Castell

“ To check such marauders, or at any rate to cut them off in their retreat, other castles were constructed by the marchers, such as Castell Coch on the Taff, the tower of Whitchurch a little below it, and finally, at the head of the two great valleys of the Nedd and Taff, and at the apex of this contained triangle of mountainous country, Morlais. ”

“ And though I come pridie Calendas, before I am cald, yet (I hope) my audacity shall have audience, and my faithfulnes favor. I am your Lordshippe's Elephaunt and heere is your castell, so that where other Lords are brought to their castells, heere your castell is brought to you. ”

“ AND ye shall understande, that for to go from the dead sea afterward out of the marche of the land of promissions, is a stronge Castell that men call Carran1 in Sermoys, that is to saye, the kinges hyll in English. This castell did a King of Fraunce make, that men call Baudewin, that had conquered all that lande, and put it into Christen mens handes to kepe, and under that castell is a fayre towne that men call Sabaoth, and there about dwell many Christen men under tribute. ”

“ Donat’s, which, as Leland says, “stondith on a meane hille a quarter of a mile from the Severn Se.” This castle, partly Norman and partly Tudor, has been inhabited ever since the Norman conquest of Glamorgan; and so, as “the parkes booth and the castell long to ... a gentilman of very fair landes in that countery,” we can see no more than a glimpse of towers above the trees. But we pass close to the churchyard, and there we may see the very beautiful and uninjured Celtic cross. ”

“ When we come to the chroniclers of the middle of the 10th century we find a marked difference. It is true that the words castrum, castellum, municipium, oppidum, munitio, are still used quite indifferently by Flodoard and other writers for one and the same thing, and that in a great many cases they obviously mean a fortified town. But there are other cases where they evidently mean a castle. ”

“ I ordered some ale and bread-and-butter, and whilst our repast was being got ready, John Jones and I went to the bridge.
“This bridge, sir,” said John, “is called Pont y Velin Castell, the bridge of the Castle Mill; the inn was formerly the mill of the castle, and is still called Melin y Castell. As soon as you are over the bridge you are in shire Amwythig, which the Saxons call Shropshire. A little way up on yon hill is Clawdd Offa, or Offa’s dyke, built of old by the Brenin Offa in order to keep us poor Welsh within our bounds.” ”

“ BARCLAY'S WORKS. CONTENTS.
I. The Castell of Laboure.
II. The Shyp of Folys.
III. The Egloges.
IV. The Introductory.
V. The Myrrour of Good Maners.
VI. Cronycle complyed by Salust.
VII. Figure of our Mother Holy Church.
VIII. The Lyfe of Saynt George.
IX. The Lyfe of Saynte Thomas.
X. Haython's Cronycle.
I. The Castell of Laboure.—Wynkyn de Worde. 1506. Small Quarto. Black letter.
The title, "The castell of laboure," is within a scroll above a woodcut of men over a tub: on the verso, a cut of a man sitting at a desk. ”

“ About the same time, to wit, the thrée and twentith of September (as some write) was castell Galiard surrendred to the hands of the duke of Excester, which had béene besieged euer since the last daie of March (as before yée haue heard.) But others write that it held out seauen moneths, and was not deliuered vp till the twentith of December. This castell was not onelie strong by situation, standing vpon the top of a stéepe hill, but also closed with mightie thicke walles, and furnished with men and all maner of munition and things necessarie. The king appointed the lord Ros capteine of it. ”

“ Besides, manifest traces of a great number of wells are visible on the table-land, so that it is evident the besieged can never have wanted water, besides which, they could always descend to the two rivers.
[523] We believe that these castella were palisaded redoubts having a recess attached, similar to the wooden blockhouses represented on the Trajan Column; often even these recesses alone composed the castellum. ”

“ The Conqueror erected and restored many castles; and on the lands parcelled out to his followers they erected castles all over the country. These edifices greatly multiplied in turbulent and unsettled times; and, towards the reign of Stephen, they amounted to the almost incredible number of eleven hundred and fifteen.
As the Feudal system strengthened, castles became the heads of baronies. Each castle had a Manor, and the Castellain, Owner, or Governor was the Lord of the Manor. ”

