SIMPLE ARTIFICIAL ENCLOSURES
(_a_) _The Romano-British Period, 54 B.C.-A.D. 410_
The earthworks under consideration are those which, rectangular or
otherwise, were constructed during the historic period commencing with
the Roman subjugation of Great Britain, and ending a few years before
the Norman Conquest. It may be termed the Romano-British-Saxon Period.
It was the incipient era of castellation proper in the British Isles,
distinct from pure earthworks, inasmuch as during the Roman period
massive defences of masonry supplanted the earlier uncemented walls and
wooden palisading.
At the first invasion of Caesar, 55 B.C., we read of no towns being
assaulted, but in the next, 54 B.C., the great _oppidum_ of
Cassivelaunus was taken by storm after the passage of the Thames. This
capital, Verulamium (adjacent to the modern St. Albans), was a large
oval enclosure defended upon three sides by a deep fosse and vallum, in
one place doubled, and upon the other by an impassable marsh. The city
was attacked in two places and captured. In A.D. 43 the final
subjugation of England took place, and the vallum at Verulamium was
crowned by the Romans with a massive wall of masonry, great portions of
which still remain, supplanting the former wooden obstructions.
That which occurred at Verulamium happened also in numerous other
places, Silchester for example, the Romans thus adapting an efficient
earthwork to suit their own requirements. Where, however, pre-existing
works did not occur, the walls, ramparts, and fosses were invariably
constructed round a rectangular area such as may be seen at Chester. The
enclosed streets crossed each other at right angles, and this feature is
a marked one in Verulamium, although, as stated, the defences do not
conform to the rectangular shape. Isolated earthworks constructed during
the Roman Period are always more or less square.
[Illustration: MELANDRA, DERBYSHIRE.]
_Melandra_ is a Roman earthwork in a good state of preservation near
Glossop in Derbyshire. It is almost square, and consists of a simple
vallum and external fosse. There are four openings caused by two main
roads which intersected at the centre of the earthwork. It affords an
example of the prevailing structure of Roman Camps, which are numerous
in those parts of the British Isles which owned the sway of the
conquerors. The many camps, for example, upon the Watling Street all
exhibit the same general plan, based upon the formation of the Roman
legion.
_Richborough Castle_, near Sandwich in Kent, may be cited as a veritable
example of a Roman castle built in Britain, and is almost the only one
remaining at the present day that preserves in any marked degree its
original salient points. It is conjectured to have been erected in the
time of the Emperor Severus, its mission being to protect the southern
mouth of the great waterway which then separated the island of Thanet
from the mainland, a similar office being performed by Reculvers at the
northern entry. Three sides of the rectangle are still protected by the
massive masonry walls which the Romans knew so well how to build; the
fourth, or eastern side, where flowed the river Stour, possesses no
visible defence, as it has been undermined and overthrown by the
river-current. The northern boundary is 440 feet long, and the western
460. The walls, which vary in height from 12 to 30 feet, are about 12
feet thick and batter towards the top; they are beautifully faced with
squared stone in horizontal courses similar to those seen at Segontium,
the Roman station at Carnarvon; the core is composed of boulders from
the neighbouring beach, embedded in mortar with courses of the usual
Roman bonding tiles. In the centre of the area stood a temple and other
buildings; the foundations of some of these are still in evidence.
Whether the external walls were strengthened by the addition of square
or circular towers of masonry, as at Porchester and Silchester, has not
as yet been definitely determined.
[Illustration: SECTION OF THE CITY DEFENCES OF VERULAMIUM (NEAR ST.
ALBANS).]
A common device in Roman castrametation was the berm or platform outside
the surrounding wall, but immediately beneath it; in an attack upon the
fortifications the assailants would be exposed to a plunging fire of
missiles from the ramparts while descending the steep counterscarp of
the ditch, to a raking discharge when ascending the slope of the scarp,
and be entirely devoid of cover when crossing the berm, which was
generally about 20 feet wide. Another advantage of the berm was that it
placed the engines of the besiegers on the remote side of the ditch at
a greater distance from the walls, and thereby lessened the effect of
the missiles discharged from them. To still further modify the results
of the latter upon the wall it was customary to bank up the earth upon
the inner face to form a ramp, and this also lessened the effects of the
rams of the besiegers. These features are shown in the foregoing
diagrammatic section of the walls of Verulamium.
