CASTLE KEEP

 Glen Weatherwax
Illinois Geographic Alliance Summer Institute in Europe, 1998

Preview of Main Ideas

The Middle Ages (from roughly A.D. 476 to 1450) were important years for castle building in Europe, especially from the 11^th to the 16^th century. Although the age of knights and castles ended long ago, thousands of castles remain scattered throughout Western Europe. Choosing possible sites and determining suitable building materials were definite geography considerations.

Connection with the Curriculum

This activity can be taught in either Geography, Social Science, or Art classes.

Teaching Level: Grades 6-8.

Objectives Classification Outline

Objective #1: The student will understand site selection upon which castles were built.

Essential Element: Human Systems.

Standard #13: How the forces of cooperation and conflict among people influence the division and control of earth’s surface.

Knowledge Statement#2: How cooperation and conflict among people contribute to political division of earth’s surface.

Skill Set #2: Acquiring geographic information.

Skill #2: Use maps to collect and/or compile geographic information.

Theme: Place.

Objective #2: The student will demonstrate where to build and how to draw a one-point perspective castle.

Essential Element: The World in Spatial Terms.

Standard #1: How to use maps and other geographic representations, tools, and technologies to acquire, process, and report information from a spatial perspective.

Knowledge Statement #1: The characteristics, functions, and applications of maps, globes, aerial and other photographs, satellite-produced images, and models.

Skill Set #1: Asking geographic questions.

Skill #2: Plan how to answer geographic questions.

Theme: Place.

1. Various topographic maps of the United States.
2. Drawing paper.
3. Pencils.
4. Markers.

Opening the Lesson

1. Choosing the Site:  The word "castle comes from the Latin word "castellum," which means "fort."  The first castles were built as fortresses. They were constructed for warrior kings or noblemen, who needed a safe base from which to fight. A castle provided shelter for a lord, his servants, and his family. It was also a stronghold from which the lord’s soldiers could ride out and terrorize the local people in hostile territory.
2. What made a good site for a castle? First of all, the site had to be easy to defend. Discuss, geographically, what defensible places those may be. Hopefully, students will mention steep hillsides or the tops of rocky cliffs. On flat land, where there were no hills, artificial mounts of rocks and earth were created instead. Other castles were built along the coast, on islands, or on river promontories.
3. Because castles had to control the surrounding countryside, they might be built astride mountain passes, or at river crossings, or at the junctions of major roads. In that way, no one -friend or enemy- could pass by without the castle guards’ permission.
4. The earliest castles were built of earth and wood. (Two major problems developed concerning rotting or fire.) Local timber was used if possible, for economy and convenience.
5. Soon stone replaced wood as a building material. Stone could better withstand attack, could not be set on fire, and walls could be built several yards thick. Stones to build castles came from local mines or quarries if possible, but in lands where building stone was scarce, it had to be carried long distances, by water or on lumbering ox-wagons.

1. Using topographic or other maps of the U.S., students, either individually or in cooperative groups, choose a suitable site to build a castle.
2. Once the site is chosen, the student(s) should be able to defend their selected site by giving geographic reasons for such.
3. Old fort sites will probably be logical choices, but accept new cites as well, if they meet criteria brought out in class discussion.
4. Once site is approved, students can design and draw their castle. (An art objective for me locally is to draw this using a one-point perspective.)

Concluding the Lesson

Students can then share drawings and explain their individual aspects. Most will probably include keeps, towers, drawbridges, moats, etc. Others may do further research and include lesser-known features. (Bailey, chutes, barbicans, battlements, belfrys, curtain walls, etc.)

Extending the Lesson

Have students locate a suitable site in their own community to build a castle.

1. Can students explain the process by which they chose their castle sites?
2. Does their design and drawing reflect ideas gleaned from class discussion and/or independent research?

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