THE RECTANGULAR KEEP OF A NORMAN CASTLE.
In a preceding chapter an attempt was made to describe the appearance
and to give an outline of the history of those earthworks in England
and Normandy upon which the Norman and Anglo-Norman barons founded
their chief strongholds, and which, therefore, are connected with the
military architecture of either country. It is now proposed to describe
the buildings themselves, whether placed within the ancient earthworks
or altogether of original foundation, which constituted the fortresses
of England in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, through the periods
known in ecclesiastical architecture as the Norman and Transition, and
which, in military architecture, include the Norman form of castle.
What is known as the Norman style of architecture prevailed in England
from the Conquest to the close of the reign of Stephen,—that is, from
1066 to 1154; but this latter is necessarily an arbitrary date, since
it was by degrees only that one style of architecture passed into
another, and the Norman features, though found in all buildings, and
especially in castles, down to the end of the reign of Henry II., or
1189, became more and more mixed up with those of the succeeding style.
The castles of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, whether in Normandy
or in England, were of two distinct types,—those with the rectangular
and those with the shell keep. The former type was almost always
employed when the site selected was a new one, the latter where the
site was old, and where there existed a “motte” or mound. There
are exceptions to this; that is to say, the rectangular keep is
occasionally found on an old site, but the shell keep is never found on
a new one. The distinction was mainly due to the fact that the massive
heavy tower could only be safely founded upon solid ground, whereas
the lighter and more widely-distributed weight of the shell keep was
better suited to that which was artificial. The shell keep was the most
numerous of the two; but the tower type, being of a more solid and more
durable character, has lasted longest, and is at this time so much
the most common that it has been designated by writers of authority
as the type, instead of as but one of the two types of a Norman keep.
The rectangular and the shell keep never occur in the same castle;
and, as a rule, where there is a mound there is no rectangular keep.
The only known exceptions to this rule are at Christchurch, Guildford,
Clun, Saffron Walden, Mileham, Bungay, and Bramber. At Christchurch
and Mileham the mound is low, and the keep walls seem to be carried
through it to the solid ground. At Guildford, as at Clun, where the
mound is large, the keep is built on its slope, so that the lower end
and one-third of the contiguous sides are seen to rest on the solid
ground, and thus effectually counteract the tendency of the upper part
to slide down. Walden has not been carefully examined, nor is it known
whether the foundations at Bungay are carried down to the solid earth.
At Bramber there is an oblong natural hill, surrounded by a very deep
ditch, in part artificial, while at one end of the hill is a square
keep, and near the other a small mound. At Llwchwr, in South Wales, a
small square tower stands upon a low and small mound, mixed up with the
bank of a Roman camp. The tower, indeed, is not actually Norman, though
no doubt early, and it most probably descends to the natural ground.
The large rectangular tower at Oxford is not the keep, but a mural
tower, though of unusual bulk. The keep there was a shell, and crowned
the mound. At Kenilworth there seems to have been a small mound, which
has been included within the keep, the walls of which rest upon the
natural rock. The mound in this way fills up the basement of the keep,
the ground-floor of which is thus raised 12 feet to 15 feet above the
exterior level, as in the shell keep of Berkeley and in some degree at
Pontefract.
The rectangular keep is, of all military structures, the simplest
in form, the grandest in outline and dimensions, the sternest in
passive strength, the most durable in design and workmanship, and
in most cases by some years the earliest in date. Of the five great
fortresses which covered the road from Dover to London, Dover itself,
Canterbury, Rochester, and London have square keeps; the fifth,
Tonbridge, having an earlier mound, has a shell keep. Farnham and
Berkhampstead, Windsor, Wallingford, and Oxford,—fortresses guarding
London from the west,—having mounds, have not square keeps. Hedingham
and Colchester to the east, having square keeps, are without the mound,
though Hedingham, like Corfe and Bramber, stands on a natural hill.
