INTRODUCTION TO CASTLES

|in shining armor riding up to the castle, doing hand to hand combat. |

|Or maybe hundreds of guards streaming out of the castles to meet |

|their enemy. None of this is true, except in fairy tales and movies. |

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|Most of the time, the attacking force would send a messenger to the |

|lord of the castle and give notice of their intentions to attack. |

|This notice allowed the castle to surrender. Sometimes the lord |

|surrendered, but most often the castle was restocked and made ready |

|for the siege. They would restock themselves with food, supplies and |

|drink, and add men to the garrison. |

|There were three ways to take a castle. The first is not to attack |

|the castle at all - just avoid the castle altogether and seize the |

|lands around it. The second is direct assault, or laying siege to the|

|castle. The last is besieging. |

|Here is an account of a siege. Stone throwing mangonels attack the |

|towers and walls every day. The walls of the castles would hopefully |

|be breached, and towers damaged. The enemy erects wooden towers |

|called belfries, taller than the castle towers, to conceal and enable|

|bow men to shoot arrows down into the castle. While this is going on,|

|miners would be tunneling under the walls and towers of the castle in|

|preparation to collapse them. |

|To counter the mining, anti-mining tunnels could be dug by the castle|

|soldiers, which insured a ferocious hand-to-hand battle underground. |

|Inside the castle, the guards would place a pot of water near the |

|castle towers and walls. When the water rippled, they would know |