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A 19th-century reconstruction of the keep at Château d'Étampes. Since the 16th century, the English word keep has commonly referred to large towers in castles. [4] The word originates from around 1375 to 1376, coming from the Middle English term kype, meaning basket or cask, and was a term applied to the shell keep at Guînes, said to resemble a barrel. [5]
A shell keep is a style of medieval fortification, best described as a stone structure circling the top of a motte. In English castle morphology, shell keeps are perceived as the successors to motte-and-bailey castles, with the wooden fence around the top of the motte replaced by a stone wall.
The Device Forts, also known as Henrician castles and blockhouses, were a series of artillery fortifications built to defend the coast of England and Wales by Henry VIII. [a] Traditionally, the Crown had left coastal defences in the hands of local lords and communities but the threat of French and Spanish invasion led the King to issue an order, called a "device", for a major programme of work ...
Medieval fortification refers to medieval military methods that cover the development of fortification construction and use in Europe, roughly from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to the Renaissance. During this millennium, fortifications changed warfare, and in turn were modified to suit new tactics, weapons and siege techniques.
In particular, a medieval type of European castle is known as a motte-and-bailey. Castles and fortifications may have more than one bailey, and the enclosure wall building material may have been at first in wood, and later transitioned to stone. Their layout depends both on the local topography and the level of fortification technology employed ...
The keep was richly decorated with hangings and furnishings. [74] Dating from the second quarter of the 12th century, it is Rochester Castle's dominant feature. It had a square plan, and measures 70 by 70 feet (21 by 21 m) externally with pilaster buttresses at each corner. The keep was built in the castle's southern corner, close to the ...
Arnside Tower, a late-medieval pele tower in Cumbria Smailholm Tower near Kelso in Scotland Preston Tower, Northumberland. Peel towers (also spelt pele) [1] are small fortified keeps or tower houses, built along the English and Scottish borders in the Scottish Marches and North of England, mainly between the mid-14th century and about 1600. [2]
Square Norman keeps continued to be built after Orford, whilst Henry II was aware of fully circular castle designs before building the keep. [19] A round keep was constructed at New Buckenham, Norfolk, in 1146, for example. [20] Historians have therefore questioned to what extent the design can be seen as legitimately transitional. [19]