Northwards, Warwick and Kenilworth confirm the rule, one having had a
mound and no square keep; the other a square keep which has absorbed
the mound, if mound there was. At Belvoir, the mound, a natural hill,
is capped by a shell, as were the artificial mounds of Bedford,
Cambridge, Clare, Eye, and Ongar, while rectangular keeps are, or were,
found at Chepstow, Ludlow, Bristol and Wattlesborough, Lancaster and
Newcastle, and on the moundless sites of Bamburgh, Carlisle, Corfe,
Norham, Norwich, Nottingham, Porchester, Scarborough, Knaresborough,
Helmsley, and Richmond, and in the less distinguished lordships, some
of Norman foundation, of Appleby, Brough, Brougham, Bowes, Castle
Rising, Clitheroe, Castleton, Goderich, and Prudhoe. Where there is
a rectangular keep it rises high over every part of the fortress,
and gives, as at Bamburgh, unity and grandeur to the architectural
composition. It is usually, as at Rochester, Dover, Richmond, and
Scarborough, placed upon the highest ground within the enclosure, and
very rarely indeed in or near the centre, although, as in London,
it may have been rendered central by the removal of its original
_enceinte_ and the substitution of new and extended lines. At Malling,
perhaps the earliest in England of these keeps, and at Helmsley,
probably the latest,—for that of Knaresborough, though square, is of
Decorated date,—the keep stands on one side of, and forms a part of
the _enceinte_. At Bamburgh, Bramber, Canterbury, Carlisle, Clitheroe,
and Rochester, the keep stands clear of, but very near to, the outer
wall, of which, at Porchester, it forms one angle. At Kenilworth and
Bridgenorth the keep forms an angle of the inner wall; at Norham one
face ranges with the outer and one with the inner wall; and at Ludlow
the keep is placed on the inner wall, close to the main gateway. At
Ogmore it occupies an angle, having one face on the outer and one on
the cross or inner wall. Dover stands detached in the middle of what
appears to be its original enclosure, and so, probably, did Hedingham
and Castle Rising. At Mitford, near Morpeth, is a singular example of
a rectangular keep, of which three angles are right-angled, and the
fourth face is broken into two planes meeting at a low salient. It is
probably late in the period.
These keeps vary in dimensions from 25 feet to 80 feet and even 100
feet in the side, and they are usually from one and a half to two
diameters in height to the base of the parapet. Many, perhaps most,
have been raised a stage, as Porchester, Bridgenorth, Richmond, Brough,
Brougham, Kenilworth, and Norham. In most of these cases the addition
was made within the Norman period, and possibly contemporaneous with
the substitution of a covering of lead for one of shingles or stone
tiles.
Usually the flat exterior faces are relieved by broad pilaster strips
of slight projection from 5 feet to 10 feet wide, by 6 inches in depth,
one at the end of and flanking each face, and in the larger keeps one,
or even two, between them. The flanking pilasters are commonly placed
so as to cover the angle, the two meeting; sometimes, however, they
do not quite meet, and the solid angle is replaced by a hollow nook,
occasionally, in late keeps, as at Castle Rising and Scarborough,
occupied by a bold bead or engaged shaft. In all but the very small
keeps these flanking pilasters are continued 8 feet to 10 feet clear
above the parapet as the outer faces of square turrets, now usually
ruined. At Hedingham one, partly perfect, remains. Those on the White
Tower and at Rochester are in part original, and certainly represent,
very closely, original structures. At Bowes there seems to have been
but one turret, covering the stairhead. The intermediate pilasters
usually stop either just below the base of the parapet or below an
upper window. At Dover they are carried into the parapet and support
slight internal recesses there, but this is very rare. The pilasters
usually are divided by strings into stages, marking the levels of the
different floors, and all rise from a common plinth, sometimes slight,
but sometimes, as at Malling, Kenilworth, Guildford, Scarborough,
and Norham, where one side rises from lower ground, the plinth is on
that side 8 feet to 10 feet high, and has at Kenilworth and Norham a
very bold base. The set-off and string-course are sometimes carried
along both wall and pilasters. At Colchester and at the White Tower a
projecting half-round forms the apse of the chapel, and the pilasters
appear upon it; at Rochester a rounded corner is solid, save at one
story, but this is probably due to a reconstruction. The pilasters
are one of the most marked features of the Norman style, and their
presence at once distinguishes a keep of that period from the fine
fourteenth-century towers, as Borthwick and Lochleven, found in
Scotland, as well as from towers of Early English date, where the
pilasters are bolder and narrower, and often, as at Exeter Castle,
chamfered at the angles.
The keep wall is from 7 feet to 14 feet thick, and at the base of the
foundation sometimes 20 feet. That of Colchester is reputed to be 30
feet. That of the Tower of London is said to have taken six weeks to
pierce, with all modern tools and appliances. The lower 14 feet of the
keep of Newcastle is thought to be solid. The wall usually diminishes
in thickness as it rises, sometimes by external sets-off of 6 inches,
more commonly by an internal step of 1 foot at each floor level.
