Page:The castellated and domestic architecture of Scotland from the twelfth to the eighteenth century (1887) - Volume 1.djvu/406

 THIRD PERIOD 386 KILRAVOCK CASTLE builder in planning the stair tower as he has done. The upper rooms of the south block are of a modern character, with private turret stairs, and angle closets, such as are usual in the seventeenth century, the stairs being arranged so as to give separate accesses to the various apartments. Although there is a corridor on the basement floor, there was none on the upper floors, the rooms on which occupied the full width of the block, and had separate access by the turret stairs. In more recent times other buildings have been added to the north of the main house, so as to suit modern requirements, and a wing has been extended along the west side of the quadrangle, but these additions have been omitted in the plan. BALVENY CASTLE, BANFFSHIRE. This ancient fortress, which is said to have belonged successively to the Comyns, the Douglases, the Stewarts, and the Inneses, is situated on an isolated peak of rock in the valley of the Fiddich, near the point where it is joined by the Dullan, and within a mile of Dufftown. The castle consists (Fig. 334) of a great wall of enceinte about 170 feet from north to south by 130 feet from east to west, and about 6 feet thick, with a tower-shaped buttress at the north-east angle. This enclosing wall is 28 feet high to the top of the parapet, and is probably the most ancient part of the buildings. Its size and massive strength remind one of the early castles of Kinclaven and Castle Roy. About 20 feet beyond the north wall, and extending round the sides, are the remains of a great ditch about 30 feet wide, which may perhaps indicate the defences of an earlier and more primitive fortress even before the days of the Comyns. Along the north wall there are some vaulted cellars, over which there appear to have been large upper rooms. The portions of the castle most recently occupied extend along the south front (Fig. 335). The western portion is of rough work like the wall of enceinte, and is evidently the oldest part. The walls are 6' feet thick, with small openings, and the hall, which is on the first floor, has a high pointed barrel vault (see First Floor Plan, Fig. 334). The ground floor of the western portion was evidently partly occupied as the bake- house, from the ovens which still exist in the west wall, and also partly as a cellar, provided with the usual private stair from the hall above. The kitchen and offices were along the west wall, where the great kitchen chimney still remains. The eastern part of the building, including the two stair turrets and the south-east angle tower, have been rebuilt in the sixteenth century. The coat-of-arms over the door of the central stair turret (see sketch, Fig. 334) combines the arms of Stewart, Earl of Athol, and Forbes ; while on the outer front there are the arms of the Earl of Athol, with a long scroll containing the motto of the Stewarts