Shoreham Castle.

Shoreham Castle.

A Motte or castle perhaps existed in Shoreham, a interesting map of the area published by J.Edwards in 1789, does show a mound on the north side of the town, it is in the angle where the present Mill Lane and Southdown road meet; it is possible that this was the remains of an earth motte, which was built in that position to guard the approaches to the town.
Today there are no remains of this mound to be seen, but it is interesting that this position was at the junction of the road from Steyning, Shoreham and Steyning would have that time been major trading towns, Shoreham a port with goods coming in and out, and Steyning being a major market town, with a long history of trading, and not forgetting that the River Adur once flowered much closer into the town of Steyning, there being a port and a Mint there.
The site in Southdown Road was excavated in the 1970s, this being possible due to the building of a garage in the garden of no 42 Southdown Road, the excavation did revel a flat bottomed ditch, this ditch is shown of the map by Edwards, it was not possible to excavate to any extent, but a well was discovered on the site, it was difficult to excavated it fully, but material removed from it included Samian dated to the late 1st /early 2nd century, there were also some sherds of course ware, other material was dated to the 4th century.
The ditch itself had a few finds within the layers, two sherds of pottery; these was dated to the 14th century, but over all the finds were thin on the ground.
It is interesting to note the construction of the well is dated to around 1st/2nd century, this is important as it is our first indication of a Roman building in the area, especially as there were a few finds of tessera found.
The ditch is difficult to understand as it was not very deep, and dug into quite soft clay, depth approximately 1.1m deep, if you look at the size of the ditch and its depth, it would only produced a mound in the region of 2m high, the ditch is dated to the 14th century, and therefore it is not so likely that this was the site of an early Motte.

In conclusion, was this site of the Motte in Shoreham, is it a site that now because of the buildings that now cover the area, it difficult to understand.
The area is an ideal spot for a defensive structure, but the evidence is on the ground not that strong, but this does not mean that we should dismiss it, perhaps the real Motte or even a larger castle did exist somewhere in the area, and through time and research we may learn more about the Castle of Shoreham..


Rodney Gunner. 2008