Castles
Fortifications come in all sizes and shapes. Some are a straggling line like Hadrian’s Wall or the Great Wall of China, others are more or less circular, such as an earthwork crowning a hilltop; some are rectangular like a Norman keep, others are irregular and multisided as, for example, town walls, while still others are like a Russian doll, castle within castle. All were designed for strength, not beauty. Yet their massiveness and skilful masonry convey a sense of grandeur and of style. There is no mistaking the character of a Norman keep or a 14th-century gate-house. Their style was a function of their military purpose. It is only with modern technology that weapons can be custom-built to meet specific military problems. Castles were designed to deal with weapons and tactics which changed only slowly; and the availability of materials, manpower and skills was also influential. The shortage of timber in Palestine, for example, encouraged more stone vaulting than in Europe.
Some fortifications had a purely defensive purpose; they were intended as dykes to hold back the Barbarians, or as places of refuge in time of trouble. Others had a more aggressive purpose; they were intended to push forward and secure the occupation of new territories or to overawe a town. At the simplest level, fortifications, whether defensive or aggressive, protected the lord’s family and immediate retainers from surprise attack and, equally likely, from treachery. At a more sophisticated level, castles could resist sieges for upwards of a year. When the tide of the invading army had receded, the defenders could reassert their authority over the surrounding land.
For some centuries, the security of life in towns depended upon their fortifications, and the constricting girdle of walls and towers did much to shape the architecture of cities. As with the island of Manhattan, they encouraged high rather than wide building. Castles were fortified villages, sheltering people of every level of society and providing a store for grain against famine as well as imminent siege. Often, they were also administrative centres.
Hundreds of castles still exist in Europe and the Levant as evidence of the fact that building fortifications and guarding them was an important part of medieval life. The cost of these activities also formed an important charge on royal and baronial budgets. But there is no doubt that for several hundred years they were cost effective. Quite small numbers, measured in terms of trained men, could hold a fair-sized castle for weeks against a besieging army; there are cases of garrisons as small as thirty holding off 3,000. Famine was their worst enemy and sickness among the besiegers their best ally. The Crusaders captured Jerusalem in 1099 by wheeling tall towers up against the walls and taking them by storm. But a more certain and effective method of assault was to drive a mine under a tower and then set light to the mine props, so that the weight of the tower caused it to fall in. The only sure defence against mining was to build on rock or to cut a water-filled moat round the castle. In the end, cannon was the great leveller; but it was only slowly after their introduction in the early 14th century that cannon affected castle design. Many castles in northern Italy of the 16th century bear witness to this; the basic design is little changed, but the towers are more squat and the thicker walls are pierced with gun embrasures.
The purpose of a castle determined its site and to some extent its shape, but its detail and character depended upon the state of military art. Where commanders could deploy large forces, they designed armed camps which allowed their men to line the walls and launch their weapons against the enemy. Hence, the Roman castrum, or camp, and the Byzantine field castle with its long, thin walls and meagre towers. But where men were lacking, as with the Crusaders, towers and walls had to take their place; massive masonry had to deter attack and withstand batter, twisting walls and projecting towers threatened the attackers in their rear or on their flanks, and elaborate entrances were designed to trick the unwary. All castle designers had to provide water and living quarters for the garrison. Hence, deep wells and cavernous cisterns, now the haunt of bats. Hence also, great halls for the men-at-arms and airy apartments for the ladies.
The design of castles has always been a subject worthy of princes. Chateau Gaillard in France, one of the most original designs, was the personal achievement of Richard I of England. The great Military Orders, the Hospitallers and the Templars, had their own distinctive "house style". The owners of most castles played a large part in their design, more, in all likelihood, than in the design of their civil and ecclesiastical buildings; in doing so they were exercising the profession of arms to which they had been bred.
The evidence is scanty, but we can reasonably surmise that there was a close working relationship between the princes and peers who designed the castles and their usually anonymous master masons, who nevertheless signed their work with their individual marks. The masons were a well-paid fraternity, who ranked high in the hierarchy of medieval craftsmen; and their military work has endured as well as their ecclesiastical. The turbulence of the times provided reason for building castles more speedily than churches, but often they were not less carefully constructed. Their masonry, now largely unroofed and uncared for was intended to resist not merely time and weather but also to withstand the mine, the battering-ram and the catapult.
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Article taken from:
Norwich, John Julius. (1982). Great Architecture of the World. New York: Bonanza Books.
Fred J. Becker, Architect
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