Brunette Girl Reveals In The Old Castle

Walls could be undermined by the creation of a sap; a mine would be dug to conceal the attackers' approach to the wall, with wooden supports to prevent the tunnel from collapsing. When the target had been reached, the supports would be burned, caving in the tunnel and bringing down the structure above. The best defence against this form of attack was to built a castle on a rock outcrop or to surround it with a wide, deep moat. A counter-mine could be dug towards the mine of the besiegers; assuming the two converged, this would result in underground hand-to-hand combat in the pitch black. Mining was an effective method of breaching walls and may have had a negative effect on the morale of the defending garrison. At the siege of Margat in 1285, Sultan Al Mansur Qalawun created a mine extending underneath the castle's keep. When the Knights Hospitaller were informed of the mine they surrendered the castle. Battering rams were also used, usually in the form of a tree trunk given an iron cap. They were used to batter down the castle gates, although they were sometimes used against walls with less effect. Those manning rams and entering mines required protection from a castle's defenders; small movable wooden structures called "penthouses" would cover the entrance or the ram. They were often covered in raw hides to offer some protection against fire.
As an alternative to creating a breach in the walls, which was time consuming and a task for skilled men, an escalade could be attempted to capture the walls, with fighting along the walkways on the curtain walls; in this instance, attackers would be very vulnerable to arrowfire, particularly from crossbows or the English longbow. A safer option for those assaulting a castle than climbing ladders was to use a siege tower, usually called a belfry. Once ditches around a castle were partially filled in, these wooden movable towers could be pushed against the curtain wall. As well as providing a degree of protection for those within, a belfry could overlook the interior of a castle and offer an advantageous position from which to unleash missiles. As a result, bowmen and crossbowmen were often in the siege towers.