29 March 2023
Whenever I speak or write about castles, I am aware that castle specialists, such as myself, have perhaps not been completely successful at communicating new thinking to the wider public. In the minds of lots of people castles were built primarily as military defensive fortifications. However, this has not been an orthodox view among castle specialists since the late 1980s.
Instead, research by numerous experts, over almost 50 years, has consistently demonstrated the incredible complexity in the function of mediaeval castles. Security was certainly a consideration, but it was probably not the paramount purpose of castles. In concentrating on military matters, at the exclusion of all else, we risk understanding only a tiny fraction of how castles were viewed and used in the mediaeval period. I would like to explore the amazing diversity of castle functions in this blog.
History of Castle Studies
We must trek back in time to understand how the military interpretation of castles became so dominant for so long (and why it still holds sway for so many). The study of castles did not really get underway until the second half of the nineteenth century. Two of the earliest figures to carry out fieldwork were the French restoration architect Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc (1860) and the English archaeologist Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (1883, 429-65). Both men had military backgrounds and saw active service. As a young man Viollet-le-Duc manned the barricades during the July Revolution and, later in life, was a military engineer at the siege of Paris (1870-71). Pitt-Rivers was a Captain and Assistant Quarter Master General at the battle of Alma (1854) and spent 32 years in the British Army, finishing at the rank of Lieutenant General. Perhaps it is no surprise that both men were interested in what they perceived to be mediaeval military structures.
Viollet-le-Duc and Pitt-Rivers were followed by figures such as the engineer, George Thomas Clark, who published Mediaeval Military Architecture in England in 1884; and the academic, Alexander Hamilton Thompson, who released Military Architecture in England During the Middle Ages in 1912. It is notable that the word “military” appeared prominently in both titles. Militarism dominated castle studies for much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Even scholars, such as Ella Armitage or Reginald Allen Brown, who accepted that castles also had important residential functions, were still drawn into debates on the tension between living in and defending a castle. Brown’s definition of castles summed up this tension: “the private fortress and residence of a lord” (Brown 1954, 17).
As late as 1973 Philip Warner, a Senior Lecturer at the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, stated that: “Castles were… magnificent devices for delaying and dislocating an invading army” (Warner 1973, 8). Such overtly martial interpretations were addressed by David Stocker in an essay, entitled ‘In the Shadow of the General’s Armchair’, which noted that the early commentators on castles came from military backgrounds and tried to make the mediaeval evidence fit their own experience (Stocker 1992, 415-20). This observation can be extended to consider multiple generations of authors in the early- to mid-twentieth century who had grown up in a world fundamentally underpinned, and effected by, the legacy of the British Empire, Boer War, First and Second World Wars. The bureaucracy and militarism of those years may have skewed the interpretation of castles to such an extent that it would have been unrecognisable within the mediaeval world.
By the late 1970s the tide began to turn against the dominance of militarism in castle studies. One of the first to attempt new interpretations was Charles Coulson (1979, 73-101) who suggested that castles were fundamentally architectural expressions of elite living. Whilst acknowledging that the castle did have residential and military roles, Coulson concluded that: “The social purposes of fortresses almost always comprehended and transcended their military functions.” In doing so he opened the floodgates.
Battle for Bodiam
There was a brief period of volatile argument between the militarist old guard and the revisionists but by the mid-1990s the latter were in the ascendancy. Much of the debate centred on the so-called “Battle for Bodiam”. On the one hand were those who thought that Bodiam Castle (East Sussex) was constructed for Sir Edward Dallingridge – a veteran of the Hundred Years War – to protect south-eastern England from attack by the French (Warner 1973, 232-33). Militarists tended to draw attention to the presence of machicolations, gunports, gatehouses, corner towers and the moat; alongside reference to the wording of the 1385 licence to crenellate: “for the defence of the adjacent country, and the resistance to our enemies” (Thompson 1987, 17, 36; Platt 1982, 114-18).
