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Shell-keeps re-visited: the bailey on the motte?

Shell-keeps re-visited: the bailey on the motte?

By Robert Higham

Published Online by the Castle Studies Group (2015)

17th century depiction of Windsor Castle by Wenceslas Hollar
17th century depiction of Windsor Castle by Wenceslas Hollar

Abstract: Scholarly attention was first paid to the sorts of castle discussed here in the later 18th century. The “shellkeep” as a particular category has been accepted in academic discussion since its promotion as a medieval design by G.T. Clark in the later 19th century. Major works on castles by Ella Armitage and A. Hamilton Thompson (both in 1912) made interesting observations on shell-keeps. St John Hope published Windsor Castle, which has a major example of the type, a year later (1913). Twenty years on, Sidney Toy published several case-studies in south-west England (1933). The “shell-keep” has been with us ever since. While many sorts of castles have been subject to new interpretation in the last twenty years, the shell-keep has not figured in this revisionism. This essay revisits the historiography, history and archaeology of shell-keeps, offering a critique both of past applications of the term and of the sites themselves. It is suggested:

● that the value of the ”shell-keep” category has been reduced by a lack of clarity about essential characteristics, leading to a loose application of the term for too wide a variety of sites.

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● that ring-walls built on motte-tops to enclose freestanding donjon structures should be seen as a separate form;

● that multi-lobed towers built on motte-tops should be seen as a separate form; that truly circular forms (not on mottes) should be seen as a separate form;

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● that the term “shell-keep” should be reserved for mottes with structures built against or integrated with their surrounding wall so as to leave an open, central space with inward-looking accommodation;

● that, defined in this way, they are found primarily in England, normally built by wealthy castle owners on larger mottes;

● that, despite an early (and sometimes repeated) view of shell-keeps as widespread and numerous, when defined thus it appears that this was not so;

● that, despite the influential idea of shell-keeps as transformations into masonry of originally timber-built structures, this putative transformation cannot be demonstrated archaeologically or historically;

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● that, in contrast, the analogy of the shell-keep with the domestic and defensive planning of some early baileys – an idea first tentatively suggested more than a century ago – provides a more convincing model of development.

Click here to read this article from the Castle Studies Group 

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