@@diollinebranderson6553 No she didn't. Earlier, Ygritte had mistaken a watchtower for a castle, and Jon told her that he'd take her to a proper castle one day. That's probably what you're remembering. She said the above line when she was dying in his arms at Castle Black in reference to his promise.
So a good summary would be: 'The Wall' is actually a castle that looks like a wall but is the actual castle. And 'Castle Black' is actually a barracks that looks like a castle but is actually just a barracks.
And it is supposed to be that way for several Lord Commanders fucked up (declraed themselves as Kings etc. pp.) and it was decided that Castle Black shall not have the capability to face an army from the South.
+graveeking That is exactly right. Castle Black is not a castle by any definition, because it is not designed to face any enemies at all. The enemies would be coming from _above_, not from about. If enemies defeated the actual defences at the wall, they would not need to bother with Castle Black at all. Once the wall defences are gone, that's it - they now have access to the other side of the wall. They are now free to cross the wall any way they like - and if the wall is made entirely of ice, they can simply make a tunnel at ground level, exiting miles away from Castle Black. They could just ignore the entire garrison, just making sure to prevent them from re-capturing the top of the wall. Which should be easy enough.
Shad, the lack of walls around the Castle Black has nothing to do with arrogance or trust. Far from it. Castle Black used to be a regular castle, but its outer walls were demolished after the 13th Lord Commander of the Night's Watch rebelled, began to practice magic, took a dead woman (possibly a White Walker or Wight) as his queen and made sacrifices to the Others. He was defeated by Joramun (King Beyond the Wall) and Brandon "the Breaker" Stark, and Northeners made sure that all the castles on the Wall (19 in the books, I think the show only mentions 3) would never again have walls. So again - not a matter of trust or arrogance. A precaution by the Northeners, who knew that Lord Commanders can go crazy.
Well, you were wrong on the reason why Castle Black is the way it is, but you were spot on when you talked about how vulnerable it is. In fact it's quite an important theme in the books. Members of the Night's Watch aren't that threatened by a large army that stands beneath the Wall, but the very idea that a hundred wildlings could get to the other side is terryfing to them. In fact the lack of walls around Castle Black is the reason why Jon dies in the books. He isn't killed because he let Wildlings through (besides, in the books it wasn't Jon who gave that order, but Stannis). He is killed, because men of Night's Watch think that Jon's conflict with Boltons will get them all killed, as they have no means to defend themselves from an army south of the Wall. So I think your video is still very informative. Especially for show-only people.
I was always under the impression that it's called Castle Black because it sounds better than semi-fortified structure that's more of a barracks Black.
Some descriptions from the book: "The gate guards the tunnel through the Wall, which is long, twisting and narrow. Three iron gates block the inner passage. Each of these gates is locked and has a murder hole above it." So, the book version of tunnel is twisted (harder to maneuver siege equipment through... or for giants to gain speed), has three gates instead of two, and even built-in murder holes. You really should read the books, they have lots of great little details like this.
If memory serves, in the books there weren't any walls AT ALL on the south, west, and east sides of Castle Black. It was essentially a glorified village.
Rith King Will it's because one lord commander married a white walker and took over the watch as the night's king. The king in the north and the king beyond the wall had to team up to stop him and they took away all the south fortifications to make sure if it happened again the realm could come up and stop it.
It's been about four years since the book was announced. In the first four years of the Second Punic War, Hannibal had... -- Sailed to Iberia -- Raised an army -- Defeated, allied with, and gathered auxiliary forces from local Gallic tribes -- Crossed the Alps -- Won the Battle of Trebia -- Crossed the Apennines -- Won the Battle of Lake Trasimene -- Won the Battle of Cannae -- Slaughtered about 50,000 Romans
There's a reason for the lack of defenses to the south. After a Lord Commander went rogue and crowned himself "Nights King" it took the Starks, their Vassals and a King beyond the Wall combined to put this rebellion down. After that, and other rebellious Lord Commanders over the Centuries they had to promise to take down all defenses to the south, and that the Nights Watch would never build new ones. So in the books there are no walls at all, and in the show there are no really good defenses. Greetings
You pretty much nail it when talking about why Castle Black is undefended from behind. Centuries/Millenia before the story there was the Night's King, who took over the Night's Watch and crowned himself as a King. The King in the North then had to ride up with his army and cast the Night's King down so that the Night's Watch could go back to properly defending the Wall. So from then on all castles were built to be vulnerable from behind to prevent the Night's Watch from ever being able to rebel again.
9:20 This is actually addressed(in the books, i think there was only a brief mention in the show)as very deliberate in and far less a sign of trust so much as open mistrust. They assumed that any lord with a military garrison is just as likely as any other to attack his neighbors in an opportunistic manner. That's why the back is open. Specifically to facilitate a prompt ass kicking from the southern rulers if they feel the Lord Commander is stepping out of line in any regard. They have historically attacked it on several occasions when a lord stepped out of line. Remember also that the place is manned by convicts and felons. Many of them are political exiles, not hard criminals. But even they would have some fair incentive to get hostile at some point. It's important to remember that Castle Black is as much a penal colony as a barracks. They're convict soldiers within a special legal gray area, so the considerations to their defense get a lot of caveats. As far as defense from the back in case of northern attack. Historically, the Night's Watch received more support. So they would have previously been able to request support(Houses Umber, Knot, Norrey, and Wull are the closest with retainers).