Meanwhile, the revisionists pointed out that the castle was palpably unworkable as a fortification. It is directly overlooked by a nearby hill, the main gatehouse faces inland, the walls are very thin, the crenellations are very low, the gunports are badly sighted, there are some very large ground-floor windows, and the moat is not only shallow but could easily be drained externally (see Liddiard 2005, 7-11 and Johnson 2002, 19-33 for summaries of the various arguments). Instead, they viewed the castle as an impressive moated manor house, surrounded by a landscape of lordship, with an intricate access route dominated by aquatic features intended to create a theatrically ceremonial display of prestige (Everson 1996, 79-84). Bodiam may have looked the part, but it was not a serious defensible position.
An older generation sought to apologise for the military weaknesses of sites such as Bodiam by suggesting that there was a technological evolution of castles, linked to periods of warfare and conquest, starting in the eleventh century which reached a high point at the end of the thirteenth century. From here, they argued, the castle went into decline as the country was largely pacified; but lords still needed the protection offered by strong, self-sufficient, great towers should their own post-feudal mercenaries revolt (Simpson 1969). Given the political upheavals of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries this simplistic linear model was never realistic.
To this Coulson offered a radical solution – that this evolutionary rise and subsequent decline would have been anathema to the actual lived reality of the mediaeval period. Instead, he suggested that the castle was primarily a building which evoked elite status, prestige, and ceremony at all points during the mediaeval era and that this was always the primary imperative for building such structures… but was he correct?
Diversity of Thought
One of the chief joys of working in castle studies in the twenty-first century is the diversity of thought. No longer are specialists confined to relatively narrow arguments within the military versus residential parameters. Coulson helped to enable a whole new spectrum of interpretation. Castles have come to be understood as the most complex structures built within the mediaeval period.
This diversity of function can be typified through analysis of the great hall. Everything in houses of both modest or palatial means pivoted around the hall – sandwiched between the lower status services and the high-status apartments beyond. This layout can be felt in the houses of yeoman farmers or in great castles of all periods including Oakham, Kidwelly, Bodiam, Raglan and Thornbury.
The Great Hall
Castle great halls offered multi-purpose venues. Traditionally, they could be used as a place of dining for the household. However, these were not mere canteens. Everything about such spaces was geared towards the social rituals which helped to order and bind community. The hall had a low end (closest to the cross-passage and services) and a high end (closest to the high-status apartments). The lord would sit on a raised platform, known as a dais, at the high end beneath a tester canopy (a signifier of status). Below the lord the household would sit at trestle tables in order of rank, and, during meals, the lower status members would serve those higher up the pecking order. The architecture of the hall emphasised the innate hierarchy of the mediaeval household (Johnson 2002, 78-80).
The hall was a space festooned with architecture and artwork which proclaimed the status of the lord and his household. Knowledge, patronage and understanding of such motifs was a signifier of lordship. Halls included lavish portable goods and comestibles, elaborate timber roof structures, up-to-the-minute tracery windows, sculpted and moulded stonework, tapestries or wall paintings and fireplaces dripping with iconography. The first-floor hall chimneypiece at Tattershall Castle (Lincolnshire) features armorials of Ralph Cromwell’s ancient family pedigree, purses symbolising the source of his wealth as Lord Treasurer of England, miniature crenellations (the ultimate symbol of lordship), religious scenes of the fight between good and evil, and more marginal images including woodwoses, grotesques and foliage which explored notions of chivalry, spirituality, and sinfulness. Everything here was intended to be an expression of a great and pious Christian lord (Wright 2021, 313-329).
Halls were not just used by the feasting household. They could provide a location for activities including manorial courts, meetings with visitors or retainers, and for dispensing patronage, gift-giving, and charity. At a time when the cohesion of society was predicated on the itinerant management of manors by lords the hall was the centre from which those estates were run. For the uppermost ranks in society the castle hall acted as the beating heart of the complex.
