DANGEROUS GAME II

As some readers already know, I have had previous experience in using medieval siege-engines. Their power is not to be under-estimated - a simple ballista on the Roman principle can be devastating against human targets and the weight of missiles thrown by mangonel and trebuchet could do great damage to fortifications - especially the tops of castle walls where 25 to 200 pound rocks would crush wooden hoardings and crumble crenellations and machiolations. But - the myth of medieval siege-engines created by film and feature film is that they were only used to besiege castles : the reality is that such engines were also used to defend castles. The true story of medieval castle development is that it was a continuing ‘arms-race’ in terms of design to prevent or limit such siege-engines being applied and used. Unless you like living on a knife-edge, digging ditches, chopping wood and working long hours in bad weather risking disease and starvation - or seek to greatly enhance your knowledge, experience and a living-history persona - I would avoid taking part in a real 13^th century siege against a castle … especially one at The Tower of London.

Advertising the recent event in the London Underground. This event was based on a projection of visitors daily ‘experiencing’ a medieval siege of the 13^th - 14^th Century. Knights in foot-combat and a recreated Tournament featuring mounted knights were two of the special highlights.

www.griffinhistorical.com

Understanding Castle-Mentality is very much an on-going and developing process from Roman Times to the introduction of Gunpowder and beyond. A presentation also depends on the social and economic structure of the particular country and era designated. It is very much an ‘arms-race’ of long-term development depending on available resources, manpower and improved techniques. Very few medieval ‘geniuses’ can be found who both gained and enhanced their military reputations by a successful application of the combination of castle, applied ‘diplomacy’ and the use of armies in the field. The Romans had to deal with fortified places before, during and after their Invasion of England but their forces were already well-versed in military engineering, especially those under Julius Caesar. To say that no ‘castles’ existed in England before and during the Norman Conquest is rather misleading as Anglo-Saxon fortified ‘burghs’ constituted the same thing and were faced by both the Danes and the Viking invaders : Norman methods of dealing with such fortified places are shown in The Bayeaux Tapestry. Developments in the construction of castles equal those of developments in ‘engines’ to break into such places. As castles are all individual entities much depends in individual cases as to the particular circumstances of a siege but several examples are given in the text but can only be taken as an overall ‘generalisation’. Castles were garrisoned by men-at-arms but were often also the fortified home of a lord and as such they had a permanent staff of servants and workers to support family life. Medieval castles are defined as statements of possession and intent - but were also designed to be bases for a strategical offensive and were never intended to stand on the defensive alone. This is the crux of realising and appreciating ‘castle-mentality’ …

After 1066 and the Norman Conquest, both England and Normandy were still subject to unrest. Ireland, Wales and Scotland considered themselves independent from any Norman rule, and from 1071 a series of 'Saxon' revolts in Northern England had to be dealt with at the same time as a watch kept for a new Scandinavian invasion ; back across the Channel, France had designs on Normandy. Local disagreements in both places would give rise to bloody skirmishing, and civil war also periodically raised its ugly head over the next five centuries, mostly due to disputed rights of succession to the throne being hotly contested between rivals. Between 1150 and 1500 England was continuously upset by foreign and civil wars, border disputes, enemy invasions, battles, unrest, oppression, pestilence and brigandry. All these disputes called for military power in the form of soldiers.

A 12^th Century archer takes careful aim : such men were highly effective during sieges on both sides. They were considered ‘light infantry’ and could shoot an assault to pieces, cover an attack or a withdrawal, be used in raids on siege-engines and if properly supported, hold captured ground. Archers and slingers were the earliest form of ‘artillery’ used on a battlefield. Captains of archer companies were often ex-huntsmen who possessed experience in scouting, tracking and stealth - but usually unarmoured, they were vulnerable if caught in open country by surprise attacks by enemy horse or foot. Medieval armies were most successful when operating in a combination of horse, men-at-arms, archers and crossbowmen and when the long-range ‘English’ longbow was later used en masse on battlefields and sieges from 1340 to 1450, proved particularly devastating against both armoured enemy foot and horse.

