Page:Medieval Military Architecture in England (volume 1).djvu/134

 118 Mediceval Military Architecttire in England. earlier castles, including therein those of the reign of Henry III. and the three Edwards. With the reign of Henry H. may be said to close the principal castle-building period of English history. Coeur de Lion was scarcely an English sovereign. He designed, it is said, and certainly built, the great fortress of Chateau Gaillard upon the Seine ; but he built no castle in England, nor does any castle of consequence appear to have been founded in his reign. John, his successor, was always moving from one castle to another, exercising in a very unpopular degree the royal prerogative of purveyance. He introduced the Writ known as "Commissimus," by which castellans were appointed to the royal castles, and he showed his distrust even of his supporters, by continually transferring these officers from one castle to another, lest they should establish any local interest. The siege of Rochester Castle was the great military engineer- ing operation of the reign, in which the outer wall was under- mined near one angle, and the gallery carried on beneath the keep, which stood but a few feet within the enclosure. The result was to bring down the wall and the lower part of one angle of the keep, and the place and extent of the mischief may still be traced, owing to the angle having been rebuilt with very indifferent masonry. Almost the last event of his reign was the siege of Dover by Louis of France, who set up a " malvoisin " to overtop the walls, but failed to take the place, though before it for four months. John died at Newark, which, if not the finest castle of the Midlands, con- tains certainly the grandest Norman gatehouse in England. From his accession in May, 1199, to his death in June, 1207, John dated public instruments from 131 castles in different parts of England, and must have visited a great many more. Henry HI. found his realm over-built with castles, and amongst the vigorous exertions by which William Marshall and Hubert de Burgh restored the royal authority should specially be recorded the sieges of Biham and Bedford castles, two very strong places. The Close Rolls show the extent of the preparations for these sieges. The sheriffs of the whole Midland and westward to the Forest of Dean are directed to provide and forward materials and munitions of war. Car- penters, smiths, quarrymen to dress stone bullets, miners and engineers, are placed under requisition, and from all sides are ordered timber, stone, lead, cord, cable, chain, iron bars, balistae, catapults, mangonels, crossbows of wood and horn.