If the great hall was the heart of the castle, it had many arteries spreading out from it. Beyond were the services – including buttery, pantry, kitchen, bakehouse, brewhouse and barn – geared towards feeding the household. Off the upper end were apartments for the higher-ranking members of the household and their guests – which might include a parlour, privy chamber, great chamber, garderobes, bedchambers, and a chapel.
Beyond the Castle Gate
Religion played a fundamental part in mediaeval life and there was no clear distinction between the sacred and the secular worlds (Aston 2003, 72). Consequently, castles had a strong provision of ecclesiastical structures. These might range from personal oratories at the Tower of London, to the household chapel at Haddon Hall, to the Augustinian priory at Porchester Castle (Hampshire) or the collegiate foundation within the walls of Warkworth Castle (Northumberland). Castles were sometimes founded at more or less the same time as monasteries by the same patrons as part of a planned lordly landscape. Examples include Walter Espec at Helmsley Castle and Rievaulx Abbey (North Yorkshire, 1120s) and Nicholas de Cantelupe at Greasley Castle and Beauvale Priory (Nottinghamshire, 1340s).
A close proximity between castle and parish church is near-ubiquitous, with the lord of the manor often a significant patron of the church. Examples include Bolingbroke (Lincolnshire), Northallerton (North Yorkshire) and Egmanton (Nottinghamshire). Sometimes the church was rebuilt at the same time as the foundation of the castle, as happened at Strelley (Nottinghamshire) in the 1350s where it provided a location for the burials of the lordly family.
Religious foundations by castle patrons are a reminder that the reach of a castle projected, far beyond the walls and moats, across designed landscapes of lordship (Creighton 2002, 110-132). The immediate locale of a castle could include structures essential to providing for the household. At Tattershall this included a substantial, adjacent, extra-mural enclosure which featured a collegiate foundation, bedehouses, walled gardens, a rabbit warren, fishponds and a brick-built mill. Beyond this the power of Ralph Cromwell was felt through his reorganisation of the adjoining village around a large marketplace with a prominent cross at its heart (Wright 2022, 153-163).
Such markets point towards castles acting as economic centres which could propagate regional trade (Creighton 2002, 163-66). Markets directly outside the gates of castles can be found at Lincoln, Ludlow, and Richmond. Other important features of urban life, such as grammar schools, and almshouses, were sometimes founded at the same time as castles – as they were at Tattershall by Ralph Cromwell (Wright 2022, 165-66, 167-68).
Further afield, castles acted as the centres of great agricultural estates. The open fields which surrounded castles and their settlements would provide a source of food and income for the lord, household, and tenant farmers (Creighton 2002, 89-109). The families of those farmers might also find gainful employment within the walls of high-status dwellings too. In the fourteenth century there are records of local women acting as both cleaners and singers at the royal palace at Kings Clipstone, Nottinghamshire (Wright 2016, 17, 110).
Beyond the fields could be found enclosed deer parks – intended to protect, feed and nurture beasts of the chase. Again, the infrastructure of parks required an investment in the local labour force to keep them managed, repaired and free of poachers (Creighton 2009, 100-66). Within the hinterlands of castles further structures were built including the hunting lodge at Woodhall Spa (Lincolnshire) and the banqueting house or pleasance at Kenilworth (Warwickshire). The latter was separated from the castle by a manmade lake and was probably only accessible via boat – making it an exceptionally elite space for the most high-status guests or household members (Johnson 2002, 139). Whole landscapes were designed and managed to support and project the power of the castle lords.
Women and Castles
The lordly household was primarily male, but it is possible to sense women in castles and the study of feminine patronage, space and access has been approached with greater frequency in recent years. Abigail Wheatley (2004, 78-111) has raised the connections between femininity and spiritual discourse in castle-themed poetry such as the Château d’Amour. Gillian Scott (Eadie 2015, 174-88), the current chair of the Castle Studies Group, has delved into the use of Irish tower houses within the context of family life. Karen Dempsey (2020, 85-98) has looked at the historiography and place of women as castle specialists as a preface to her discussion on the meanings and interpretation of gender within the gardens of Irish castles.