@@bureaucratbayonet not for long. They could move along the wall but all their supplies and shelter are on the ground on the south side. They could escape along the top to another castle though.
Depends on how much wind there is I suppose, some places here in Iceland don't need very sloped roofs since the wind blows everything down before it can stack up in any meaningful quantity
I don't think they can afford to rely on the wind keeping their rooftops clear given that Castle Black is located right next to a 700 foot high windbreak!
I really appreciate this kind of videos because you are very analytic in making your considerations, very logic. And that's something that today is sometime missing,even in content coming from professional journalists and science popularizers.Instead It seems to me that you always try to tackle an issue from all the possible angles. This makes understanding a problem or a topic very straight forward and "smooth". Thank you.
In the books it's explained that the Night's Watch isn't allowed to have back defences. This is because in it's history, one Lord Commander went rogue, declared himself King and did all sorts of horrible things, so once he was defeated it was decided that to ensure the Watch couldn't ever rebel against the Realm, they shouldn't be able to fend of southern attackers, which would idealy be the very people they could have potentially betrayed.
Well... If you're talking about the White Walker, "The Night's King," then no, they aren't the same person. Very similar name. Night's King and Night King... One is a White Walker, one is a mad Night's Watch Lord Commander, respectively.
Fire arrows are likely only used in fiction for 2 reasons 1) They're a really cool concept 2) It makes the viewers able to see the arrows a night, to add to the spectacle.
Actually the tunnel bellow the Wall have three gates, external one with thick steel, middle one we see Grenn then the internal on made up of Steel too.
black gate- No, it has 2 battlments, but none seem to be manned(the gang just sorta walked up to it). It's a single wall with no redundant defenses between it and the eye.
Loved it :) So entertaining and informative. Would love to see more like this. How about doing one on TV series Vikings when they lay siege on Paris? They were quite detailed on siege and anti-siege equipment (not sure if correct)
The vulnerability to the south side is neither a sign of arrogance, nor trust. You see in past times, the nights Watch was much bigger than at the time of the story is told. It was a considerable Army. All structures from the nights watch were vulnerable to the south on purpose. The lord commander should be discouraged from trying to become a powerplayer himself.
I just found your channel and have been watching all of the videos. Kudos for the Lindybeige shoutout. Would you be interested in doing a video on the greater area of a kingdom as a whole, like breaking down regions or towns or whatever as they relate to the land in its entirety?
Shad mentioned the reason that the south of Castle Black was poorly-defended before going on to critique it, and also said at the beginning of the video that he was focusing on the show and not the books because the books don't have detailed diagrams of the castles. Yet the top few comments are all people pointing out how Shad's ignoring a detail from the books...which is basically exactly what he said, plus a detail about an ancient Lord Commander.
Would you consider looking at some of the castles in Mount & Blade? It's generally a somewhat realistic game and there are number of them to choose from. thanks for all the castle insight
Love your videos Shad! Would you ever consider a video in the future discussing the use (if any at all) of prosthetics in medieval times? I.E specifically Jaime lannister's gold forged hand that he has after getting his chopped a while back. Was that ever a thing (especially for those of noble/wealthier status)? Its bothered my brain for a while now and I cant ever seem to find any research/evidence of it being historically done for things like that. Thanks if you even read this haha, have a good one!
I can recall that the old Egyptians (i know far off in time and and space) had at least oe toe prothesis of the big toe. A rather well done design as well. can't say much about wedieval europe though.
In the books it's mentioned that the defenses other than the wall are intentionally neglected as seven thousand years ago the Commander of the Night's Watch led a rebellion against the Stark King and declared himself king and it took an alliance between Joramun (then king-beyond-the-wall) and the Starks to successfully stop him. After that the southern defenses of the castles along the wall were stripped, so that a Stark King would never have trouble fighting the nights watch again.
Though as usually, in fantasyland, things last much longer than they do in the real world. A diplomatic agreement lasting seven thousand years, yeah, good luck with that XD.
Hagane no Gijutsushi Given the nature of the alliance (I protect your northern border and you don't attack me and you have no reason to ever want to expand north given there's a huge fucking wall in the way), it's not completely unrealistic for it to be long lasting. but yeah I agree. I prefer to pretend it was 700 years ago and not 7000 to at least make it plausible.
Trepur349 well lets not forget, theres no resources and an army of dead mofos up there, i would gladly let outlaws and cutthroats deal with it, theres nothing up there for me anyways
I'd call it a fort. It looks a lot like the historic forts near where I grew up, except it has some stone rather than being all wooden, like the forts near me, But in the books, at least, there are NO walls except *the* wall around castle black, because the Night's Watch is never meant to interfere with the realms of men, and thus has no reason to defend against them. Love your videos, Shad! (Even if I disagree with some of your conclusions.... but not on this video, just on others.) I really liked your cathedral video, too.
