The collapse of the Roman Empire, the establishment of Germanic realms and dreadful invasions marked the beginning of a new era. The decline of institutions, the lack of military means and the complete decrease of central power brought far-reaching changes, while insecurity gave rise to the first medieval castles. During the 9th and 10th centuries, which were dominated by violence and troubles, there was a general revival of fortification. Fortifications reflected the local power of the numerous lords; they reassured the frightened common folk and allowed the protection of people and property. Organized defenses, even rudimentary ones, offered the possibility for a small garrison to resist mounted attackers. Two types of fortification gradually appeared: urban and rural.
Urban fortification was often due to the initiative of the local bishop, who sometimes organized the people for survival and self-defense. Not before the 12th century, however, would cities regain the importance they had had in the Roman empire, as we shall see in chapter 5. Much more significant was rural fortification, which evolved following the Celtic, Roman and Germanic tradition. Farms, villages and hamlets were isolated, more or less at the mercy of nature and vulnerable to outlaws, raiders and invaders. Fortified, they constituted a type of primitive refuge, which went by various names: for example, borough in Britain, Burg in Germany, burcht in the Netherlands, ferte, plessis and bourg in France. Those terms survive today in the names of numerous villages and towns.
Rural fortifications were characterized by the use of wood and earth. A common feature was the stockade or palisade, widely used since ancient times. It was a barrier, fence, breastwork or a defensive wall made of pointed tree-trunks, set vertically in the ground. The cohesion and solidity of the poles were reinforced by ropes, transverse beams and stones forming foundations in the ground. The stockade was very often placed on an earth wall, created by digging a ditch and heaping up the soil on the inner side of the excavation. This was the easiest and earliest permanent method of marking a boundary or creating a fortified perimeter. Sharp sticks, dead bushes or thorny hedges were sometimes placed in the ditch to provide further protection (prefiguring barbed wire). The top of the earth wall behind the stockade was flattened to create a wall-walk (also called allure), permitting circulation and defense.
The combination of ditch and earth wall formed a passive obstacle, while the stockaded parapet sheltered the inhabitants within from enemy missiles and provided for the active emplacement of combat. This primitive form of fortification constituted a considerable defense, but it needed constant maintenance. Another drawback was that if the palisade was relatively cheap and rapidly raised, it was vulnerable to battering ram and fire.
The inhabitants could also find protection in the church, which was very often the only stone building in
Cross-section of wooden and earth defense. The cross-section shows the ditch (which was sometimes double) and the earth wall crowned by a palisade and a wall-walk. The gatehouse was possibly a wooden tower with a primitive drawbridge.
The village. Constructed in great numbers before the erection of the stone castles, fortified churches were a common feature not only on the pirate-infected coasts or in the regions exposed to Saracen raiders, but all over Europe. The village church could easily be converted into a defensive structure with just a few adaptations. By narrowing the windows in loopholes, crenellating the top of the walls, reinforcing the doors and using the bell-tower as an observatory and a donjon, churches and cathedrals were turned into fortresses. Furthermore, medieval country churches were usually surrounded by the village cemetery; if the cemetery wall was well maintained and adapted to defense, it could be used as an external line of combat. So, with determination, a good deal of luck and many prayers, the frightened villagers were in some cases capable of resisting a gang of bandits, a party of looters or a group of raiders.
Examples of fortified religious buildings are numerous throughout Europe: Se Vilha (old cathedral) in Coimbra and Lisbon in Portugal, the church of Signy-le-Petit and Liart in the French Thierache, the church of Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer in Camargue, the cathedral Saint-Eti-enne in Agde and the cathedral of Albi in France or the Sankt-Michaelis Kirche in Hildesheim in Germany, just to mention a few.
World History
