The objectives of Castle Defense
One of the main reasons a castle was built was to defend a position and the people inside it. To understand how a castle was designed we must understand what they were defending against.
A castle was usually taken by attackers either breaking through the walls or waiting out the defenders inside who eventually ran out of food. A castle, therefore, had to be designed to defend against both of these possibilities.
The best way to defend against long seige was to have a huge stockpile of food and preferably some allies on the outside who would come and break the seige.
Most of the defenses in a castle were created for the first scenario. First of all, the area around the castle would be cleared of trees and buildings(either when the castle was built or just before the seige). This would give archers a clear shot at the attckers before they could get near the walls. This area might also have traps with stakes hidden in it or pitch (oil) poured over it (which could be ignited).
After this, the attackers would reach the walls. Walls were usually 3-16 feet thick. On top of the walls would be crenelations (stone blocks sticking up) that archers could hide behind when not firing. If the defenders were expecting the seige they would have time to construct hoardings, wooden platforms that hung out over the edge of the walls giving archers more cover and allowing defenders to drop things on attackers below. There might also be arrow loopholes (to fire arrow out of) or pitch slits (to pour boiling oil down) in the walls. If a wall section hadn't already been partially destroyed by a catapult or seige engine then the attackers might try to use ladders or belfrys (giant wooden towers used to scale walls).  
However, the gate was the weakest point of a castle and attackers would often focus here. One of the best ways to take out the gatehouse is by way of battering ram.  The most simple battering ram was a trunk of a large tree with handles in it. The more complex rams were a trunk hanging suspended from a small roof-like cover (which was covered in wet animal skins to prevent it from catching fire) and equipped with wheels. The idea was to swing the trunk against the doors until they broke open. Anybody that saw "Beauty and the Beast" has seen this.
Once the first gates were open attackers would have to charge through a tunnel that ran through the gate house until they reached the second gate. In the roof of the tunnel were holes up into the second floor of the gatehouse. These were called Murder Holes and everything from oil to arrows to rocks could be dropped, shot, or poured through them.
If the attackers broke through the second gate they had now breached the first wall. If there were more walls they had to repeat the whole process over after killing or caputuring all the defenders on the first set of walls (only nobles were taken for ransom when a castle fell, most of the common soldiers were killed). If there was only one wall to the castle they would have to clear the rest of the tower and walls to take it. If the keep was seperate from the main walls then they would still have to take that (the keep was usually a large tower in the middle of the courtyard).
If attackers managed to breach every one of these defenses then the castle was theirs. |
