Humans began shaping Corfe history as early as 6000 BC, when the first settlers arrived in the area. The Celts established themselves around 1300 BC. The Romans followed around 50 AD. The Saxons later occupied Corfe until the Norman Conquest of 1066, when builders constructed the castle we recognise today.
For over a thousand years, Corfe Castle has dominated the Purbeck skyline and played a central role in Corfe history.
Its commanding position in a gap of the Purbeck Hills suggests people fortified the site long before the Normans arrived. Both the Romans and the Saxons most likely built military defenses at Corfe.
Over centuries, two streams carved out a natural gap in the chalk ridge, leaving a central knoll that provided the ideal place for a castle. The Romans and Saxons probably built their earlier defenses from wood, but by the Saxon period, the site had become a Royal residence, adding another defining chapter to Corfe history.
One of the earliest references to Corfe appears in the Saxon Chronicles of 955, where scribes recorded the name as “Corf.” Later records mention “Corffe” in 1217, “Corffe Castle” in 1302, and “Corfecastle” in 1545.
The name comes from the Old English word “Corf,” meaning a cutting or pass, which perfectly describes the natural gap in the central ridge of the Purbeck Hills at this site. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle also refers to the area as “Corfesgeate,” meaning “gap.” These early references highlight how the landscape shaped both the name and the enduring significance of Corfe Castle in medieval Corfe history.
In March 978, the young King Edward, great-grandson of Alfred the Great, visited his half-brother Ethelred at the Royal Residence in Corfe. During the visit, assassins stabbed the teenage monarch to death, most likely on the orders of his mother-in-law, who wanted her own seven-year-old son to take the throne. Locals hurriedly buried Edward in the neighbouring town of Wareham.
Within a year, however, people disinterred his remains after reporting miracles connected to him. They claimed his body had been miraculously preserved, which Christians at the time saw as undeniable proof of sainthood. Edward became known as St Edward the Martyr, and his death marked one of the most dramatic moments in medieval Corfe history.
His body was moved to Shaftesbury Abbey, where pilgrims from across England came to venerate him. Today, the story of St Edward the Martyr Corfe Castle remains one of the most compelling episodes in Corfe history.
In this year King Edward was killed at the gap of Corfe on the 18th March in the evening, and he was buried at Wareham without any royal honours. And no worse deed than this for the English people was committed since they first came to Britain…. Men murdered him but God honoured him. In life he was an earthly king, he is now after death an heavely saint’
You will find a commemorative sign for Edward the Martyr on the main square towards the church. This is a replica of an original sign painted by a local artist in 1927.
Unfortunately the original sign was cut down and thrown into the village millpond. Hence the original is kept safely by the Town Hall. Underneath the sign is written “Edward the Martyr King of Wessex treacherously stabbed at Corves gate in A.D. 978 by his stepmother Elfrida.
After the Norman Conquest, William the Conqueror founded the Corfe Castle we recognise today. Corfe became one of several major fortifications that King William ordered to secure his power over the defeated English. While most Norman castles of this period relied on hastily built wooden structures set on artificial mounds known as mottes, William gave Corfe stone walls from the beginning. This choice highlights Corfe’s strategic importance in Corfe history.
In the West Bailey, William built a stone hall, whose remains survive as the oldest part of Corfe Castle. In the early 12th century, King Henry I, William’s son, added the keep. Rising 21 metres above a 55-metre-high hill, this gleaming limestone tower dominated the Purbeck landscape and could be seen for miles.
Builders sourced the Purbeck limestone just a few miles from the castle. They prized the stone for its workability and durability, making it the perfect material for such a monumental project in medieval Corfe history.
Between 1199 and 1216, King John visited Corfe Castle regularly and transformed it into a more luxurious residence. He ordered the construction of the gloriette, a palace-like building set near the old Norman keep. England’s finest craftsmen built it in the latest architectural style and decorated it with fashionable interiors, making it one of the most impressive additions to medieval Corfe history.
King John’s reign, however, was also filled with turmoil. He often used Corfe Castle as both a royal refuge and a prison for his political enemies. His nephew, Prince Arthur of Brittany, posed a threat to his throne. After Arthur’s death, John imprisoned Arthur’s sister Eleanor and about 25 loyal knights at Corfe. While Eleanor lived under comfortable conditions, the knights suffered a harsher fate. After attempting escape, they were thrown into a dungeon where 22 of them starved to death—one of the darkest chapters in Corfe history.
