T. E. Lawrence’s Undergraduate Dissertation – Page 130

broad enough for a cross-bow. The archer would be forced to stand back within the tower ; and to pass a yard-long arrow or broad quarrell through a slit three inches or less in width is a feat requiring some skill, even if the shot is to be straight ahead. Through such loopholes as those in the garden wall of New College Oxford an arc of fire only 21 yards long at a range of 100 yards is the maximum. Walls generally speaking are always defended from the top. The loops at Safita are evidently intended only to light the chapel, and they do it very badly at that. Those of the hall occupying the first floor are a little broader, but it is hardly possible from them to command the ground near the foot of the tower. The roof on the other hand is flat and unencumbered with fittings, and on the top of each merlon is a recessed socket, for the swinging bar of the shutter that closed the crenellations ; this shows that some use was made of it in attacks, cut even so the keep of Safita can never have been a very efficient stronghold. It would be crowded with a garrison of 200 men and the necessary stores, which must have included water, for the upper floor (evidently meant, by its door, as a last resort) has no means of access to the cistern in the foundations. The keep can never have stood alone. There are remains of walls to the east, and in Rey's plan they are more comprehensible than to-day, since the governor of the district is