The 1574 castle The current Te Riviere Castle consists of the remains of the castle as it was when it was destroyed in 1574. A painting from around 1574 shows its earlier appearance. The current ruins consist of a 20 by 17.5 m area. On it are the lower part of a tower house and the foundations of some walls. The base of the tower house measures 12 by 12 meters. The wing north of it measures 8 by 17.5 m. The remaining southwestern space measured 12.5 by 5.5 m. In an investigation, Dutch archaeologist
Jaap Renaud concluded that the small west side of the northern wing had a
stepped gable, and that the remaining southwestern part was divided in two, and got two west-facing stepped gables, leading to a consistency between the painting, and the archaeological evidence. Renaud concluded that the painting indeed reflected the 1574 appearance. Renaud also stated that the castle would have been a very exceptional construction if the 1574 situation had been the result of the original plans for the castle. The 1947–1948 excavations that Renaud led, allowed him to draw a floor plan of the tower house and part of the 1574
outer bailey. This solved the very important question whether the old painting reflected the pre-1574 situation. In the context of investigating the relation between the picture and archaeology, Renaud then did something that was scientifically correct, but would later be proven wrong. With respect to the northern wall of the outer bailey, he concluded that this was a replacement of a wall from 1300. For Renaud, Te Riviere was a small castle with an outer bailey, comparable to Middelburg Castle near Alkmaar. However, subsequent archaeological research would lead to very different conclusions.
A formidable square castle The current ruins show the remains of an
enceinte with
buttresses on the inside at a very small distance from the main tower house. This wall was also found on the western side of the supposed outer bailey. It was even known that the wall extended into the
moat a bit from the 'keep'. The supposition that it had formed one continuous wall would seem obvious, but it was not. The construction date of Te Riviere Castle lay before the date that the square castle type appeared in Holland, and it would lead to a very large castle suddenly appearing in the history of Holland. The theory that the oldest castle had been a formidable square castle became logical, when in 1962 archaeologists found that the southern wall of the supposed outer bailey was very similar. See 1975 floor plan. The conclusion from the archaeological evidence was that in about 1265, the construction of a large 45 by 50 m (almost) square castle with square corner tower was started. On the inside of the northwest corner, was the still remaining 12 by 12 m tower house. This was cut off from the rest of the castle by a small inside moat. The project for this formidable castle was not completed. Work on the castle and especially the main tower house continued in 1300–1304, but after that the project was left unfinished. In 1339, the castle is granted to Dirk van Matenesse, who begins to finish the main tower, leading to the 1574 castle.
The big tower or keep The remaining big tower or
tower house was a free standing building within the square castle. It is supposed that the first phase of the castle was a solitary tower which was surrounded by the big square in about 1260. The situation of a free standing tower inside a square castle is very rare in the current Netherlands. The only other examples that comes to mind is
Oud Haerlem Castle dating from about the same time. The high basement of the tower was closed by a still discernible
barrel vault. The basement had four openings to let in light. These were 12 cm wide on the outside, and 95 cm on the inside. The walls of the basement were over three meters thick. Inside the northwest wall were that gave access from the ground floor, which was actually very much above ground, but contained the access to the tower. The current direct access to the basement is a later breakthrough. This also goes for the access from the stairs to the later northern wing on the ground floor level. The brick used in the foundation of the tower was the biggest found on the site in 1947–1948. It generally measured 28 cm with a thickness of 7.5–8 cm, but some 31–32 cm long. Higher up the exceptional lengths are not found. The brick above the basement is generally red, while the lower sections contain many yellowish bricks. This points to a construction break. Another clear indication is that after the basement was finished, it was allowed to sag into the ground on the eastern side, which necessitated a layer of cut bricks to make the construction level again before building the ground floor. The ground floor itself had walls of only 1.40 m thick. Here the stairs continued to the first floor. The ground floor had windows in the south and east walls, and probably also in the west wall. The south side had a toilet and a
niche for a
Lavabo with a sink of red stone. The north wall had a fireplace. From a drawing we know that the first floor had two windows in the east wall. It might be that the stairs protruded from the tower at this level, as is shown by the 1574 painting. Above the first floor was a
hip roof with
merlons. == History ==