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Medieval Castles
By Med | March 26, 2006
Early castles were called strongholds. They were very primative but they served the purpose of defense early in Feudalism when barbarian raids were more common.
In medieval Europe the first castles appeared in the 9th century, when the Carolingian empire was collapsing as a result of Viking and Magyar raids. As central authority disintegrated, nobles fought for power and territory. They built castles so that they could control and defend their land. These castles started out as simple, wooden structures, relying on natural defences such as rivers or hills, but soon builders were adding earthworks - mounds, banks and ditches - for extra defence. Earthworks could be mounds, called mottes, or round, raised enclosures, called ringworks. A motte was topped by a wooden tower; while a ringwork contained buildings protected by a wooden palisade. In each case earth was dug from the perimeter area, leaving a protective ditch.
The fragmentation of land into separate estates or domains, and the manner in which they were ruled, led to the development of feudalism. The most powerful men, the counts, dukes and kings, controlled more than one estate. They would keep some of the land for themselves and give control of the rest to other lords. In return these lords promised to provide knights for their overlord’s wars and for the garrisoning of their overlord’s castles. In theory, a person’s allegienace was always to their overlord, however there were constant battles for land and power and some men became almost as powerful as their overlord. One such man was William, Duke of Normandy. After many years of war he had become very powerful and a real threat to his overlord, the king of France.
In September 1066, he launched an invasion of England to enforce his claim to the English throne. Castles played an important part in European warfare, and William brought this knowledge with him. He built his first defensive structure within the walls of the old Roman Fort at Pevensey where his invasion force had landed. He then continued to build castles to defend his line of retreat and within two weeks of landing had built castles at Hastings and Dover. After his victory at the battle of Hastings he went to London where he was crowned King of England, on Christmas Day 1066.
The period of Norman castle building had begun. As William’s forces spread across the county they built castles as a means to subdue and control the populace. William claimed all the land as his own but gave grants of land (fiefs) to the Norman lords that had provided him with military assistance during the invasion. In order to prevent any of them achieving the level of power that he had acquired in France, he gave them many separate estates spread across the country so that it would be difficult for any one lord to join all his froces together in a single power base. In order to protect and control their new lands the lords built castles on each of their estates. By the time of William’s death, in 1087, there were 86 Norman castles in England.
The early castles were mainly ‘ringworks’ or ‘motte and baileys’ which were quick to construct. A ‘motte and bailey’ castle consisted of a large mound, or motte, where possible based on solid rock, and made of compacted rubble and earth, topped with a wooden tower. It provided a look-out post, as well as adding tactically important height if the castle was attacked. The ‘bailey’ was a large, level enclosed area beside the motte, surrounded by an earthwork bank and ditch, topped with a timber palisade. The bailey often contained a hall, buildings for livestock, a forge and armoury, and a chapel. Due to the use of wood in their construction, these castles were particularly vulnerable to fire.
Many of these early wooden castles were later rebuilt in stone making use of the old earthworks. Stone castles needed more workers, were more expensive, and took much longer to build than wooden ones, but they were fireproof and much more secure.
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