Why were castles built?
Posted on 08. Mar, 2010 by Iwind in History
The many castles of the world have fascinated people for hundreds of years, and you may wonder why were castles built? There are actually several reason, but the most important one is for protection and defense. It is pretty obvious that it is easier to defend yourself from on top of castle walls than on the ground. Castles enabled small armies to defend themselves against much larger enemy forces. Even with a large army it was very hard to take a well defended castle without heavy losses.
Some forms of fortifications have been built for thousands of years, one of the oldest being the 3700 year old wall built by the ancient Canaanites, but the first real castles were built only 1000 years ago. Most of the large castles in Europe were built from 1100 to 1500. Initially these castles were built to hold down conquered territory and for defense, as stated earlier, but the lords also noticed that they were an effective way to intimidate and strike fear into local people in the area. The castles became a symbol of wealth and power for the lords controlling them, and a very effective way of keeping control of their territory.
The basic social structure in this time was the Feudalism. All land was held by the king and he gave pieces of this land to various high nobles in return for helping him fighting wars and putting down rebellions. The great castles were the home to these high nobles, and several lesser nobles built castles as well. The high nobles gave land to the lesser nobles in exchange for their help in battle. There are a lot of castles still standing all over Europe and visiting them can be a really interesting experience.
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