Duke William - nicknamed 'The Bastard' – was a tough, relentless, rapacious and ruthless soldier who never learned to read or write, descended from Viking raiders who settled in Northern France and whose parents never married - and under pressure from the age of seven (when his father The Duke of Normandy died unexpectedly on a pilgrimage in 1035) from both neighbouring French rulers and rivals threatening to invade Normandy. William had to pay large sums to both create and support armies of soldiers to help him defend his lands. William through Robert II had a hereditary claim to the English Crown since 1002, reinforced by Edward the Confessor in 1051 and known to Harold Godwinson, both men already under the influence of Normandy. The claim made for Duke William by the powerful Norman clergy that Harold in accepting the English Crown in 1066 had betrayed and usurped the rightful heir - Duke William - gained support from the Pope and rallied many Normans with 'God is on Our Side' calling for a rightful and just invasion and campaign. William had cause to fear a French invasion from the east as he left Normandy to the west - despite some strong frontier defences - and had to hire mercenaries to pursue his claim with promises of bonuses in the form of cash, land or plunder if successful. After 1066, his nickname changed to 'The Conqueror' ; during a campaign in northern England, William punished the revolt of 1076 by utterly devastating a swathe of land, including burning York and killing hundreds of people, right up to Durham. In 1079 back in Normandy he was unhorsed and defeated during a family feud by his eldest son Robert ; still battling on at the age of 59, he was accidentally thrown from his horse during the siege of Mantes in 1087 and died from the internal injuries he sustained. His eldest son Robert got Normandy, William 'Rufus' was given the throne of England, Henry got most of his father's money (William's other son, Richard, was dead, killed when he fell from his horse hunting in the New Forest). Duke William's favourite oath was 'Splendour of God !' although at times he probably said much worse than that. Although the Conqueror's funeral was disgraced through a series of events and he was interred at Caen without dignity, William I remained a legendary figure throughout the medieval period, and many a nobleman's idea of an excellent – if rapacious - 'role model', leading to them becoming the kind of feudal gangster Robin Hood is often called upon to chastise - in the movies, anyway - although Robin Hood uses the growing precedent set by William I and re-asserted by Henry III that a man's main fealty was always to the King rather than his immediate lord, under the growing institutionalised royal despotism post-1086 the only way to change a rapacious, weak or foolhardy Kings' will was to break your oath and rebel, try to bring him to terms or simply overthrow him and elect someone else to rule instead.

The 'feudal system’ (as it became known in the Victorian Era) tied a realm together by oath and homage by linking each man to the one 'above' him in a social contract by means of sworn fealty ; using land ownership as the common bond and means of support. The fyrd in Anglo-Saxon England or the arriere-ban in Normandy, a sort of emergency but indifferently armed militia made up of all men between the ages sixteen to sixty to support the main body of fighting men. Harold called it out in 1066 to support his housecarles and their 'select fyrdsmen' to fight the invasion of Harald Hardrada and his brother Tostig at Stamford Bridge, and then marched them south to fight Duke William coming ashore from Normandy near Hastings. Weapons reflected the mainly agricultural origins of the general fyrd and included clubs, flails, scythes and billhooks. With the threat of French Invasion in 1205 King John re-organised the fyrd using as a basis The Assize of Arms of 1181.The arrangement for men working the land to support the military created during Anglo-Saxon times developed in later centuries, originally based on one fighting man per five 'hides' (a measurement of land from an old Saxon term based on the area a man could plough in a single day to support a family). At a time of a major threat to the nation, the Crown could call out a 'levy' of every man of military age (between sixteen and sixty) from a shire or county to support the nobles and their semi-professional armed retinues to defend the realm bringing any weapon they could get their hands on - but as many monarchs and lords realised, the men of the fyrd were of doubtful use in battle against the type of armoured cavalry developed by the Normans. It was calculated as seen that the nobles' holdings could and should support a number of trained soldiers, to be brought to war by him armed and equipped from the revenue of the estate, to support those already retained on a permanent basis. In cases of less dire necessity such as a local revolt, a pirate raid or an expansion of the kingdom by invasion spearheaded by the Kings 'household' troops, the Crown could call on the nobles holding land anywhere for military service, bringing a fixed number of armed and trained men with them based on the size of the lands held. The size of these retinues rose and fell with the need to maintain them ; in peacetime they would still require paying and feeding and be subject to a loss of efficiency through boredom. Some proven and loyal 'vassals' were given allocations of land to support them 'off-duty'. Any shortfall in soldiers could be filled by raising, equipping and training extra men if there was time, and if not by hiring mercenaries - but mercenaries could be expensive, did not always give the same loyal service and could later change sides or just leave for home if anything went wrong. Theoretically, the system would enable skilled full-time fighting men to defend the civilians, who supported them in return with food. Some very ambitious, rich and powerful nobles used the system to set themselves up with small personal armies to pursue their own ends, settle an old score with a rival or browbeat a rival neighbour into submission, particularly during times of civil war and though prohibited by the King. Holdings and crops would be burned, villages ransacked, their occupants killed and the livestock run off. Small but powerful professional mercenary forces raised on a short-term basis and paid for in cash, land or booty could form or reinforce armies, hold territory or conquer neighbouring areas ; a tactic used by the experienced commander Duke William of Normandy in 1066 to invade England and by King John in 1216 to try to crush his Baron's revolt after he and the Pope repudiated Magna Carta (Magna Carta also banned carrying the crossbow as King John, his deceased elder brother and the Church saw it as the weapon of assassins ; his elder brother King Richard I 'The Lionheart' had been killed by a shot from one in France). King John hired many foreign mercenaries to support him during his reign - but he made a lot of enemies by doing so and this set the precedent for later centuries when powerful barons allied with each other to ‘feather their own nests’ and make or break Kings.

