Entre le mostier et sa mote.”
“Mostier” being the church. Also in “La Bataille des Sept Arts”:—
“Qui fu fier cum chastel sur mote.”
Also the Consuetudines Trecensis speak of “Le principal chastel ou maison-fort, mote, ou place de maison seigneuriale”: and in Colletus, “Il y a des masures qui ont des droits très considérables; nous avons des simple poypes [ce sont des terres élevées et fossoyées] qui ont les plus beaux droits.” The History of Dauphigny has, in 1290, “Item castrum seu Poypiam de Montlyopart; item castrum seu fortalicium de Pusigniano.” Ducange is copious on this subject.
The use of the mound as the site of the “maison seigneuriale” was general in England, and several such—as Barwick-in-Elmet and Laughton-en-le-Morthen—are still pointed out as the seats of early English nobles and kings; and of others thrown up primarily for defence, as Tamworth and Leicester, and afterwards occupied as royal and other residences, the date is on record.
After the Conquest, the English term “burh” seems to have given place to the Latin “mota,” at least in public records. It is true that in a charter by the Conqueror, given by Rymer, occurs “Et in burgis, et muro-vallatis, et in castellis,” but “burgis” may be held to mean borough towns. In the charter of Matilda, 1141, bestowing the earldom of Hereford on Milo de Gloucester, she grants “Motam Hereford et cum toto castello,” words which evidently refer to the mound, now destroyed, and not, as has been supposed, to the right to hold a moot there. Also, in the convention between Stephen and Henry of Anjou the distinction is drawn between “Turris Londinensis et ‘Mota de Windesora,’” London having a square keep or tower, and Windsor a shell keep upon a mound. Probably when, as at Durham, keeps of masonry superseded the “ligna tabulata firmissime compacta,” the fortress ceased to be called a mote, and became a castle; but in very many instances this change was a long time in coming about, and in many of the less important and private residences it never occurred at all. Thus, the moated mounds on the Upper Severn show no trace whatever of masonry, and as late as the reign of Henry III., 159 years after the Conquest, and years too of incessant battling with a warlike and sleepless foe, timber was still the material of their defences. The Close Roll of 9 Henry III., 30 May, 1225, thus addresses the Custos of Montgomery:—
“Rex etc. dilecto et fideli suo Godescallo de Maghelins salutem. Precipimus tibi quod ex parte nostra firmiter precipias omnibus illis qui motas habent in valle de Muntgumery quod sine dilatione motas suas bonis bretaschiis firmari faciant ad securitatem et defensionem suam et parcium illarum.”[1] And not only in the defences of these lesser motes and fortified private houses did timber play an important part. Turrets of timber were prepared for the castle of Montgomery, and even Shrewsbury itself, the seat successively of three most powerful earls and the chief place in their earldom, was by no means wholly a work in masonry. In the reign of Edward I. the jurors appointed to report upon the condition of the castle, state: “Quod unus magnus turris ligneus qui edificatur in castro Salop corruit in terram tempore domini Uriani de St. Petro tunc vice comitis et meremium ejusdem turris tempore suo et temporibus aliorum vice comitum preterea existencium ita consummatur et destruitur quod nichil de illo remansit in magnum dampnum domini Regis et deterioracionem ejusdem castri.” In a French charter of 1329 occurs, “Premierement le motte et les fossez d’entour le motte de Maiex,” and in 1331, “Le motte de mon Manoir de Caieux et les fossez entour.” It appears, then, that from an early period, certainly from the ninth century, it was a common practice in constructing a strong place, whether a private dwelling or a military post, to place it upon the summit of a mound, and to surround both the mound and an appended enclosure with defences of earth, and that in many, probably for some time in all, cases the building within and the defences around such places were of timber, and indeed, so far as they stood on made ground, necessarily so. Sometimes probably, when the front was more extended, as when a small pasture ground attached to the main fortress was to be protected from sudden assaults, recourse was had to a “haia” or “clausura.”
In viewing one of these moated mounds we have only to imagine a central timber house on the top of the mound, built of half trunks of trees set upright between two waling pieces at the top and bottom, like the old church at Greensted, with a close paling around it along the edge of the table top, perhaps a second line at its base, and a third along the outer edge of the ditch, and others not so strong upon the edges of the outer courts, with bridges of planks across the ditches, and huts of “wattle and dab” or of timber within the enclosures, and we shall have a very fair idea of a fortified dwelling of a thane or franklin in England, or of the corresponding classes in Normandy from the eighth or ninth centuries down to the date of the Norman Conquest.
The existence of these mounds in distinct Welsh territory is very curious and requires explanation. That this form of dwelling was in common use among the Welsh is certainly not the case. Where moated mounds occur in Wales it is usually on the border, or near the sea-coast, or in or near the open valleys accessible to the English, which the English or Northmen are known to have invaded in the eighth and ninth centuries. The mound near Llanidloes is an exception, being distinctly within the hills. But that of Tafolwern, from which the Welsh princes dated several charters, is near the open valley. That of Talybont, whence Llewelyn dated a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1275, and which was afterwards visited by Edward the First, is on a plain within easy reach of the sea. Hên Domen and Rhos Diarbed on the Upper Severn are also good examples. Still, as the Welsh princes intermarried and had frequent communication with the English, they must have been familiar with a form of fortification very simple and easy to construct, and yet very capable of being held against a sudden attack. It must be observed, also, that the English hold upon the Welsh border was of a very fluctuating description, and the Welshmen must not only have been perfectly familiar with the English method of construction, but from time to time have been actually in possession of their strongholds. That the Welsh used timber for defensive purposes appears from their law by which the vassals were to attend at the lord’s castle for its repairs or for rebuilding, each with his axe in his hand. In some cases in these Border works there is scarcely any mound, at others the mound is low and hollow in the centre. Caer Aeron and another small earthwork near Builth seem to have been the earthen bases of a mere circular wigwam. Caer Aeron cannot have been a mere temporary structure, as the circumscribing ditch has been cut with considerable labour in the rock.
It is very evident, both from the existence of Offa’s dyke, and from the immense number of these moated mounds thrown up along its course, that the English had early and long possession of large tracts of the border territory. Offa ruled over Mercia from a.d. 757 to 796, and his dyke extends from the mouth of the Wye to that of the Dee. At its northern part, for about forty miles, is a second work, known as Wat’s Dyke, a little in its rear, and thought to be a somewhat earlier work, also by Offa. Before the actual line of a work so galling to the spirit of a turbulent people could have been decided upon there must have been many years of contest along the border, and the English must have had something like permanent possession of the land on either side, and have held estates of which the mounds still existing were the “capita” or chief seats. The dyke, it should be remembered, was rather a civil boundary than a military defence.