CASTLES OF THE EARLY ENGLISH PERIOD.
The transition from the Norman to the Early English style, which in
ecclesiastical architecture constitutes a period of great interest,
is by no means, at least in England, so strongly marked in buildings
of the military type. The rectangular and circular or polygonal
keeps, with their Norman features, retained their hold upon English
castle-builders through the reigns of Stephen and that of Henry II.,
1135-1189, or for a century and a quarter from the Conquest, or even
later. At Dover, the dog-tooth ornament and a bead moulding, combined
with very decidedly Norman features, mark the Transition period, as
do the ornamental details of the rectangular keep of Helmsley, and
the particulars of the shell-keeps of Tamworth and York. The later
keeps are known by the increased depth of the pilasters, which become
buttresses, as at Dover and Clun, and in the twelfth-century keep of
Chambois (Orne); sometimes by their improved and fine-jointed ashlar,
as at Hedingham; by a more frequent use of the stone of the district
instead of that brought from Caen; by the presence of ribs upon the
groins of the hip-vaulting of the galleries and mural chambers; by
the use of nook-shafts at the exterior angles, as at Scarborough and
Castle-Rising; and by the greater tendency to ornament about the rib
bosses, door cases, window recesses, and fireplaces; and by the more or
less Early English character of such ornamentation. The portcullis is
perhaps less rare in the later keeps. There was, however, little change
in the internal arrangement so long as the Norman outline was retained,
and but little tendency, so far as the keep was concerned, towards
flanking defences. Passive strength is still relied upon.
Little is known of the _castra adulterina_, of which so many score
were constructed during the reign of Stephen, and destroyed by his
successor. They could scarcely be of the solidity of the Norman
keeps, else their demolition would have been a more difficult task.
They were probably either of timber, or mere walled enclosures of no
great strength. Few, if any of them, represented the chief seats of
large estates, and being built for the most part on new sites, the
earthworks were inconsiderable, and where the works above ground were
destroyed there was little left to show where was their site. Among
the latest rectangular keeps should be mentioned the tower at Penhow,
Monmouthshire, the cradle of the house of Seymour; and that of Fonmon,
in Glamorgan, still inhabited. They are small, without pilasters, and
with scarcely any Norman features, and belong to the Early English
period, as, judging from its foundation laid open and from some
fragments dug up several years ago, did the castle of Sully, near
Cardiff, and probably that of Dunraven, in the same county, the remains
of which are built into a later house.
By degrees, as the Norman towers and shell-keeps fell out of fashion,
they were succeeded by towers of a cylindrical form, known as Donjons
or Juliets, and this change corresponds to the middle period of the
Early English style in ecclesiastical architecture. Scientifically,
in a military point of view, this was scarcely an advance, for the
defenders of an isolated round tower could not concentrate their fire,
and could only protect the foot of the wall by exposing themselves at
its summit. On the other hand, with equal material, the round tower
was stronger, and more difficult to breach or to bring down by a
mine. Also, it admitted of being vaulted in every story, and was thus
more solid and less exposed than the rectangular keep to being set on
fire, either from within or by balls projected upon its conical roof.
Usually, however, in England, only the basement was vaulted, as at
Brunless. At Pembroke, the great round tower is vaulted at its summit,
as are some of the cylindrical towers in the _enceinte_; but it is
possible that these elevated vaults may be additions. At Coningsborough
the basement alone is vaulted, and the vault is entered by a ladder
from an aperture in the centre of the dome, under which is the well;
the basement, as in Norman and Early English towers generally, being
used as a store-chamber, and seldom, if ever, as a prison. In fact,
in a single tower, whether rectangular or cylindrical, intended by
its passive strength to defy attacks and to wear out the patience of
a blockading force, an ample store of provisions was of the first
consequence, and to their storage all the spare space was necessarily
devoted. In those days, when the keep was the citadel, and not
unfrequently used as such, prisoners were not kept within its walls.
Dungeons there were none, save in a very few exceptional cases, and the
basement or ground-floor was invariably occupied as a magazine.
These donjons were usually entered at the first-floor level, either
by an exterior stone stair or by one of timber; or sometimes, as at
Pembroke, by a drawbridge, which dropped upon a detached pier, whence
an inclined plane or a flight of steps descended to the ground level.