“ Llangadoc.—“Luchewein” should not be identified with this castle; Professor Lloyd thinks it may refer to a castle at Llwch [Pg 395] Owain, a lake in the parish of Llanarthney, where there is an entrenchment known as Castell y Garreg.
Maud’s Castle.—Camden identified “Matildis castrum” with Colewent or Colwyn, but Professor Lloyd is of opinion that “a careful collation of the English and Welsh authorities for the events of the years 1198 and 1231 will make it clear that Payne’s Castle and Maud’s Castle are the same.” This of course does not affect what is said about Colwyn Castle in the text. ”

“ Do you know the Castello?"
"'"I was born here. I can tell you all. There is good accommodation in the sotterraneo. It is extended, but it is not lofty. You will have company, but the living is poor, meagre. I have said that you would not see the sun again, but you may! For in one place is a slot, cut slantwise in the stone, that the guests of the Duke who come to stay may not want air. Through the slot, one day in the year only, and then but for a very little space, comes a ray from the sun in heaven. ”

“ About the same time the king remooued all such shiriffes as were either préests or strangers, and in their places appointed knights to be shiriffes, that were of the same countrie were their offices laie. Moreouer, about this season king Edward builded the castell of Flint, and fortified the castell of Rutland and others, placing garrisons of Englishmen in the same to defend the countrie, and to kéepe the Welshmen vnder obedience. ”

“ Castlebar, Irish Caislean-an-Bharraigh (the fort of the Barrys) ; Castle-Dillon, Castle-Dermot, and Castle-Kieran were renamed from castles erected near the hermitages of the monks whose names they bear. Castel, [43] Lat. Castellum (the capital of the Electorate of Hesse-Cassel) ; Castel Rodrigo (Roderick’s castle) , in Portugal; Castel-Lamare (by the sea-shore) ; Castel-bianco (white castle) ; Castel del piano (of the plain) ; Castiglione (little castle) , in Italy. In France: Castelnau (new castle) ; Castelnaudary, anc. Castrum-novum-Arianiorum (the new castle of the Arians, i.e. the Goths) ”

“ The reference to Arundel in Domesday Book, for example, seems to imply an origin almost as early for the castle there.40 Ordericus Vitalis speaks of Dover as though there were already a castle there, when William the Conqueror stormed the town after Hastings.41 But Ordericus is our authority for the important and explicit statement that, in 1068, “the fortresses, which the Gauls call castella, had been38 very few in the provinces of England ”

“ For although those that had these castels in keeping, were sufficientlie prouided of all necessarie things for defense, yet the sudden comming of the king (whom they thought verelie would neuer haue returned) put them in such feare, that they wist not what to make of the matter, and so (as men amazed) they yéelded without anie further exception. The bishop of Durham bringing those The castel of Tickhill yéelded. Rog. Houed. prisoners with him which had yéelded vp this castell of Tickhill, came to the king the 27 daie of March, the verie daie before that Notingham castell was giuen ouer. ”

“ Leland (who says, erroneously it would seem, that Sheriff-Hutton Castle “was buildid by Rafe Nevill of Raby the fyrst Erl of Westmerland of the Nevilles,”) gives the following description of it. “There is a Base Court with Houses of Office afore the Entering of the Castelle. The Castelle self in the Front is not dichid, but it stondith in loco utcunque edito. I markid yn the fore Front of the first Area of the Castelle self 3. great and high Toures, of the which the Gate House was the Midle. In the secunde Area ther be a 5. or 6. ”

“ I have won 2 florins at play. Have changed an angel for expenses: paid 14 stivers for a basket of raisins. I have made the portrait in charcoal of Bernhard von Castell, from whom I won the money. Tomasin's brother Gerhardt has given me four Brabant ells of the best black satin, and has given me three big boxes of candied citron, so I gave the maid 3 stivers for a tip. Paid 13 stivers for wood, and 2 stivers for pine kernels. ”

