Unveiling the secrets of a medieval castle hailed as the birthplace of Sheffield
But, with excavations underway, its secrets are tantalisingly revealed. A drawbridge pier, a moat, and now new interior walls, with hints at remains of an even earlier building.
In a city known for its industrial heritage and rightly famous for its cutlery and steel, say archaeologists, this adds a new layer of richness to Sheffield's long history.
Ashley Tuck, archaeologist at Wessex Archaeology, said: "We are making new discoveries about the very story and identity of Sheffield.
"To put this part of the story back into Sheffield, to have the remains of the castle uncovered and one day on public display, is really important."
Once a strategic stronghold and medieval centre of power, the castle was lost to time, destroyed following the Civil War as a symbol of the Parliamentarians’ victory.
It was back in the 1920s when builders uncovered parts of its medieval remains, then again during reconstruction works after the Second World War.
Wessex Archaeology carried out a trial excavation at the site in 2018, which gave a glimpse of the castle’s remains. Now, under Sheffield Council’s Castlegate regeneration project overseen by specialists Keltbray, this is the first time large areas of the site have been explored using modern methods.
Among the remains unearthed is a drawbridge pier - a dressed sandstone platform on which the drawbridge to the castle would have set down. Then a series of internal castle walls measuring up to 1.5m thick.
And as archaeologists excavated a six-metre-deep moat, new insights are revealed into even older remains, suggesting an earlier castle may once have stood on this site. And within the moat, a copper-alloy counter called a Jetton that would have been used a bit like money. This Jetton is thought to date to the mid-16th century, to a time when Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned at the castle by her cousin Queen Elizabeth I.
To the Friends of Sheffield Castle, it is particularly exciting to see parts of its walls uncovered that do not appear on any old maps or documents.
And to Mr Tuck, the castle just keeps revealing its secrets. New discoveries share the layout of the castle, with hints at findings that teams can now begin to piece together.
"This is the very origin of Sheffield - this is where the city was founded," he said. "The castle itself is hugely significant. It would have been huge, one of the biggest in England.
"We don't have a painting of the castle, we don't have any images that are reliable. It's just been guesswork. Every day we are discovering something unexpected.
"We are answering questions that have been hanging over the site for a long time and making brand new discoveries that nobody ever imagined were here."