Motte-and-baileys declineīy the end of the 11th century, motte-and-bailey castles (especially those made entirely out of earth and timber) began to fall from favor. This allowed the Normans to quickly consolidate their power, then move on and conquer the next region.Īs a marker of their success, almost 1,000 motte-and-bailey castles were built in England, Wales, and Scotland.Īlthough the motte-and-bailey design is a particularly northern European phenomenon (most castles of this type can be found in Normandy and Britain), we can also see such structures in other parts of Europe, such as Denmark, Germany, Southern Italy and occasionally beyond. This meant that a motte-and-bailey castle could be built relatively quickly using local manpower and earth and timber alone as building materials. Designers could use an existing mound or hill for foundations which could save significant construction time.Ĭonstruction didn't require any special materials, and the work could usually be carried out by unskilled men. The biggest advantage of the Motte and Bailey design was how extremely cheap and easy to build it was.
Moreover, Norman designers found that the wider the ditch was dug, the deeper and steeper the sides of the scarp could be, making life even more difficult for the attackers. Attackers soon found out that the keep on top of the motte was surprisingly hard to capture as the height of the motte and the ditch surrounding it gave defenders a significant defensive advantage. The Normans were huge advocates of this type of castle design and we have already learned that motte-and-baileys were a decisive factor in the Normans successful conquest of the British Isles.ĭespite the simple and relatively rough design, motte-and-baileys had excellent defensive capabilities. Motte-and-bailey castles were immensely popular for nearly 200 years. We can see the two baileys (left and right) flanking the original motte in the middle Why were motte-and-baileys so popular? Sometimes, the ditches were filled with water by damming or diverting nearby streams forming water-filled moats.Īerial view of Windsor Castle. The bailey was linked to the motte either by a flying bridge stretching between the two, or, more commonly in England, by steps cut into the motte. The bailey was the center of domestic life within the castle and could contain a variety of buildings, including halls, kitchens, stores, stables, a chapel, barracks, and workshops. The yard was surrounded by a wooden fence called a palisade and then a ditch. The term bailey refers to a yard formed by flattening an area alongside the motte. It was not uncommon for the tower to be built and then partially buried within the mound, with the buried part forming a cellar. Larger towers were often equipped with cellars and granaries, more living rooms and rooms for the watchmen and the servants appointed to keep the house. The keep on top of the motte was the castle's last line of defense and it was the place where the lord of the castle (together with his wife) inhabited. Small mottes could only support a simple tower but larger mottes could support more complex structures that often contained multiple rooms. It was surrounded by a protective wall, originally made of wood. The keep on top of the motte was the castle's primary defensive element. The steep embankment on the side of the motte was known as a Scarp. The motte was flattened on top to make place for the wooden keep. That's because it took an enormous effort to pile up such a huge volume of earth. Large mottes could be as high as 30 meters and as large as 90 meters in diameter, but they were rarely used. It was often artificial, meaning it had to be built by piling up earth, but sometimes it incorporated a pre-existing feature of the landscape, such as a nearby hill. The Motte (the word derives from Old French) was a large earthen mound with a ditch surrounding its base. As we can see, these castles included three main design elements:
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