Occasionally the exterior face slopes inward or batters, but this is
unusual. The summit at the level of the allure or battlement walk is
seldom less than 6 feet, and often 7 feet or 8 feet thick. Within, the
larger keeps are divided by a cross wall, usually ascending to the
summit, and pierced in each floor. Sometimes this wall is confined
to the basement and first floor. Kenilworth, a large keep, had no
cross wall; Norwich and Canterbury had two, and some have chambers
walled off at the ends by secondary cross walls, as Castle Rising,
Wolvesey, Colchester, and the White Tower. At Bowes two walls divided
the basement into three chambers. Usually these dividing-walls were
pierced by doorways, but the openings in the main floor were larger.
At Scarborough was, and at Hedingham still is, a single large arch; at
Rochester and at Middleham are several arches. At Porchester are only
small doorways. Where there is no cross wall its place was, no doubt,
supplied by posts of timber. The smaller keeps have a basement and a
first floor; the larger, a second and third floor,—the latter being
often an early addition.
The basement chamber is almost always at the exterior ground level,
and never much below it; it is commonly from 12 feet to 15 feet high,
aired, rather than lighted, by one or more narrow loops in each
face, splayed and stepped up to within: Richmond has not even these.
The basement was evidently always a storeroom. Now and then, as at
Scarborough, but not often, its walls contain chambers; more commonly
they are solid. In small keeps, as Ludlow and Carlisle, the first was
the main floor, or room of state; in the larger, as Rochester, it
seems to have been a barrack. The apertures were rather larger than
those below, but not much. In the walls were commonly chambers. In
the large keeps the main floor, usually the second, was from 25 feet
to 30 feet high, generally with windows 2 feet or so broad, and often
coupled under a single arch outside. Inside, the recess was splayed,
and sometimes descended to the floor level, while in the jambs were
door-openings into mural chambers. Some of these castle halls must
have been noble rooms. Where there was a cross wall, as at Rochester,
Norham, and Middleham, there were two rooms; at Kenilworth the large
open space was probably subdivided by a brattice. Usually, in the
larger castles, the wall of the main floor is pierced, high up, by
a sort of triforium gallery, into which the outer windows open, and
which opens into the chamber by lofty and larger arches of 3 feet to 4
feet opening. Possibly these galleries and their windows were intended
to give another line of defence; but they must have destroyed the
privacy of the hall and made it very cold. Above the main floor was
an upper floor, probably occupied as private rooms, bratticed off by
partitions of wood. Where this floor was not a part of the original
building, to gain it seems to have been one object of the addition. It
was placed immediately below the roof. The original roof seems to have
been inclined at a moderate pitch, such as was necessary to carry off
the water from a covering of shingles. The gables did not rise above
the parapet, so that there was thus a great loss of space. In the
smaller keeps the roof was a simple ridge with lateral gutters; where
there was a cross wall the roof was double, with a central as well as
lateral gutters. That this was the usual arrangement is clear from the
old weather mouldings, which remain in the end walls wherever these
have been raised. The original roof having its ridge rather below the
parapet, had its side gutters in deep hollows. Of course, no military
engine could have been placed on such a roof. Where the walls have
been raised the roof has been replaced by a floor, and an upper story
introduced with either a flat, or nearly flat, and leaded roof. These
additions are almost always late Norman; but at Brougham they are
Decorated. At Ludlow, where there was a central ridge with two lateral
gutters, the interior has been re-arranged, and a flat roof laid at the
ridge level of the old one, gaining a floor without raising the walls.
The gables never seem, as in the Scottish towers, to have risen above
the parapet. Probably one reason why the Norman roofs were lifted and
flattened was to allow of military engines being placed upon them, and
the use of lead must have come in rather suddenly just before the close
of the Norman period.
The floors of these keeps are almost always of timber; thick rough
planks, resting upon stout balks 12 inches or 14 inches square, placed
about 2 feet or 3 feet apart, and resting either on a ledge or in
regular joist-holes. Such floors exposed the keep to be burned, and
once well on fire it would certainly burn till it was gutted. The
basement is now and then vaulted, but the vaulting is very rarely
original, and when it is so the keep is late. The vaulting at the Tower
and at Dover is modern brickwork; the Ludlow vault seems Early English;
that at the lower part of Carlisle, that of Porchester, Brougham,
Bowes, and Richmond, Decorated; the vaulting at Middleham, Newcastle,
and Mitford may be original. The vaulting at Norham, a late keep, may
be original, but was more probably inserted at an early period by
Bishop Puisèt. That of Bamburgh is an insertion. The basement of Bowes
was vaulted, but what remains of one rib is either Decorated or later.
In a few examples where guns have been mounted on a Norman keep, a
brick vault has been sprung over the upper chamber, and the roof filled
up and paved. At Dover, Carlisle, and Newcastle, where this has been
done, the upper openings of the hall are closed, and the interior of
the fabric utterly disfigured. There is certainly no original vaulting
of a great chamber higher than the basement.