The three basic types of 12^th Century soldier. A small number of soldiers would often be retained in castles in a permanent garrison under knights owing castle-service to the king or lord and the garrison would be reinforced at times of threat or war. The archer would often be a lightly-armoured man with a crossbow : faster-shooting archers would man the battlements of a castle but crossbows could more easily shoot through the ‘arrow-slits’ in the towers and walls. Plate armour began to replace mail armour circa 1200.

The castles built in England from 1068 would be garrisoned and held by soldiers (in varying numbers as the climate of war and peace continuously rose and fell) under a loyal 'Constable' appointed by the King or lord himself. The county would be headed by the Kings personal representative - the Sheriff - and in wartime the county Sheriff's and castle Constable's would work closely together in raising and directing any county 'levy'. In peacetime 1200, Nottingham Castle probably held around twenty to thirty soldiers with administrators and officials, with a steward overseeing the logistical aspects of cooks, servants, brewers, butchers and bakers, all under the overall supervision of the Constable. The garrison would exercise in drill, train with personal arms, learn to handle siege equipment such as catapults and heavy crossbows, and maintain gear and equipment in storage in the armouries. Any revolt or disturbance in the nearby town that was too much for the Nottingham Town Watch to handle would see the garrison guard of a castle turned out to help them break a few heads if necessary to re-establish order. Any public punishment resulting from such a revolt would be closely supervised by soldiers too. For public appearances in any climate of civilian unrest, the Constable would give the County Sheriff an armed guard of men to protect him from any civil complaint getting too close or forceful. Common men-at-arms would as a general rule be more likely to carry a spear or a similar pole-arm rather than a sword.

This common 13^th Century soldier taking a break from operating a siege-engine is wearing basic protection in the form of a short mail-shirt over a padded leather jack and over a padded coif a ‘kettle-hat’ which replaced the earlier nasal spangelhelm. He has unlaced the sleeves of the padded jack to ease his work but in actual combat he would wear this protection and carry some sort of pole-arm of far more practical use than his handy poniard (dagger) adding gauntlets to protect his hands. He wears a linen shirt and his hose and leggings are tucked into stout leather boots. The mail-shirt was notorious for going rusty – the soldier has wiped over the surface with linseed oil (a by-product of making linen) but if it became rusty the soldier would place it in a sack and adding sand then tie up the sack and ‘rumble’ it by hand to remove the rust by abrasion. His nearby snap-sack contains a ration of bread, ‘hard cheese’, dried fruit and a few strips of dried meat and to quench a thirst, a leather bottle holds a welcome measure of ale.

A Commission of Array - as specified in 1258 by Henry III - made sure that each landowner in each County fulfilled their obligations to the monarch and the defence of the realm. In that year, smaller landowners (those holding lands worth £2 or more per annum in revenue) were required to 'serve as or provide' an archer for the Array to support the 'horse and foot'. Archers were cheaper and easier to equip than crossbowmen and especially armoured foot-soldiers, even if their rate of pay for service was higher. Henry I had - as part of his military household - a full-time unit of archers as early as 1114, who may have been Welshmen. The crossbow was re-introduced into England after 1066 and from the 11th to the late 13th Centuries it was usual to find crossbowmen fulfilling the ‘artillery’ role in a medieval army in battle. Expensive to create, equip and train, mercenary companies of continental crossbowmen could be 'hired' short-term to strengthen or support any infantry and cavalry force (and is where the two present-day sayings ‘a bolt from the blue’ and ‘to pick a quarrel’ originate). County Commissioners attended statutory practice sessions decreed by law where men would be called on and encouraged to practice their military skills, including archery. Sundays would see men with bows - not necessarily 'longbows' - all over England shooting at targets and the 'clout' in woodland clearings and on village commons. From 1250, archers - after the battle at Northallerton in 1138 and the surprises they inflicted as 'commoners' against armoured soldiers in the early Welsh and Scots Wars – had reached the point where they were considered highly important in the formation of English armies. By the end of the century, archers were already serving in the initial form of semi-irregular bodies of close to long-range 'artillery support' for the infantry and Horse, and in later centuries were formed into regular household or ‘professional’ companies, using by then the powerful and longer-ranging 'English' longbow which through rate of shooting and penetration had eclipsed the mechanically-wound crossbow (but these were often retained for the defence of castles by men-at-arms who weren’t archers). This large body of men in England trained in some degree to warfare far outstripped that in any other European country ; most military forces there were small permanently retained professional and aristocratic bodies of well-armoured knights and companies of foot. The confident companies of character-archers as part of the English county levy under a stout commander and using the powerful 'standardised' longbow laid the foundations for famous victories such as Crecy (1346), Poitiers (1356) and Agincourt (1415). Many minor skirmishes and battles were fought in and around Nottinghamshire throughout The Dark Ages period such as Hatfield (632), Trent and Nottingham (868 and 1015) ; battles of The Middle Ages include Northallerton (1138), Lincoln (1141), Evesham (1265), Boroughbridge (1322), Bosworth (1485) and East Stoke (1487). By the time of ‘The Wars of the Roses’, the fyrd had largely disappeared and the ‘professional medieval soldier’ – some now equipped with early handguns and cannons - had been in existence for some time.