In their elevated entrance, and in some other respects, these donjons
recall the isolated towers erected during the decline of the Roman
Empire, of which a good example, but square, remains at Autun. There
are only two instances in England of the application of a fore-building
to cover the entrance of these towers, but these—Chilham near
Canterbury, and Orford in Suffolk—are late Norman, not Early English.
Dolbadarn, in North Wales, a rather later tower, but cylindrical, has
an exterior stair of stone, which, however, may be an addition.
There were commonly three floors. The basement was for stores. The
central floor contained the principal apartment, usually with a
fireplace, and sometimes with mural chambers, one of which is almost
always a garderobe. The flues of the fireplaces and the shafts of
the garderobes are often vertical, and contained within the wall.
The upper floor was either for the soldiery or for a bedroom for the
lord. The walls are ordinarily 10 feet to 12 feet thick, and there is
often a well stair—as at Skenfrith, in Monmouthshire—from the first
floor, leading to the upper chamber and the battlements. In some of
the ruder towers—as in that by the church of Aghadoe, near Killarney,
the ascent from the first floor is by the narrow steps projecting from
the interior face of the wall into the chamber. In the larger towers,
as at Coucy, there is often a small chamber in the wall, over the main
entrance, for the working of a portcullis. Now and then the staircase
begins at the ground-level, ends at the first floor, and begins again
at the opposite side, as in the rectangular keeps. Thus no one could
leave his post on the battlements without the knowledge of the captain,
who lived in the main chamber.
Where the cylindrical tower formed the donjon or keep, it was commonly
placed within the area, as at Brunless and Skenfrith. At Coningsborough
it stands upon the outer wall; at Pembroke on the wall of the inner
ward; but in neither case is there any communication between the
tower and the rampart of the wall. At Coucy the tower stands on an
inner wall, but is girt about with a low concentric wall covering the
foundations. At Launceston the annular space thus created between the
tower and the girdling wall was roofed over, and there is something
similar round the tower of Penrice in Gower. At Tretower a round tower
has been built within an older rectangular keep, and the space between
roofed over. In these cases the outer wall was about half the height of
the tower. At Lillebonne and Coucy the tower has its proper ditch.
Coningsborough on the Don is the most complete English example of
the Early English or Transition Norman cylindrical keep. Pembroke,
though rather later, and of far inferior workmanship, is also, in its
proportions and dimensions, a very fine building. Launceston, Tretower,
Penrice, Skenfrith, Brunless, and Dolbadarn, are good examples, as
are the Danes’ tower at Waterford, and the small and rude, but very
curious, tower at Aghadoe. At Nenagh also is a very fine tower,
apparently of the Early English type. The round keep of Barnard Castle,
though of nearly similar pattern, is of later date. At Whitchurch, near
Cardiff, are, or recently were, the foundations of a detached round
tower of considerable diameter, the base mouldings of which showed it
to be of Early English date. At Caldecot, a fine old Bohun castle,
admirably described by Mr. Octavius Morgan, is a round tower, probably
Early English, having a ditch of its own. This tower crowns a small
and evidently artificial mound. It is now a mural tower upon the line
of the outer wall, but it seems to have been cased, and the core is
probably, or possibly, the keep of an earlier castle.
Those English towers, though curious, are far inferior to those of the
same period remaining in France, whether keeps, such as Étampes, 1160,
the plan of which is a quatrefoil; or Roche-Guyon, where one-half of
the cylinder is absorbed in a triangular spur; or mural towers, as the
King’s Tower at Rouen, that at Carcassonne, and a specially fine one,
lately restored, at Pierrefonds. The keep at Nuremberg is also a good
example. The tower of the Louvre has long been destroyed, but its base
was recently laid open, and found to contain two shafts—those of a well
and a sewer.
Probably the round towers, or keeps, are the oldest examples of the
form, but very soon afterwards they came into use in England and France
as mural towers, flanking and strengthening the _enceinte_ wall. They
were especially used to cap an angle or to flank a gateway. There is
an example of a round tower capping an angle, of this date, in the
Tower of London, known as Bell Tower. Marten’s Tower at Chepstow is a
good example of a mural tower of the Early English period, having a
fine oratory attached. Its interior is a complete cylinder, but the
exterior, or gorge wall, seen within the court, is flat. At Rochester,
the angle of the ward next the keep has a circular tower, or rather a
buttress tower, as it is not higher than the curtain. In such positions
their passive strength was a great advantage.
