Of the castle there remain parts of 12thc. walling at the postern gate of the Piper Tower and part of the gatehouse tower, but nothing extensive and certainly nothing sculptural (Roberts, 2002, 405a). Most of the 12thc. fabric was of Magnesian limestone, ashlar but including some herringbone work, and is now mostly internal. A cellar in the inner bailey, later extended, may originally have been Norman work with a stair vice for access (Roberts 2002, 120, fig. 81). The most significant remains of the Romanesque period are the foundations and a few courses of the chapel in the inner bailey, at the opposite end from the motte.

Despite the chapel’s apparently ‘free’ location, it is not correctly orientated but points 30 degrees N of E. Stonework of the chapel rises to about four courses, and has been neatly patched with pebbly cement. No plinths are exposed, but the apse had the unusual detail of shafted pilasters. The chapel is, at first sight, a small version of Birkin church, or Steetley chapel (Derbyshire) since the stilted apse, the presbytery and the nave are all present. However this resemblance may be misleading. The nave still awaits excavation below some 2m of spoil and Victorian landscaping covering the bailey.

The materials used for the castle and the chapel are Coal Measure sandstones and Magnesian limestone. The stone is broadly characteristic of various phases of building, according to Roberts (2002, 85): Anglo-Saxon remains tend to involve sandstone; Magnesian limestone for 12thc. work; sandstone again from the 13thc. century; both types are available in Pontefract.

The current estimate of the size of the chapel is approx. 25.6m long overall; nave approx. 12 x 10m; chancel 9 x 7.5m; apse 4.6m long (Roberts 2002, 87b). This is surprisingly similar to the size of Birkin church.

In DB, Tanshelf was held by Ilbert de Lacy; this was an estate, rather than a settlement. Pontefract, the Norman name for the inhabited centre, was the caput of a large honour in South and West Yorkshire. No date of building for the castle is documented, but it was complete to the extent that the chapel of St Clement was dedicated c.1088 (Roberts 2002, 10, citing Farrer 1916, 1492). The castle is ‘unlikely to have been under construction until after the northern revolts of 1067-9’ (Roberts 2002, 10) and for most of the 12thc. it was an earthwork castle. Some stonework and foundations are of late 12thc. date; for phased plans, see Roberts (2002, 404-5; fig. 161).

This simple outline of motte, bailey and chapel, so like that of many other castles, has acquired more interest since the excavations in the 1980s. It is now thought that, pre-Conquest, there may have been a Saxon defensive enclosure where the motte is, and that the area called Kirkeby, to the east of the castle, was characterised by several religious sites: the chapel of St Clement and the hospital of St Nicholas are both believed to have existed before 1090; two un-named Saxon churches have been found. All Saints may also be a pre-Conquest church (Roberts and Whittick, 2013, 71, 74-5). Further, burials were found throughout an area within which are the churches of St Clement, one recently discovered Anglo-Saxon church, and All Saints. All this suggests that, pre-Conquest, Kirkeby was the site of a minster church (Roberts and Whittick, 2013, 74-5). ‘It is thus proposed that the castle site formed an important component of Saxon Taeddenesscylf/Kirkeby – a royal/monastic centre, without a substantial attendant population, to which the dead from outlying settlements within the vill were brought for burial’ (Roberts, 2002, 404). The Normans divided this complex by enlarging the castle at the expense of the cemetery, and they changed the religious character too, founding the Cluniac Priory to which they give the churches. They 'encouraged' population in the expanded town of Pontefract, to the west of the castle, with its own church(es) and eventually a market (Roberts and Whittick, 2013, figs. 3, 4). Comparisons where Normans reconfigured settlement and cemeteries at Norwich and elsewhere are cited by Roberts (2002, 404b).

There are reasons for thinking that there may have been a pre-Conquest predecessor chapel to St Clement's, including the density of graves around it and the long continued practice of burial there, as well as the fact that the nave and much of the chancel are in sandstone (Roberts, 2002, 73-4, 85, 403). The earliest chapel components (a small two-cell church) might be Saxon or Norman. A 'neatly chamfered external plinth' was found which might belong to either period (Roberts, 2002, 85b). The archaeologists seem to favour an initial building in the pre-Conquest period, retained and remodelled after it.

Phase 2 of the chapel’s development was the re/building of the square-ended sandstone chancel and nave (Roberts, 2002, 75-6).

Phase 3 is the addition of the apse (Roberts, 2002, 76). The columns and bases of the main apse arch are in Magnesian limestone. A coin of King Stephen was found associated with the deposits in the chancel (Roberts, 2002, 78a, 405a). The altar was supposedly moved slightly eastwards at that time, and three shallow steps were added across the chancel.

The reconstruction by the West Yorkshire Archaeological Service shows the doorway in the presbytery out of proportion and too low.

Discussion (Roberts, 2002, 85) contrasts the exterior shafted pilasters of the apse to the unshafted pilasters at Birkin, but notes that Birkin also has shafted pilasters on the S wall of the chancel. I have suggested a link between features at Campsall, notably the Burgundian shape of the crossing arches, and the work of the Cluniacs of Pontefract.