The ‘White Tower’ of London was founded by William I in 1078 but saw a continuing medieval expansion through Henry III and especially Edward I. By 1500, The Tower of London was practically impregnable - without the application of heavy cannons - but by that time medieval ‘robber-barons’ had become a thing of the past and the defence of the realm had long-ago passed to the coast, making many such places in the internal parts of the country useless and to avoid the expense of their upkeep, were quickly becoming abandoned.

The Bywards Tower at The Tower of London. This tower was strongly-defended and fitted with a drawbridge and portcullis - and is the fourth defensive tower defending the entry to the castle itself - to reach this point during a siege in the year 1300 you would already have had to reduce three other such towers and think of some way to cross the former water-filled moat in the foreground to breach the ‘concentric’ wall and the main castle defences are yet to come …

The Third Crusade - though largely a failure from a Christian point of view - brought back to the West enhanced knowledge of the design and use of siege-engines which led to a greater development of the basic Roman principles and of course, led to design-amendments to existing and new castles to withstand the use of these. The siege of Acre in The Holy Land saw larger and more powerful engines used to reduce fortified places. These siege-engines threw not only heavy destructive missiles - and in many cases, human and animal projectiles - but also highly incendiary missiles based on ‘Greek Fire’.

Note : the author has manufactured ‘Greek Fire’ based on a medieval formula - it must be considered a highly volatile mixture using the naphthalene-petroleum basis and should be manufactured with great care. Two options on use are available - use it to be ignited by fire-arrows after launch or fit the clay-pots to be launched containing the mixture with a wick in a ‘molotov-cocktail’ (the latter application is the most hazardous means of use). As a petroleum-naptha base was not available in the West, ‘Greek Fire’ saw little use in Europe - but almost certainly Richard I used it to reduce the wooden Gatehouse of Nottingham Castle to ashes in March 1194.

Two of the three siege-engines on display (the ballista is inside the walls). The siege-engine is the foreground is the Springald (or Espringal) and the engine in the background is a Traction-Trebuchet (people-powered, and the design was also applied as a form of Mangonel). The medieval record for missiles thrown in a single day during one siege is 5000 by a pair of traction-trebuchets. The Springald is traditionally held to be the most powerful flat-trajectory anti-personnel weapon before the introduction of gunpowder. Though several recreations of the Traction-Trebuchet and Counterweight-Trebuchet exist, the Springald seen here is the only recreated siege-engine of the kind in the world to be currently operational. Such engines also had added protection from a ‘sally’ by the defenders and pavais (wooden shields) to protect the operational crews of siege-engines from enemy archers and crossbow-men. A short brief on ‘castle-mentality’ and a demonstration in the use of the crossbow was included by the author as part of the event.

www.griffinhistorical.com

Many early post-Conquest castles after 1066 were secure in the knowledge that no ‘engines’ were locally available to break into them – as such, they were constructed from earth and timber to withstand only an immediate attack or a short siege from infantry and horse. These castles were garrisoned by a small force of trained knights and sergeants backed up with a body of men-at-arms to hold off a local rebellion. But – wooden walls could be taken by surprise by a sufficiently adequate force raised before support could be sent for and arrive (which is what happened to the Norman garrison of York in 1075, who were taken by surprise and duly massacred). The ‘motte and bailey’ castle was typical of the first castles built after the Norman Conquest : these were easy and quick to construct using available manpower. If a suitable ‘motte’ was not available in the chosen spot, the Normans would build one. Building a castle initially required the possession of land, investment and planning. Post-Conquest this was not a problem as many of the major land-owners were the relatives of William I ; the conquered territory of England and the borders (note that Scotland, Wales and Ireland are not included) had to be made secure and no threat to him from these individuals was anticipated before his death in 1087. The succession to the throne of William I was however not so secure and a degree of in-fighting occurred before the kingdom ‘settled down’ under William II but it was during the reign of Henry I that the stone-built castle and city walls began to make a long-term mark on the landscape of England. Possession of territory and the reduction of such places became an enormous ‘chess-game’ in medieval politics and economics.

