And if you go to the Vale of Towy, and see Dryslwyn Castle,
remember that the wall once came down before the miners expected, and
that many men were crushed.
In order to prevent mining, many changes were made. Moats were dug
round the castle, and filled with water. Brattices were made along
the top of the towers, galleries through the floor of which the
defenders could pour boiling pitch on the besiegers. The walls were
built at such angles that a window, with archers posted behind it,
could command each wall. Stronger towers were built--round towers
with a coping at each storey, solid as a rock, which would crack and
lean without falling; there is a leaning tower at Caerphilly Castle.
One other way I must mention--the child or the wife of the castellan
would be brought before the walls, and hanged before his eyes unless
he opened the gates.
The newer or Edwardian castles, those of the reigns of Henry III. and
Edward I., are concentric--that is, there are several castles in one;
so that the besiegers, when they had taken one castle, found
themselves face to face with another, still stronger, perhaps, inside
it. Of these castles, the most elaborate is the castle of
Caerphilly, built by Gilbert de Clare, the Red Earl of Gloucester who
helped Edward in the Welsh wars.
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