(_b_) _The Saxon Period, c. 410-1066_
Concerning the defensive works erected in the British Isles during the
Saxon Period there is more indefiniteness prevailing at the time of
writing than there is with regard to any period antecedent or consequent
to it. This may be attributed to two causes, the first being the
unsatisfactory use of the word _burh_ in Anglo-Saxon manuscripts, and
the second the effects produced during the past half-century by writers
wrongly attributing the remains of early Norman castellation to the
period preceding it, following upon a misunderstanding of the word above
mentioned. This has had the result of rendering the major portion of
the works produced upon the subject of castellation during the latter
half of the nineteenth century unreliable and obsolete so far as the
Saxon and Roman periods are concerned, while at the same time producing
a marked hesitancy among experts to definitely attribute any work to the
first of the periods without systematic excavation of the site.
In O.E. the word _burh_ in its nominative form signifies a fort or
stronghold and is generally translated as "borough," while in its dative
form _byrig_ it is commonly used to indicate what its modern
representative "bury" conveys. But Anglo-Saxon writers did not use the
two words strictly, and thus hesitancy and confusion have been produced.
It is now being generally accepted that the usual form of burh or
borough was that of a rectangular enclosure surrounded by a rampart and
an external ditch, the area being of any dimensions up to 20 or 30 acres
or more. This arrangement is probably exemplified in the earthworks at
Wallingford.
It is obvious that the inherent weakness in this very elementary system
of defence lies in the inability to adequately man all the ramparts at
once because of their great extent; the defenders probably relied upon
the promptness with which they could meet a threatened attack at any
particular point. The Anglo-Saxons at a very early period recognised the
advisability of forming fortified positions in the island, and carried
out the system so entirely that practically every isolated house, farm,
or group of buildings was enclosed by its rampart and ditch. Even at the
present day we become aware of this fact from the scores of "burys" and
"boroughs" with which the surface of our land abounds. The burh was thus
a comparatively slight affair when compared with earthworks which had
preceded it.
But undoubtedly the great centres of defensive strength lay in those
towns which the Romans had formerly fortified, and the inclusion of
their masonry walls in the borough boundary immensely augmented their
efficiency, as is exemplified at York, Lincoln, and Chester. Around
villages and farmsteads the defences probably consisted of a ditch, a
vallum surmounted by a turf wall, a palisading of thick stakes, or even
a hedge. That the latter was a mode of defence in the earlier part of
the Saxon Period is proved by an insertion in the Old English Chronicle
under the year 547--where Ida of Northumbria is said to have built
_Bebban burh_, _i.e._ Bamborough,--that it was first enclosed with a
hedge, and subsequently with a stone wall. Illuminations in Saxon MSS.
representing fortified towns invariably depict stone walls with
battlements; but, again, it may be that these are Roman, and crenellated
walls are extremely ancient, being represented upon the Nineveh marbles.
In the illustration from the Caedmon MS. given here true battlements are
depicted by the Saxon artist, while a similar attempt has also been made
in Harl. MS. 603--a battlemented parapet being evidently intended.
[Illustration: BATTLEMENTED PARAPET SHOWN IN CAEDMON'S PARAPHRASE; MS.
IN BODLEIAN LIBRARY.]
[Illustration: BATTLEMENTS SHOWN IN HARL. MS. 603. (An Anglo-Saxon MS.
of the Psalms.)]
Ida "wrought a burh" at Taunton (before 721), and Alfred built many
burhs against the Danes. His son, Edward the Elder, and Ethelfleda, the
Lady of the Mercians, were yet more energetic in raising these defences.
To Edward the burh at Witham, now unfortunately in process of
demolition, and also that at Maldon are attributed, while Ethelfleda was
responsible for those at Stafford and Tamworth in 913, and at Warwick in
914. In the absence of rebutting evidence we are undoubtedly justified
in assuming that these burhs were simply replicas of the conjectured
method of fortification pursued by the Saxons; the belief is
strengthened by the remains at Maldon and Witham, where wide rectangular
enclosures are found surrounded by earthen ramparts and external fosses.
A difficulty, however, arises when we consider the two burhs erected at
Nottingham. No rectangular enclosures have been discovered there, and it
seems probable that the word simply signifies that two forts were
erected to protect the bridge which passed over the Trent at this point,
similar perhaps to the mounds of earth at Bakewell and Towcester, which
are supposed to date from the same period.