A view of the northern walls of the royal castle of The Tower of London : an ever-expanding and on-going development from 1078 until the 16^th century. Prior to the introduction of gunpowder, such a place was virtually impregnable without a protracted siege requiring a high degree of planning, investment and available resources … but an equal degree of investment was required to make it impregnable : ‘royal’ castles always had the advantage in this through the king being far more wealthy through a regular yearly income over twenty times the amount of that of his wealthiest subjects. With the exception of The White Tower, the original Norman castle has all but disappeared with the extensive and expensive medieval expansions of Henry III and Edward I. Though this outer ‘curtain wall’ is fitted with ‘arrow-slits’ they have been amended for firearms and the large embrasure seen in the centre of the wall is for a defending cannon to be mounted. The lawned area seen here was up to 1840 a deep and wide water-filled moat.

The inhabitants or occupants of a castle fall into four categories : the Lord or Constable, Household Servants, Men-at-Arms and Artisans or Workmen.

Many noble lords held a number of castles and in their absence from one would appoint a Constable or Castellan to be in charge of it and his responsibility would be the safe-keeping, upkeep and defence of the castle. If it was a large castle, he might appoint a Deputy to assist him or supervise some tasks. The Constable would live in his own quarters within the castle along with his family if he had one. The Constable or his deputy would handle the day-to-day affairs of the castle garrison.

The senior of the household staff would be the Steward : he would have many responsibilities which could include maintaining financial records and paying the bills, but would always include the necessities of daily life including provision of meals, suitable food and drink and the supervision of servants. In a large castle, the Steward could have an under-staff or a deputy in the form of a butler or chatelaine to supervise the household staff of body-servants, valets, musicians, cooks, butchers, bakers, pages, maids, grooms, huntsmen, gardeners and cleaners. Many castles had stables for horses, mews to house hunting-hawks and kennels for hounds. Most castles contained a church or chapel and would have had a resident priest to hold mass and cater for spiritual matters.

The garrison of men-at-arms in a castle could be any number between half-a-dozen to many hundred men. A small number of these would be professional retainers or serjeants who would handle the day-to-day command and training of soldiers. The most senior of these would cater for the storage, maintenance, supervision and/or manufacture and repair of equipment and gear by the castle armourer.

There would be artisans in the castle such as carpenters, masons, blacksmiths, grooms and labourers employed on maintenance or building work - some of these might be resident in the castle but were often daily visitors from a nearby town or village, along with the suppliers of necessary basic foodstuffs and raw materials as castles generally had their own built-in kitchens, bakeries and breweries.

The impression often gained from visiting many medieval castles today is that they were damp, cold and uncomfortable places to live in but …

… many apartments in castles were sumptuously decorated and furnished and very comfortable : especially royal and private chambers. The chimney having been invented means a source of efficient heating can be built into such ‘solars’ and the windows of this 13^th Century private bedroom are glazed and have curtains to offer privacy. This private apartment has an adjoining lavatory and also a small chapel.

Outside a state visit or a royal occasion, the lack of day-to-day formality inside a castle surprises many today – a lord or even the king himself would not deign to talk to any of his subjects on any matter if he felt the need. A visit to any castle by the King and the many people accompanying him and forming his Household would often see it stripped bare of stores and provisions. The duration of a royal stay at a castle was often limited by this fact … and also how long it took for the castle garderobes (lavatories) to become full to overflowing !

For many years, castles and cathedrals were the largest man-made structures in the western world. Here, a royal master-mason supervises the building of a typical 13^th Century castle tower : his team are working with basic wooden scaffolding and lifting-cranes. It was not unknown for a small army of as many as three hundred stone-masons, carpenters and labourers supported by on-site cooks to be working on such a project for some years with suitable stone often being brought many miles to the building site. Such powerful stone-built fortifications under siege require equally powerful ‘engines of destruction’ to reduce. The First, Second and Third Crusades saw the development of ‘Roman’ siege-engines and the ever-more powerful structures then built in the West to withstand these engines in turn required increasingly powerful and devastating engines to reduce them.