The diversity of voices within modern castle studies can, and must, be extended. It has been figures such as Ella Armitage, Roberta Gilchrist and Pamela Marshall who have helped to make significant shifts in the discipline. At various times such scholars have asked important questions which have broadened the debate away from military matters to include greater emphasis on residential aspects (Armitage 1912), spaces devoted to female members of the household and the gendered language which was used to discuss castles (Gilchrist 1999, 109-145), or the use of the great tower as a ceremonial space (Marshall 2002, 110-125).
One of the most important reassessments of any castle has come, in recent years, from Rachel Swallow’s work at Caernarfon. She has queried the orthodox view, initially proposed by Arnold Taylor (1963, 369-71), that the design of the castle walls and towers were uniquely the vision of Edward I – who wished to present himself as a new conquering emperor in the Roman mould. Instead, Swallow has proposed the significant involvement of Eleanor of Castile through a curious interplay between history, myth, and theatrical ceremony at the Queen’s Gate to the castle (Swallow 2019, 153-195). Some of the most significant statements about castles ever to have been made are those by authors – including Gilchrist, Wheatley, and Swallow – that have queried who the varied audiences for castles were and what those people thought about castles in the contemporary moment.
Breadth of the Subject
The sheer variety of the built environment of castles must be underlined. Broadly speaking, castles were constructed across Europe from the ninth through to the seventeenth century, with an especial focus on the eleventh to early sixteenth century in England. Although there are certain similarities between some sites or periods of construction, no two castles are the same. There is tremendous diversity in architecture across time, space, and patronage.
Anglo-Norman motte and bailey castles of the eleventh century look radically different to the brick courtyard castles of the late fifteenth century. An early sixteenth century Irish tower house bears little resemblance to contemporary late mediaeval English buildings. Even within a specific time period, such as the late eleventh century, the earth and timber ringworks of regional lords bore little physical relationship to William I’s great donjons at Norwich, Colchester or London. Yet all were intended to project the power of their lords.
The pages of the Castle Studies Group Journal reflects this cultural diversity and includes articles on structures such as motte and baileys, moated manor houses, courtyard houses, palaces and great stone castles. All such works were the architectural expression of lordship – it is just that the means of the lords and the physical form of their buildings altered according to available wealth, regional styles, and chronological developments.
Despite all this, we can still embrace the thoughts of latter-day militarists. Castles often had defensive elements and, in some rare cases, those features were challenged during actual armed conflict (Liddiard 2005, 71-78). Some of the best work on sieges in recent years has come from Peter Purton (2010) and Dan Spencer (2018) who offer well-rounded perspectives in the light of modern scholarship. Bodiam has once again been re-considered as a fortified site by Jonathan Foyle (2017, 10-13). Security was certainly a feature of castles. However, the wider discussion is no longer just about defences. Voices who concentrate their study on fortifications are welcome additions to the literature, but a balance has been achieved.
Definitions
Many scholars, such as Brown and Coulson, have attempted to define the castle. More recently, John Goodall (2011, 8) has offered a re-worked version of Brown’s definition: “A castle is the residence of a lord made imposing through the architectural trappings of fortification.” I especially like the use of the word “trappings” here as it acknowledges that the fortifications only had to look the part rather than necessarily be fully functional.
Personally, I would like to see a greater degree of diversity and complexity to be considered in the definition of castles. To be honest, the functions of castles are rather nebulous despite their earthworks, carpentry and masonry being oh-so-very tangible. Any definition will be open to criticism, revision, or outright rejection. However, I offer up the following option:
Mediaeval castles were highly complex architectural expressions of elite rank, power, and prestige. Castles were built in a wide variety of regional traditions for diverse patrons in chronologically differing styles. The environment of castles involved the construction and management of buildings and landscapes which may incorporate functional or symbolic military features, but this was not their primary purpose. Instead, the construction of castles was concerned with a wide range of hierarchical, ceremonial, theatrical, religious, residential, administrative, economic, agricultural, social, political, and gendered functions and perspectives which enabled a display of elite status.