The genius of the Saxons appears to have been adapted to field warfare
rather than to the construction or maintenance of strong military
stations, for we find that when defeated they took refuge in natural
fastnesses rather than in fortresses; the woods and marshes of Somerset,
for example, protected Alfred from the pursuit by the Danes, and the
last stand of these people against the Normans occurred in the fens and
marshes about Ely. There is no account extant of a protracted resistance
afforded by a Saxon fortress; that of London against the Danes may be
attributed to the massive Roman walls there.
It is unsatisfactory to be compelled to wander thus in the realms of
conjecture, but it is probable that the kinds of defence varied in
different places, since at Worcester Edward surrounded an ancient
borough with a wall of stone. An oblique light, however, is thrown upon
the subject by the presence in England of a few undoubted examples of
fortifications erected at definite dates by another northern race,
_i.e._ the Danes, who might be expected to fortify themselves somewhat
similarly to the Saxons.
[Illustration: THE DANISH BURH AT GANNOCK'S CASTLE, NEAR TEMPSFORD.]
These marauders built burhs at Reading, Quatford on the Severn, and
Benfleet, but by far the best now remaining are those at Willington and
Tempsford on the river Ouse. At Willington the Danes proposed to
establish their winter quarters in 921, and an extensive burh was thrown
up for the purpose. It consisted of a large enclosure with inner and
outer wards, high ramparts, and three wide ditches filled with water
from the river. The most striking features, perhaps, were the two large
harbours within the fortifications, designed to protect the Danish
galleys. The Saxon king Edward, however, carried the place by assault
and burnt the fleet. The discomfited Danes, much lessened in numbers,
retreated up the river, and near the junction of the Ivel with the main
stream threw up a smaller burh which now bears the name of Gannock's
Castle, near Tempsford. The fort is an oblong area enclosed within a
single fosse, and, what is very significant in face of later
developments, a mound of earth stands within it near a corner, where the
only entrance to the fort is found. Probably this mound was protected by
palisades the same as the rampart, but Edward, flushed by his former
success, stormed the burh and captured it with terrible loss to the
routed garrison.
[Illustration: PEVENSEY CASTLE.]
_Pevensey._--Pevensey Castle is associated with the earliest history of
Britain. Upon its site stood the Roman Camp of Anderida, oval in shape,
and obviously adapted to surface configuration. It is the reputed site
of the landing of Caesar. The British occupied it when the Romans left,
and here occurred the great massacre by the South Saxons under Ella in
477. In 1066 William I. landed at Pevensey and erected one of his
portable wooden castles, probably within the Roman Camp. The Castle
came to his half-brother Robert, Earl of Mortaign, who considerably
strengthened the existing remains. The supposition that he erected a
Motte and Bailey castle seems to be negatived by recent investigations.
The Castle was held by Bishop Odo against the forces of Rufus for six
weeks in 1088, but was surrendered, Odo promising to give up Rochester,
which promise he subsequently violated. King Stephen besieged it in
person in the war with the Empress Maud, when it was defended by
Gilbert, Earl of Clare, and only surrendered through famine. It came to
the Crown during the thirteenth century, and John of Gaunt appointed the
Pelham family to be castellans. In 1399, Sir John of that name, an
adherent of Bolingbroke, was absent when the Castle was besieged by the
king's forces, but his wife, the Lady Jane, conducted an historical
defence with such gallantry that the assailants retired. Pevensey
appears to have been used as a State prison, and within it many notable
persons have been incarcerated, including Edward Duke of York, James I.
of Scotland, and Joan of Navarre, second queen of Henry IV.
A large proportion of the Roman wall surrounding the oval site is still
in excellent preservation; it is strengthened by fifteen drum towers of
great solidity. The height ranges between 20 and 30 feet, and upon the
summits may still be perceived some of the strengthening Norman masonry.
The inner castle is a remarkable feature of the enclosure; it is
supposed to have been erected at the end of the thirteenth century, and
one of the towers dates from the time of Edward II. It forms an
irregular pentagon, each angle being strengthened by a massive drum
tower; two semicircular towers flank the entrance, of which one only
remains in good condition. The masonry of the drawbridge is still to be
seen, and the entrance passage with portcullis grooves and meurtrière
openings are in good condition. The great Roman wall has been utilised
to form portions of the eastern and southern sides, but this suffered in
the time of Elizabeth, when a part of it was blown up by gunpowder.