In most keeps there is a well-stair in one angle, which commences
at the ground-level, supplies every floor, and terminates on the
roof under the turret-head, but has no communication below with the
exterior. This was so originally at the White Tower. There are also
other staircases at other levels, beginning on the first, or even
the second, floor, and not always reaching the roof. As a rule, one
stair, descending to the storeroom, seems to have been enough; but
it was thought an advantage to have two or three ascending from the
hall or upper floor to the ramparts, for readiness during a siege. At
Canterbury there are also two well-staircases in the side walls; and
there is one in London. These well-staircases are from 8 feet to 12
feet in diameter, and lighted with loops. Usually they communicate
with each floor through a sort of lobby. The stairs are always of
stone. As the steps at each angle do not suit the same level of the
mural gallery, these latter are coaxed and accommodated, usually very
clumsily. Now and then the arrangement is different, the stair stops at
the first floor, and is continued at the opposite diagonal. Sometimes,
as at Carlisle, Ludlow, and Bamburgh, where the outer door is at the
ground-level, the staircase commences in the side of the doorway, and
ascends straight in the wall, and, on reaching the next angle proceeds
as a well-stair. This is so at Chepstow, where the upper ascent is
probably an addition. At Carlisle and Ludlow the staircase stops at the
first floor, and is continued at another angle. At Brough, where the
outer door is on the first floor, a narrow straight stair rises in the
wall to the second. At Prudhoe, it is continued round two sides, and
at Richmond. The direction of the staircases may be always detected by
the position of the exterior loops, and the general rule seems to be to
limit the approach to the stores and main floor, and from the latter
to give a free access to the ramparts. The curves and angles in those
narrow staircases facilitated the defence of them.
The immense thickness of the walls is usually taken advantage of for
the formation of mural chambers. These are rectangular, and sometimes
placed in an angle, and =∟=-shaped. They are vaulted, usually in a
plain barrel, or equally plain groining, lighted by external loops, and
now and then, though very rarely, have, as at Bowes, a fireplace. In
breadth they vary from 4 feet to 6 feet, and they are of all lengths.
Usually they are more abundant and larger, in the main and upper
floors. They were intended for sleeping-rooms, garderobes, oratories,
and well-chambers. At Guildford is a very remarkable oratory, at
the first-floor level, =∟=-shaped, with a mural arcade. At Brougham
the oratory is on the upper floor. At Rochester and Dover the upper
gallery does not run all round; and in the latter ends in a prison
cell. Some keeps, even with thick walls, contain but few chambers. The
two remaining sides of Norham, a late keep, have none, or, at most,
one. Dover, also late, is honeycombed with chambers at every level,
and even the cross-wall above is threaded by a gallery, a singular
example. Newcastle, built in 1080, has very many chambers. Where
there are garderobes they have stone seats, and the vent is usually a
vertical shaft in the wall, though sometimes there is a shoot upon the
exterior surface of it, or, though more rarely, it is corbelled out.
At Kenilworth, a fine but late keep, one angle contained a well-stair,
and the three others chambers. They are turrets from the ground, and in
size larger than usual. They are floored with timber. One angle turret
seems to have been wholly occupied by garderobes, and the lower part,
at present filled with light soil, was evidently a large cesspool.
At Corfe a very large garderobe tower,—perhaps a Norman addition,—is
appended to one side of the keep.
Most keeps, even early ones, contain fireplaces. One has been
discovered in the Tower, long supposed to be without them. At Dover
they are in the cross-wall; at Rochester, where they are very handsome,
in the sides. Usually the funnel ascends in the wall; at Rochester and
Colchester it forks, and the two flues open a little way up on the
face of the wall, concealed in the hollow angle of a pilaster. It is
not easy to tell whether a flue is original when the fittings of the
fireplace have been inserted; thus, in the Tower closets, where the
fireplaces are Tudor, there are no marks in the wall as though it had
been cut into to construct a flue, so these may represent original
fireplaces, though this is not probable. No doubt open hearths were
much used, and fireplaces of iron with flues of wood and plaster, which
would leave no trace when removed. The fireplaces in the mural chambers
at Dover seem all to be of Tudor date. No fireplace has been discovered
in Richmond keep; there is an original one in a mural chamber at Bowes.
These keeps, built mainly for security, have but few external openings,
and those rarely of any size. Sometimes the narrowest part of the loop
is in the centre of the wall, with a splay each way, having the section
of an hour-glass. This is seen at Kenilworth and Porchester, late
keeps. The arrangement seems a bad one, much aiding the entrance of an
arrow. The larger windows, sometimes of 3 ft. or 4 ft. opening, were
closed with shutters.
