A Medieval Knight's Dream
T0 buildor not to build, that is the quest
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A Medieval Knight's Dream T0 buildor not to build, that is the quest |
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The Music Room
Castles
.... ............... As you look out the wind hole of the giant keep all you see is the moat and the giant meadows! You see the horses and nights charging towards the castle. Panic flies all over your body. You tell your servants to run and warn the defenders to prepare for a siege. BOOOM! The castle wall starts collapsing!
Stone castles first existed in the 9th century. The castle was held together with mortar. The mortar held the bricks of the castle together. Walls could be as thick as thirty feet! Passages under ground were also helpful to defenders. They have many parts to them. They are the Keep, the Sentry Walk, the moat, the Inner and Outer Bailey, the Inner and Outer gatehouse, the Curtain and the Drawbridge. They are often built on high mountains surrounded by a moat. This makes the castle harder to attack. A drawbridge lays across the moat and can be raised when under attack. Comfort is not what castles were designed for. A castle was built to be a fort and was designed to withstand a siege. The castle also has an Inner and Outer wall. In case the enemy got through the Outer wall the Inner wall was also protective to the king and his servants. The Outer wall is covered in merlons which are steel plates so it is harder to get through the wall. The holes in the wall are made for defenders to fire arrows at the enemy. There are also holes in the ceiling and floor. This allows castle inmates to look down and see if the intruder in friendly or not. If he does not look friendly they will pour a sticky substance called Greek Fire which can easily burn through flesh and kill them. These are called murder holes. A crusader castle has a second and third wall for defense. That is the design of a castle.
A castle has many defenses. One of them is that the walls had small slits in them. They were called arrow loops. These allowed the defenders to shoot arrows out at the enemy. They stood on ledges or galleries. If one defender died the rest did not care! They just went on with the battle. Round walls made each part of the castle harder to hit. Outer walls gradually got thicker and was harder to get through and harder to get over. Doors and gates had thick iron plates on them and needed more protection because they were wooden. A series of walls is farther from the moat so it would be even harder for the enemy. The castle could not get fresh food under attack. When their supplies ran out they would have to surrender. So the defenders had to get rid of the enemy before the supplies were gone.
A castle could attack in many ways. Giant crossbows and cannons were some of the main sources of attack for a castle. They also used catapults, crossbows, and bow and arrows. They started lighting arrows on fire for more destruc- tion. If they were attacking a castle and were loosing bad the horse helped them get out fast. Soldiers or Knights used ladders or scaling towers to climb over walls. They also used a battering ram to Knock down walls. Castles were very important in the Middle Ages.