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Building A Stone Castle
By Med | April 18, 2006
Choosing a Site
The Normans would have to have a good view of the countryside, roads and rivers so that it would be easy to defend the castle.
They needed water to fill the moat and also for cooking and cleaning.
They would need a large supply of timber and they would need a huge supply of stone to build the castle.
They would need hundreds of people to build the castle.
Castles were large heavy buildings so the site had to have solid rock underneath. A castle could not be built on soft soil.
The site had to be easy to defend. You could not build a castle near a high hill in case your enemies would attack you. Sometimes castles were built on the bend of a river.
How the Stone Castle was built
It took many years and cost a lot of money to build a stone castle. Building the castle was very hard work. It was slow and dangerous. Many of the workers were forced to work.
Engineers planned what the castle would look like.
All trees and houses around the site were cleared away.
Usually the keep, a great tower, was built first. This was the lord’s family home. It was rectangular in shape. The windows were narrow and had no glass but they were built so that an archer could fire arrows out through them.
The keep was surrounded by a curtain wall. This could have several towers. Outside the curtain wall was a moat. The area between the keep and the curtain wall was called the bailey. This contained buildings such as stables and sheds. Visitors entered the bailey through the gatehouse after crossing a drawbridge. When the castle was under attack, the drawbridge was raised and an iron grille called a portcullis was lowered.
Stonecutters worked at the stone quarry. They cut out blocks of stone and shaped them for building. They numbered the stones so that the masons could fit them together easily.
The stones were taken to the castle. The stone masons put them into place.
Workers burned lime and mixed it with sand and water to make mortar. This was used to stick the stones together. The walls of the castle could be five or six metres thick. The centre of the walls was packed with loose stones and mortar. The outside and the inside of these walls were made of cut stone.
The walls of a stone castle could be over sixty metres high so wooden scaffolding was needed to carry up stones and mortar and to work on. Carpenters built this scaffolding.
The carpenters also made the wooden roof. It was covered with lead.
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