You mention, and rightly so, the idea of arrow loops in the side tunnels and in the video (at 7:20 and other spots) you see what might be a door in the far left-hand side of the frame. Looks like it might actually lead to a side tunnel. Possible they thought about it but decided not to use it for some reason. From what I remember of the early seasons I watched, if it didn't involve intrigue or softcore porn the show wasn't worried about historical accuracy. As always, a great video.
i imagine thats on purpose, the realm wouldnt want the castles of the wall to either be able to rebel against the south or become a stronghold for any wildlings that may over take the wall.
Since there's dozens of comments referring to the TOTAL lack of walls in book Castle Black I'll mention the tunnel. Book tunnel differs from TV tunnel in three important ways: 1) It has 2 right angle turns with gates at each turn. 2) It's narrow. It's only wide enough to get 1 wagon through. In fact, in the attack on the wall in the books, on man barricaded the tunnel and held it against attack for hours. 3) Book tunnel has murder holes. The murder holes are a means of killing attackers and can be used to seal the tunnel by simply flooding it and letting the water freeze.
I'm guessing here Shad, but I assume that the reason why the south end of the castle is less defended, is because people are actually more concerned about being able to get OUT via the south, than they are about anyone else getting IN. Given the scenario Castle Black is in, they'd only really be worried about White Walkers coming in through the Wall gatehouse potentially; everyone is going to be running south in order to get away from said Walkers. So if they built up those walls, they might actually create obstacles to an orderly and fast retreat if it became necessary.
Well, two things... presumably the original assumption was that they didn't need stronger defences on the other side of the wall simply because getting over the wall used to be much harder. Because back in the day the nights watch was large enough to man all of the fortresses along the wall and cover the entire wall. So just climbing over wouldn't have been a good option. Aside from how dangerous it is, people would see you and sound the alarm. In the present, that's no longer the case. In addition, in the books there IS an additional reason for why Castle Black's defences are poor on the outside. Now granted, this is a TV-show video and the book version doesn't even have walls at all, but this explanation could still be true for the TV-show as well... Namely that the leaders of Westeros didn't want that part to be defended because it stops people that command the nights watch from trying to use it to gain power over the rest of Westeros or involve themselves in its struggles. Because if there aren't defences on the side of the wall towards Westeros, you have no way to pull back to a strong hub. So, two reasons why I don't think it was so much about arrogance as about other, more practical things.
_"back in the day the nights watch was large enough to man all of the fortresses along the wall and cover the entire wall. "_ Even when they were properly manned the Night's Watch couldn'tve patrolled all 300 miles of the Wall. A mile is 1,760 yards, so even if you spaced them out 10 yards apart you'd need 176x300 = 32,800 Crows to man it's entire length! They had maybe a tenth of that number for most of their history which works out at a Crow every 100 yards, so there were always unmanned sections along the Wall large enough for Wildling raiding parties to slip through, but these were too small for an army to approach/pass undetected. The truth is that Wall was never intended to keep out Wildlings.
I am enjoying what you are doing about castles. I do like to visit the "real" ones when I can, but usually just end up drawing (pencil and paper) them. Really like your points about the double gates at the entry.Have you any information about the transitions from "Mote and bailey" to castles with stone curtain walls? Wasn't there a period when defensive wall were mostly wood and stone came "later"? Certainly I'd prefer stone.
The problem with any Bethesda setting settlement is that each is severely truncated. A more in-story version of each would be much larger, i.e. main cities having thousands of people, not dozens. The games give the basic layout and feel along with key structures, but as-is the cities and towns are non-starters in terms of size. A *realistically* scaled Skyrim would be virtually unplayable as travel from one side of the country to the other would take way too long. If we'd take an overly simplified calculation of the length of days in-game and get their ratio to an actual 24h day, we might be getting close to the scale at which Bethesda settings are miniaturized, for the lack of a better term. A full rotation in Skyrim is 72 minutes real-time. A real day is 24h = 1440min. The time ratio would be 72:1440, so a scale of 1:20. The length of Skyrim is 119 cells of 57.6 metres; 6854,4 meters in total. So using the time scale as a yardstick, Skyrim would be 137,1 kilometers in length. Still small in the grand scheme of things (just under 15k square kilometers, 1/3 the size of Switzerland), but it would make more sense than the distances in-game taken at face value. Then again, Dagerfall had a map of 161k square kilometers, and a rough estimation puts it around 2/5 of the size of Skyrim, if we keep the same scale on the Tamrielic map, so Skyrim would be closer to 400k square kilometers in actual scale. That's larger than Germany. And that would lead to the scale being even more crazy, 3:1600. TL;DR Bethesda fucks with the scale of everything in order to make crafted open worlds without them being overwhelmingly huge to play.
I found this really interesting, however I think you could still talk about the structures' defenses adequately, just how they defend a smaller population.
"TL;DR Bethesda fucks with the scale of everything in order to make crafted open worlds without them being overwhelmingly huge to play." and also impossible to made, to fill all that space with content more than the tens of gb the game weighs, and much more time and work, by the time they have finished the game the game graphics would already be outdated. But maybe in the future we will have a game set in the whole Tamriel not just one province.
