T. E. Lawrence’s Undergraduate Dissertation – Page 186

vaulted gallery, with openings at intervals into small chambers, corbelled out from the face of the wall. (52. 53). They resemble the latrines common in France in appearance, but are defensive in intention. Each is of a size fitted for one man, or two at a pinch, but freedom of movement would be very severely hampered when working in a room only 15(sixteen) inches wide. No kind of bow could be used. The openings would be available only for dropping stones. If a gallery in a wall is to have machicoulis this is of course the only possible pattern: but the whole thing is not very effective to Western minds, accustomed to the unbroken ring of corbelling along the top of the wall. In the East however the tops of towers could not be roofed in, and so the covered machicoulis were the better form. The Arabs adopted them whole-heartedly in Aleppo, and Damascus and elsewhere, and presumably the credit of their invention lies with the Hospitallers of Crac des Chevaliers. At least they have not been found in earlier buildings of the Latins. A third and still more interesting form of machicoulis exists on the tower P of the inner ward. (54) It is composed of buttresses applied to the face of the tower, and arched over at a height of some 30 feet. The front wall of the tower is then carried on them, with a peculiar double system of relieving arches relieving nothing. On top of all seem to have been machicoulis of the corbelled pattern.