A well was an important accessory to a Norman keep. In Dover there are
two—one being in the forebuilding. Sometimes, as at Bamburgh and Castle
Rising, its mouth is at the ground level. More frequently its pipe is
contained within the wall, and opens into a special well-chamber, as
at Dover, Newcastle, and Kenilworth. At Carlisle it is in the wall,
and was reached by an internal lateral opening, now converted into an
external one. At Rochester it is in the cross-wall; the pipe there
ascends to the summit, and has an opening at each floor, and there are
traces of some such arrangement at Canterbury. At Porchester the well
occupies one angle of the wall, and opens on each floor. At Colchester
the well, long closed, has been discovered. It is in the basement,
near the entrance. At Hedingham there is known to be a well, but its
place is lost. At Bamburgh, one of the most remarkable wells in the
country, carried down 145 ft. in whin rock, was only discovered in the
last century. At Richmond a hollow octagonal pier, carrying the vault,
has been built exactly over the well, which is reached through it. At
Arques, in Normandy, where the well is near one angle, a pipe has been
built over it, raising the mouth to the first floor. At Bowes, Brough,
Brougham, Guildford, Castleton, and Corfe, no well has been discovered,
and it is only very recently that one has been laid open in the White
Tower, in London.
Great pains were usually taken to cover the entrances of these keeps
by a forebuilding, the details of which have been but little studied.
Upon one side of the keep, but a part of its structure, was placed a
smaller tower, also rectangular, of the length—that is, covering one
side—and about one third of the breadth, of the keep, and two thirds
of its height. At one end, at the ground level, commenced a straight
staircase which rose to near the other end when it stopped at a landing
which was the vestibule of the actual entrance to the keep. Above the
lowest part of the staircase was a low tower and a strong doorway.
Halfway up the staircase was often a second doorway, and sometimes,
as at Dover, a second tower. Over the landing at the stair-head was
a larger and taller tower, also with a strong doorway. Outside
this doorway the staircase was often broken by a drawbridge, as at
Rochester. The staircase was not always covered over, but was protected
by an exterior parapet of some height, as at Berkeley, where the shell
keep has a forebuilding, a very unusual example. The battlements of the
lower or entrance tower were reached by a little door in the adjacent
angle of the keep high up. This is seen at Rochester, and at Middleham
and Brougham, where the tower itself is removed. In the keep-wall by
the side of the staircase was often a recess for the guard, as at
Middleham. The bridge-pit had an exterior parapet concealing those who
used the bridge. At Castle Rising where the middle gate is perfect, its
battlements are reached by a small door from the keep.
The vestibule at the stair-head was usually a good-sized chamber, often
vaulted. In it was the main doorway of the keep, of not less than 6
feet opening, with flanking shafts and moulded architrave. At Castle
Rising this ante-chamber is arcaded, and very handsome; at Rochester
it is plain, or nearly so. At Dover it contains a guard-chamber, at
Newcastle and at Middleham a chapel. The basement below the vestibule
was usually a prison, and had a small door into the corresponding
basement of the keep. At Rochester are two floors below the vestibule
and two above it. The forebuilding is perfect only at Castle Rising,
Norwich, Dover, and Newcastle; there are large remains of it at
Rochester, Porchester, and Middleham, and some at Hedingham, Corfe,
and Kenilworth. At Scarborough, Brougham, Bramber, Canterbury, and
Helmsley there are traces only. At Dover there are vaults below the
staircase and lower tower, above which is a vestibule and a chapel,
and in the first or upper floor a second chapel. Sometimes there is
a way from the foot of the staircase of the forebuilding into the
basement of the keep, but probably this is not original. It is seen at
Dover, Newcastle, and Castle Rising. The White Tower has been so pulled
about that it is difficult to say how it was originally entered. The
forebuilding is essentially a Norman appendage, and, with the exception
of Berkeley, and, perhaps, Chilham and Orford, confined to keeps of
the rectangular pattern. It has been supposed to mark a late keep, but
there is a forebuilding at Arques usually regarded as a very early one.
In the smaller keeps, and some few of the larger ones, there is no
forebuilding, and the entrance is by a plain arch, as at Clitheroe,
Goderich, Bowes, Guildford, and Malling. This entrance was on the
first floor. In the latter case it is, indeed, in the basement,
but nevertheless 10 feet above the ground level. The approach in
these cases seems to have been by an external staircase of timber.
