The castle of the latter half of the thirteenth century, the golden age of English military architecture, was, then, an enclosure within a strong and well-flanked curtain wall. The keep, where the site was new, was dispensed with: where an old plan was altered or enlarged, it took a secondary position. The castles of this age may be divided into three separate classes. First, there are castles without keeps, in which the flanked curtain wall forms the sole line of defence. Secondly, there are old castles, which, by extension of their site, have adopted a concentric plan of defence. And thirdly, there are castles newly planned, in which the defences are formed by two or more concentric curtain walls.
Carnarvon Castle
Conway Castle
I. The grand examples of the first class are the castles of Carnarvon ([253]) and Conway ([254]). Conway was begun in 1285 by the orders of Edward I. Carnarvon, in which more architectural splendour is shown, was begun in 1283, and was not finished until 1316-22.[269] Both castles were built in connection with walled towns, and occupied an angle of the defences; and both stand on a point of land where a river meets the sea, so that two faces of the site were defended by water, while the base was separated from the town by an artificial ditch. Carnarvon, however, is situated on low ground, and commands the town only by the height of its curtain and its formidable towers; while the promontory on which Conway stands is raised high above the greater part of the town and commands the whole ([256]).
The plan of both castles is very similar. The enclosure, in both cases an irregular polygon of an oblong shape, was divided into two wards by a cross-wall,[270] built at a point where the curtain is slightly drawn in on both sides, and the site is consequently narrowed. At Conway the main entrance is in the west or end wall of the lower ward, opposite the cross-wall. The lower ward, thus entered, is a hexagon in shape, flanked by six cylindrical or drum towers, one at each of the angles, and occupies about two-thirds of the enclosure. The remaining third is the upper ward, an irregular rectangle flanked by four drum towers, the two towers to the west being common to both wards. The whole enclosure is thus flanked by eight towers, four at the angles, and two on each of the sides.
The two wards at Carnarvon ([253]) were more nearly equal, the upper ward, placed, as in Conway, at the end next the confluence of the river and the sea, occupying about two-fifths of the site. The main entrance to the lower ward, the King’s gateway, is in the middle of the side wall next the town, and the wall of division between the wards crossed the enclosure from a point close to the right of the inner entrance. The curtain of the lower ward was built in five sections, with a tower at each of the projecting angles between them. With these towers must be reckoned the two splendid gatehouses, the King’s gatehouse at the north-west, and Queen Eleanor’s gatehouse at the east angle of the ward. The curtain of the upper ward was built in four pieces, and this ward, with its cross-wall, forms an irregular pentagon, at the apex of which is the famous Eagle tower, at the point where the town wall joins that of the castle. There are nine towers in all, counting the two gatehouses, and a turret on each of the north-east and south-east sections of the curtain. The towers are polygonal in shape, the straight faces being for the most part very broad, and the angles very obtuse.[271]