BERKELEY, or NESS.--The identity of Berkeley Castle with the Ness castle of Domesday may be regarded as certain. All that the Survey says about it is: "In Ness there are five hides belonging to Berkeley, which Earl William put out to make a little castle."[270] Earl William is William FitzOsbern, the trusty friend and counsellor of the Conqueror, who had made him Earl of Herefordshire. He had also authority over the north and west of England during William's first absence in Normandy, and part of the commission he received from William was to build castles where they were needed.[271] Berkeley was a royal manor with a large number of berewicks, and the probable meaning of the passage in Domesday is that Earl William removed the _geldability_ of the five hides occupying the peninsula or _ness_ which stretches from Berkeley to the Severn, bounded on the south by the Little Avon, and appropriated these lands to the upkeep of a small castle. This castle can hardly have been placed anywhere but at Berkeley, for there is no trace of any other castle in the district.[272] Earl Godwin had sometimes resided at Berkeley, but probably his residence there was the monastery which by evil means had come into his hands;[273] for we never hear of any castle in connection with Godwin. But a Norman motte exists at Berkeley, though buried in the stone shell built by Henry II. Mr Clark remarks: "If the masonry of Berkeley Castle were removed, its remains would show a mound of earth, and attached to three sides of it a platform, the whole encircled with a ditch or scarp."[274] The motte raised by Earl William has, in fact, been revetted with a stone shell of the 12th century, whose bold chevron ornament over the entrance gives evidence of its epoch. What is still more remarkable is that documentary evidence exists to fix the date of this transformation. A charter of Henry II. is preserved at Berkeley Castle, in which he grants the manor to Robert Fitzhardinge, pledging himself at the same time to fortify a castle there, according to Robert's wish.[275] Robert's wish probably was to possess a stone keep, like those which had been rising in so many places during the 12th century. But there had been a Norman lord at Berkeley before Fitzhardinge, Roger de Berkeley, whose representatives only lost the manor through having taken sides with Stephen in the civil war.[276] This Roger no doubt occupied the wooden castle on the motte built by William FitzOsbern. Henry II.'s shell was probably the first masonry connected with the castle. This remarkable keep is nearly circular, and has three round turrets and one oblong. As the latter, Thorpe's Tower, was rebuilt in Edward III.'s reign, it probably took the place of a round tower. The keep is built of rubble, and its Norman buttresses (it has several later ones) project about a foot. The cross loopholes in the walls are undoubtedly insertions of the time of Edward III. The buildings in the