To stand on the ancient ramparts of Lincoln Castle around the year 1200 was to survey more than just the sprawling rooftops of a prosperous city and the marshy flats of the Witham valley. It was to occupy the very heart of royal power in one of England’s most vital shires. In the century and a half since its brutal imposition upon the Anglo-Saxon landscape, the castle had undergone a profound transformation. Born of the Norman Cœur’s need for defence and suppression, it had matured under the Plantagenet kings into a sophisticated instrument of domination: a centre for administration, a key to economic control, and a decisive weight in the scales of national politics. The story of Lincoln Castle in this period is the story of the very nature of power in medieval England, a narrative of stone, steel, and ruthless ambition in which the fate of kings and kingdoms could be decided.
The Norman Scar: A Foundation of Conquest
The origins of the castle lie not in defence but in aggression. When William the Conqueror marched north in 1068 to quell the rebellious heartlands of Mercia and Northumbria, he recognised the immense strategic value of Lincoln. Perched atop a steep hill at the intersection of the Roman Ermine Street and the navigable Foss Dyke, the ancient city of Lindum Colonia was a commercial and administrative hub. To control Lincoln was to control the eastern artery of England.
William’s solution was swift and brutal. As the Domesday Book of 1086 records with chilling administrative detachment, 166 houses were cleared “on account of the castle” to make way for the new fortification. This was not merely a construction project; it was a political statement. The great stone keep and its surrounding bailey, built within the protective embrace of the old Roman walls, were a permanent scar on the conquered landscape, a daily reminder to the citizens of Lincoln and the magnates of Lincolnshire of where true power now resided. For the tenants of manors like Brattleby, held at the time of Domesday by the Abbot of Peterborough, the new castle represented a formidable and inescapable centre of gravity, a focus of royal authority that superseded old allegiances.
The first constable, Thorold of Fécamp, and his successors were not just garrison commanders; they were the king’s personal representatives. They presided over the shire court, enforced the king’s peace, and collected his revenues. The castle was their headquarters, a fortified base from which the process of Normanisation was projected across the shire. This fusion of military and administrative roles established a precedent that would define the castle’s importance for centuries to come.
The Anarchy: A Prize of War
The castle’s evolution from a purely royal instrument to a tool of baronial ambition was violently accelerated during the civil war between King Stephen and the Empress Matilda, known as the Anarchy (1135-1154). With royal authority fractured, England’s great castles became the prizes in a devastating game of thrones played out by powerful magnates.
Lincoln, with its strategic position and wealth, was at the epicentre of this conflict. Control of the castle was contested fiercely by two of the most powerful figures of the age: the formidable Ranulf de Gernon, Earl of Chester, and William d'Aumale, Earl of York, who held the castle for King Stephen. In late 1140, Earl Ranulf and his half-brother William de Roumare seized Lincoln Castle by a ruse, smuggling their wives in for a social visit and then overpowering the small royal garrison.
King Stephen, infuriated by this audacity, marched on Lincoln and laid siege to the castle. This precipitated the First Battle of Lincoln on 2 February 1141. In a dramatic clash on the fields west of the city, Stephen’s army was overwhelmed by a relief force led by Ranulf and his father-in-law, Robert, Earl of Gloucester, the Empress Matilda’s illegitimate half-brother and chief commander. The king, fighting valiantly on foot after his horse was killed, was captured and taken to Bristol in chains. For a brief period, the possession of Lincoln Castle had effectively unseated the King of England.
The chaos of the Anarchy saw the proliferation of so-called "adulterine" (unlicensed) castles across the country, as local lords fortified their own manors to protect their lands or prey upon their neighbours. While Lincoln was a royally ordained fortress, its role during this period demonstrated a critical shift: its immense power could be wielded against the crown as effectively as for it. Holding Lincoln Castle was no longer just about serving the king; it was about becoming a kingmaker.
The Angevin Restoration: Reclaiming the Sinews of Power
The accession of Henry II in 1154 marked a turning point. The first Plantagenet king was a man of immense energy and administrative genius, determined to restore the authority of the crown that had been so eroded during the Anarchy. A key part of his strategy was to dismantle the adulterine castles and reassert royal control over strategic fortresses like Lincoln.
Under Henry II, Lincoln Castle was firmly re-established as a bastion of royal governance. He strengthened its administration and ensured its castellans were men he could trust. However, the castle’s power had become so entrenched that its custody was itself a source of immense influence and wealth. This became acutely apparent under Henry’s son, Richard I, ‘the Lionheart’.