One of the earliest siege-engines in use was the battering-ram. This was a heavy log reinforced with iron suspended by ropes under a cover (named a ‘sow’ or a ‘cat’ and stout in construction to withstand heavy missiles being dropped onto it from above by the defenders and incorporating wet hides to prevent incendiary means being deployed against it) and pushed or drawn up to the walls or gate of a castle by men or oxen, swinging the iron-tipped ram would begin to damage the gate or wall. The design, application, size and power of these ‘siege engines’ would be decreed by the objective, especially if the early wooden defences had been rebuilt in stone. Due to their increasing size and weight, these ‘engines’ would often be built by artificers or engineers on-site at a siege and were also fitted into castles for defensive purposes. Military engineering and the building or development of castles went hand-in-hand with the development of siege engines – an early defence against all these engines was to surround the existing castle by a fosse (ditch) and if possible a water-filled moat to prevent such engines being brought into optimum range. This also made the use of wheeled ‘siege-towers’ awkward for the attackers. Another defence was to build an extra ‘curtain wall’ around the existing castle defences and strengthen this wall with strong towers. All sieges required planning and patience. All siege-engines had to be supported by a large team of men to supply and maintain them. The siege-engines of the besiegers had to be carefully sited - and also defended as they were very vulnerable to a sudden ‘sally’ or raid by the defenders intending to capture or burn them.

Developments of siege-engines to overcome and reduce stone fortifications meant they had to throw heavier missiles and so became much larger, heavier and required more personnel and support to apply. The Ballista took several forms : the Mangonel and especially the Counterweight-Trebuchet became so large by the end of the 13^th Century they were terribly destructive and often given whimsical names by the soldiers to reflect their power – such as God’s Own Sling and The Wicked Neighbour - requiring teams of up to 100 men to maintain, supply and operate.

Without recourse to siege-engines the only remaining way to besiege a castle or town was to quickly ‘invest’ or surround it with your army in an attempt to starve the defenders out or employ miners to dig a tunnel to under-mine a wall in order to induce a collapse to permit an assault. Both these methods were expensive, required logistical support and specialist troops and could be rather time-consuming.

A siege would often begin with a surprise raid by the attackers into the enemy territory to capture or destroy resources. Castles generally held a permanent garrison and a store of food but such a surprise raid would reduce the effectiveness of the castle and possibly reduce the potential numbers and morale of the defenders. It could also provoke the defenders to come out and attack the raiders, and if they could be defeated in battle lessen the need for a siege. If a siege was required, a survey of the castle (or prior information from a spy or informer) and the time available would decree the above means to be employed and what form of attack this would mean. Consideration would also have to be given as to if an enemy relief force was available to support the castle in a counter-attack. During the siege of Acre in The Holy Land during The Third Crusade, the besiegers found themselves besieged by such a relief force and forced to fight both the castle to their front and the enemy to their rear. Another ‘occupational hazard’ during a siege was that when a large number of troops were brought together, sickness would sooner or later begin to reduce numbers - an early form of ‘bacteriological warfare’ was to use siege-engines to throw the dead bodies of men or animals into the castle to promote or spread disease. Mediterranean marble-stones had to be imported by the Crusaders during the same siege to manufacture missiles for siege-engines as the local sandstone rocks were found not to be sufficiently hard enough to smash defences made of the same material. Engines could also launch incendiary missiles to try and start fires - the dreaded ‘Greek Fire’ was highly volatile and destructive and was used in siege-engines during the Crusades in The Holy Land projected in clay pots rather like a ‘molotov-cocktail’ or ignited with fire-arrows - but the petroleum-napthalene constituents of the mixture were not available in the West so this rather hazardous incendiary material saw little use in Europe. Blazing ‘Greek Fire’ could be extinguished by bucketfuls of strong vinegar but the damage was often done before these could be brought.

