Castle Hill, Huddersfield

Castle Hill is a scheduled ancient monument in Almondbury overlooking Huddersfield in the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees, West Yorkshire [1]. The hilltop has been settled for at least 4,000 years [1]. The scheduled monument comprises the remains of a late-Bronze Age or early Iron Age univallate hillfort with a single raised bank, a later Iron Age multivallate hillfort, a 12th-century motte-and-bailey castle, and the site of a deserted medieval village [1]. The hillfort was constructed in the early Iron Age, around 555 BC taking up the whole hilltop [1]. Modifications were made around 43 AD to improve the defences, probably in response to the threat from the Roman invaders [1]. Excavations on part of the hillfort in 1970 demonstrated that Castle Hill had at some stage suffered from a severe episode of burning [1].