ARX 351 I wonder how a game would work as a mix of oldschool and current gen: overmap travel between locations and those locations have highly detailed AND realistically scaled environments? Imagine a Fallout 4 version of Fallout 2.
Tounushi those kind of mechanics always took me out of the game and I never liked them. I'd honestly rather have an unreasonbly big world that takes ages to cross.
Well given that for much of the Night's Watch's history they themselves have forgotten the true purpose of the Wall it's and easy mistake to make :) "The Night's Watch has forgotten it's true purpose!" - Jeor Mormont.
Castle black did have defences on its other walls when it was built but then one of the lord commanders (can't remember which one) married a female white walker and then took over the nights watch. When they were defeated the North decided that to stop this from happening again they would take down the southern defences of castle black. However, the fact that the main entrances to Castle Black are east and west but the Kingsroad (on the map) approaches from the south, the south facing buildings just outside the small south wall and the way the cliff appears to be dug out rather than natural suggests that there used to be another wall that surrounded Castle Black that was destroyed/removed.
I saw you did the video of Whiterun's defences so could you do a video on the cities and castles in Witcher 3? That's be really cool 'cos they're a lot larger than the stuff in Skyrim
It's important to note that Caste Black was originally built as more of a minor outpost of the Night Watch then one of its many fortress. There is like... 27 various structures in thatnside of the world, ranging from things built to be simple outposts like the 3 'castles' manned now, all the way to the city/fortress like 'Capital' which was called the Nightfort, of something like that. However that was ruined when the Nightswatch wa stead againts the Seven Kingdoms millennia ago, and the rest of the larger castles fall into dis-repair and ruin as the Nightwatch grew less and less important and valued to the rest of Westeros.
I think the fire ball would be even larger than that actually, those barrels must be travelling at least 120 kph when they hit the ground, the barrels would break, causing the oil to ignite quickly, pushing out the surely flaming shards of wood everywhere, as well as sending the oil flying outwards.
im new but love these videos. I know game of thrones wise you stick to the tv show, but could you do a video on how a army could possibly take winterfell but winterfell from the books? It seems impossible, Crossing the 1st wall then somehow the moat and on to the 2nd larger wall. Then the multiple baileys all flanked by towers.. idk how it could be done. pls and thank you
Your opinion being so, how would YOU have made such a castle/fortress? In answering this question in full, please provide a visual representation of your ideal version of such a place. In the process, would you kindly make a 3d render of a castle/fortress like honour-guard?
Nice vid. Small correction: your effective cover is wrong: an archer standing in the center, or at the far end, can shoot into the red area on the other side.
I just have more a question but burning arrows seems pretty useless, maybe you fire one arrow to start a fire or something. But i was thinking, at night there is no way of seeing were your arrows hit. You dont't know if you have to aim higher or lower when firing. So is it some what usefull if your first three-ish arrows were burning? Or does that not matter at all?
Greate Video 7:00 I would add a deep pit in front of the second gate inside the tunnel. Like a dry partial moat in front of gates of some "mountain" castles. So before the enemy will attempt to break the gate he will have to bridge the ditch. What do You think ? 7:40 I think this is actually clever solusion If the fortress is captured it will be easier for us to recapture. Some bunkers were designed in such a way. And don't forget Night Watch is composed mostly of criminals so the risk of rebellion is quite high. Besides, it seems to me that Night Watch can't have large fortifications in south of the wall.
But thickness is constrained by the building materials. If it is stone or hard materials like marble. Then the wall doesnt need to be that thick. But if it is clay and mud, which often happened in ancient China, the the wall needs to be much thicker with the thickest layer on the bottom.
wrothacker4 - Happy to see another Witcher fan. I would posit that Crows Perch is not a very good fortification and could not hold out a siege very long for two reasons: 1. the relatively shallow moat around the base of the outcrop would mean that an enemy's troops could cross the moat and attack from the bottom. While there are wooden palisaids around the place, they do not form a cohesive line until you get to the very top of the incline, where the village is located. In addition, we should remember that the local Lord/Baron (before Phillip - the bloody baron) fled when Temeria was conquered by the Nilfgaardians.
Wil Francis That makes sense for a real life fortress. However, I personally think it is a good fortress for the world it's set in. Perfect to hold off Drowners, Nekkers, and other montsers. If you have Radovid's army, or Nilfgaard's army besieging your town, giant walls and a moat won't really do you any good. Witcher 3 is easily my all time favorite video game
another thing to note is that originally there where castles across the entire wall. Making sure there was no undefended part of the walls wildlings could climb over. Another thing ofc is that the ice wall is magic and that protecting against wildlings isn't the purpose of the wall at all.
They have a good reason to use fire arrows even if they forgotten why and that is because the enemy the wall was built to repeal was the white walks, whose only weakens is fire.
The southern facing defences were demolished after the Night's king became lord commander and ruled the night's watch like a king and needing to be brought to heel by force. So it used to be a more fortified position.
A point about fire arrows: Fire arrows are *mostly* useless, but during night time battles they can actually be somewhat useful, as a kind of medieval version of a "tracer" bullet. So, at night, when it's difficult to see, fire arrows can help archers see the trajectory of their shots, and where their arrows are landing, and they can then adjust their aim accordingly. Since this battle happens at night, I would like to think that's why fire arrows were used.
