Castles and Warfare in the Middle Ages

by Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, M. MacDermott (Translation)

This profusely illustrated and thoroughly researched book describes in detail the diverse methods used to attack and defend castles during the Middle Ages. In a groundbreaking study — the first to shed light on the purpose, construction techniques, and effectiveness of medieval fortifications, noted nineteenth-century architect and writer Eugene-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc discusses such architectural elements as dungeons, keeps, battlements, and drawbridges. In addition to describing a vast number of European structures — among them fortifications at Carcassonne, Paris, Avignon, Vincennes, Lubeck, Milan, and Nuremberg — he examines the use of artillery and trenches, as well as such weapons as battering rams, mines, and the long-bow.
A concise, scholarly reference for architectural historians, this absorbing history will appeal as well to medievalists, military buffs, and anyone interested in the evolution and development of the castle.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Medieval History

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 26, 2005

About the author

Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc was a French architect and theorist, famous for his "restorations" of medieval buildings. Born in Paris, he was as central a figure in the Gothic Revival in France as he was in the public discourse on "honesty" in architecture, which eventually transcended all revival styles, to inform the emerging spirit of Modernism.

Reviews

[Zach Karinen · Rating 3 out of 5]

It can be somewhat tedious reading this book since it isn't broken down into individual chapters on individual subjects. But then again the book is 150 years old. If you're expecting this to be fascinating it will be. It's wonderfully illustrated with over 150 plates and there are times as you are reading, you aren't sure what the author is describing. But then, he has provided very detailed drawings and goes further to explain what is happening in some of the pictures. It's very interesting learning about castles and their parts.

[Kris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Somewhat dry, exhaustively detailed, often times witty. I thoroughly enjoyed it, especially the occasional asides relating to national character (with appropriate slights against that of the English - the author *was* French, after all and still bearing a grudge about Agincourt, apparently.)

[John]

This book came free with a toy siege tower that I built with my son. Looking at it, I knew that it would be far too advanced for him, but I am interested in this kind of thing and wanted to check it out myself.

I made it through the first sentence.

"To write a general history of the art of fortification, from the days of antiquity to the present time, is one of the fine subjects lying open to the researchers of archaeologists, and one which we may reasonably hope to see undertaken; but we must admit that it is a subject, to treat which fully requires much and varied information, -- since to the knowledge of the historian should be superadded in him who would undertake it the practice of the arts of architecture and military engineering."

Yes, that was enough for me.

[Stephen Stewart]

Note: I'm going to refrain from rating this book because I have no sense of how 1800s translated from French analyzes of history should be rated.

Castles and Warfare in the Middle Ages, as mentioned above, was written in French and translates into English (which gives wonderful occasional footnotes where the English translator lords over the French's losses to the English). The book really focuses on the evolution of architecture, specifically castles, and their evolution in response to the change of siege weapons and the introduction to gun powder over time. To do this, the author includes numerous illustrations that help the reader visualize the aspects of architecture he is referring to and its specific purpose.

However, the book is incredibly dense and difficult to read. It features technical jargon that requires an already working knowledge of medieval architecture or frequent access to a dictionary. The drawings, while useful, tend to also obscure meaning as I found myself hunting through the diagrams for letters A, B, C, etc. to find out what the author was referring to. Finally, the style of the text has no chapter breaks and infrequent paragraph breaks, making it difficult to follow the author's shift from one topic to another.

If you have a working knowledge of the material that's already being covered by the book, then I think this is worth the read, especially for the detailed French point of view of architecture. However, for someone like me with minimal medieval architectural knowledge, the work is difficult and will command a great deal of time to track what the author is writing about and referring to.