At Chepstow, Carlisle, Bamburgh, and Ludlow, the entrance was by a
single doorway at the ground level. In almost all the larger keeps it
has been found convenient—probably when they ceased to be used solely
as military buildings—to have a large direct entrance at the ground
level. Such have been made at London, Rochester, Norham, Kenilworth,
Porchester, Guildford, Clitheroe, Hedingham, Colchester, Goderich,
Canterbury, Brough, and Malling, and probably Chepstow. Some of these
are evidently insertions, taking the place of a loop; others seem to
have been original doors opening from the basement of the keep into
that of the forebuilding, made external on its destruction, as at Corfe
and, perhaps, Kenilworth. At Richmond the removal of the forebuilding
has laid open a large Norman arch in the basement which opened into
it. Besides these main doors, Ludlow has two doors opening from the
keep upon the ramparts of the curtain; and at Rochester is a small
door whence probably a plank drawbridge, six feet or eight feet long,
dropped upon the adjacent curtain. There is something like this at
Helmsley, and in the Norman keep of Adare, in Ireland.
Most keeps contain an oratory; some a regular chapel. Dover is peculiar
in having two, both in the forebuilding, in its lower tower. Newcastle
has one in its forebuilding, under the staircase and upper tower.
Middleham has the remains of a very handsome one at the head of the
outer staircase. At Rochester the chapel seems to have been in the
forebuilding, high up, beneath the kitchen. At Castle Rising it is on
the first floor of the keep, at one end of one of the large rooms. At
Guildford and Brougham it was in the wall. The finest and earliest
castle-chapel in England is that in the White Tower. It is large, has a
nave, aisles, and semi-circular apse, all vaulted. This chapel occupies
two stories, and below it are two floors of vaulted crypts, intended
for prisons. The chapel at Colchester, though smaller and ruder,
resembles in position that in the White Tower.
Of the three drawings here given, the first gives the plan of the White
Tower, London, at the second or chapel floor. The three well staircases
are there seen, and the outer and cross walls. Here also is shown, in
the south wall, the small mural staircase which ends at this level, and
affords the only communication with the main floor of the chapel.
[Illustration]
The next drawing shows a plan of the third or uppermost floor, at the
level of the clerestory of the chapel. Here the outer wall is shown
perforated all round by a mural gallery, which communicates with the
three well staircases and with the chapel.
Finally follows a vertical section of the whole keep from east to west,
in which is shown the chapel with its clerestory above and its two
tiers of crypts below. These drawings, which more especially belong
to the detailed description of the Tower of London which follows in
its place, are here inserted as illustrating what is written of Norman
rectangular keeps in general.
[Illustration]
The kitchen, though a necessary appendage to a keep, is not often to
be discovered. Probably the cooking was of a simple character, mostly
carried on before an open fire, or by boiling, or broiling over a
brazier. There is a kitchen in the forebuilding at Rochester, high up;
and one at the first-floor level in a mural chamber, at Castle Rising
and at Norwich. The kitchen when it was in a distinct chamber was at
the level of the hall, or even above it.
The defences of the outer doorway in a Norman keep were usually one or
two stout doors of oak, strengthened with iron, and held close by one
or two bars, also of oak, which ran back into deep holes in the wall
about four inches square. The herse or portcullis, though used in other
parts of castles, was rare in the keep. It is a very old method of
defence, formed of stone in the Great Pyramid, and the groove for which
remains in the city gate of Pompeii. When employed, as in the keeps of
Scarborough, Hedingham, and Rochester, it was a single grate, probably
of oak spiked and plated with iron, and it was worked from a mural
chamber over the archway. Sometimes, from the narrow dimensions of the
groove, the grate seems to have been wholly of iron. It was worked by
chains or cords wrapped round a cylinder or windlass, such as is still
in use in the main gate-house of the Tower. Norman keeps very seldom
retain their original parapets or turrets. The parapet was about two
feet thick and five feet high. It was either plain or had broad merlons
and narrow embrasures. Usually it was a mere continuation of the wall,
without corbels or any contrivance to widen the rampart walls, which
were of sufficient thickness for the walk. At Rochester, holes are seen
at the base of the parapet for beams to carry a _brétasche_ or external
gallery, but these probably are not original. The angle turrets are
usually mere places of arms, the rampart walks passing through them.
Sometimes they have an upper floor reached by a stone stair or a
movable ladder.