Good video. I'll pose this question. As to its lack of defense. If the best way to take castle black is to engage it from the sides on the inside of the ice wall, wouldn't you have already succeeded in breaching the castle? If you found another way through the wall that would allow you to exploit it's poor defense then you might as well just forget it and continue onward. I'd assume that's why it isn't built as a proper castle and just a barracks.
what about it being designed to keep the enemy inside the bailey around the ice wall gate. I cant really tell, but I did not notice any way inside that area to get into the buildings. There looked to be a gallows in one corner, and some wooden shack structures on another, but no easy way into the stone building or out of that bailey if you got through the ice wall.
I agree with you Shad a better name would have been compound black or Black Priory (since they lived like monks). Since the structure was not designed to be defended.
I know that there is a reason within ASOIAF lore to explain why the castle/barracks are so poorly outfitted, however, I think there is another logical reason not to keep it weak. If, somehow, the enemy were to capture the castle through a full frontal assault (either up over the wall, or through the tunnel), then it would be a really bad idea to have them be able to use the castle themselves. Having a weaker structure would mean that it would be easier to take back from the enemy, if that were ever to happen.
There is a bit of lore that explains the lack of defenses apart from the Wall. The reason they built Castle Black was built that way was so if the Night's Watch rebelled against the crown, their stronghold would have crappy defenses to the south. This was meant to keep them focused on their role as watchers on the Wall, and to prevent kings from seeing them as a threat.
Once again a great video, I love your channel! I'd also be interested in seeing you analyze the castles in The Witcher 3, especially Kaer Morhen and Kaer Trolde. I think you might actually like them ;)
Considering the sole purpose of the Castles at the wall, you could see the lack of defense on the back sides of the castle as strategic decision. If you only looks the TV series, they seem not to think the wildlings to be clever enough to take the castle from behind. Therefore, any attack taking the castle would come from the north. In this case, the lack of defensive measures would make it much easier to retake the castle, if it would ever be necessary. ( Besides, the castle seems not to be able to house a lot of people, so if an actual army tried to movethrough the wall, it would be tedious and slow due to the tunnel and there would be no defensive advantages waiting for the biggest part of the army that does not fit inside).
The fire arrows in game of thrones have a sharp point at the front so it still will dig in to objects so I think the fire part is like a tracer shot it tells you where the arrow hit
if I remember my game of thrones lore correctly, a few hundred years before the series starts, one of the night watch generals along with few other generals of some other wall castles (there were about 11 proper castles without the problems you mentioned back then if I remember correctly), rebelled and tried to concur the 7 kingdoms. the one that started the rebellion called him self the night king. they were defeated at great coat in the end. the castles were destroyed and then new castles with almost no defence were created... so that if the night watch ever rebelled again they would not have such a defective position. the castle are designed to be able to withstand a small raiding party, but not be able to withstand a full size proper army on the 7 kingdoms side of the wall. so the way the castle is build it's a sigh of distrust not trust shadiversity. p.s. sorry for my bad english, not my first language and also typing on phone with small screen :(
Jabun The Wanderer expept for the wildlings and giants and random white walkers of course ... which would know and would attack ... plus a castle is not something you build over night and it cost quite a bit. it would not work and also what would be the point.
There are a total of 19 castles along the Wall. One of them is called Nightfort, and as the story goes, there was once a Lord Commander of the Nightfort who broke the rules and made it his personal castle, using the Night's Watch brothers as his own garrison and army. He warred against the other castles, then the Starks and northern lords had to go defeat him. It wasn't easy because the castles along the Wall were originally built with full fortifications all the way around. After that incident, the castles along the Wall aren't allowed to be fortified on the southern side anymore, lest another Lord Commander gets any wise ideas and the Starks need to deal with him again. Unfortunately this leaves the south side of the castles vulnerable to any wildling raiders who manage to go around, under, or over the Wall.
Yay! New videos from Shad. Considering your streak into architecture, why don't you check out Dark Souls architecture? It is simply beautiful and an architectural marvel. A lot of it also makes sense for its purpose, but is blocked off for game play purposes. I just want a video where we can all join in appreciation for the architecture and nit pick it.
The lore actually talks of the 13th Lord Commander betrayal, and after he was defeated, the King in the North ordered them no never again keep fortifications facing south/ south side of the wall. In the event of another betrayal by a Lord Commander
In defense of castle Black they had dozens of manned castles originally and every castle would have 24/7 patrols on the walls making it near impossible to get on the other side. The problem is that at the time of the show the Nights watch is probably at around 1% of it's fomer manpower (at best) with only 3 manned castles left.
The reason Skyrim has the loading screens in abundance was because the game was coded with accommodating the 7 gen consoles (xbox 360/ps3) which were limited to 500mb of memory. Dragon Age Inquisition and other later games were designed for the 8th gen consoles and pc which don't have those memory limitations.