Unwieldy, I know… but nuanced.
Conclusions
It must be said, though, that heavy-handed militarism lingers. Perhaps this can be excused at sites, such as Beeston (Cheshire) or Dunstanburgh (Northumberland) where it is only the defences which survive to a meaningful extent. It is difficult to tell other stories in these cases. Yet, castles with substantial surviving architecture, such as Warwick (now owned by a financial investment firm and leased to Merlin Entertainments), have a plethora of opportunities to tell a wide range of stories. However, Warwick is presented as a mediaeval theme park. Events are dominated by knights and jousting. The gift shops are full of plastic swords, helmets, and shields. The nineteenth century militaristic view of castles still reigns… which makes Warwick my least favourite castle to visit. Only a tiny fraction of the story is being told.
Part of the problem stems from pop culture representations of castles. Blockbuster films set in the mediaeval period – such as Kingdom of Heaven (2005), Robin Hood (2010) and Ironclad (2011) – rely on depictions of sieges for major set-piece action scenes. This is despite the relative rarity of sieges of castles in mediaeval warfare (Liddiard 2005, 71-78). Unfortunately, the military interpretation has been continuously reinforced by TV historians, including Dan Jones, who make programmes where the tropes presented reach little further than the research of the 1980s.
Much of the militaristic view is learned early in life from both family and school. It is impossible to stand on a castle spiral staircase and not hear a small child listening to an elderly relative knowledgably repeating the myth that they all turn clockwise to advantage right-handed defenders (a subject covered in a former Mediaeval Mythbusting Blog). Meanwhile, the coverage of castles in the National Curriculum for schools is largely stuck in the 1950s. Militarism prevails.
Despite this, castle specialists have found allies. The National Trust and Usborne Books have brought out fabulously accurate, yet hugely entertaining, books on castles for children (Colby 2021; Cox 2015). Usborne can even boast Abigail Wheatley on their roster of authors. English Heritage are generally excellent in their diverse multi-level presentation of castles through online platforms, social media, audio tours, interpretation panels and guidebooks written by genuine experts in the field such as John Kenyon, Richard K. Morris, and Marc Girouard. Having experts such as Will Wyeth on the strength at English Heritage has no doubt had a positive effect too.
There are different methods of telling the castle story, it just requires castle specialists to be able to find broader platforms to accurately communicate the last 50 years of research in innovative and accurate ways.
References
Armitage, E., 1912, The Early Norman Castles of the British Isles. John Murray. London.
Aston, M., 2003, ‘The Use of Images’ in Marks, R. & Williamson, P. (ed.’s), Gothic: Art for England, 1400-1547. V&A Publications. London. pp68-75.
Brown, R. A., 1954, English Medieval Castles. Batsford. London.
Colby, R., 2021, The Castle the King Built. Nosy Crow / National Trust. London.
Cox, P. R., 2015, What Were Castles For? Usborne. London.
Creighton, O., 2009, Designs Upon the Land – Elite Landscapes of the Middle Ages. Boydell. Woodbridge.
Creighton, O., 2002, Castles and Landscapes. Equinox. Sheffield.
Coulson, C., 1979, ‘Structural Symbolism in Medieval Castle Architecture’ in Journal of the British Archaeological Association Vol. 132. British Archaeological Association. pp73-90.
Clark, G. T., 1884, Medieval Military Architecture in England Vol. 1 & 2. Wyman & Sons. London.
Dempsey, K., 2020, ‘Planting New Ideas: A Feminist Gaze on Medieval Castles’ in Château Gaillard – Etudes de castellologie médiévale Volume 29. Publications du CRAHAM. pp85-92.
