T. E. Lawrence’s Undergraduate Dissertation – Page 58

there is at an angle a berm so disposed as to be practically an outwork. The presence of a small ditch across the centre of this camp almost persuades Allcroft to call it a Norman addition. If this were the case, then the entrance would also be Norman, for the transverse wall is a necessary part of its defence. One may reasonably consider the whole to be pre-Norman, and of one date. (i.e. All......e ...........ork b........, o... ........... n............r Don......: English: earthworks are not intended to stand long sieges : only seldom is there water with... them. The finest are usually on bare chalk downs, since chalk was so easily worked, and yet so little friable. None the less they are of exceptional interest, as definite fore-runners of the multiple-castles of the thirteenth century. Their ground- plans, for efficiency of defence, have never been improved upon, and they are still extant in such numbers, and often on such a colossal scale, as to give a very high idea of the culture of their engineers. It was in all respects most unfortunate that the clumsy substitute of the imported Norman keep checked their development for nearly a century. The question as to the amount of skill in mason's work common in Western Europe between the ninth and the eleventh century is not very important. In Paris the inhabitants prepared stone walls and towers against the coming of the Northmen in 886, and a little later Alfred and Ethelfleda repaired the