In the latter part of the twelfth and the beginning of the thirteenth
centuries, much was done to introduce domestic comfort into castles.
Fireplaces, which in the Norman keeps were but recesses in the wall,
often with a mere lateral orifice for a smoke-vent, as at Colchester
and Rochester, are now adorned with hoods, often of stone, sometimes of
wood and plaster, and the flues are capacious and calculated to carry
off the smoke. The stone hoods are usually of excellent masonry, and,
even when plain, of much elegance of design, resting upon brackets, and
these on clustered columns flanking the hearth. The vent or flue is
often capped by a chimney-shaft and smoke lanthorn, such as may be seen
at Grosmont and St. Briavels castles, or in the remains of the priory
at Abingdon. Where the hood was of wood or plaster, with a shaft of the
same, or where there was an opening or louvre in the roof, all traces
are, of course, gone, and thus is explained the absence of fireplaces
in rooms evidently intended for ladies and persons of rank.
In the Norman keeps boarded floors were a necessity, and very
ill-jointed and cold they no doubt were, but with the vault the floors
were composed of beaten lime and sand. Garderobes continued to be
frequent, both in mural chambers and on the battlements, and the shafts
were usually vertical, and descended within the wall, having an outlet
at the foot of it. The hall chapel, and other buildings, placed usually
in the inner ward, were more ornate than in the Norman period.
In addition to the flanking defence afforded by towers upon the line
of the _enceinte_ wall, there was in general use a contrivance called
a “Brétasche.” This was a gallery of timber running round the walls
outside the battlements, and at their level, supported by struts
resting upon corbels, and covered in with a sloping roof. Sometimes,
in large towers, there were two tiers of these galleries, the upper
projecting beyond the lower, and thus affording a very formidable
defence. As these galleries concealed the top of the wall, this part
was often left in a rude state, and now that the _brétasche_ is gone,
such towers, as at Caerphilly, have a very unfinished appearance. The
_brétasche_ was only put up when a siege was expected, and examples of
it are very rare indeed, although it is evident in numerous instances
that it was formerly in use. There remains a fragment of the actual
_brétasche_ over the Soissons gate of Coucy; and at Ledes, over the
outer gate, is the place of its main beam. The tower of the Palazzo
Vecchio at Florence shows by its lines of corbels that it was intended
to carry a _brétasche_, and a door is seen, as at Norham, in the wall,
which could only have opened upon a timber gallery. Château-Gaillard,
the work of Richard I., has what is not unlike a _brétasche_, executed
in stone.
The best example in England of the kind of tower which succeeded to
the rectangular and shell keep of the Norman period is the keep of
Coningsborough, which, though containing certain Norman ornaments and
details, belongs to the Transition period. It stands on the summit of
a natural hill, and forms a part of an earlier _enceinte_ wall, which
has been clumsily broken to admit it. The tower, about 70 feet high,
is cylindrical, about 50 feet diameter at the base, and 40 feet at the
summit, but the cylinder is supported exteriorly by six buttresses of
great breadth and bold projection. There is a basement domed over with
a central hole above the well. The only entrance is in the first floor,
about 12 feet from the ground. The upper floors and the roof were of
timber. The staircases are in the wall, winding with it. There are two
garderobes, two fireplaces, no portcullis, and in the upper part of one
of the buttresses is an oratory. The roof was a cone, but sprang from
a ring wall, about 3 feet within the battlement wall and the rampart
walk. By this means the tower could be defended without a _brétasche_,
which would not have been the case had the roof rested on the outer
wall. A similar arrangement may be seen at Marten’s Tower at Chepstow,
and at Pembroke.
It is not, however, in England that the best examples of these Early
English or Transition keeps are to be found. In rectangular and shell
keeps England has some fine remains, but in France Philip Augustus
carried the new style of building much further, and even now there
remain keep towers of that time which have defied time and the madness
of the Revolution, and still remain tolerably perfect. The greatest
triumph of the period, in this case early in the thirteenth century,
is the tower of Coucy, probably the finest military tower in Europe.
