and still more...

The motte

The motte varied in size from:◦50 – 120’ in height and 50 to 300 feet in diameter

The size of the motte was influenced by whether it was necessary to impress the population both militarily and politically

The motte of the Castle were constructed using earth

The process of excavating the earth to build the motte created a defensive ditch at the base of the motte

The motte was crowned with a wooden tower which served as a look-out, an elevated fighting point and provided housing for the lord of the castle.

Layout of the Tower

The Tower, complete with defences, was built at the top of the motte.

The Tower usually consisted of two or three storeys:◦The Ground Floor housed a kitchen and storeroom

The First Floor housed the Great Hall (optional)

The Top floor housed the Lord's apartments

Outer walls

The motte and Bailey Castle tower was surrounded by a rampart and palisades - A fence of pales forming a defence barrier or fortification (a pale was a fence, or timber wall, made with a stake or pointed stick which enclosed the area)

Some castles had a parapet - a low wall along the top of the rampart

A wooden bridge afforded access to the top of the motte and the Tower during time of peace

In time of siege the bridge was completely removed

Towers, or Keeps, were built as the most protected part of the castle.

Under Attack

When the area around a castle was under attack, the local inhabitants could retreat first to the bailey and then to the motte if the attackers managed to enter the castle.

From the top of the motte the defenders could throw missiles at their attackers and defend or even destroy the narrow bridge that linked the bailey to the motte.

Attackers would need to:

Penetrate the first line of defences provided by the bailey

Cross the ditch which surrounded the motte ( the bridge used during times of peace would be removed during a siege situation)

Climb or crawl up the steep mound to the pinnacle of the motte

Negotiate the fortified tower gate

And finally attack and capture the tower or keep

All the time they would be bombarded with arrows and other missiles.

From the top of the motte the defenders could throw missiles at their attackers and defend or even destroy the narrow bridge that linked the bailey to the motte.

Attackers would need to penetrate the first line of defences provided by the Bailey

Cross the ditch which surrounded the motte ( the bridge used during times of peace would be removed during a siege situation)

Climb or crawl up the steep mound to the pinnacle of the motte

Negotiate the fortified tower gate

And finally attack and capture the Tower or Keep

All the time they would be bombarded with arrows and other missiles!

The Layout of the Bailey

The Bailey was a defended yard which contained:

Barracks

Stables

Livestock

Other buildings for storage

The perimeter of the Bailey was surrounded by a ditch which was often filled with water

Filling such a ditch with water was sometimes impractical and in this situation the ditch was filled with spikes and other obstacles!

The entrance to the Bailey was through a large wooden gate some of these gates had Guardhouses which were built either side of the gate

When the motte and Bailey Castles were completed many were covered in white plaster - which made them look as if they were made of stone

Kitchens

In a few castles the kitchens were built in the keep but in most castles the kitchens were in buildings outside in the bailey.

When the king or lord was staying in the castle there would have been plenty of banquets and plenty of guests to feed.

The kitchens had to be large and they had to have large fireplaces over which all the food was cooked. This included whole oxes or pigs which were roasted on spits over the open fires. Vegetables and stews would be cooked in large pots over the fires and they would have baked a lot of bread.

Store rooms

In normal times most of the food and drink used in the castle would have been supplied fresh from the surrounding land but anything that needed to be stored was kept in store rooms. Stored rooms can commonly be found on the lowest floor of the keep.

The Castle Entrance

The entrance to the keep of the castle was usually on the first floor and not at ground level. This made it easier to defend as a drawbridge could be used. When the King or Lord was in residence his best knights could sleep and eat in this area guarding their master at all times.

Toilets or Garderobes

Toilets were simply holes in the floor that emptied through passages in the walls out into the moat or ditch around the castle. Designers of the castle had to be careful that attackers could not enter the castle through the toilet and so even the toilets were protected, either by making the holes too small to get through or too high to reach.

The Great Hall

The great hall was were all the important meetings and banquets took place.

Everyone eat at long tables sitting on benches apart from the nobles who would have had chairs to emphasise their importance.

The lord, his family and important guests would sit at the high table.

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The well

A castle needed to have its own water supply. This was because in the time of a siege when it was not possible get supplies the people in the castle were assured of at least water to drink. Without fresh water the castle would have been forced to surrender much more quickly. Wells were constructed inside the castles, sometimes inside the keep itself so that the keep could be held against the attackers even if the outer walls of the castle had fallen.

Stables

As horses were the main method of transport in medieval times it was important to have them kept safe within the castle walls.

ONE EXAMPLE:

... a hall well ceiled with oak. On the western side is a bed, on the ground, a stone chimney, a wardrobe and a certain other small chamber; at the eastern end is a pantry and a buttery.

Between the hall and the chapel is a sideroom. There is a chapel covered with tiles, a portable altar and a small cross. In the hall are four tables on trestles. There are a good kitchen well covered with tiles, with a furnace and ovens, one large the other small for cakes, two tables, and alongside the kitchen a small house for baking. Also a granary covered with oak shingles and a building in which the dairy is contained, Likewise a chamber suitable for clergyman and an inner chamber. Also a henhouse. These are within the inner gate.

