MEETINGS FOR 1900 207 



towers, below the string course, is a series of stone escutcheons, 

 displaying arms of the following families : — Tyson, De 

 Vescy, CliflPord, Percy, Bohun, Plantagenet, Warren, Arundel, 

 Umfraville, and Fitz-Walter ; those of Tyson, De Yescy, 

 and Percy represent the owners of the Barony, the others 

 the most impurtant matrimonial alliances. On the two centre 

 shields are the arms of England and France. 



This Gateway between the Octagon Towers had, like the 

 others, its fosse, crossed by means of a drawbridge ; and the 

 Towers themselves of a uniform height, still bear on the 

 summit of the battlements at the extreme angles four full 

 length stone figures, all equippeil in armour, and posed in 

 the act of defence. The erection of these towers marks an 

 extension of the Norinau structure, and we find, as in the 

 Barbican, the marks of the early Percies upon its front, the 

 arms of Clifford indicating that this extension was not earlier 

 than the time of the second Percy lord of Alnwick, who 

 married Idonea, daughter of Kobert Clifford. He died 

 February 26th 1352, and was buried in the Abbey of 

 Alnwick, and was succeeded by his son Henry, who at 

 the time of his father's death was 30 years of age. 



Of this Gateway, the late Dr Bruce said that " oft times 

 from the windows of these towers will the spouse of Harry 

 Hotspur have waved a parting adieu to her heroic husband, 

 as he valiently rode forth on some warlike expedition." 



Inasmuch as the Castle from the fourteenth to the early 

 part of the sixteenth century was subjected to many changes, 

 and still further when the first Duke of Northumberland 

 resolved on making it more habitable, it becomes very difficult 

 to determine the date of certain portions of its masonry. 

 But it is nevertheless certain that at the time of the death 

 of the fifth Earl (1527) the greater portion of the Norman 

 structure had been demolished and replaced by later work. 



That portion of the Castle which was purely Edwardian, 

 the Great Dining Hall, generally assigned to the work of 

 the first Percy lord, must in the eighteenth century have 

 been in a very dilapidated condition, as was seen in 1854, 

 when that part of the building was being restored. The 

 workmen, when engaged in removing the plaster from the 

 walls, discovered the site of the dais, and the hooks on which 