It is the keep of a castle which is itself the citadel of a town, also
strongly fortified. This wonderful work, a cylinder of fine masonry
about 98 feet in diameter, and rising clear and unbroken to 180 feet,
was the work of Engerrand III., Sieur de Coucy, and the most powerful
Baron of his age. The walls are of great thickness, and the basement
and upper floors, three in number, were vaulted, each in twelve deep
and pointed cells. A fosse, paved and walled, 20 feet broad and 12 feet
deep, the counterscarp of which is raised as the wall of a _chemise_,
surrounds the base, and protects it from the operations of the miner. A
drawbridge, crossing this fosse, leads to the first floor of the tower
by its only entrance, which is protected by a portcullis, an interior
_meurtrière_, and a stout door. From the entrance passage a staircase
ascends in the wall, at first direct, and afterwards as a turnpike,
and supplies each floor, reaching finally the ramparts. The basement
was the store, and above are state and other chambers. The well, of
large size, is in the basement, and each floor has its fireplace and
garderobe. The roof was conical, and rested upon an internal wall,
outside of which was the rampart walk, protected by an unusually lofty
parapet, surmounted by a heavy bold coping, and pierced by twenty-four
doorways, intended to open into the timber _brétasche_, while between
the doorways are twenty-four loops, intended to be used when the
_brétasche_ was not fixed. A curious evidence remains of the manner
in which this tower was scaffolded. A double row of putlog holes are
seen to wind round the tower spirally, in two parallel lines, showing
that as the wall rose it was surrounded by a sloping roadway of timber,
of which the main beams were thrust into the wall, and supported by
struts, the lower ends of which rested upon blocks in the lower holes.
A similar arrangement may be seen in the north-west tower of Harlech
Castle, commencing at the top of the curtain-wall. So strong was
Coucy keep that when, at the command of Mazarin, powder was exploded
in its basement-chamber, and the vaultings throughout, thus lifted,
fell, the cylinder, though cracked, was not thrown down. This noble
example of a thirteenth-century tower has been successfully repaired by
Viollet-le-Duc, who closed the fissure, and made the tower apparently
as sound as ever. The vaulting, however, is gone.
Nor does Coucy, though the chief of the towers of the thirteenth
century, stand alone in its magnificence. Issoudun, known as La
Blanche Tour, is remarkable for the position of its entrance-door,
and for its well-stair contained in the projecting spur; Tournebut,
Cosson, Verneuil, Chinon, Villeneuve-le-Roi, Semur, Alluye,
Bourbon-l’Archambault, and Châteaudun, are a few only of the round
towers or donjons scattered over France, and dating from the latter
half of the twelfth and from the thirteenth century.
There is a peculiarity in these French towers unknown in England.
Where, as at Château-Gaillard, they are exposed on one side to be
battered, they are constructed with a projection forming a right-angled
salient from the cylinder, which thus becomes keel or boat-shaped in
plain. This spur has a fine effect, and being usually solid, adds much
to the strength of the tower. This projection, of which Roche-Guyon is
a fine example, and which ascends the whole height of the tower, is
very different from the spur-buttress, by which a round tower rises
from a square base. This is especially common in Wales, and may be seen
producing a good effect both at Chepstow and Goderich.
Of cylindrical keeps, either of early English or late Norman date, in
England, may be mentioned Brunless, near Brecon; probably Caldecot,
Monmouthshire; Coningsborough, described above; Dolbadarn, in North
Wales; Launceston; Pembroke; Penrice, Glamorganshire; Skenfrith,
Monmouthshire; and Tretower, county Brecon. The round tower at Barnard
Castle, a very fine one, already mentioned, is later.
The reign of Henry III., 1216-1272, was long, and that prince was a
munificent patron of art, and especially of architecture; nevertheless,
and notwithstanding the internal dissensions of the period, the
reign produced (excepting perhaps in South Wales) but few original
castles, and those not remarkable for grandeur. The cause of this was
that the country was already rather over-furnished with castles, so
active had the Norman lords been during a century and a-half, and the
positions of the existing castles being well chosen, and their keeps
of a substantial character, it was found better to add to them, when
space was needed, rather than construct new ones in new positions.
