Lincoln Castle

Lincoln Castle is one of the most complete and impressive Norman castles in England, founded by William the Conqueror in 1068 on the site of a former Roman fortress at the top of Lincoln's steep limestone ridge. Together with Lincoln Cathedral, it dominates the city skyline and forms the centrepiece of the historic Bailgate quarter.

Visitors can walk the full circuit of the medieval walls, a route of roughly a third of a mile, with sweeping views over the cathedral, the rooftops of the old city and out across the Lincolnshire countryside. Within the bailey stand two surviving keeps, the Lucy Tower and the Observatory Tower, the latter offering a climb to a Victorian-era turret added by a former prison governor. The castle also houses the Georgian and Victorian prison buildings, now home to the Victorian Prison experience with its eerie chapel of separate pews.

The undoubted highlight is the purpose-built vault containing Lincoln's original 1215 copy of Magna Carta, one of only four surviving, shown alongside the 1217 Charter of the Forest. Together these documents form an extraordinary pairing found nowhere else in the world, making the castle a key site for understanding English constitutional history.