Castlefacts³

Holehouse, Wark

Has been described as a Possible Bastle

There are uncertain remains

Name	Holehouse, Wark
Alternative Names	Hole House
Historic Country	Northumberland
Modern Authority	Northumberland
1974 Authority	Northumberland
Civil Parish	Wark

Recorded by MacLauchlan in a list of local 'Pele Towers' given to him by an old resident.

Gatehouse Comments

Most of these 'towers' actually were bastles or pele-houses.The location is entirely consistant with a pele-house type bastle. It is unlikely as the site of a gentry status dwelling. Can not be the bastle at Mortley, which is seperately listed.Nothing is recorded in PastScape or Keys to the Past (the online Northumberland HER).Hole House is marked as a rectangular east-west building on the 1862 OS map and as 'Hole House (In Ruins)' on the 1st edn 1:25,000 OS series (revised 1952). The appears to be nothing on the site now except a track leading to the site and some rough vegetation marking the site. The 'Pele Tower' reported to MacLauchlan is, most likely, to have been a bastle on the site occupied by Hole House and it is just possible the ruins seen in 1952 were partly this bastle. Do any foundations survive? Do these suggest the thick walls of a bastle?

- Philip Davis

Not scheduled

Not Listed

County Historic Environment Record

www.northumberland.gov.uk/Planning/Conservation/Archaeology.aspx

OS Map Grid Reference	NY832769
Latitude	55.0870895385742
Longitude	-2.26417994499207
Eastings	383230
Northings	576990