Hastings Castle was constructed before or immediately after William II, the Duke of Normandy landed in England (after his conquest he became known as William I, King of England & the Duke of Normandy) and was a motte-and-bailey castle and in 1070 William I ordered the castle rebuilt in stone along with St. Mary's Chapel.

Hastings Castle, England

A motte-and-bailey castle is a castle, which has a raised earth mound ("motte" in French), and a wooden or stone structure known as the keep, surrounded by a palisade surrounding the courtyard called a bailey.

Across the narrow stretch of the English channel is Normandy and from there William II, the Duke of Normandy, launched his invasion force of eighty-four hundred soldiers and defeated the Saxon army of seventy-five hundred just north-west of the coastal town of Hastings.

William I, King of England and the Duke of Normandy, built a chapel to Saint Mary within the walls of Hastings Castle and this is an archway of that chapel with the curtain walls of Hasting Castle on the elevated area.