The finest surviving section of Denbigh's town walls runs along the eastern side of the old borough, where a spur wall descends steeply from the two-storey Countess Tower down to the ruined Goblin Tower. Together they represent both the ambition and the vulnerability of Denbigh's medieval defences.
The main circuit of walls was begun in 1282 under Henry de Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, and largely completed by around 1285. Around 1295, a further stretch of wall was added, projecting eastward beyond the original line to enclose a spring lying just outside the town boundary — a vital water source that could not be left exposed to a besieging army. The vast polygonal Goblin Tower was built directly over this spring, on the natural rock.
That decision proved its worth — and its cost — during the Civil War siege of 1646, when Parliamentary forces under Sir Thomas Mytton targeted the Goblin Tower and the adjoining walls in an effort to cut off the castle's water supply. The considerable battle damage still visible on the tower and surrounding masonry dates from Mytton's siege guns, making this stretch of wall one of the most tangible physical reminders of Denbigh's role in the Civil War.
The Countess Tower takes its name from a tradition that the Countess of Leicester, wife of Robert Dudley, once sheltered there during a siege, while the polygonal Goblin Tower — more properly the North-East Tower — stood guard over the town's water supply below the walls. Both towers formed part of the eastern circuit of Denbigh's medieval defences, built alongside the castle from 1282 onwards under Edward I's programme of castle-building in North Wales.
During the Civil War siege of 1646, this eastern stretch of wall bore the brunt of Parliamentarian artillery, and the towers still show the scars of that bombardment today. Visitors can walk a good stretch of the town walls from this point, with views down into the Vale of Clwyd that made Denbigh such a prized strategic position for both Welsh princes and English kings.