In the late 12th century, the castle entered the hands of one of medieval England's most remarkable families. The hereditary custodianship had passed to the de la Haye family. The heiress, Nicholaa de la Haye, was married to Gerard de Canville, a loyal supporter of Richard’s younger brother, Prince John. In 1189, as Richard prepared to depart on the Third Crusade, Canville made a shrewd political and financial move. He paid the king the enormous sum of 1,000 marks for the right to his wife’s inheritance, which included the castellanship of Lincoln and the shrievalty of Lincolnshire.
This transaction is deeply revealing. Power was becoming a commodity. The custody of a great castle was not simply granted on merit; it could be purchased, binding the holder to the king through a financial as well as a feudal bond. For Gerard de Canville, the castle was now the foundation of his regional dominance, giving him command of the shire’s military, judicial, and financial apparatus.
This power was tested when King Richard was captured on his return from the crusade and held to ransom. His regent in England, the chancellor William Longchamp, attempted to strip Canville of his offices, viewing his allegiance to Prince John with suspicion. Canville resisted, and his defiance was indicative of the quasi-independent power a great castellan could now wield. Upon Richard’s return in 1194, Canville was indeed temporarily deprived of the shrievalty, but his hold on the castle itself, through his wife’s inheritance, was too strong to be broken. When Prince John ascended the throne in 1199, Canville was swiftly restored to all his former glory.
A Woman of Substance: Nicholaa de la Haye and the Reign of King John
The reign of King John (1199-1216) saw Lincoln Castle’s role as an instrument of domination reach its zenith. John’s reign was plagued by military failure abroad—most notably the loss of Normandy in 1204—and growing baronial opposition at home. He relied ever more heavily on a cadre of loyal officials to enforce his will and extract the funds needed for his wars. In this environment, the sheriff-castellans of royal fortresses became the linchpins of his regime.
Following Gerard de Canville’s death around 1214, King John made a truly extraordinary decision. He formally invested Gerard’s widow, Nicholaa de la Haye, with both the shrievalty of Lincolnshire and the command of Lincoln Castle. For a woman, by then at least in her sixties, to be entrusted with such a vital military and administrative post was almost unprecedented. It speaks volumes not only of Nicholaa’s formidable character and proven administrative competence but also of John’s desperate need for officials whose loyalty was absolute. He trusted her implicitly.
For the people of Lincolnshire, from the merchants in the city to the villeins working the fields of Brattleby, Nicholaa personified the crown’s authority. Her agents collected taxes, presided over justice, and requisitioned goods. The castle was the unassailable base from which this often-harsh rule was enforced. It is precisely this kind of arbitrary and concentrated power, wielded by royal officials like Nicholaa, that the barons sought to curtail.
When the grievances against John’s rule boiled over into open rebellion in 1215, the issue of royal castles was central to the dispute. Clause 50 of Magna Carta, the great charter of liberties forced upon the king at Runnymede, specifically demanded the removal of a list of John’s foreign-born officials and their families, including relatives of the notorious Sheriff of Nottingham, Philip Mark. Though Nicholaa de la Haye was not named, the principle was clear: the barons wanted to break the king’s stranglehold on local governance by wresting control of the castles and shrievalties from his personal appointees. Hugh of Wells, the Bishop of Lincoln, was present at Runnymede, and one of the four surviving original 1215 exemplifications of Magna Carta has been kept at Lincoln Cathedral ever since—a potent symbol of the city's place at the heart of this national crisis.
The Lincoln Fair: A Castle Saves a Kingdom
Magna Carta failed to bring peace. Within months, England was plunged into the First Barons’ War. The rebel barons took the fateful step of offering the English crown to Prince Louis, the son of the King of France, who landed in England in May 1216. After King John’s death from dysentery in Newark in October 1216, the cause of his nine-year-old son, Henry III, seemed almost hopeless. London was in French hands, and much of the east and north of England was controlled by the rebels.
In this desperate situation, the loyalty of a few key castellans was all that stood between the Plantagenet dynasty and its extinction. Foremost among them was Nicholaa de la Haye. While a rebel army under Gilbert de Gant, who had been granted the title Earl of Lincoln by Prince Louis, occupied the city, Nicholaa and her small garrison held firm within the castle walls, flying the banner of the boy king Henry III.
In the spring of 1217, a large French force commanded by the Comte du Perche arrived to reinforce the siege and storm the castle, the last royalist outpost in the east. The situation was critical. Responding to the crisis, the 70-year-old regent of England, the legendary William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, assembled a relief army at Newark. Alongside the formidable Bishop of Winchester, Peter des Roches, Marshal devised a daring plan.
