Page:Medieval Military Architecture in England (volume 1).djvu/380

 352 Medieval Military Architecture. The main entrance is from the city in the middle of the south front, 40 yards west of the keep, through the great gatehouse. The drawbridge across the ditch was removed in the last century, and is replaced by a bridge of stone, which crosses the ditch and leads up to the gatehouse, called John de Ireby's or Irby's tower. It opens into the outer ward. The plan of this gatehouse is peculiar. It may be conveniently described as a plain structure, 44 feet square and of 20 feet projec- tion in front of the line of the curtain. It is composed of a base- ment and upper floor, but the entrance, instead of passing, as usual, through the centre of the building, is at its east end. The south- east angle of the building is hollow, forming a nook or recess of 18 feet each way, the two outer sides being walls 6 feet thick, and about half the height of the main building. These walls are provided with parapets, front and rear, so as to form a covered way, which communicates with the east curtain. In front of this inclo- sure is the outer gate, of 1 1 feet opening, with a drop-pointed arch, placed in a sunk square-headed panel, intended to lodge the draw- bridge when lifted. This entrance leads into an open chamber 1 2 feet square, commanded by its outer walls. It is, in fact, a barbican, niched in a hollow angle of the gatehouse, wnth outer walls the height of the curtain. The barbican leads to a second archway, with a portcullis in a square groove, and a gate. Then follows a vaulted passage ending in another gate which opens into the ward. In the passage, on the left, is a lancet doorway opening upon a rising well- staircase, and beyond it a drop-arched door opening into the lodge. On the right hand is a shoulder-headed door, which leads, or did lead, into a staircase. In the front wall of the gatehouse are two corbels, which seem to have carried a small oriel or bartisan, com- manding the approach. Appended to the east side of the gatehouse, but entirely within the ward, is a smaller building, fitted on obliquely, as though an addition. Entering the outer ward, the well is seen at 40 yards' distance. The buildings within the ward are modern, of various degrees of ugliness, and painfully substantial. Some are detached and harm- less ; others are built into the old curtain, so as to conceal and more or less injure it. The curtain, which is extremely curious, and most of it original, is best seen from the outside. Besides the gatehouse, it carries but one mural tower, — an original one, open in the gorge, in the centre of the west front. The gatehouse of the inner ward is placed upon the salient and central point of the cross curtain. It is called the Captain's Tower. It is rectangular, or nearly so, about 32 feet each way, with a projection from the curtain of 18 feet. There is one floor above the portal, which is central. The gateway is a low drop arch, flanked by a pair of buttresses. The passage is vaulted, and has a door at each end, and at the inner end also a portcullis. Over the outside of the inner gateway is a ring of tracery, unusual, but effective. Much of this gatehouse is Decorated, but the buttresses seem Norman.