It consists of a ditch and rampart, now greatly reduced by agriculture, excavations, and rabbit burrowing.
The earthwork has every appearance of being Saxon or Danish in origin with the exception of the northeast corner where there appears to be a Norman “mount and bailey” fortification known as Castle Toll.
The motte and bailey are in fair condition whereas the ‘earlier’ work has been extensively reduced by cultivation.
The defenses appear to have been abandoned unfinished: This supports the identification of the site with a half-finished ‘work’ mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 892 attacked by the Danes known as Eorpeburnan.
Castle Toll is located in the civil parish of Newenden, Kent.
The earthworks of a 9th-century burh and a mid-13th-century fort lie on a tongue of land projecting into the low marshland between the river Rother and its tributary the Hexden Channel.
Castle Toll Location
Approximate geographical coordinates: 51.0254, 0.645486.
Maytham Rd, Rolvenden, Kent TN17 4, UK