Mediæval Military Architecture in England, Volume 2 (of 2)Clark, George Thomas
History
Mediæval Military Architecture in England, Volume 2 (of 2)
Clark, George Thomas
Architecture -- England; Architecture, Medieval; Military architecture
It was in 1673, while the regalia were in Martin’s Tower, that the
attempt of the notorious Colonel Blood was made upon them.
Constable’s Tower stands 102 feet south of Martin’s Tower. It seems
to have resembled Broad Arrow Tower in pattern and dimensions; but it
has, to all appearance, been recently rebuilt from the foundations.
It is now a half-round tower of 32 feet diameter, rising a story
above the curtain, which seems also to have been rebuilt. It bore its
present name under Henry VIII., and was a prison at least as early as
1641.—[Harl. MS., 1326.]
From hence to Broad Arrow Tower, the curtain, 102 feet in length,
seems, for the most part, to be old; but it is completely locked in, on
both faces, by houses.
Broad Arrow Tower, though obscured by modern buildings, does not
seem to have been much altered. In general arrangement it resembles
Beauchamp Tower, but has only two stages, and is much smaller, being
26 feet diameter, with a projection on the curtain of 13 feet. Its
inner face is flush with the curtain. On each flank is a small square
turret. That on the north contains a steep narrow stair, not a well,
entered below by a Caernarvon doorway. That on the south contains a
small chamber, probably a garderobe. The ground floor is entered from
the gorge, and is a rude, half-round chamber with three loops under
drop-pointed arches.
The upper chamber seems to have had four outward faces, and a loop in
each; and another in the gorge wall. The mural chamber, 6 feet by 4
feet, has a lancet vault and door, and a loop commanding its curtain
southward. A passage from the rampart traverses the upper floor, making
it a _place d’armes_. The stair is continued to the battlements. In
1532, this was “the tower at the east end of the wardrobe,” and as late
as the reign of Elizabeth, the wardrobe gallery abutted on this tower,
extending from it towards the keep.
The curtain from Broad Arrow to Salt Tower, 156 feet, is so completely
locked in by high buildings on each face, that its rampart walk serves
as a gutter between the two lines of roof. It is evidently original,
about 30 feet high, and 12 feet thick at the base. It does not appear
to contain any cells like those in the west curtain.
Salt Tower, in 1532 Julius Cæsar’s Tower, caps the south-east angle
of the ward. It is circular in plan, 30 feet in diameter, and 62 feet
high. It is constructed of uncoursed rubble, with vertical lines of
ashlar, resembling coigns, as in Beauchamp Tower.
[Illustration: SALT TOWER.—BASEMENT.]
The ground floor, entered from the inner ward between the two
curtains, is an irregular pentagon with five loops beneath drop-arched
recesses. The door opens into a short passage at the north end of the
west wall under a segmental arch, against which abuts a similar but
half arch in the north wall, under which a small door with a drop-arch
leads into the ascending well-stair. The arch-rings are all of good
ashlar, but the room is not vaulted.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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