An important consideration for a defending commander was not to permit the garrison of the castle to become inefficient through boredom (a typical medieval soldier spent very little of his time fighting). Another was not to permit morale to droop during a siege and seek any and all means of counter-attacking the besiegers as a siege against a stout castle manned by well-supplied and determined defenders was a stiff challenge for an attacker to accept. Castles came in all forms of shapes and sizes and the site and construction of castles developed alongside the development of siege-engines. Design continually changed as new building methods were created and older or existing castles were updated. Castles built on high places (and especially upon solid rock) were far harder to besiege. Castle-walls with projecting bases and surrounded by a ditch or a moat were less susceptible to attack counter-mining and round towers - rather than square ones - had no corners or edges to be broken away by missiles. Castles built alongside rivers added to their strength and were impossible to surround and also meant this facility could be used to re-supply them : in some cases by using sluices, the adjacent river could be used to fill a moat with water and hold it in place during times of war (Kenilworth Castle could dam local streams to be surrounded by large lakes at times of threat). With the threat of a siege - if time and manpower permitted - the land surrounding the castle was stripped of anything useful to deny the use to an enemy. In several medieval cases, a ‘scorched earth’ policy was employed with fields containing crops which could not be gathered and associated villages burned, with the occupants and their livestock used to reinforce the garrison or driven far out of reach of the enemy. A castle would hold long-term storage facilities for food and often incorporated a deep well in a basement to access water. With the threat of a major siege, the storage capacity of a castle would be filled to maximum and all un-necessary inhabitants or non-combatants described as ‘useless mouths’ required to leave or were even thrown out (but some civilians would be retained such as cooks, carpenters and smiths). Siege-engines in store would be assembled and placed in position : ammunition for archers, crossbowmen and missiles for engines would be augmented and armour and weapons carefully inspected. The defensive wooden hoardings and cranes upon castle walls - if not already in place - would be brought out of store and erected.

Wooden ‘hoardings’ were kept in store to prevent exposure to rot and erected prior to a siege to give more protection to the defenders. The holes in the base of the hoardings permit missiles and boiling water or red-hot sand (‘boiling oil’ is largely a myth) to be poured onto an assault. Hoardings were often the primary target for missiles thrown by siege-engines. The tops of castle towers were often fully enclosed by hoardings - the holes for the beams to support the wooden hoardings can still be seen in many medieval castle walls today.

Recreated wooden hoardings at a restored medieval fortification

Scouts would be dispatched to learn the strength of the enemy and messages or warnings would also be sent seeking support from any nearby friendly castle or ally. The gates would then be closed, the portcullis lowered, the drawbridge raised and sentries would be placed on the towers to watch for the approaching enemy as it was not unusual before a siege for negotiations in the form of a ‘parley’ to occur. An enemy commander could ‘summon’ a castle to surrender or suffer the consequences : this summons could equally be rejected and both the summons and the rejection or defiance could be edged with ‘psychological’ aspects to indicate or reduce confidence on both sides. If a formal siege began, the defenders would watch the attackers very closely to identify which form of siege warfare was intended before it happened, in order to take any necessary precautions to defend against it - and also seek to spot any weakness in the attacking forces which could be counter-attacked or exploited by the defenders.

Tactical applications during sieges often saw several innovations used by both the attacker and the defender : large flat plates were placed on the flagstones of castle basements and filled with water - men would then be placed nearby to both listen carefully and watch for any ripples on the surface of the water which would be caused by enemy miners working beneath the ground. A simple ‘claw’ on a rope from a crane mounted on the castle walls was used to ‘hook’ unsuspecting attackers to raise them off the ground to drop them from a height - and in one siege, an injured knight in armour lying on the ground at the base of a wall was literally roasted alive in his armour as a large bundle of blazing straw was dropped onto him by the defenders. In another siege, a commander in plate-armour directing the besiegers was crushed almost flat by a heavy stone thrown out of the castle under siege from a wall-mounted trebuchet. During one medieval siege, a particularly enterprising and stout-hearted spy entered a castle with the intention of poisoning the water-supply by clambering up into it using an external lavatory-shaft – but before the spy could carry out his mission, he was caught and hanged. Four of the defending soldiers in a siege were once transfixed by a single quarrel loosed-off from a very powerful ballista and likened by an observer as resembling ‘chickens on a spit ready to be roasted’ but mail armour and the padded jack worn beneath it had already been found not to be sufficient protection against the high-velocity bolts or quarrels fitted with armour-piercing points from the powerful mechanically-wound individual ‘arbalest’ or crossbow below their medium-range of 200 yards and even the best steel-plate armour also had to avoid having flat surfaces for the same reason. These crossbows could often only shoot two bolts per minute as opposed to twelve arrows per minute from a longbow - the Church in a ‘chivalric notion’ unsuccessfully attempted to forbid the use in warfare of both the arrow and quarrel in the early 12^th Century as they objected to a ‘common man’ shooting either after a brief period of training being able to kill at a distance a high-status noble knight : but at the same time the Church held that it had no objection to a ‘chivalrous’ armoured knight using a sword to scythe down any number of unarmoured ‘common’ infantry.