Likewise outside of that gate are an old house for the servants, a good stable, long and divided, and to the east of the principal building, beyond the smaller stable, a solar for the use of the servants. Also a building in which is contained a bed; also two barns, one for wheat and one for oats. These buildings are enclosed with a moat, a wall, and a hedge. Also beyond the middle gate is a good barn, and a stable of cows and another for oxen, these old and ruinous. Also beyond the outer gate is a pigsty. This was not a castle, just a large manor It did, however, have its chapel and hall and was surrounded by a moat and an enclosure wall with a gatehouse.

Purposes of the castle

The objective of the motte and Bailey castle occupants was to control the surrounding area. Other purposes included:

To act as a fortified post from which an attack could be launched or a strong defence could be made

To provide a base where men, provisions and horses could be housed

To overawe and frighten the local population

to provide a base from which the lord could govern and control the surrounding district - and launch a strong attack or defence.

The motte and Bailey Castle was not used as a refuge or a retreat where men cowered behind walls - it was there to dominate the indigenous population.

The Norman soldiers therefore spent a lot of their time patrolling the surrounding area.

Foot soldiers could cover up to 30 miles in one day and horse soldiers could cover much wider areas.

Life in a motte and Bailey Castle

Life in the Bailey was:

Busy - workers and armed men completing their daily tasks

Noisy - People talking, shouting orders, doing work together with the noises made by livestock

Dirty – the bailey was built on a mound of earth

Boring - most of the tasks performed were routine

The life of the soldier would have centered around the bailey - patrolling and practicing and improving their weapon skills. Their leisure time would have been spent resting, some gambling and praying.

The workers in the bailey were expected to ensure the life of the lord and his soldiers was as comfortable and orderly as possible.

The blacksmiths were expected to make the weapons and ensure that enough arrow heads were produced. Their 'smithy' environment was hot and noisy and their life governed by the demands of the lord of the castle.

The horses were extremely important to the lord and knights - the horses had to be fed, groomed and their stables kept clean - life around the stables was also noisy and smelly!

The kitchen staff and servants would be expected to feed the lord and the soldiers.

The bailey would house small animals - and the animals would need to be slaughtered during the autumn as it was not economic or practical to feed animals during the winter.

The meat was preserved in salt.

Bread was a mainstay of everyone's diet.

Grain, cabbage, ale or cider was obtained from the local area. The foodstuff all needed to be stored - enough was required to not only feed men on a day-to-day basis but also the withstand a siege situation.

Life in the Tower

Exactly what form the early halls took in Normandy itself has been a subject of much debate.

The typical arrangement consisted of an independent communal great hall at ground--floor level, open to the timber roof, associated with a residential block in two stages.

Life in the norman motte and bailey castle was not just designed as a fortress it was also a residence for the lord and possibly his family - they all lived in the most secure part of the castle - the tower.

The tower was positioned on top of the motte and was reached via a wooden bridge from the bailey.

Larger towers were complex buildings

The tower generally had two or three storeys:

The Ground Floor housed a kitchen and storeroom

The First Floor housed the Great Hall

This would usually only be built if the location was of significant political or military importance and semi-permanent occupation of the castle was envisioned

The Top floor housed the Lord's apartments

If the Tower had a Great Hall then there would be some forms of entertainment - the richer the Lord the better and more varied the entertainment.

Meals would be also be taken in the great Hall and religious observances such as Mass would be taken here.

Life in the Tower would also be noisy, dirty, busy and smoky - there was little privacy for any of the inhabitants.

Life for the Lord and his Family

Life in the Norman motte and bailey castle was better for the lord and his family than for anyone else.

The norman lords and knights who owned the castles tended to move around continuously.

The majority of motte and bailey castles were seldom occupied for long periods.

Everyday life in the motte and Bailey castle would follow a similar routine:

• Life in the castle started at cock crow

• Mass would be heard at a portable altar in the Great Hall

• Breakfast

• Lord would attend to business matters in relation to his land

• Mid morning meal

• Lord would go hunting or inspect the estate

• Ladies would undertake embroidery etc

• Evening supper in the Hall - with occasional entertainment

SOLAR

Another room in larger (and alter) castles was the solar, the private withdrawing chamber for the lord, his family and guests

The solar would hold the lord's bed, a four--poster with curtains not only for added privacy - the whole family and guests might be in this room, as well as a body servant or two - but also to help keep out the draughts.

Other furniture would include at least one large trunk or chest for clothes, and perhaps another for armour, though rods or rails for hanging clothes might be provided.

A chair would be a luxury for the lord and lady.

Stools, benches or the floor were good enough for most people.

The floor might be covered with fur rugs.

Inside a donjon or external hall the main rooms were probably plastered and perhaps whitewashed. Some could be decorated, a common theme being painted lines to represent masonry.

Around the hall were satellite buildings.

In a few castles the kitchens were built in the keep but in most castles the kitchens were in buildings outside in the bailey.