What about the paucity of battlements on the ice wall itself? There are a few wooden ones we see built onto the wall, but most of the soldiers are standing on bare ice shelves. While battlements aren't necessary for cover, the slip and fall hazard is immense.
1:54 I don't know if it's totally fair to take away the ice wall when judging it. A lot of castles would be useless without the natural barriers that they are built into. Like, the Castello del Pietra in Italy on its own without its mountains would be pretty undefensible structures otherwise. Fortifications are built for their situation.
My biggest gripe is the sheer size of the tunnel. It was made in a time when the Nights watch numbered in the thousands, now they are fewer than a thousand, even before Mormont's expedition. They should have narrowed it, to funnel the attackers, and to prevent any giants from getting through at any reasonable speed. Also, it's vulnerable from behind by design. The Lord Commander is not allowed to set up defenses to the south, as one Lord Commander once declared himself king and took up arms against the south. In the books, the defenses are even more lackluster. At best, there are some wooden barriers to keep any wildlife out. Castle Black is also much larger in the books, with allot of buildings abandoned. Also, the name comes from when it actually was a castle, the defenses were presumably dismantled after the Nights Watch attacked the south. Keep in mind that this is ancient history in the books, thousands of years old. The author acknowledge that most, if not all of the history from thousands of years ago is made up.
Remember Ygritte's dying words? "Is this...a proper castle?" Jon: "Well...sort of...".
She said it to a different castle
@@diollinebranderson6553 No she didn't. Earlier, Ygritte had mistaken a watchtower for a castle, and Jon told her that he'd take her to a proper castle one day. That's probably what you're remembering. She said the above line when she was dying in his arms at Castle Black in reference to his promise.
So a good summary would be:
'The Wall' is actually a castle that looks like a wall but is the actual castle.
And 'Castle Black' is actually a barracks that looks like a castle but is actually just a barracks.
And it is supposed to be that way for several Lord Commanders fucked up (declraed themselves as Kings etc. pp.) and it was decided that Castle Black shall not have the capability to face an army from the South.
+graveeking That is exactly right. Castle Black is not a castle by any definition, because it is not designed to face any enemies at all. The enemies would be coming from _above_, not from about. If enemies defeated the actual defences at the wall, they would not need to bother with Castle Black at all. Once the wall defences are gone, that's it - they now have access to the other side of the wall. They are now free to cross the wall any way they like - and if the wall is made entirely of ice, they can simply make a tunnel at ground level, exiting miles away from Castle Black. They could just ignore the entire garrison, just making sure to prevent them from re-capturing the top of the wall. Which should be easy enough.
Shad, the lack of walls around the Castle Black has nothing to do with arrogance or trust. Far from it. Castle Black used to be a regular castle, but its outer walls were demolished after the 13th Lord Commander of the Night's Watch rebelled, began to practice magic, took a dead woman (possibly a White Walker or Wight) as his queen and made sacrifices to the Others. He was defeated by Joramun (King Beyond the Wall) and Brandon "the Breaker" Stark, and Northeners made sure that all the castles on the Wall (19 in the books, I think the show only mentions 3) would never again have walls.
So again - not a matter of trust or arrogance. A precaution by the Northeners, who knew that Lord Commanders can go crazy.
I wondered if there was an explanation like this but as I said I'm far from a Song of Ice and Fire expert 0.o
exactly ahahha 8 min late, the idea is that they can defend against the north but they can not withstand an attack from the south.
Well, you were wrong on the reason why Castle Black is the way it is, but you were spot on when you talked about how vulnerable it is. In fact it's quite an important theme in the books. Members of the Night's Watch aren't that threatened by a large army that stands beneath the Wall, but the very idea that a hundred wildlings could get to the other side is terryfing to them. In fact the lack of walls around Castle Black is the reason why Jon dies in the books. He isn't killed because he let Wildlings through (besides, in the books it wasn't Jon who gave that order, but Stannis). He is killed, because men of Night's Watch think that Jon's conflict with Boltons will get them all killed, as they have no means to defend themselves from an army south of the Wall.
So I think your video is still very informative. Especially for show-only people.
You could have explained all of this just fine with half the detail.
In the TV show they don't really explain it,it's really the writing's fault.
when he says that castle black is a bad castle, imagine his view on book castle black
just a glorified village :D
On the other hand the tunnel is better defended in the book.
True and also the wall naturally sheds
I was always under the impression that it's called Castle Black because it sounds better than semi-fortified structure that's more of a barracks Black.
Riceball01 "Collection of Buildings Black"?
Some descriptions from the book:
"The gate guards the tunnel through the Wall, which is long, twisting and narrow. Three iron gates block the inner passage. Each of these gates is locked and has a murder hole above it."
So, the book version of tunnel is twisted (harder to maneuver siege equipment through... or for giants to gain speed), has three gates instead of two, and even built-in murder holes. You really should read the books, they have lots of great little details like this.
He did make a huge point at the start of the video of saying this was the castle from the TV show. Not the books.
If memory serves, in the books there weren't any walls AT ALL on the south, west, and east sides of Castle Black. It was essentially a glorified village.
Rith King Will it's because one lord commander married a white walker and took over the watch as the night's king. The king in the north and the king beyond the wall had to team up to stop him and they took away all the south fortifications to make sure if it happened again the realm could come up and stop it.