The hand-held shield began a steady decline in battle from the mid-13^th Century with the development of plate-armour harness but was often carried during later sieges, with the sword of the attacking knight replaced by the heavy crushing potential offered by the alternative of carrying an iron mace, an axe or a war-hammer for siege-assaults which would often result in close-combat in confined spaces. The 15^th Century bevor and the sallet helmet offered good protection from both missiles and in combat and became common - but the wearer in having to peer out from slits or holes in a helmet or visor had accepted a great restriction in his visibility.

As with medieval hunting, there is no real generalisation beyond a set of unwritten ‘basic rules’ but it appears that along with most hunting-trips only very few medieval sieges took place ‘avant-garde’ or opportunistically and most indicate careful planning and consideration in what was a potentially risky and hazardous operation. Some medieval campaigns see castles falling relatively quickly and often to the surprise of both sides – the new, well-manned and strongly commanded Chateau-Gailliard in 1204 for example - some after a sheer show of force, many by bribery or guile, ‘negotiation’ inducing a commander to change sides or a simple lack of support, but also saw some sieges lasting for months longer than anticipated and even then unsuccessful. The consideration of ‘chivalry’ often took a back seat during some sieges when commanders became frustrated and lost their tempers and they even continued after two-thirds of the castle had been captured and eventual defeat was obvious – Rochester in 1215 for example – and leaving out the religious aspects of sieges during the Crusades, this could happen through sheer obstinacy or the fact that the defenders strongly suspected they were to be executed if captured (always a risk for men seen as ‘rebels’ by loyalists though of course common soldiers despite whatever their personal feelings might be were only obeying the orders of their lord). Some castles simply could not be cracked – Dover in 1216, for example – even surrounded long-term by strong and well-equipped armies. Bringing together a medieval army was a risk in itself : starvation was a threat to both attackers and defenders during a siege of any length (several sieges saw the soldiers horses being killed and eaten by necessity) and because hygiene was not understood many forms of disease usually manifested themselves within thirty days inside any large gathering of medieval people in one place and could lessen available manpower considerably. In the case of a castle in a town coming under siege, even if the town was surrendered to the besiegers by the burghers it was no guarantee of safety – Nottingham town was burned to the ground twice during the civil war between King Stephen and the Empress Maud in the years 1135-1154 on both occasions as a result of an unsuccessful siege of Nottingham castle.

The powerful Tower of London itself was never formally besieged … but on 14^th June 1381 during the early years of the reign of Richard II it was unexpectedly captured. After the King departed The Tower to meet and address the crowd forming ‘The Peasants Revolt’ at Mile End, the castle gates were left open - the reason given was that the nation had not been invaded by a foreign army and not at war – and a large mob of unarmed common men and women camped on nearby Tower Hill took the opportunity of uncertainty amongst the garrison at the time to overpower the sentries and rush into the castle to steal weapons and stores, plunder valuables, generally abuse the civilian occupants within (including members of the royal family) and carried off and murdered two senior state officials sheltering in the castle at the time. The fourteen-year old Richard II upon returning to the Tower after the Mile End meeting and hearing what had happened had to flee for his life and hide overnight in London … but the revolt ended and the mob disbanded next day with the death of their leader – Wat Tyler - who was stabbed by the furious Lord Mayor of London at a second meeting.

Medieval soldiers circa 1500 about to fire a muzzle-loading cast-bronze ‘bombard’ cannon during a siege. Early medieval cannons – though they used a less powerful mixture of the gunpowder propellant than today – required great skill to apply and use. Such a weapon required a gun-crew which would be supervised by a ‘Master Gunner’ in transport, siting and loading - but he would probably stand well clear during firing as due to careless storage and handling of gunpowder along with metallurgic defects in casting cannons causing the barrel to ‘burst’ the early weapons were often equally dangerous to the firer as the intended target for the missile. The term ‘barrel’ was applied as the very earliest guns used the technology of fitted wooden staves firmly strapped together with iron bands … and as such were constructed by coopers.

Many medieval castles subsequently underwent ‘conversion’ to fit cannons for defence - but the continuing development of gunpowder and cannons made castles of medieval designs largely redundant. Even after gunpowder and cannons were introduced and all the associated problems in application and use ironed out including several accusations of using ‘witchcraft’ during the manufacture of the propellant. Though wounds had already been inflicted in battle by guns, one of the first recorded ‘aimed shots’ from a common soldier carrying a hand-gun in battle struck and pierced the armour of the commander of the rebel forces at East Stoke in 1487 and eventually led to cannons being placed aboard warships and the use of ‘handgounnes’ for sporting and hunting purposes … but despite any disparaging opposing numbers, a medieval battle or siege against a fortification was never a foregone conclusion in seeking and dealing with ‘The Most Dangerous Game’.