Much has been said of Norman dungeons, oubliettes, and subterranean
vaults, damp and wretched, appliances of Norman tyranny. So far as
these keeps are concerned in the matter, they never contain underground
chambers of any kind. The basement floor is usually at the ground
level, or at most two feet or three feet below it. Where the keep
is built on rising ground it may happen that a chamber, the door of
which is at the ground level, may have one wall half buried beneath
the soil, but there is nothing beyond this. Prisoners of the common
sort were not shut up in the keep, space there was too valuable. The
basement could scarce have been used as a prison where it contained
the castle well, and the mural chambers usually are barred inside. The
rooms under the vestibule, and some of the lower vaults at Dover, and
the crypts of the Tower of London, and at Colchester, probably were
used as prisons. In the upper gallery at Dover there is a very evident
prison. At Carlisle, where the basement has recently been used as a
prison, it probably was not one originally. Large as some of the keeps
were, they were not calculated to be held against a long siege or a
blockade, and all the spare room would then be needed for provisions
and stores. The earlier keeps are very plain. The Tower has not even
a moulding save in the chapel, and an exterior blocking over its main
tier of windows. No doubt it has been much mutilated, but, had the
ornaments been cut off, the courses of freestone that carried them
would still be distinguishable from the ordinary rubble masonry. Some
of the later keeps exhibit rather rich details, though usually marked
by much simplicity, about the doors, windows, and fireplaces. Such is
the case at Rochester, Hedingham, Dover and Newcastle, and specially
at Castle Rising, one of the most highly ornamented of keeps. Bamburgh
has a fine doorway early in the twelfth century; Ludlow and Guildford
some arcades; Porchester some good windows. The exterior of Norwich is,
or rather was, rudely panelled in tiers of arches. Goderich, otherwise
very plain, has an exterior string of hatched or chevron work. In these
keeps the arches are usually full-centred, but sometimes segmental, and
where flat there is commonly above the lintel a relieving arch with
a recessed tympanum, as at Chepstow. At Malling, though there are no
mouldings, the first-floor window on one side is the centre of five
deep plain full-centred niches in the exterior face, which cannot have
been meant for use, and in another face, also outside, are five other
niches, all unpierced. Occasionally false arches are turned in the
walls, as though a door had been closed up, or the possibility of a new
opening provided for. Such are seen at Dover, Norwich, and Guildford.
They are thought, but scarcely on good grounds, to be intended to
invite an attack where the wall is specially thick.
One or two keeps have buttresses of bold projection, greatly in
contrast to the usual flat pilaster. This is so at Colchester and at
Arques, where the exterior stair passes through one of them. At Arques
also these buttresses are turned to account in the upper story, arches
being thrown across from buttress to buttress, upon which are built
chambers, and on one face a chapel, through the floor of which missiles
could be dropped upon the assailants below. Arques, unfortunately, is
built of chalk and flint with little or no original ashlar, and it is,
in consequence, difficult to decide between what is original and what
has been added.
Norman keeps differ in workmanship as in material. The White Tower,
built in great haste, is of rubble, rudely coursed, with very open
joints; but the plinth, quoins, and pilasters seem to have been of
Kentish rag, dressed as ashlar, and also open jointed. Malling is an
excellent example of very early Norman rubble, with open joints, and
this may also be said of a part of the adjacent abbey church, and
perhaps of the tower of the parish church. Guildford contains a good
deal of herring-bone work; Chepstow and Penllyne a little. Colchester
is partly built of old Roman materials, chiefly brick, and contains
some herring-bone work. In the chalk districts flint was largely used,
as at Bramber, Dover, Hastings, Canterbury, Thurnham, Berkhamsted,
Bungay, and Walden. In the south, or near the sea, the ashlar is often
in small blocks from Caen. Corfe is of excellent local ashlar, as is
most of Kenilworth. Porchester is of chalk and flint rubble, faced
with ashlar outside and partially inside. Hedingham is all ashlar,
and altogether the finest keep in England. Bowes is a fine example of
ashlar, in a local stone. Whatever Norman masonry may be in church
towers, in keeps it is always sound, though often rough, and is very
durable. Now and then chain courses of timber are inserted in the heart
of the walls, to hold the work together till the mortar shall have set,
and it has happened that the wall has been breached and the exposed
timbers have been found to have rotted away, leaving cavities, as at
Rochester, concerning the use of which much nonsense has been written.
In considering the limited and very inconvenient accommodation afforded
by a Norman keep, it should be remembered that it was not meant for
a residence, save during an actual siege, and that at such times it
often only received the baron’s armed tenants, and not his mercenaries.
Indeed, the builders of some of these keeps seem to have mistrusted
their own troops as much as they feared those of the enemy. The
staircases and galleries are often contrived quite as much to check
free communication between the several parts of the building as between
its inside and its outside. Further, the excessive jealousy in guarding
the entrance, the multiplied doors, the steep and winding staircases,
the sharp turns in the passages, although they helped to keep out an
enemy, or, if he got in, placed him at a disadvantage, also rendered
impracticable the rapid re-entry of the garrison, so that if the court
or outer ward were taken by assault, the defenders had scant time
to retire into the keep, which was thus liable to a _coup de main_.