Javo Oh, I know this. I've skimmed the wiki and TWOIAF. I mentioned it because in the books it's LESS fortified than in the show.
In the books, it was a jumble of keeps and buildings.
But there was a tunnel system that was used.
yeah, Eastwatch is the only one with any sort of defenses because of the harbour
In the book the tunnel has murder holes and multiple gates, and that section of wall has one trebuchet at least.
It only took Lloyd two years to make that video on fire arrows. That man knows how to keep a schedule.
Just look at his Kickstarter.
It's been about four years since the book was announced. In the first four years of the Second Punic War, Hannibal had...
-- Sailed to Iberia
-- Raised an army
-- Defeated, allied with, and gathered auxiliary forces from local Gallic tribes
-- Crossed the Alps
-- Won the Battle of Trebia
-- Crossed the Apennines
-- Won the Battle of Lake Trasimene
-- Won the Battle of Cannae
-- Slaughtered about 50,000 Romans
@@88fibonaccisequence How much nothing do you think he's gonna do in year 5?
There's a reason for the lack of defenses to the south. After a Lord Commander went rogue and crowned himself "Nights King" it took the Starks, their Vassals and a King beyond the Wall combined to put this rebellion down. After that, and other rebellious Lord Commanders over the Centuries they had to promise to take down all defenses to the south, and that the Nights Watch would never build new ones.
So in the books there are no walls at all, and in the show there are no really good defenses.
Greetings
You pretty much nail it when talking about why Castle Black is undefended from behind. Centuries/Millenia before the story there was the Night's King, who took over the Night's Watch and crowned himself as a King. The King in the North then had to ride up with his army and cast the Night's King down so that the Night's Watch could go back to properly defending the Wall. So from then on all castles were built to be vulnerable from behind to prevent the Night's Watch from ever being able to rebel again.
keep making these videos cause I love it
Then I shan't disappoint!
if you have a chance you should do some skyrim castles
Can't look too hard you will see double with his lotr video
Robert Deland,
Ditto! Do Skyrim/Elder Scrolls castles please.
The roof is wrong, it's not steep & snow buildup would ruin it.
Only one roof is flat and you could easily clean it
9:20 This is actually addressed(in the books, i think there was only a brief mention in the show)as very deliberate in and far less a sign of trust so much as open mistrust. They assumed that any lord with a military garrison is just as likely as any other to attack his neighbors in an opportunistic manner. That's why the back is open. Specifically to facilitate a prompt ass kicking from the southern rulers if they feel the Lord Commander is stepping out of line in any regard. They have historically attacked it on several occasions when a lord stepped out of line.
Remember also that the place is manned by convicts and felons. Many of them are political exiles, not hard criminals. But even they would have some fair incentive to get hostile at some point. It's important to remember that Castle Black is as much a penal colony as a barracks. They're convict soldiers within a special legal gray area, so the considerations to their defense get a lot of caveats.
As far as defense from the back in case of northern attack. Historically, the Night's Watch received more support. So they would have previously been able to request support(Houses Umber, Knot, Norrey, and Wull are the closest with retainers).
If the nights watch did go rogue again couldnt they just operate from the top of the wall tho?
@@bureaucratbayonet not for long. They could move along the wall but all their supplies and shelter are on the ground on the south side. They could escape along the top to another castle though.
One thing I heard being dropped through muderholes is something the defenders can make during a seige - Basically, emptying your chamber pots. :)
Could design your own castle and make a video on it, we could give you a location and time in history and you can create a castle for it. Thx mate
my biggest pet peeve about castle black? flat, or low sloped roofs... in the north... with winters that goes on for years. snow buildup anyone?
Well in the book, they have towers, where you can stand on, so there are Brothers who clean the roofs. But the show is the show. :)
Yep, Wintefell suffers from the same problem. The roofs on the towers are incredibly flat. Like wtf.
Depends on how much wind there is I suppose, some places here in Iceland don't need very sloped roofs since the wind blows everything down before it can stack up in any meaningful quantity
I don't think they can afford to rely on the wind keeping their rooftops clear given that Castle Black is located right next to a 700 foot high windbreak!
I really appreciate this kind of videos because you are very analytic in making your considerations, very logic. And that's something that today is sometime missing,even in content coming from professional journalists and science popularizers.Instead It seems to me that you always try to tackle an issue from all the possible angles. This makes understanding a problem or a topic very straight forward and "smooth". Thank you.
Thanks mate, I'm honoured that I can communicate these things well enough to be understood ^_^
I always figured that calling it "Castle" Black, was more of a title, than an actual architectural description.
In the books it's explained that the Night's Watch isn't allowed to have back defences. This is because in it's history, one Lord Commander went rogue, declared himself King and did all sorts of horrible things, so once he was defeated it was decided that to ensure the Watch couldn't ever rebel against the Realm, they shouldn't be able to fend of southern attackers, which would idealy be the very people they could have potentially betrayed.
