For the Good of the State
“If Willy’s measurement of the motte ditch was about 500 feet in circumference, then the whole motte-and-bailey was a dead ringer for the Topcliffe castle in size, if not in date—obviously not in date, because Topcliffe was an early post-Conquest castle, and this was as yet not anything at all except an anonymous ‘earthwork’ on the ordnance survey map. So it just could be Ranulf of Caen’s adulterine castle, which certainly should be somewhere hereabouts if his calculations were right.
On the... other hand, it was certainly not much of a motte, he thought doubtfully, looking up into the impenetrable undergrowth above him and trying to estimate the height of the mound. These were undoubtedly Ranulf’s lands, de facto, if the local bishop’s de jure, in the mid-twelfth century; and both Ranulf and the bishop had changed sides in the civil war, several times and not always at the same time. But the Norman barons—even a two-timing (or ten-timing) jumped-up shyster and petty hedgerow mercenary knight like Ranulf—had thrown up more impressive earthworks than this in a hundred other places, with little time and their enemies at their backs.MoreLess
On the... other hand, it was certainly not much of a motte, he thought doubtfully, looking up into the impenetrable undergrowth above him and trying to estimate the height of the mound. These were undoubtedly Ranulf’s lands, de facto, if the local bishop’s de jure, in the mid-twelfth century; and both Ranulf and the bishop had changed sides in the civil war, several times and not always at the same time. But the Norman barons—even a two-timing (or ten-timing) jumped-up shyster and petty hedgerow mercenary knight like Ranulf—had thrown up more impressive earthworks than this in a hundred other places, with little time and their enemies at their backs.MoreLess
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