Bôves underwent a siege from Philip Augustus of which an interesting account was drawn up by Guillaume le Breton. The following is extracted from it:—
“The first barriers being won, the besiegers constructed with osiers, hides and stout planks, a cat, under cover of which picked men filled in the ditch. This done, the knights, under cover of their large shields held against the wall, covered the miners, who, with bars and picks, broke into the wall, propping it up with rough trunks of trees, and then removing the masonry above the level of the foundations. When enough was thus undermined, they set the props on fire and retired. When the props were burnt the wall fell in the midst of a dense cloud of dust and smoke. The besieged then gave way, a body of youth, sheathed in armour, ascended amidst the dust and ruin, massacred some and captured others, while the remainder, retreating, fled into the keep, which, built upon a scarped rock and protected by a double wall, offered a sure asylum.
“Then a machine, contrived for various purposes, was brought to bear upon the keep; sometimes as a mangonel, such as are used by the Turks, it sent a shower of small stones into the air, sometimes a single stone of vast weight was projected with a velocity exceeding that from a sling. Fissures began to appear in the walls, shaken by the repeated blows,” &c.
The history of Bôves is probably that of Amiens. It is supposed to have been thrown up in the ninth century, for defence against the aggressive Northmen, and the character of the earthwork favours this view. Some of the Sieurs de Coucy were lords also of Bôves; and Henry IV., whose wars brought him to Amiens, is said to have occasionally visited Bôves with Gabrielle d’Estrées. The lordship was, during that reign, the property of Philippe de Mornay, son of that Du Plessis Mornay whose name is so intimately associated with the career of Henry. The earthworks are seen to great advantage from the Bôves Station of the Amiens Railway.
BOWES CASTLE, YORKSHIRE.
THE stronghold known as Bowes Castle consists at this time of a single rectangular tower, unconnected with any other buildings, and bearing no trace whatever of ever having been so connected. This is very remarkable, inasmuch as the tower is in every respect both of plan and detail, a Norman keep, and Norman keeps usually, it may be said invariably, are, as the name imports, connected with or surrounded by other buildings, of which the tower is the strength or citadel.
Brough, Brougham and Appleby, Carlisle and Newcastle, Helmsley, Scarborough, and Richmond, all Norman rectangular keeps of the Northern Counties, are parts only, though the chief part, each of its castle, and it is only to fortresses so composed of parts that it is usual to apply the name of castle, a single structure being usually termed a tower or peel. Bowes, however, is always styled a castle in the records, and it is, of course, possible that it may, in respect of composition, have resembled other castles, and that the stronger and better-built part of the work may have proved most durable. It is, however, clear that no other work in masonry abutted upon, or, at least, was bonded into this tower, nor is there any indication of building or of foundations in the greensward, to which the tower on two of its sides lies open. On another side the churchyard runs up to within but a few feet of the tower, and on the remaining side the cottages show nothing of either old walls, or of the material of which such were likely to have been constructed.
Bowes Keep, if then Keep it may be called, is a rectangular tower rather above 82 feet east and west by 60 feet north and south. It does not, however, stand with the main points of the compass, the actual north being the north-west angle of the description. It is about 50 feet high. Each angle is capped by a broad flat pilaster, 14 feet broad and projecting a foot, and the angle of meeting of each pair is solid. Midway, in the centre of each face, is also a pilaster 8 feet 10 inches broad, and of the same projection with those flanking it. There is no base or plinth or set-off, save where a plain string-course marks the level of the upper floor, and is continued along the whole building, walls and pilasters. The top of the wall is much broken down, no battlement remaining. There do not appear to have been turrets at the angles, save perhaps one at the south-east, containing the stair head.
There is a basement, a main, and an upper floor. The basement, as usual, is at the ground-level. Its walls are 11 feet to 12 feet thick and solid, enclosing an area 36 feet by 58 feet. This again is subdivided by two cross-walls, 4 feet 4 inches thick. One of these, lying north and south, seems to have ascended through each floor, the other at right angles to it was probably confined to the basement. Both walls are broken away, only enough being left to show that such there were. Of the three chambers thus formed, that occupying the west end of the floor was 37 feet long by 16 feet broad (a). Of the two others the southern was 37 feet 10 inches long by 17 feet broad (c), and the northern the same length by 15 feet broad (b).