Motte and bailey

From Traditional Witchcraft Wiki Project

A Motte-and-Bailey is a form of castle. Many were built in Britain and France in the 11th and 12th centuries, especially in England following the Norman Conquest of 1066.

The motte is a raised earth mound, like a small hill, usually artificial and topped with a wooden or stone structure known as a keep. The earth for the mound would be taken from a ditch, dug around the motte or around the whole castle. The outer surface of the mound could be covered with clay or strengthened with wooden supports. Rarely a castle might have two mottes.

The bailey is an enclosed courtyard, typically surrounded by a wooden fence and overlooked by the motte. A castle could have more than one bailey, sometimes an inner and an outer. Alternately, the multiple baileys could flank the motte.

Motte-and-bailey castles could be very quickly erected; according to records, William the Conqueror had one built at Pevensey in eight days. The rapidity and ease with which it was possible to construct castles of this type made them characteristic of the Norman Conquest period in England and of the Anglo-Norman settlements in Wales, Ireland and the Scottish lowlands. In later days a stone wall replaced the timber palisade and produced what is known as the shell-keep. The remains of castle mottes can be found in many parts of Britain. In many cases, however, earth and timber defences were never replaced with stone.