Page:Medieval Military Architecture in England (volume 1).djvu/296

 274 MedicBval Militaiy Architecture. above the river, and upon the nearly level summit of which is placed the town and what remains of the Castle of Bridgenorth. The rock is more lofty, and the position far more striking, than that of Ponte- fract Castle, the defences of which were also in a great degree natural, and in these respects Bridgenorth may challenge comparison with Coucy, which it also resembles in the relation of the castle to the town. In both places the castle lay contiguous to the town, and their connected defences formed the common eficeinte, while the castle had besides a ditch proper to itself. At Bridgenorth the castle occupied the apex and south end of the platform, the broader and northern part of which was covered by the town, and the town walls abutted against those of the castle, while BRIDGENORTH CASTLE. the castle ditch traversed the platform from one face to the other. Of the defences of the town only the north gate remains, and that in a very mutilated and disguised form, but the line of the walls may be traced, partly by the inequality of the ground and the arrange- ment of the streets, and partly by the existence of the cliff upon which they in part stood. An ancient fortified bridge, standing when Grose visited the place late in the last century, though now rebuilt, crossed the Severn east of the town, and was approached from it by a steep and narrow flight of rock-cut steps, and by a carriage-way cut in traverses almost as steep. This bridge defended the passage of the river, and connected the place with the suburb called the Lower Town upon the left bank. It is this bridge which