The West Sussex castle named a top hidden gem to visit for the coronation

It came second in a list created by digital marketing agency Tank, which ranked the best of England’s most obscure castles.

The agency analysed 155 castles across the country, ranking them according to visitor reviews and how often they appeared in social media posts, prioritising the less well-known.

To create the list, Tank cross-referenced castles that have been tagged the fewest number of times on Instagram with how many of each historic sites’ visitor reviews on Tripadvisor and Google have five-star ratings.

It means that the top five have each only been tagged between 100 and 5,000 times in the 12-year history of the platform, but all have been rated five stars in more than 70% of reviews.

The top 10 hidden gems of English castles to visit for the coronation weekend are:

Hever Castle, Edenbridge, Kent

Arundel Castle, Arundel, West Sussex

Bewcastle Castle, Bewcastle, Cumbria

Berkeley Castle, Berkeley, Gloucestershire

Elsdon Castle, Elsdon, Northumberland

Goodrich Castle, Ross-on-Wye, Herefordshire

Walmer Castle, Deal, Kent

Old Wardour Castle, Tisbury, Wiltshire

Raby Castle, Darlington, County Durham

Leeds Castle, Maidstone, Kent

Elizabeth Rhodes, founding director of Swain Architecture, said: “Castles always bring various stages of history to life. Almost all have been changed or added to at various times, which gives them differing styles of architecture across the same building or the same site, as their purpose and fate evolved.

“The most famous castles are often busy on bank holiday weekends but, by deliberately seeking out ones that most people are unaware of, you then have a chance to explore them properly and soak up their history.”

The castles in the list range from pristine and intact buildings to ruins. Many are owned by organisations like English Heritage or the National Trust, some are private homes that the public can visit and others are completely free and accessible to everyone.

Tank’s founder and director Trevor Palmer, adds:

“As an agency, we’re fascinated by heritage and old buildings in particular, the history behind them and their architectural details. The coronation weekend is the perfect time to visit those that are less well-known, as well as the usual choices.”

To see the full top 20 list of castles, find out more about each one and discover the method used to rank them, visit tankpr.co.uk/coronation-castles-hidden-gems/