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 368 MedicEval Military Architecture. what it may, it is clear that here, as at Norwich, Clare, Heding- ham, and Castle Acre, the Norman invader, having grasped the estate of the English lord, proceeded, as in Normandy, to combine the new fashion of castle-building with the old defences. The keep, the chapel, and the gatehouse, the only parts .in early masonry of which anything now remains, were probably among the works earliest executed. The Keep is a very noble example of the rectangular Norman type. Not that its area, still less its height, would place it in the first rank, but to considerable dimensions it adds a degree of ornament rarely bestowed upon military buildings, and though a ruin, its parts are unusually well preserved, and excel- lent both in materials and workmanship. Like Hedingham, it stands within, but not in the centre of, the inner ward. It almost touches the slope of the western bank, and is about thirty yards from the gatehouse and the eastern bank. Between the north and south banks it is nearly midway. It is in plan rectangular, measuring at the base 75 feet east and west, by 64 feet north and south, and, to the rampart walk, 50 feet high. Each face is flanked by two pilasters, 7 feet broad by 6 inches projection. These meet at, but do not cover, the angle, and the nook so formed is occupied by a shaft, not quite detached, and similar shafts take the place of the other angles of each flanking pilaster. Intermediate, on the north and south faces, are three pilasters of 3 feet breadth, and there is one on the east face, all dying into the parapets. The west face is of a complex character. Upon it are two large recesses, 9 feet broad and 2 feet deep, of which one is arched over the near parapet level. There are, besides, four recesses, each of 4 feet opening, by 2 feet 6 inches deep, arched over a little below the first-floor level. All these five recesses have their soffits pierced by the vents of garderobes. The wall has only one slight set-off" near its summit. The flanking pilasters have none, the others mostly two, but very high up. There was a square turret at each angle, now nearly gone. At the base of these turrets, the nook-shafts ceased, and the turret angle was solid. The parapet is gone. Considerably below its base were round holes, apparently to take off the water. The walls at the base are, the north and east sides, 7 feet, the south 6 feet 6 inches, and the west 6 feet thick, and this thickness is preserved to the top, or very nearly so. The east face is covered by the forebuilding, here very perfect. This prolongs the north front by 20 feet, and the south by 9 feet. The keep has a basement at the ground level, and a first floor. At two points, however, the upper floor is subdivided so as to give a partial second floor. Part of the forebuilding also, as at Rochester, has a second floor. The entrance is in the south end of the building, in which a straight stair rises to the main door of the keep, which is at the first-floor level. There are well-staircases, 7 feet diameter, in the north-east and south-west angles of the keep, ascending by seventy-six steps from the base to the summit, and communicating with the first floor. It is, however, to be observed that the base of the wefl-stair is about