The tower of Conisbrough, like that of Orford, was intended for residential as well as defensive purposes; but light and comfort were sacrificed to military necessities. The entrance, as usual, was upon the first floor, but there is no trace of any fore-building, nor is the original means of approach at all clear. The basement was simply a domed well-chamber and store-room: the only approach to it from the first floor was an opening in the centre of the guard-chamber, over which was probably the windlass by which buckets were lowered into the well.[199] The first floor was a guard-chamber: there were no windows, and the only means of admitting daylight was through the open door on the far side of the passage through the wall. On the right-hand side of this passage, a curved stair mounts through the thickness of the wall to the second floor, which it enters by a landing in the embrasure[200] of a loop on the north side. This floor was the hall of the keep. There is a large fireplace ([168]) in the west wall, with a spreading chimney-breast, and a lintel of joggled stones resting on triple shafts with carved capitals. In the wall between the fireplace and the entrance is a rectangular recess, containing a small sink, which was drained through the wall. There are two windows, the loop close to the entrance, and a double window opening to the south-east. The embrasures are barrel-vaulted: that of the double window has a stone bench on all three sides, and stands three steps above the floor of the hall. This window was not glazed: the upright between the two rectangular openings has at the back a rounded projection, through a hole in which the bolt of the shutters passed, and the fastening was further secured by a wooden draw-bar. On the north-east side of the hall a winding passage with two turns and a flight of steps leads through the thickness of the wall to a garde-robe.
To reach the third floor, the hall had to be crossed to a recess in the direction of the south-west buttress. From this point a curved staircase mounted through the wall to the embrasure of a loop in the south-east face of the third floor. The apartment on this floor contained a smaller fireplace, immediately above that on the second floor, and treated with similar architectural ornament. The flue of the lower chimney runs up through the wall behind that of the other: the common chimney-top projects from the rampart-walk above. There is also upon this floor a trefoil-headed recess with a sink. There are two windows, the loop in the south-east face, and a double opening, similar to that below, looking south. This room corresponded to the “great chamber,” which is found in the larger houses of the middle ages. On its east side the chapel, an irregular hexagon, vaulted in two ribbed bays with a transverse arch between, was constructed in the eastern wall and buttress. The details of its beautiful capitals, like those of the fireplaces, show elementary foliage of the water-leaf type, such as is found in the chapel of the tower at Newcastle ([152]). Chevron is used in the stilted transverse arch and round the outside of the arch of the loop at the east end. The quatrefoil openings north and south of the chancel bay, and the trefoil-headed piscinae in the same walls, are of an advanced transitional character; and, by comparing these details, a date approximating to 1185-90 may with some certainty be given to the tower. In the north wall of the chapel a doorway leads into a small vestry or priest’s chamber, lighted by a loop. The stairway to the rampart-walk mounts through the wall above this chamber, and its head is above the western bay of the chapel. It is entered from a recess in the north-east wall of the second floor, and from this recess there is also a zigzag passage to a garde-robe, the seat of which is corbelled out in the angle between the north-east buttress and the north wall of the tower. The two lower stairways and the two garde-robe chambers are each lighted by a small loop.
In the roomier arrangement of the keep at Orford, the stair is a vice in the turret or buttress to which the fore-building is annexed. The chapel is upon the first floor of the fore-building, and, being on a level of its own, not corresponding to the levels of the tower, is approached from the stair by a separate passage. The entrance to the chapel is a doorway on the left of this passage, which is continued through the south-east wall of the tower to a priest’s room in the south turret.
The defensive side of the arrangements at Conisbrough must now be considered. The tower stands close to the north-east corner of a large bailey, the shape of which follows that of the knoll on which it is built: the north segment of the tower, with the two adjacent buttresses, continues the line of the curtain; but five-sixths of the circumference, with four of the buttresses, are within the enclosure. On the north and east sides the steepness of the hill made access nearly impracticable, and the natural point of attack was from the south and south-west. The position of the keep is at the point furthest removed from attack, and the capture of the inner ward, as will be seen in a later chapter, was rendered very difficult by a well-guarded approach.[201] The tower stood on higher ground than the rest of the ward, and the entrance, on the south-east side, was sheltered by the east curtain. The south and south-west faces were fully exposed to an attack from the inner ward, and it was on this side, therefore, that the defenders needed full command of the sides and base of the tower. Accordingly, when we mount to the rampart-walk, and examine the tops of the buttresses, we find that the two which are upon the north curtain, and were not exposed to attack, contain cisterns. The two on either side of the main entrance were not necessary for flanking purposes, as the entrance itself would be defended by some kind of platform in time of siege. One, therefore, above the chapel, was employed as a house for carrier-pigeons; while the other contained an oven, in which stones and arrows could be heated. The remaining two buttresses are raised platforms which effectively flanked that part of the circumference which was otherwise insufficiently guarded, and lay open to catapults and mining operations. The spreading base of the tower and buttresses served further to keep the battering-ram and bore from direct contact with the main wall of the tower, and improved the flanking position of the defenders; while missiles dropped from the summit upon this talus or sloping surface would rebound upon the enemy with deadly effect.
Above the talus the solidity of the main wall defied the force of catapults. These engines, however, had increased in strength and range, and it was no longer safe to give light to the tower in the somewhat lavish method adopted by the engineers of some of our large keeps. At Conisbrough, as we have seen, the walls of the first floor, save for the entrance passage, are absolutely solid. The loops in the upper floors are very few in number, and the one on the most exposed face is almost concealed by a buttress. The double window on the second floor is immediately over the main entrance, on a side which it would be difficult to command with a large siege-engine. That on the third floor is placed upon an exposed face, but would probably be out of range.[202] The garde-robe vents are on the side where the tower crosses the line of the curtain.
In time of siege the larger windows would be shuttered and barred. The defence would be conducted from the top of the tower, while a body of the garrison would be told off to protect the main entrance. The whole summit would be utilised. The defence was not confined, as in a rectangular keep, to the rampart-walk; but there was a rear-wall to the walk, through which openings probably gave access to a covered round-house above the third floor. To this room, which, to judge from contemporary instances, had a conical roof, arms and missiles could be hauled up, through trap-doors in the floors below, from the guard-room and the store-chamber in the basement. There was no vaulted roof in the tower above the basement, so that the flat roof could not be used as a platform for catapults. There is no indication that hoarding was employed outside the rampart. The tower and its buttresses were finished off with a battlemented parapet in the usual way; the buttresses, as has been shown, were so constructed and so near together that additional wooden defences were practically unnecessary.
Etampes; Donjon. Plan