On the morning of 20 May 1217, the royalist army approached Lincoln. While a detachment under Falkes de Bréauté launched a diversionary attack on the North Gate of the city, Marshal led the main force up the old Roman road to the west, gaining access to the castle grounds through a disused gate. The royalist crossbowmen lined the castle walls, firing down into the city.
In a pivotal moment, one of Falkes de Bréauté’s crossbowmen, positioned inside the castle, fired a bolt that struck the Comte du Perche in the eye, killing him instantly. With their commander slain, the French and rebel forces, caught between Marshal’s knights charging downhill into the city and the garrison sallying from the castle, fell into panic. The ensuing battle became a rout. The royalist knights swept through the streets, and so much looting took place that the battle was mockingly referred to ever after as the "Lincoln Fair."
The Second Battle of Lincoln was arguably the most important battle fought on English soil between Hastings and Evesham. It was an overwhelming victory for the royalists. Prince Louis’s cause was broken, his English allies deserted him, and within months he had abandoned his claim to the throne. The Plantagenet dynasty was saved, and it was saved because a 60-year-old woman had held a castle. Nicholaa de la Haye’s steadfast defence of Lincoln Castle had provided the anvil upon which William Marshal’s army could smash the rebellion. Never had the strategic and political importance of a single fortress been so decisively demonstrated.
Conclusion: The Enduring Legacy of Stone and Power
In the aftermath of the battle, Nicholaa de la Haye was briefly, and perhaps unjustly, superseded as constable by the triumphant Earl of Salisbury. However, her rights were soon restored, and she continued to serve as joint-sheriff for a time, a testament to her enduring status. She finally retired in 1226 and died in 1230, a woman who had wielded more direct power than almost any of her contemporaries, male or female.
The story of Lincoln Castle in the Plantagenet era is a microcosm of the evolution of power in medieval England. From a symbol of foreign conquest, it became a pawn in baronial wars, a commodified administrative centre, and finally, the bastion that secured a dynasty’s future. For the lords and commoners of Lincolnshire, the castle on the hill was far more than a defensive structure. It was the source of law, the instrument of taxation, and the ultimate expression of the king’s will—a will that could be challenged and even broken, but which, when embodied by stone walls and a loyal castellan, could prove to be the final arbiter of a kingdom’s destiny. The great stone keep, which had once terrorised the populace, had become the ultimate safeguard of the very crown it was built to serve.
Sources & Further Reading
Primary Sources:
Domesday Book: A Complete Translation. (London: Penguin, 2003). See the entry for Lincolnshire (L1-L14) for details on the houses cleared for the castle. The Chronicle of Roger of Wendover, in Roger of Wendover's Flowers of History, trans. J.A. Giles (London: H.G. Bohn, 1849). Provides a near-contemporary account of the reigns of John and Henry III, including the Battle of Lincoln (1217). History of William Marshal, ed. A.J. Holden, trans. S. Gregory (London: Anglo-Norman Text Society, 2002-2006). A verse biography offering a detailed, if partisan, account of the regent’s life and the 1217 battle. Patents Rolls of the Reign of Henry III Preserved in the Public Record Office (London: HMSO, 1901-). These official government records contain entries confirming Nicholaa de la Haye's appointments.
Secondary Sources:
Bradbury, Jim. Stephen and Matilda: The Civil War of 1139-53. (Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 1996). Carpenter, David. The Struggle for Mastery: Britain 1066-1284. (London: Penguin, 2004). An excellent overview of the period. Carpenter, David. The Reign of Henry III. (London: Hambledon Press, 1996). Contains essays with valuable detail on the minority of Henry III and the post-Magna Carta period. Carpenter, David. Magna Carta. (London: Penguin Classics, 2015). The definitive modern analysis of the charter and its context. Hill, J.W.F. Medieval Lincoln. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1948). The classic and most detailed study of the city and castle in the Middle Ages. Holt, J.C. Magna Carta. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2nd ed., 1992). A seminal work on the Great Charter, its origins and impact. Stenton, F.M. 'The Changing Feudalism of the Middle Ages', in Preparatory to Anglo-Saxon England: Being the Collected Papers of Frank Merry Stenton, ed. D.M. Stenton (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970). Victoria County History: A History of the County of Lincoln, Volume II, ed. William Page (London, 1906). Wilkinson, Louise J. Women in Thirteenth-Century Lincolnshire*. (Woodbridge: Boydell Press for the Royal Historical Society, 2007). Chapter 2 contains the most authoritative modern scholarship on Nicholaa de la Haye.