Every dwelling-house of consequence was more or less fortified, at any rate during the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries. A lofty square tower, called a keep, built to stand a siege, and with a walled inclosure at its feet, often protected by a wide ditch (fosse or moat), formed the castle of the twelfth century, and in some cases (e.g. the White Tower of London), this keep was of considerable size. The first step in enlargement was to increase the number and importance of the buildings which clustered round the keep, and to form two inclosures for them, known as an inner and an outer bailey. The outer buildings of the Tower of London, though much modernised, will give a good idea of what a first class castle grew to be by successive additions of this sort. In castles erected near the end of the thirteenth century (e.g. Conway Castle in North Wales), and later, the square form of the keep was abandoned, and many more arrangements for the comfort and convenience of the occupants were introduced; and the buildings and additions to buildings of the fifteenth century took more the shape of a modern dwelling-house, partly protected against violence, but by no means strong enough to stand a siege. Penshurst may be cited as a good example of this class of building.
It will be understood that, unlike the religious buildings which early received the form and disposition from which they did not depart widely, mediæval domestic buildings exhibit an amount of change in which we can readily trace the effects of the gradual settlement of this country, the abandonment of habits of petty warfare, the ultimate cessation of civil wars, the introduction of gunpowder, the increase in wealth and desire for comfort, and last, but not least, the confiscation by Henry VIII. of the property of the monastic houses.
Fig. 8.—Plan of Warwick Castle. (14th and following Centuries.)
Warwick Castle, of which we give a plan (Fig. [8]), maybe cited as a good example of an English castellated mansion of the time of Richard II. Below the principal story there is a vaulted basement containing the kitchens and many of the offices. On the main floor we find the hall, entered as usual at the lower or servants’ end, from a porch. The upper end gives access to a sitting-room, built immediately behind it, and beyond are a drawing-room and state bed-rooms, while across a passage are placed the private chapel and a large dining-room (a modern addition). Bed-rooms occupy the upper floors of the buildings at both ends of the hall.
Perhaps even more interesting as a study than Warwick Castle is Haddon Hall, the well-preserved residence of the Duke of Rutland, in Derbyshire. The five or six successive enlargements and additions which this building has received between the thirteenth and seventeenth centuries show the growth of ideas of comfort and even luxury in this country.
As it now stands, Haddon Hall contains two internal quadrangles, separated from one another by the great hall with its dais, its minstrels’ gallery, its vast open fire-place, and its traceried windows, and by the kitchens, butteries, &c., belonging to it.
The most important apartments are reached from the upper end of the hall, and consist of the magnificent ball-room, and a dining-room in the usual position, i.e. adjoining the hall and opening out of it; with, on the upper floor, a drawing-room, and a suite of state bed-rooms, occupying the south side of both quadrangles and the east end of one. A large range of apartments, added at a late period, and many of them finely panelled and lined with tapestry, occupies the north side of this building and the northwestern tower. At the south-western corner of the building stands a chapel of considerable size, and which once seems to have served as a kind of parochial church; and a very considerable number of rooms of small size, opening out of both quadrangles, would afford shelter, if not comfortable lodging, to retainers, servants, and others. The [!-- original location of Fig. 9 --] portions built in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries are more or less fortified. The ball-room, which is of Elizabethan architecture, opens on to a terraced garden, accessible from without by no more violent means than climbing over a not very formidable wall. Probably nowhere in England, can the growth of domestic architecture be better studied, whether we look to the alterations which took place in accommodation and arrangement, or to the changes which occurred in the architectural treatment of windows, battlements, doorways and other features, than at Haddon Hall.