Treachery, fantasy and pure majesty

From Norman-era treasures to the magic of Harry Potter, British castles are wonders to behold (and even stay in). Sophie Campbell picks 20 of the best

Of all the luck. One minute Meghan Markle is living in Canada and starring in a television series, the next she is marrying a prince (newly slipped to sixth in line to the throne, but still) in a castle. And not just any old castle, but a thumping, 1,000-year-old, super-size castle, crouched high above the Thames at Windsor, stuffed with royal chivalric imagery and the much-loved “real” home of Her Majesty the Queen.

Anyone who has built a sand castle knows the basics of castle construction: a mound for safety, a moat for defence, a drawbridge to allow selected visitors across. Then a mighty superstructure, the more intimidating the better, preferably castellated and pierced with arrow slits for firing through. Add wall-walks and portcullises to taste.

This is what makes them so brilliant to visit. You are scrambling, or possibly getting married, on the medieval equivalent of a Millennium Falcon; a live workspace once full of people, primed for battle and laden with sophisticated defensive technology.

Inside are the spaces its occupants needed to live in reasonable comfort, with a well, storage for food, weapons and artillery, guard rooms and private apartments, maybe prison cells, possibly dungeons and occasionally torture chambers (these are surprisingly rare; the Tower of London, for example, had the only rack in England.)

Paul Pattison, senior curator for English Heritage, who worked on the re-creation of the interiors at Dover Castle, defines a medieval castle as “a fortified residence and a seat of power for a particular family or clan,” explaining that the two functions would later split into military forts and domestic buildings. He also says that, as far as we know, there were no such castles in

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Britain until the Norman invasion the 1060s.

Imagine Wales without Edward I’s mighty symbols of invasion, or Scotland denuded of its clan power bases, or England minus the Tower. They are so much part of our national identity and such visual links with our history.

Everybody has a favourite. Pattison’s, not surprisingly, is Dover, encrusted on a mighty escarpment overlooking the sea, with – among other things – its intimidating stone keep and siege tunnels used to repel the Dauphin of France during the reign of King John.

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Mine is probably Corfe Castle in Dorset, a smashed tooth of a building, marooned on its mound between two ranges of hills blocking access to the Isle of Purbeck, and familiar since childhood. I love Bamburgh in Northumberland, overlooking a curve of pink sand beach, with views across the sea to Lindisfarne Castle on Holy Island; and Dudley, slighted in the Civil War, its walls full of fossils, with its own Thirties zoo.

Then there are the stories: the dark death of Edward II in Berkeley Castle, the ghosts of Glamis (which appeared in a BBC radio play), the Countess of Norfolk heroically defending Norwich Castle under siege – plus the poisonings, the babies dropped from windows, the escapes, the secret tunnels, the mantraps and priests’ holes.

And, I’m afraid, what could be more mesmerising than a dungeon, with the comforting insulation of centuries between us and the realities of imprisonment and torture? The Horrible Histories effect replaces the undoubted ghastliness with the comedy.

You can say one thing for a castle, and particularly for Windsor: it knows how to put on a show. Ms Markle’s big day will look sensational; her dress will face stiff competition from military uniforms and chivalric banners.

So I wonder if, as she and The Dress make their way under the fan-vaulted ceiling of St George’s Chapel and into the Quire, she will sense the presence of Henry VIII, Jane Seymour and Charles I (with separate head) in the royal vault beneath her feet, and the generations of Garter Knights whose stall plates crowd the walls around.

As for the rest of us, we may have to pick another castle for the moment, and luckily there are loads to choose from. Some you can actually stay in for a weekend. Some you can visit and stay nearby. And some, like Meghan’s, can be yours for the day. Here are my top 20 castle experiences in Britain.

You can say one thing for a castle, particularly for Windsor: it knows how to put on a show