![]() The base of the motte was surrounded by a ditch, which may have been filled with water. ![]() With this technique the builders could create a dry place in a possible swampy area, or keep the castle out of reach of the river in low lands. Finally the whole mound was revetted with a thick coat of clay to keep out water. In certain cases, to avoid the shifting of materials and to provide greater stability to the motte, alternating layers of stone, peat, clay, chalk, rubble, gravel, brushwood or sand were inserted between rammed or beaten down layers of earth. The motte could be completely man-made-an important or even enormous undertaking-but if there was a suitable hill in the area it would be adapted by scarping, that is, cutting vertically down the sides and digging away the lower slopes. The motte proper was a conical mound which might vary considerably in size (between 6 and 15 m). The often found subsequent difficulties with water damaging the construction lead to some inventions: –– Matthew Balent: "The compendium of Weapons, Armour & Castles", Palladium Books: Taylor, 1991. ![]() The difficulty in differentiating these types of castles may be illustrated in this watercolour picture by Wilfrid Ball in "Sussex Painted" (1906): So they just used an existing castle:īodiam Castle was used in Monty Python and the Holy Grail in an establishing shot identifying it as "Swamp Castle" in the "Tale of Sir Lancelot" sequence Then of course, Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh springs from a family that had its seat at Glücksburg Castle.Ĭastle Vischering might look most like what we expect for a medieval castle:īut to get even more to the point of Monty Python: they did not have that much money for extensive props. Today, many of these were either transformed into more comfy residences in later years and thus lost their military character (quite late construction date exception of Bourtange in Groningen), had their marshlands drained, or they did succumb – not in the least through military actions – or in their construction itself, due to the permanent water stress upon the construction. A clear cut definition and distinction between swamp castle and water castle seems difficult. They were popular everywhere where there was enough water influencing the surrounding terrain to form a natural obstacle for approaching enemies. But that is only indicating that a lot of wetlands can be found in those regions. They were most often built along the Northern European plains on the South shore of the North sea and the Baltic Sea. Harburg (Horeburg/near Hamburg), the first castle at Danzig are perhaps the most famous of these. As noted, this type of castle was extremely common.
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