Reigate Fakery

A couple of weeks ago we had an hour or two in Reigate. In the middle of Reigate, should you ever decide for some bizarre reason to make a trip there, you will find the Castle Gardens. Unlike Guildford, whose Castle Gardens surround an actual castle, there is no castle in Reigate. There used to be, until a group of recalcitrant Royalists used it as a base in the Civil War, hastening its demolition lest it shelter similar sedition in the future. In 1777 one of the town dignitaries decided to rebuild a bit of it as a sort of memorial to Earl William de Warenne, the magnate who founded the town in the 1150s and who, according to the inscription, was 'a loyal champion of our liberties'.

The 'Castle' is a delightful bit of Georgian nonsense which looks about as much like a genuine medieval castle gateway as the pyramid in the middle of the gardens,which we will come to in a minute, resembles its Egyptian forebears. It's quite fun, as it has two levels, an arched gateway you can walk through and an upper storey from which you can survey the visitors traipsing up the path, through the cross-slit windows.

Of course William de Warenne didn't give two hoots, or even one, about the ancient liberties of the town, which gives this memorial a level of fakery even beyond its physical shape. Towns such as Reigate were set up at the gates of castles and abbeys to take advantage of the opportunities for the control of trade that would result. You could argue, were you feeling generously disposed, that Reigate wouldn't exist otherwise, but it was a result of de Warenne being entrepreneurial rather than altruistic.

Ah now, the Pyramid. You can see that in the second photo. It sits atop the entrance to what is now known as the Baron's Cave, a network of underground passages which have nothing to do with the barons who compelled King John to sign Magna Carta (as the old story went) or even the fabric of the medieval castle. You can, however, book to go on a tour of these chambers, whose purpose remains mysterious. A delight which still awaits me ...