Castle Cornet

Castle Cornet is a large island castle in Guernsey, and former tidal island, also known as Cornet Rock or Castle Rock. Its importance was as a defence not only of the island, but of the roadstead. In 1859, it became part of one of the breakwaters of Guernsey's main harbour, St Peter Port harbour.

The island measures about 2 hectares (4.9 acres) in area, with a length of 175 metres (574 ft) and a width of 130 metres (430 ft). It lies not quite 600 metres (2,000 ft) east of the coast of Guernsey.

Formerly a tidal island, like Lihou on the west coast of Guernsey, it was first fortified as a castle between 1206 and 1256, following the division of the Duchy of Normandy in 1204. The wardenship of Geoffrey de Lucy (1225–26), has been identified as a time of fortification in the Channel Islands: timber and lead was sent from England for castle building in Guernsey and Jersey. At that time the structure consisted of a keep, a chapel, two courtyards, and curtain walls. In 1338, when a French force captured the island, they besieged Cornet, capturing it on 8 September; the French then massacred the garrison of eleven men at arms and 50 archers.

The island was retaken in 1340, and the castle was recaptured in August 1345, after a three-day attack by professional soldiers and the local militia. The French had spent their seven-year occupation improving the defences, including probably the barbican. In 1358, the French returned and again captured the castle, but they were evicted the following year and an island traitor was executed.

In 1372, Owain Lawgoch, a claimant to the Welsh throne, leading a free company on behalf of France, attacked Guernsey in an assault popularly called "La Descente des Aragousais". Owain Lawgoch withdrew after killing 400 of the island militia, but without capturing the besieged Castle Cornet, which he found strong and well supplied with artillery. In yet another assault the French again captured the castle in 1380, before island forces again evicted them a short time later. In the early fifteenth century improvements were made: the Carey tower was constructed around 1435. A French assault in 1461, was repulsed.

The construction costs for works, repairs, maintenance, and the garrison were met from revenues raised in the island by the Warden (sometimes called "Keeper of the Castle") under royal warrant.

Text adapted from “Castle Cornet” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Castle Cornet ranks #2,203 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking. Founded 1206, it is older than 76% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 825 atlas entries founded in the 13th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 2,256 times in the last 60 days, more than 69% of the atlas. See how Guernsey compares in the castle statistics.

View on the interactive castle map →

Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