Military Architecture in England During the Middle Ages

by A. Hamilton Thompson

Externally, Porchester castle is simply a fortress: internally, the domestic buildings rivet the attention, and only the imposing mass of the keep ([131]) reminds us of the military origin of the stronghold. Similarly, in the Cornish castle of Restormel, where the one ward is nearly circular in shape, and is surrounded by a deep ditch, the whole interior face of the curtain is covered by a series of domestic buildings, with partition walls radiating from the centre of the plan. The position of the hall, kitchen, and great chamber can easily be traced: the chapel was on the east side of the ward, separated from the hall by the great chamber, and the chancel, with a substructure, formed a rectangular projection from the curtain at this point. Here, too, as at Porchester, Ludlow, or Manorbier, the dwelling-house was masked by the fortress. But there are also castles in which the importance of the dwelling-house, as time went on, began to overshadow its military surroundings. At Tutbury the strong position of the castle, an entrenched stronghold which was probably ditched about for the first time long before the Conquest, the high mound raised by the Norman founder of the castle, and the fine fourteenth-century gatehouse[357] ([237]), approached by an ascent which was commanded by the whole length of the eastern curtain, strike the visitor far less than the remains of the great hall and its adjacent chambers. This beautiful work, often attributed, like so much else in castles of the duchy of Lancaster, to John of Gaunt, is probably of the middle of the fifteenth century: there is a remarkable similarity between the details of the stonework here and at Wingfield, a house the date of which is well known to be somewhat later than 1441. As a whole, the castles which, like Tutbury, became merged in the possessions of the house of Lancaster, and came to the Crown on the accession of Henry IV., furnish us with some of the best examples of castle dwelling-houses on a palatial scale. At Pontefract, for example, a range of buildings, known later as John of Gaunt’s buildings, rose upon the site of the eastern mound. The drawings of Pontefract and of Melbourne in Derbyshire, preserved among the duchy records, show us castles which have utterly changed their aspect, and have become palaces. Nowhere, however, is this more noticeable to-day than at Kenilworth, where the erection of the great hall may be fairly attributed to John of Gaunt.[358] The whole of the north and part of the west side of the inner ward, on the summit of the raised ground on which the castle stands, are covered by a splendid series of late fourteenth-century buildings, chief among them the hall, probably the finest apartment of its date in England, Westminster hall alone excepted ([337]). Later still, just as at Carew, the transformation of the stronghold was completed by the addition, in Henry VIII.’s time, of apartments, which have now disappeared, along the south side of the ward; and, in the reign of Elizabeth, the south-west angle was filled by a tall block of buildings erected by the earl of Leicester.

Kenilworth Castle; Entrance to hall

One may compare the growth of the domestic element at Kenilworth with that of the French château of Blois, where the military aspect of the building was obliterated by degrees. To the great hall in the north-east corner of the castle bailey[359] were added, first, the buildings of Charles of Orléans (1440-65) on the west face.[360] Then came the late Gothic work, on the east, of Louis XII. (1498-1502). In the sixteenth century the hall was joined to Charles of Orléans’ block by the Renaissance pile of building raised under Francis I. and Henry II. The castle by this time had become a palace, and the transformation was completed in the seventeenth century (1635) by the erection of the tall range of Palladian buildings in the north-west angle, which is the most prominent feature in the northern view of the château.[361] A similar work of transformation took place at Amboise under Louis XII. and Francis I. In both these instances, however, the chief changes were made at a period when the Renaissance was exercising a powerful influence on French life and thought. As a rule, French castles of the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries, while increasing in splendour, preserved much of the character of the feudal stronghold. The two splendid halls and the northern range of buildings at Coucy, built by Enguerrand VII., lord of Coucy, in the last quarter of the fourteenth century, were added without detriment to the strength of the fortress; and to this same period belongs the talus covering the spring at the foot of the donjon curtain, a work of purely military character.[362] In the châteaux of Méhun-sur-Yèvre (Cher), built by John, duke of Berry, between 1370 and 1385, and Pierrefonds (Oise), built by Louis, duke of Orléans, between 1390 and 1420, the splendour of the palace was equally balanced by the strength of the fortress.

haddon: upper courtyard and tower

Lamphey Palace

In tracing the development of the castle until it is merged in the manor-house, we must not forget that the fortified dwelling-house was not merely the creation of an age which was ceasing to build castles. Many of the strongholds to which allusion has been made, especially in the north and west of England, were dwelling-houses rather than castles. Acton Burnell, Aydon, Markenfield, Haughton, or those houses which, like Mortham in Yorkshire or Yanwath in Westmorland, have pele-towers attached to them, whether as part of their original equipment or as a later addition, are all fabrics in which military precautions had to be taken, but the everyday needs of the occupants were first considered. A castle is a military post which may include one or more dwelling-houses within its walls: the house which may be turned into a castle, when occasion requires, is on a different footing. Bishops’ palaces, such as Auckland, Cawood, Wells, or Lincoln, are examples of the large manor-house in which fortification was merely a measure of precaution. The splendid houses of the bishops of St David’s are not the least remarkable of the remains of medieval architecture, half-domestic, half-military, which are common in south-west Wales. Bishop Henry Gower (1328-47) developed at Swansea castle, and at his manor-houses of Lamphey and St David’s, a type of architecture which deserves mention on account of its originality. The three houses mentioned are somewhat different from each other. Swansea castle is a large block of building, obviously military in character, and in general appearance not unlike the earlier castle which so nobly commands the town of Haverfordwest. Bishop Gower’s hall at Lamphey is a plain building, the chief architectural feature of which is the great cellar on the ground-floor: this was covered by a pointed barrel-vault, originally strengthened by heavy transverse ribs, most of which have fallen away. The vast palace of St David’s, on the other hand, displays in all its details, and especially in the ogee-headed doorway of the porch of its larger hall, a sumptuousness of decoration which is not often found in the domestic architecture of the time. The great hall on the west side of the courtyard, the smaller hall and private apartments on the south side, the vaulted cellars which occupy the whole of the basement in each range, are planned upon a scale equal to that of a castle of first-rate size. But, although these buildings differ so much in general character, they have a common feature in the parapet, pierced with a row of wide pointed arches, and corbelled out above the top of the walls. Comparatively rough and coarse at Swansea and Lamphey ([341]), this parapet at St David’s is treated with much delicacy, and the jambs of the arches are furnished with slender shafting. Whether there was any thought of its employment in war is a doubtful point; although it might be useful in such a case, it was probably intended in the first instance merely as an ornament. The corbelling is very slight, without machicolation. The whole design of the parapet is a curious feature which deserves special notice. There is another and later hall at Lamphey, west of the earlier building; and adjoining this on the north is the handsome chapel, built by Bishop Vaughan early in the sixteenth century. The gatehouse at Llawhaden, another manor of the bishops of St David’s, appears to be of the fifteenth century, and, with its flanking towers, rounded to the field, has a more distinctly warlike appearance than anything at Lamphey or St David’s.