Caerphilly Castle; Plan
III. The castles, however, of the last twenty years of the thirteenth century, planned with a system of concentric defences, may be taken, with Carnarvon and Conway, as reaching the highest pitch of military science attained in medieval England. The earliest of these, Caerphilly ([270]), which was begun before the end of the reign of Henry III., was also the most elaborate.[284] The castle proper was placed in the middle of a lake, formed by the damming up of two streams; and in this respect the situation was not unlike that of Kenilworth, which was defended on the south and west by an artificial lake, and was irregularly concentric in the ultimate development of its plan.[285] The sides of the island were enclosed within strong retaining walls, which rose to form the curtain of the outer ward. This curtain was low, and was flanked, not by towers, but by curved projections forming bastions at the angles. Within this outer defence rose the rectangular inner ward, the lofty curtain of which was flanked by drum towers at each angle, and by a very large gatehouse with two drum towers in each of the east and west sides. The outer ward had also a front and back gatehouse, flanked by small drum towers, in its east and west curtains: these were directly commanded by the inner gatehouses, and the entrance was not oblique. The inner ward was spacious and cheerful. In the centre is the well: the great hall ([272]), the excellent stonework of which is sheltered from the weather by a modern roof, was built against the south curtain, and the chapel was at right angles to it at its east end. The kitchen was contained in a projecting tower south of the hall, which blocked the outer ward at this point: beneath the kitchen was a postern communicating directly with the lake. The place of the rampart-walk in the curtain next the hall was supplied by a gallery running in its thickness, and looped to the field. At the east end of the hall were apartments, through which the rooms in the first floor of the east gatehouse could be reached.
Caerphilly Castle
This plan, in which the military and domestic elements were so well combined, is interesting upon its own account. But more interesting still were the outer defences by which the castle was surrounded. The whole east face of the castle on the outer edge of the lake was guarded by an outer wall, which had in the centre, nearly opposite the inner gateways, a large gatehouse, and was returned at the ends into clusters of towers, the larger of which, on the south, covered a postern. A wet ditch divided this outer line of defence from the village of Caerphilly, and in its centre was a pier on which the two sections of the drawbridge met. North of the gatehouse, the outer curtain was defended simply by the rampart-walk: on the south side, however, there was a narrow terrace left in the rear of the curtain, by which access was obtained to the castle mill and other offices. These two portions of the curtain were separated from each other by the gatehouse and a dividing wall, which, in case of the capture of one part of the curtain by besiegers, gave the defenders a distinct advantage. The inner lake was crossed from the platform in front of the main gatehouse by a drawbridge, which probably was worked by a counterpoise from the island side.
Caerphilly Castle; Hall
Harlech Castle