Leland, who visited Leicester about 1512, says,—“The castelle stonding nere the west bridge is at this tyme a thing of small estimation, and there is no apparaunce other [either] of high waulles or dykes. So that I think that the lodgings that now be there were made sins the tyme of the Barons’ war in Henry III. tyme, and great likelyhood there is that the castelle was much defaced in Henry II. tyme, when the waulles of Liercester were defacid.” (Itin., i., p. 16.) Speed gives a rough perspective view of the castle and town, which, however, is very indistinct as regards the former. In 1633 Mr. Herrick, of Beaumanor, was directed by the king to remove the ruinous parts and sell their material; to repair the castle house, which contained the records of the Honour of Lancaster, and to preserve the vaults and stairs leading to it, for the use of the keep of the castle. Upon this an inquisition was taken in 1633–4, and the value recorded of the materials, “excepting the Sessions Hall and the vault under the old castle, and the stairs leading to it.” This inquisition gives several details, chiefly of parts now removed; and mentions as to be repaired “John of Groat’s kitchen, divers outhouses belonging to the Great Sessions Hall, and the ruinous pieces at the south end of the same hall; also the south gate, and the wall from this gate to the Soar, which divides the castle from the Newark; also a wall next the porch of the church.” By “keep” is no doubt meant the hall. The south gate and wall to the Soar remain, as does a wall next the (south) porch of the church. In the civil wars, the castle was held for the king. It then fell to the Parliament; was retaken by the king in 1645, and finally yielded to the Parliament after Naseby. In the struggles the south gate was probably reduced to its present ruined condition. In 1781, Mr. Rogers Ruding had a lease of the premises from the duchy, which specifies the south gate evidently that remaining towards the Newark, the castle house, several tenements, the mount, and the appendages to the castle, and stipulates for the holding of sessions in the great hall. The castle stands at the south-western angle of the town, upon ground close to, and about 20 feet above, the right bank of the Soar, the three channels of which unite below the castle. The nearest of these streams is the artificial leat which supplied the castle mill, and does still supply its modern representative. From the line of the castle wall the ground slopes rapidly, and terminates in a strip of level land that forms the margin of the mill leat, therein closely resembling the river front of Taunton Castle on the Tone.