222 Observations on English Castles. 



The castles erected by the Conqueror appear to have been built for the 

 most part after one model, A square or oblong keep, two or sonnetimes 

 three squares in height, strengthened along the sides and at the angles by 

 pilaster strips of very slight projection, and usually dying into the wall 

 below its summit. The entrance to such keeps is on the first story, that 

 Hoor only being vaulted. Where these keeps are large, as at Rochester 

 and Portchester, they are divided into two unequal parts by a wall ; and 

 tlie exterior walls are perforated by triforial galleries, accessible by a well 

 staircase at one of tlie angles. The pipe of the well is also often carried 

 down in the thickness of the wall. The windows are small, excepting at 

 the summit, or towards the court j the fire-places large, and provided with 

 regular flues. These structures, the details of some of which are highly 

 ornamental, continued to be erected for about a century after the conquest; 

 and, from their great strength and solidity, continued to give the distin- 

 guishing feature to the works, through all subsequent alterations. 



Besides these keeps, the Norman castles were defended by outer walls, 

 of the circle of whicli they sometimes form a part ; but such walls, and 

 other subordinate defences, have in most cases been destroyed or materially 

 altered. 



The early keeps were not all quadrangular : some, as Cardiff and Oxford, 

 were polygonal j and others, as Launceston and Coningsborough, circular 

 or nearly so. 



Many of the Norman keeps, and especially of the circular and polygonal 

 ones, are placed upon artificial mounds. It is at present uncertain, whe- 

 ther these mounds were thrown up by the Norman engineer, or only 

 adopted by him where previously existing. Of course, one round hill of 

 earth is pretty much like another; but there remain in various parts of 

 England, as at Silbury, Marlborough, Brinklow, and other places, mounds 

 about the same size and figure with many of those above referred to ; and 

 some of which, as Brinklow, are evidently ante-Roman, from the diversion 

 of the Roman road at the place. 



During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the method of fortification 

 underwent considerable alterations, the general tendency of which was to 

 oeconomise men and material, by a more scientific disposition of the line of 

 wall. More attention also was paid to the marshalling of armies in the 

 field, and rather less to the enabling castles to stand a siege by their purely 

 passive resistance. 



These changes assumed a determinate form under the superintendence 

 of Edward the first, whose powerful mind had been directed to the subject, 

 under the peculiar advantages of a protracted residence in foreign coun- 

 tries. In the Edwardian castles the keep is no longer a lump of masonry, 

 but becomes, as tiie anatomist would say, developed, into an open quadrangle, 

 defended at the angles and sides by towers and gate-houses ; and having 

 the state apartments arranged along one side of the court. The name of 



