Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The act of adding crenels to a previously unbroken parapet is termed crenellation. The function of battlements in war is to protect the defenders by giving them part of the parapet to hide behind, from which they can quickly expose themselves to launch projectiles, then retreat behind the parapet.
Annotated sketch of an Italian battlement. As an essential part of battlements, merlons were used in fortifications for millennia.The best-known examples appear on medieval buildings, where battlements, though defensive, could be attractively formed, thus having a secondary decorative purpose.
Embrasure with 3 angles of fire, Keoti Fort, India A loophole or inverted keyhole embrasure, allowing both arrow fire (through the arrowslit at the top) and small cannon fire through the circular openings, Fort-la-Latte, France Embrasure of Chinese wall Embrasures at Mdina, Malta Embrasure at Atalaya Castle (Spain) Annotated sketch of an Italian battlement
Elements of a rampart in a stone castle or town wall from the 11th to 15th centuries included: Parapet: a low wall on top of the rampart to shelter the defenders. Crenellation: rectangular gaps or indentations at intervals in the parapet, the gaps being called embrasures or crenels, and the intervening high parts being called merlons.
Crenellation is the collective name for alternating crenels and merlons: gaps and solid blocks on top of a wall. Hoardings were wooden constructs that projected beyond the wall, allowing defenders to shoot at, or drop objects on, attackers at the base of the wall without having to lean perilously over the crenellations, thereby exposing ...
The castle has a triangular plan dominated by the circular keep in the highest point. The keep is 11 m (36 ft) in diameter with walls 4.42 m (14 + 1 ⁄ 2 ft) thick. The original parapet has been kept to a height of 0.55 m, with the crenels and merlons restored. The spiral staircase is concrete. Access is to the first floor, through an arched ...
A line embattled is a square wave, representing the battlements of a castle. When a fess is embattled, only the topmost edge is altered (as in the arms of Muri bei Bern). If both edges are to be embattled, the term embattled-counter-embattled (or counter-embattled, as in the arms of Sir Cecil Denniston Burney) is used. In this case the lines ...
The 12th-century curtain wall of the Château de Fougères in Brittany in northern France, showing the battlements, arrowslits and overhanging machicolations.. In medieval castles, the area surrounded by a curtain wall, with or without towers, is known as the bailey. [4]