The itinerary of John shows that almost all the great castles of
the country were even then built, and the use to which they were so
frequently put may well have made the successors of that sovereign
anxious rather to destroy than to build. Thus Bedford, a very early
and very strong castle, was held by Fulke de Bréauté against the king
in person, and was only taken by assault after a vigorous siege of
two months, after which it was not only dismantled, but destroyed,
its ditches filled up, and the materials of its walls and towers used
for other constructions. Sometimes, however, where it was desirable,
as in London or at Porchester, or Winchester, or Richmond, to retain
the existing castle, either _enceinte_ walls or more extended outworks
were added, affording more accommodation for troops or for live stock
for the garrison. Palisades gave place to walls, and mural towers and
gatehouses, of large size and great strength, were added. Sometimes, as
at the Tower of London, an outer ward, encircling the older building,
was added; in other cases, as at Corfe, Chepstow, and Barnard Castle,
the new ward was applied on one side, or at one end. In these augmented
castles the keep was still treated as an interior citadel, a last
resource or refuge, and was protected by one or two lines of wall, with
mural towers, usually round or half round, and by gatehouses, composed
of two round towers with the entrance between them, the new area within
being proportioned to the importance of the place.
These composite structures are the earliest to which the term
concentric is properly applicable. Where the keep is central, and the
_enceinte_ double, as at the Tower and Dover, the result is a very
perfect example of the concentric type of castle, though of course
the parts are of different dates. Of Kenilworth, and probably of
Bridgnorth, the original arrangement was concentric, although the
central part is a ward or walled enclosure, not a single isolated
keep tower, which in these is worked into the line of the inner ward
wall. As the outline of most castles was materially affected by the
disposition of the ground, it is obvious that no classification as
regards chronology can be based altogether upon the ground plan. At
Alnwick, for example, the outline of which is probably Norman, and to
some extent governed by the ground, the keep stands between two wards,
and is the connecting part between them, and so at Chepstow and at
Pickering; while at Richmond, also Norman, the arrangement is wholly
different, as it is at Porchester, where Roman walls have been turned
to account.
South Wales contains some castles which appear to have been altogether
built, though possibly on old sites, in the reign of Henry III., as
Cilgerran, Manorbeer, Grosmont, and Whitecastle. These, especially
Whitecastle, are mere enclosures of irregular plan, within a strong
curtain wall, supported by mural towers almost always round, and
entered between two such towers as a gatehouse. The domestic buildings
or lodgings, as the hall, sleeping-rooms, kitchen, offices, and
stables, which in a regular English castle were of masonry, in these
Border structures, such as Whitchurch, were partly of timber, with flat
or moderately-sloping roofs, built against the walls of the area.
In the royal castles, and others the “capita” of estates and seats of
the greater barons, great attention was paid to domestic comfort and
splendour. The records of the reign contain many sheriffs’ accounts
for additions or repairs for domestic buildings within the castles,
for painting the walls in fresco, or filling the windows with stained
glass, all showing a vast growth in taste and luxury. More attention,
indeed, was paid to these matters than to the military defences, for
the pure castles in time of peace were allowed to fall into disrepair,
and scarcely any garrisons were kept up within them. When a rebellion
broke out, and the castles of a district were threatened, the patent
and close rolls are filled with orders to the sheriffs, constables,
and castellans, to supply timber, nails, lead, cordage, barrels of
arrow-heads and cross-bow bolts, calthrops, bow-staves, and now and
then military engines, which were collected from all quarters. All,
however, was done hastily, and any masonry work erected under such
circumstances is generally found to be of inferior quality, and in
marked contrast to the masonry of churches and ecclesiastical buildings
of the same period.
In the reign of Henry also began to be constructed fortified
dwelling-houses, embattled and usually moated, but not regular castles.
The invasion of the prerogative, under Stephen, led to its enforcement
with strictness in the subsequent reigns, but as there were few
new castles, it was chiefly in favour of fortified houses that the
_licentia kernellare_ was applied for and granted. The earliest extant
licence of this character dates from this reign, and about a score
altogether appear to have been issued by Henry. Of these, six only were
applied for by considerable barons, and in only two cases for castles
of consequence, namely, Dudley and Belvoir.