T. E. Lawrence’s Undergraduate Dissertation – Page 224

hill-side. At Hautefort(75) near Perigueux he cut one ditch across the neck of the ridge of hill, and led the entry along it through an outwork and then over it by a bridge. There is really no necessity to assume that the architects of these and a hundred similar fortresses went to the trouble and ex- pense of visiting the Holy Land, to learn from the Byzantines how to labour the obvious. The kind of building erected within these ditches one may gather from the castles of Carcassonne,(84) and Lehon,(85) or the much-repaired "tour du Moulin" at Chinon. There would be plain curtain walls with hoards, and lofty round towers at the angles ; if the place was large enough there would be salient towers,half-round,along the curtain as well. Very complicated defences were not required so early : they came in as they were required, for military architecture is less a series of miraculous improvements than a steady development along existing lines. The square keep was an exception with- out precedent, and without result : when it had been over- passed the evolution of the form outlined in earthwork was resumed. A few details must be cleared up as far as possible. In the vexed question of machicoulis one can come to no decision. The ordinary type are found apparently first in France round three sides of a little tower in the castle of Montbron near Chalus in the Limousin.(96) The tower is evidently Italian