A fighting platform or terrace [1] is the uppermost defensive platform of an ancient or medieval gateway, tower (such as the fighting platform on a bergfried) and breteche. The fighting platform is surrounded by a parapet, usually a battlement.
Whilst in warmer climates (for example in the Mediterranean region) the platforms were usually open, in Central Europe they were frequently covered by a roof structure (on towers by a spire or tented roof).
A portcullis is a heavy, vertically closing gate typically found in medieval fortifications. A portcullis gate is constructed of a latticed grille, made of wood or metal or both, which slides down grooves inset within each jamb of the gateway.
A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires are typically made of stonework or brickwork, or else of timber structures with metal cladding, ceramic tiling, roof shingles, or slates on the exterior.
Medieval architecture was the art and science of designing and constructing buildings in the Middle Ages. The major styles of the period included pre-Romanesque, Romanesque, and Gothic. In the fifteenth century, architects began to favour classical forms again, in the Renaissance style, marking the end of the medieval period. Many examples of religious, civic, and military architecture from the Middle Ages survive throughout Europe.
In architecture, a turret is a small circular tower, usually notably smaller than the main structure, that projects outwards from a wall or corner of that structure. Turret also refers to the small towers built atop larger tower structures.
A motte-and-bailey castle is a European fortification with a wooden or stone keep situated on a raised area of ground called a motte, accompanied by a walled courtyard, or bailey, surrounded by a protective ditch and palisade. Relatively easy to build with unskilled labour, but still militarily formidable, these castles were built across northern Europe from the 10th century onwards, spreading from Normandy and Anjou in France, into the Holy Roman Empire, as well as the Low Countries it controlled, in the 11th century, when these castles were popularized in the area that became the Netherlands. The Normans introduced the design into England and Wales. Motte-and-bailey castles were adopted in Scotland, Ireland, and Denmark in the 12th and 13th centuries. By the end of the 13th century, the design was largely superseded by alternative forms of fortification, but the earthworks remain a prominent feature in many countries.
A battlement, in defensive architecture, such as that of city walls or castles, comprises a parapet, in which gaps or indentations, which are often rectangular, occur at intervals to allow for the launch of arrows or other projectiles from within the defences. These gaps are termed embrasures, also called crenels or crenelles, and a wall or building with them is described as crenellated; alternative older terms are castellated and embattled. The act of adding crenels to a previously unbroken parapet is termed crenellation.
Texas Towers were a set of three radar facilities off the eastern seaboard of the United States which were used for surveillance by the United States Air Force during the Cold War. Modeled on the offshore oil drilling platforms first employed off the Texas coast, they were in operation from 1958 to 1963. After the collapse of one of the towers in 1961, the remaining towers were closed due to changes in threat perception and out of a concern for the safety of the crews.
A blockhouse is a small fortification, usually consisting of one or more rooms with loopholes, allowing its defenders to fire in various directions. It is usually an isolated fort in the form of a single building, serving as a defensive strong point against any enemy that does not possess siege equipment or, in modern times, artillery, air force or cruise missiles. A fortification intended to resist these weapons is more likely to qualify as a fortress or a redoubt, or in modern times, be an underground bunker. However, a blockhouse may also refer to a room within a larger fortification, usually a battery or redoubt.
A keep is a type of fortified tower built within castles during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars have debated the scope of the word keep, but usually consider it to refer to large towers in castles that were fortified residences, used as a refuge of last resort should the rest of the castle fall to an adversary. The first keeps were made of timber and formed a key part of the motte-and-bailey castles that emerged in Normandy and Anjou during the 10th century; the design spread to England, Portugal, south Italy and Sicily. As a result of the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, use spread into Wales during the second half of the 11th century and into Ireland in the 1170s. The Anglo-Normans and French rulers began to build stone keeps during the 10th and 11th centuries, including Norman keeps, with a square or rectangular design, and circular shell keeps. Stone keeps carried considerable political as well as military importance and could take a decade or more to build.
An observation tower is a structure used to view events from a long distance and to create a full 360 degree range of vision to conduct long distance observations. Observation towers are usually at least 20 metres (66 ft) tall and are made from stone, iron, and wood. Many modern towers are also used as TV towers, restaurants, or churches. The towers first appeared in the ancient world, as long ago as the Babylonian Empire.
The Point Park Civic Center was a proposed civic center for downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, where the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers forms the Ohio River. Frank Lloyd Wright designed the structure on a commission from Edgar J. Kaufmann in the late 1940s. Wright initially envisioned a circular building more than 1,000 feet (300 m) in diameter and 175 feet (53 m) tall. The structure, containing an opera house, sports arena, three movie theaters, and a convention hall, was wrapped by a spiraling strip of road. The plan expressed Wright's insistence on bringing the automobile into the social setting. It did not find favor with Pittsburgh authorities.
A water castle, sometimes water-castle, is a castle where natural or artificial water is part of its defences. It can be entirely surrounded by water-filled moats or natural waterbodies such as island castles in a river or offshore. The term comes from European castle studies, mainly German Burgenkunde. When stately homes were built in such a location, or a Wasserburg was later rebuilt as a residential manor, the German term becomes Wasserschloss, lit. "water palace/manor".
A curtain wall is a defensive wall between fortified towers or bastions of a castle, fortress, or town.
Bergfried is a tall tower that is typically found in castles of the Middle Ages in German-speaking countries and in countries under German influence. Stephen Friar in the Sutton Companion to Castles describes a bergfried as a "free-standing, fighting-tower". Its defensive function is to some extent similar to that of a keep in English or French castles. However, the characteristic difference between a bergfried and a keep is that a bergfried was typically not designed for permanent habitation.
In medieval fortification, a bretèche or brattice is a small balcony with machicolations, usually built over a gate and sometimes in the corners of the fortress' wall, with the purpose of enabling defenders to shoot or throw objects at the attackers huddled under the wall. Depending on whether they have a roof, bretèches are classified in two types: open and closed. The open ones were accessed from the battlement's wall walk, or from a crenel.
The architecture of Scotland in the Middle Ages includes all building within the modern borders of Scotland, between the departure of the Romans from Northern Britain in the early fifth century and the adoption of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century, and includes vernacular, ecclesiastical, royal, aristocratic and military constructions. The first surviving houses in Scotland go back 9500 years. There is evidence of different forms of stone and wooden houses exist and earthwork hill forts from the Iron Age. The arrival of the Romans led to the abandonment of many of these forts. After the departure of the Romans in the fifth century, there is evidence of the building of a series of smaller "nucleated" constructions sometimes utilizing major geographical features, as at Dunadd and Dumbarton. In the following centuries new forms of construction emerged throughout Scotland that would come to define the landscape.
A conical roof or cone roof is a cone-shaped roof that is circular at its base and terminates in a point.
A butter-churn tower is a two-part defensive tower in which the upper section has a smaller width than the lower section.
A half tower, open tower, or open-gorged tower is a fortified stone tower in an external wall or castle enceinte that is open, or only lightly constructed, at the rear. Towers of this type were used, for example, in city walls. City gates can also be incorporated into a type of half tower.
The corner towers were defensive towers built at the corners of castles or fortresses.
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