PEVENSEY

 Around 290 AD the Romans built a fort they called Anderida on a peninsula of land jutting into an area of marshes at what is now Pevensey. The marshes surrounded Anderida on three sides, and offered a protected anchorage. Anderida is almost unique in that no civilian settlement grew up around the fort, probably because of the limited dry ground on the peninsula site. 

It was the landing place of William the Conqueror's army in 1066. 

Although in ruins, the site is huge, around 10 acres, and there's plenty to look at. The Roman walls stand to a height of 20 feet in places. William of Normandy gave Pevensey to his half-brother, who built a fort of his own within the Roman walls. It was besieged by Simon de Montfort in 1264, given to John of Gaunt in 1372, neglected by the Tudors, patched up to help repel the Spanish Armada, and  finally abandoned.

The curtain wall surrounding the fort is fascinating to examine. The wall was built by different gangs of workmen, each responsible for a 20 metre section. Each section is slightly different, uses different techniques and materials, and there are very obvious breaks in the wall where sections join.

The East gate (below)  - there is a public right of way through the castle grounds to the West gate, where you emerge close to the church in the next village! (Westham) Just shows how big it is still.