“ At sunset the Prince embarked in a galley and went four miles up the Ganges to the old Fort of Ramnagar, where he was received at a carpeted and decorated landing-place by the Maharajah of Benares and witnessed a beautiful spectacle of illuminated river and battlements. Preceded by spearsmen and banners, carried in gold and silver chairs, passing between lines of cavalry, accompanied by elephants and the constant strains of wild music, the host and his Royal guest then went to the Castle. ”

“ Behind the Castle swells a great dome-shaped hill, forest-clad, and beyond that a nobler and loftier one. The Castle looks down upon the compact brown-roofed town; and from the town two picturesque old bridges span the river. Now the view broadens; through the gateway of the sentinel headlands you gaze out over the wide Rhine plain, which stretches away, softly and richly tinted, grows gradually and dreamily indistinct, and finally melts imperceptibly into the remote horizon.
I have never enjoyed a view which had such a serene and satisfying charm about it as this one gives. ”

“ They at the mountain's foot the cleft espy,
With steps by which the rugged hill to round;
And climb, till to the castle-gate they wound:
XXXVIII
Atlantes from the threshold, graved by skill,
With characters and wondrous signs, upturned
A virtuous stone, where, underneath the sill,
Pots, with perpetual fire and secret, burned.
The enchanter breaks them; and at once the hill
To an inhospitable rock is turned.
Nor wall nor tower on any side is seen,
As if no castle there had ever been.
XXXIX
Then from the lady's toils the wizard clears
His limbs, as thrush escapes the fowler's snare ”

“ The Castle on a lofty rock is so strongly grounded, bounded, and founded, that by force of man it can never be confounded; the foundation and walls are unpenetrable, the rampiers impregnable, the bulwarks invincible, no way but one it is or can be possible to be made passable. In a word, I have seen many straits and fortresses, in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and England, but they must all give place to this unconquered Castle, both for strength and situation. ”

“ Across a natural moat of great depth, on a cliff crag, stands the castle. The road picks its way down perilously; only a mule path, and that precipitous. Then it crosses the dry bed where once may have hung a draw bridge, and, entering through a portcullis, it climbs to the castle, through a winding, tortuous way, sometimes a climb, sometimes a flight of steps, sometimes open to the sky but ramped sternly on either side, sometimes through stone canyons; a place impossible to surprise. Finally you reach the top, the sky. ”

“ From the land side the castle looks perhaps even more stern and severe, and like the fortress it was in old days. Not a window is to be seen, only the bare fortifications and the old walls clad with ivy, almost as old to all appearance as the walls themselves.
What appeals to one most is the restfulness and quiet of the place. The old castle, with its towers and battlements, its cloisters and courtyard, stands just as it has stood for centuries. You are out of the world here, the bustling, hurrying, work-a-day world of to-day, and back again in a world of two or three hundred years ago. ”

“ It seems as if heaven’s sweet air must play about the towers, and heaven’s sunshine stream in at every window, of a house built from turret to foundation-stone of such royal material. The Castle might look like other castles, but every enchanted brick and stone and block of wood, every grain of mortar, every bit of glass and marble, unlike all others of its kind, would be transformed by the thought it represented and thrilled with the message it bore. ”

“ The castle of my fathers is planted high up on a ledge of rock, but so that the conical roofs of the tower just reach above the level of the plain. My mother having poor health, and having no other place to walk save one tiny platform before the castle on the edge of the abyss, took it into her head to create for herself a garden at the summit of the crag on which we were perched midway. ”

“ The castle stands high among vast, sharp-edged waves of sand at the edge of a cliff, and looks at the sea and a long, empty shore. At its feet a little river can be seen running in a narrow valley. A few miles off it rises in the red moorland, then it falls with many a cascade down ladders of crag, broadens among willows where long leaves are all horizontal in the wind, and here by the castle it has reached an elvish, merry old age already, as it moves clear over the brown stones and out among the rocks to the sea. ”

“ And by the castle walls runs an enchanted river, in which live beautiful water-witches, that sing in the moonlight, and draw the lonely home-returning knight down into their watery bowers. In the castle itself is one tower loftier than all the rest, with windows on every side, through which you can see, as in a magic glass, the whole wide earth, with its cities and its roads and all its hidden places. ”