Castle Bolton

Castle Bolton has dominated the skyline of Wensleydale for over six hundred years. Now floodlit in the evening, it is prominent both day and night.
Several unpretentious stone cottages line its single street along a green, with a water-trough at one end and the massive ruins at the other. The castle was erected by the first Lord, Sir Richard Scrope, Chancellor of England, in 1379, it took 18 years to complete.
Designed with a huge, five-storey tower at each corner, their four ranges of living quarters enclose a courtyard, and turrets at two of the sides.
From July 1568 until January 1569 Mary, Queen of Scots, was imprisoned at Castle Bolton in some degree of comfort, with about twenty servants billeted in the village. She is thought to have occupied a large room in the south-west tower, with a fireplace, and steps leading to her bedroom.
Castle Bolton was a garrison for the Royalists during the Civil War, and besieged by the Parliamentary forces in 1645 eventually surrendering.

St Oswald's Church dates from about 1250, and was clearly built before the castle...as the the small sundial in the south wall catches no noonday sun. Each summer the church puts on a display, usually an interpretative exhibition of some aspect of Wensleydale's history or wildlife.

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