In the royal palace at Winchester, which was near the cathedral. Winchester was the capital of late Anglo-Saxon England, having previously been the capital of Wessex. Winchester was also the home of the treasury, the royal workshops and the officials and scribes who issued charters and tended the country's comparatively well developed bureaucracy. The kings also lived on various royal estates scattered around the country (that at Corfe in Dorset, on the site of the present castle, would be an example) as they moved about their domains to give justice, assert their power and counter threats. Early mediaeval kings tended to be mobile, both for military and political reasons, and for the practicalities of feeding and supplying the court.