In 1215, rebellious barons forced John to sign the Magna Carta, which cut back his royal power. The following year, during the final months of his reign, John spent even more time at Corfe Castle. Few mourned his death in 1216, yet his legacy at Corfe endures in the building works he commissioned—especially the magnificent gloriette, a lasting reminder of his troubled but influential rule in Corfe Castle history.
The story of Corfe Castle has always loomed over the history of the village. It is believed that the settlment of the village probably developed as a work camp for the building works for the castle during the Reign of King John. These first houses would have been made of cob, or wattle and daub, and probably surrounded the village square, with a bustling hub of workshops.
In the 1200’s the village of Corfe was granted a weekly market by Henry III.
At one time, there were two castles at Corfe! If you look south-west from Corfe Castle, you can just still pick out the site of the second Castle, looking towards toe road to Church Knowle.
This fortification was originally a ring and bailey castle, built by the Normans. The higher inner ring was a stronghold and the bailey was the storage and working area, surrounded by fences. The rings are believed to be the site of a siege castle built by King Stephen in 1139 AD, during the Anarchy War Civil War between King Stephen and the Empress Matilda. King Stephen made an unsuccessful attempt to regain control of Corfe Castle.
During the English Civil War Parliamentarians used The Rings as their base to bombard the castle. Today all that is left are low mounds in a field.
In 1572 the Castle passed into the hands of Sir Christopher Hatton. Sir Christopher was Lord Chancellor under Queen Elizabeth I. Hatton never married so Corfe Castle passed to his nephew William Newport. In the succeeding generations, the castle passed into the hands of the Bankes family, prominent members of the Dorset gentry.
The ruined Corfe Castle that we know today was brought about due to the English Civil War. The Bankes family supported King Charles I (the Cavaliers) against Oliver Cromwell (the Roundheads). Lady Mary Bankes led the defence of Corfe Castle during two major sieges while her husband was away serving the King. The Castle seemed to be impregnable but an act of betrayal from one of Mary’s own officers led to its demise.
After taking the Castle, Oliver Cromwell’s parliament issued an order to destroy it! Captain Hughes of Lulworth was given the task, using gunpowder to bring the towers and ramparts crashing down, resulting in the ruins we see today.
Mary Bankes bravery did not go unnoticed. The victorious Parliamentarians eventually presented her with the keys to Corfe Castle as a tribute to her courage. The Bankes family preserved the keys at their family home of Kingston Lacy, near Wimborne.
Many of the present buildings were built using Purbeck Stone from the castle after its destruction by parliementary forces in 1646. Most of the older village houses date from the 16th to the 19th century.
The quarrying of the local Purbeck Stone would have been an important industry for the village. Corfe was home to many of the Quarry owners and marblers, who would also have had their yards for dressing and finnishing the stone.
After a brief period of confiscation, the castle was eventually handed back to the Bankes family, and it remained in their ownership for three and a half centuries. In 1982, Ralph Bankes gave the castle to the National Trust along with the family’s extensive holdings in Purbeck, including their mansion at Kingston Lacy near Wimborne and its adjoining land. The Bankes estate was one of the most generous gifts in the National Trust’s history.
The village is ancient and grey, a dim, mumbling lace of tales and gossip. It has changed but little in the last century or so, and has remained unspoiled, although the canker of red brink has begun to gnaw its vitals. It is a wrinkled old place in the winter of its age, lying at the foot of its Castle like a faithful hound. Its three little streets lead humbly to the castle gate. The keep rises above the village, and looks down upon it as a sacred image would regard an adorring worshipper. The small town has even been dependent upon the castle, and is dependend on it still, for it brings to the place hungry tourists in chara—bancs, with their holiday money in their pockets.
Today the romantic ruins of Corfe Castle is one of the most popular visitor attractions in Dorset. Corfe Castle will also be familiar to many who have enjoyed reading Enid Blyton’s Famous Five Books, with Corfe Castle being the inspirationg behind Kirren Castle in the children’s series.
The castle was also featured in the Disney movie classic Bedknobs and Broomstricks (1971) and was certainly the inspiration for the village of Pepperinge Eye.
The National Trust visitor’s centre has more information about the Castle and the general area, as well as a shop and tearoom in the village. Find out more about Visiting Corfe Castle.