Eadie, G., 2015, “Know you that serving folk be of three kinds’ Irish towers and the familia’, in Oram, R. (ed), ‘A house such as thieves might knock at’ – Proceedings of the 2010 Stirling and 2011 Dundee Conferences. Shaun Tyas. Donington. pp174-188.
Everson, P., 1996, ‘Bodiam Castle, East Sussex: castle and its designed landscape’ in Chateau Gaillard – Etudes de castellologie médiévale Volume 17. Publications du CRAHAM. pp79-84.
Foyle, J., 2017, Bodiam Castle. National Trust. London.
Gilchrist, R., 1999, ‘The Contested Garden: Gender, space and metaphor in the medieval English castle’ in Gender and Archaeology – Contesting the Past. Routledge. London and New York. pp109-465.
Johnson, M., 2002, Behind the Castle Gate. Routledge. London.
Liddiard, R., 2005, Castles in Context. Windgatherer Press. Macclesfield.
Marshall, P., 2002, ‘The Ceremonial Function of the Donjon in the Twelfth Century’ in Château Gaillard – Etudes de castellologie médiévale Volume 20. Publications du CRAHAM. pp141-51.
Pitt-Rivers, H. L. F., 1883, ‘Excavations at Caesar’s Camp near Folkstone, conducted in June and July, 1878’ in Archaeologia Volume 47. Society of Antiquaries of London. pp429-65.
Platt, C. 1982 (1995 edition), The Castle in Medieval England & Wales. Chancellor Press. London.
Purton, P., 2010, A History of the Early and Late Medieval Siege. Boydell. Woodbridge.
Simpson, W. D., 1969, Castles in England and Wales. Batsford. London.
Spencer, D., 2018, The Castle at War in Medieval England. Amberley. Stroud.
Stocker, D., 1992, ‘The Shadow of the General’s Armchair’ in The Archaeological Journal Volume 149. Royal Archaeological Institute. pp415-20.
Swallow, R., 2019, ‘Living the dream: legend, lady and landscape of Caernarfon Castlke, Gwynedd, North Wales’ in Archaeologia Cambrensis Volume 168. Cambrian Archaeological Association.
Taylor, A., 1963, ‘Caernarvon’ in Brown, R. A., Colvin, H. M. & Taylor, A. J., The History of the King’s Works Volume I. Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. London. pp369-94.
Thompson, A. H., 1912, Military Architecture in England During the Middle Ages. Henry Frowde / Oxford University Press.
Thompson, M. W., 1987, The Decline of the Castle. Cambridge University Press.
Viollet-le-Duc, E. E., 1860 (1990 ed.), Military Architecture. Greenhill Books. London.
Warner, P., 1973, The Medieval Castle: Life in a Fortress in Peace and War. Wiedenfeld & Nicolson. London.
Wheatley, A., 2004, The Idea of the Castle in Mediaeval England. York Medieval Press.
Wright, J., 2022, Tattershall Castle: Building a History. Unpublished doctoral thesis. University of Nottingham.
Wright, J., 2021, ‘Tattershall Castle and the Newly-built Personality of Ralph Lord Cromwell’ in The Antiquaries Journal Vol. 101. Society of Antiquaries of London / Cambridge University Press. London and Cambridge.
Wright. J., 2016, A Palace for Our Kings. Triskele Publishing. Cheltenham and London.
About the author
James Wright (Triskele Heritage) is an award-winning buildings archaeologist who frequently writes and lectures on the subject of mediaeval building myths. He has two decades professional experience of ferreting around in people’s cellars, hunting through their attics and digging up their gardens. He hopes to find meaningful truths about how ordinary and extraordinary folk lived their lives in the mediaeval period.
He welcomes contact through Twitter or email.
The Mediaeval Mythbusting Blog blog is the basis of a forthcoming book – Historic Building Mythbusting – Uncovering Folklore, History and Archaeology which will be released via The History Press on 6 June 2024. More information can be found here:
