foundations, seems to be of earlier date than any other existing walls (except the early-Norman fragment of the boundary wall), and probably belonged to the keep; but it is too thin to have been its outside wall. It may have been an inside wall dividing the keep into two parts by an arrangement still seen in the twelfth-century keeps of Rochester and Colchester. If so, a considerable part of the keep lying to the south of this wall must have been destroyed, leaving no trace of its foundations.
   Certainly one and probably both of the existing dovecotes were likewise built at this time. The east clove-cote was standing before the existing enclosure wall was built up against it, as anyone can see at a glance. That enclosure wall belonged to the late twelfth-century manor-house. The dove-cote is therefore earlier and must belong to the previous stage of building, that is to say, to William de Elinton’s castle. Now William de Elinton is also known as William de Columbariis or Columbers. It is tolerably clear that he must have taken his name from these very  

columbaria. The west dove-cote has been much altered by being turned into an oast-house, but in style of building it must have been identical with the other. These two dove-cotes are the oldest existing in England as far as I have been able to discover.
   As above stated, the Columbers castle was destroyed in
1174-5. An agricultural estate without some kind of manor-house could hardly get along. When the castle was destroyed a manor-house had to be built, and no doubt it was built at once, that is to say in or immediately after 1175. Of this manor-house there remain very considerable fragments. It was built out of the materials of the destroyed Columbers castle, and contains, mixed up in the body of the walls along with the general mass of Kentish rag, numbers of wrought blocks of Caen stone shewing Norman tooling. The lower part of the present gate-house and the north end of the west wing of the castle belong to this late twelfth-century manor-house.* (Plan No. 3)
  * See the parts of the "Historical Plan" coloured brown.