The kitchens had to be large and they had to have large fireplaces over which all the food was cooked. This included whole cattle, oxen, or pigs which were roasted on spits over the open fires. Vegetables and stews would be cooked in large pots over the fires and they would have baked a lot of bread.

The kitchen contained at least one oven, probably with spits, tables for food preparation, shelves and hooks for storage and hanging utensils.

At least one hearth was needed for large cauldrons for boiling ('seething') meat, a common form of cooking at the time.

Toilets or Garderobes

A few castles also boast the occasional urinal, a rare utility in a Norman donjon.

Privies are much more common in donjons. They were simply holes in the floor that emptied through passages in the walls out into the moat or ditch around the castle.

They are sometimes formed in pairs, side by side or back to back either side of a wall section, and thus sometimes share a chute. Some are obviously designed for use by anyone in the main room, but others lead from a mural chamber and are obviously more private.

Some were provided with a wooden door, probably more to block off odours than for privacy. Window openings in a privy might well have no shutter, the better to vent the room.

The opening of a privy would be covered by a wooden

seat, probably with a rectangular or keyhole aperture cut in

it. The waste passed out through an opening on the outside

of the wall face, some of these being quite elaborate.

Designers of the castle had to be careful that attackers could not enter the castle through the toilet and so even the toilets were protected, either by making the holes too small to get through or too high to reach

Granary

If the size of the castle warranted it, there might be a granary for grain and flour, probably set on short piles to guard against vermin.

Otherwise dry food such as flour and bread would be kept in a pantry (the word deriving from the French word for bread, pain). The buttery (from the old French word bouteul, meaning bottle) held barrels of wine, beer and perhaps cider.

Limited stocks of spirits, such as English mead or French brandy, might be held for the lord and his guests.

Other buildings

Other buildings in the Norman castle might include a brewery for

producing beer and in some areas a wine press, a bakehouse for making large quantities of bread, not to mention dovecotes to provide pigeons for the table.

There would also be grain silos, barns, stables and animal pens.

Many of these buildings would be timber--framed with wattle and daub infills, and some might be of lean--to form.

Barns contained fodder for animals, as well as farm equipment such as ploughs or harrows, for working the demesne in the nearby fields.

They would also contain carts, in some royal or large castles quite a number, not just agricultural wagons but also the numerous vehicles required to carry all the equipment if the lord went on campaign or on a long journey.

STABLES

Stables were essential: not only were there knightly warhorses, but riding horses of varying quality, from good palfreys for the lord, lady and knights, to hacks for squires and perhaps mounted sergeants.

Packhorses and carthorses were also needed. In some cases mules were used instead for riding, or as pack or draught animals, or oxen might be used to pull carts.

All of these beasts of burden needed accommodation and food.

Kennels

Some lords might have kennels for a pack of hunting dogs, since hunting was almost an obsession with many Normans, not least the royal court circle

Workshops

Together with the housing for animals and equipment, there were the various workshops necessary for keeping a castle in working order.

A carpenter's shop was essential since so much of even a stone castle was made from wood; the roof beams, flooring, doors and draw,bars, window shutters, some roof shingles, toilet covers, tables, benches, stools and chairs, shelves, cupboards, chests, beds, perhaps even shields and weapon staves, not to mention those domestic buildings constructed from wood.

Together with this work went that of the blacksmith: he provided nails for everything, as well as hinges, door handles and bolts, iron implements of all sorts, plough shares, etc. In many castles he may have turned his hand to repairing or making simpler pieces of armour, but this was more the job of the professional armourer or mail maker, who might also produce, repair or sharpen weapons.

Smiths would need a furnace, bellows, anvil and water trough or bucket for quenching. Their workshops would need to have either shuttered windows or none at all, to allow them to judge by colour when to remove metal from the fire.

CHAPEL

All castles would have a chapel, if not in the tower (keep or donjon) itself then a separate building in the bailey.

It might be anything from small and fairly plain to attractively decorated and impressive.

The personnel varied according to the size of the structure and the importance of the holder.

A priest had an important role in a castle. Since the whole community was Catholic, religious services were well attended.

In addition, if a man was seriously wounded, or someone was old or dying of disease, a priest was needed to confess and shrive him before his end.

In some castles a priest or his clerks might be the only people able to read, and this was a necessary skill if messages arrived from the duke or king.

Advantages & Disadvantages

motte and bailey castles, being made from timber and earthworks were relatively quick to build, taking only a few weeks or months, a distinct advantage in hostile and newly-conquered territories where recently subjugated tribes might launch revenge attacks on their new overlords or, at the very least, proved reluctant to be conscripted into their construction.

In addition, this type of fortification did not require any particularly skilled labour or stones to be quarried and transported, which dramatically reduced their cost of construction.

As they were largely made of wood, motte and bailey castles were susceptible to fire during an attack, as can be seen in various scenes from the Bayeux Tapestry

motte and bailey castles did not resist the weather well either, with mounds and timber structures degrading over time and even causing the collapse of towers.

For these reasons, more permanent stone castles, despite their huge expense and the years needed to build them, were commissioned as a safer, longer-lasting, and more comfortable residence by those who could afford them.