Otherwise, with a sufficient and faithful garrison, and ample provision
and military stores, a Norman rectangular keep was almost impregnable,
so great was its passive strength. Its windows were too small or too
high for their shutters to be reached by fire-balls, and its walls
were too thick to be breached or mined, if properly defended from the
summit. This, indeed, was the true method of defence. An ordinary loop
in a thick wall, however widely splayed, admitted of but little scope
for an archer, or space to draw his bow. The lower loops were entirely
for air, not for defence. Higher up, with larger windows, a bow could
be used with advantage, but there were no flanking defences, for the
angles had no considerable projection, and the shoulders, or lateral
faces of the pilasters, were not pierced. With military engines for
throwing heavy stones and masses of rock from the roof much might
have been effected, but in the early keeps this was not contemplated,
and probably not to any great extent in the later ones. An arrow shot
from a battlement 50 feet or 70 feet high would lose some of its force
in the descent. Of the siege of Rochester certain particulars are on
record, and the account of the operations of the besiegers is confirmed
by the evidence afforded by the existing keep. Rochester keep stands
but 10 feet or 12 feet from the south-east angle of the outer wall, the
angle of the keep corresponding with that of the wall. The angle of
the wall and part of the adjacent curtain have evidently been removed
and rebuilt, with the capping tower, in a later style. Opposite and
behind this newer work, the lower part of the angle of the keep has
also, at some remote time, fallen away, and with it a few yards of the
adjacent sides. These parts have been rebuilt in a rude and slovenly
manner, and the junction of the old and new work is very evident. This
keep was built about 1130, and besieged by King John for three months
in 1215. Military engines produced little effect upon it, but a mine
was opened which, says Wendover, first brought down the walls and
then a part of the tower. This is what we now see. The keep seems to
have been repaired in haste at once, the outer wall probably not till
1225, when Henry III. spent considerable sums upon the castle, and the
capping-tower of the curtain is of that date. The attack by sap was
the only one to be employed against a rectangular keep, and was rarely
practicable. Where, as was often the case, the keep stood upon a rock,
the running a mine below it would produce no effect. Where this was not
the case, the foundations of the wall were so broad and so solidified
as to stand even when much of the soil beneath them was removed. At
the White Tower, for example, when it was found convenient to bring a
railway from the river quay into the base of the keep for the shipment
of stores, about 20 feet of solid masonry had to be cut through, and
much earth removed, and this, with every aid, was found to be a very
tedious and expensive operation. The defence of such a keep was its
passive strength alone. The loops were nothing in its defence; the roof
being on a slope and of shingle would support no military engine and
no great store of stones or heavy missiles. The narrow doorway did not
allow of a sally in force, and when seriously attacked the garrison had
no resource but to trust to the thickness of their walls, their ample
supply of water, their magazines of provisions, and thus patiently to
await relief.
Such are the details of the rectangular Norman keeps, of which we have
in England about fifty extant or well-recorded examples, dating from
the year 1078, when the White Tower was begun, to about the year 1180,
to which may be attributed the keep of Helmsley.
LIST (APPROXIMATIVE) OF RECTANGULAR KEEPS IN ENGLAND.
_Cheshire._—Chester.
_Cornwall._—Carnbrè (?).
_Cumberland._—Carlisle.
_Derbyshire._—Castleton.
_Devon._—Okehampton (?).
_Dorset._—Corfe, Sherborne.
_Durham._—Norham.
_Essex._—Colchester, Hedingham, Walden.
_Gloucestershire._—Bristol (destroyed).
_Hants._—Christchurch, Porchester, Wolvesey.
_Hereford._—Goderich.
_Kent._—Canterbury, Dover, Malling, Rochester, Thurnham.
_Lancashire._—Clitheroe, Lancaster.
_Middlesex._—The Tower.
_Monmouth._—Chepstow.
_Norfolk._—Bungay, Castle Rising, Mileham, Norwich.
_Northumberland._—Bamburgh, Mitford, Newcastle, Prudhoe.
_Nottingham._—Nottingham (destroyed).
_Salop._—Bridgnorth, Clun, Ludlow, Wattlesborough.
_Somerset._—Taunton.
_Surrey._—Guildford.
_Sussex._—Bramber.
_Wales._—Ogmore, Penllyne.
_Warwickshire._—Kenilworth.
_Westmoreland._—Appleby, Brough, Brougham.
_Yorkshire._—Bowes, Helmsley, Middleham, Normanby (?), Richmond,
Scarborough.