Whether looming over the land as a symbol of a ruler’s authority or providing
a setting for displays of wealth and power in spectacular feasts and
tournaments, castles made a visual statement about their owners. All architecture
has symbolic overtones, and the castle is a potent image.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, mounds, palisades, and ditches
were enough to indicate a seat of power, but as stone masonry replaced
timber, towers and crenellated palisades and rooflines defined the castle.
The licenses to crenellate, which the king issued as official permission to
fortify a place or residence, indicated a social status as much as a need
for defense. In the fourteenth century, the introduction of gunpowder in
wars irrevocably changed the nature of battles and affected the design of
castles. High walls and tall towers made excellent targets, so builders emphasized
defense in depth—low walls and wide moats. Eventually earlier
castles became an encumbrance because maintenance of a huge masonry
structure drained resources better spent on men and munitions. Nevertheless,
the idea of a castle—the castle as a symbol—lived on.
As warfare changed, the king needed money to pay armies of mercenary
troops, but as we have seen the oldest and most distinguished nobles
counted their wealth in land, not money. Newly rich city people who
engaged in commerce had the necessary ready cash. Consequently the
king and a few forward-looking nobles favored the cities. They founded
new cities and gave the burghers positions at court. These retainers, who
wanted to be associated with power and prestige, formed a new social hierarchy.
An important way for one of these “new men” to establish himself
in the eyes of his neighbors was to build a splendid castle for his
family home. Meanwhile those already in the feudal hierarchy crenel
lated and refurbished their inherited castles. The addition of crenellated
battlements to a simple domestic building gave it and the owner immediate
stature and credibility. Even today, we can still see crenellations
decorating college halls, government buildings, and even private houses.
Just as towers and crenellations indicated a building’s status, so the
crenellated wall signified a castle in the visual arts and in that distinctive
medieval sign language known as heraldry. The heraldic symbol of
the kingdom of Castile, for example, consisted of a wall and three crenellated
towers. This simple composition was easily recognized and reproduced.
As the emblem of the powerful French queen Blanche of Castile
(the mother of Louis IX and regent during his childhood, 1226–34) the
heraldic castle appears beside the lilies of France in works of art, such as
the stained glass windows of the cathedral of Chartres and the Ste.-
Chapelle in Paris.
World History