Dito!
when you realize the Night King and this lord commander are the same person
Well... If you're talking about the White Walker, "The Night's King," then no, they aren't the same person. Very similar name. Night's King and Night King... One is a White Walker, one is a mad Night's Watch Lord Commander, respectively.
Psykopat You have it backwards. The "Night King" is the WW King, the "Night's King" was the 13th Lord Commander who went rogue.
Yeah, but that is unrealistic, as they'd still need the southern parts secured in case northern attackers circled around
Fire arrows are likely only used in fiction for 2 reasons
1) They're a really cool concept
2) It makes the viewers able to see the arrows a night, to add to the spectacle.
SO glad you referenced Lindybeige on the fire arrow point, as soon as I saw those I was hoping you would address it!
Actually the tunnel bellow the Wall have three gates, external one with thick steel, middle one we see Grenn then the internal on made up of Steel too.
Can you review the walls of Ba Sing Se ?
I love your videos. Thank you for all your effort and insight.
Would the black gate,isengard,citadel ungol and Minas morgul work?
I'll have to have a look at them ^_^
Minas morgul is symmetric with Minas tirith
black gate- No, it has 2 battlments, but none seem to be manned(the gang just sorta walked up to it). It's a single wall with no redundant defenses between it and the eye.
Loved it :) So entertaining and informative. Would love to see more like this. How about doing one on TV series Vikings when they lay siege on Paris? They were quite detailed on siege and anti-siege equipment (not sure if correct)
Great video Shad! keep it up!
The vulnerability to the south side is neither a sign of arrogance, nor trust. You see in past times, the nights Watch was much bigger than at the time of the story is told. It was a considerable Army. All structures from the nights watch were vulnerable to the south on purpose. The lord commander should be discouraged from trying to become a powerplayer himself.
I just found your channel and have been watching all of the videos. Kudos for the Lindybeige shoutout. Would you be interested in doing a video on the greater area of a kingdom as a whole, like breaking down regions or towns or whatever as they relate to the land in its entirety?
Black was not let have walls on the south side so it could not be used in a fight
I love love love love these videos you make! :D please do some on Oblivion and Witcher 3!! Would be so cool to see you do those! :DD
2:55 exceptional circumstances indeed....
Shad mentioned the reason that the south of Castle Black was poorly-defended before going on to critique it, and also said at the beginning of the video that he was focusing on the show and not the books because the books don't have detailed diagrams of the castles. Yet the top few comments are all people pointing out how Shad's ignoring a detail from the books...which is basically exactly what he said, plus a detail about an ancient Lord Commander.
Would you consider looking at some of the castles in Mount & Blade? It's generally a somewhat realistic game and there are number of them to choose from. thanks for all the castle insight
Love your videos Shad! Would you ever consider a video in the future discussing the use (if any at all) of prosthetics in medieval times? I.E specifically Jaime lannister's gold forged hand that he has after getting his chopped a while back. Was that ever a thing (especially for those of noble/wealthier status)? Its bothered my brain for a while now and I cant ever seem to find any research/evidence of it being historically done for things like that. Thanks if you even read this haha, have a good one!
I really have no idea ether. Might be an interesting thing to look up.
I would recommend looking into Gotz Von Berlichingen: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6tz_von_Berlichingen
I can recall that the old Egyptians (i know far off in time and and space) had at least oe toe prothesis of the big toe. A rather well done design as well. can't say much about wedieval europe though.
In the books it's mentioned that the defenses other than the wall are intentionally neglected as seven thousand years ago the Commander of the Night's Watch led a rebellion against the Stark King and declared himself king and it took an alliance between Joramun (then king-beyond-the-wall) and the Starks to successfully stop him.
After that the southern defenses of the castles along the wall were stripped, so that a Stark King would never have trouble fighting the nights watch again.
Yeah, it's an intentional and diplomatic reason for it.
Though as usually, in fantasyland, things last much longer than they do in the real world. A diplomatic agreement lasting seven thousand years, yeah, good luck with that XD.
Hagane no Gijutsushi Given the nature of the alliance (I protect your northern border and you don't attack me and you have no reason to ever want to expand north given there's a huge fucking wall in the way), it's not completely unrealistic for it to be long lasting.
but yeah I agree. I prefer to pretend it was 700 years ago and not 7000 to at least make it plausible.
Trepur349 well lets not forget, theres no resources and an army of dead mofos up there, i would gladly let outlaws and cutthroats deal with it, theres nothing up there for me anyways
how did they dig that tunnel through the wall?
why cant the enemy dig a tunnel ?
I'd call it a fort. It looks a lot like the historic forts near where I grew up, except it has some stone rather than being all wooden, like the forts near me,
But in the books, at least, there are NO walls except *the* wall around castle black, because the Night's Watch is never meant to interfere with the realms of men, and thus has no reason to defend against them.
Love your videos, Shad! (Even if I disagree with some of your conclusions.... but not on this video, just on others.)
I really liked your cathedral video, too.
Listening to you talk makes me feel like I'm in class in the Citadel in Oldtown, learning about castle defense :)
You mention, and rightly so, the idea of arrow loops in the side tunnels and in the video (at 7:20 and other spots) you see what might be a door in the far left-hand side of the frame. Looks like it might actually lead to a side tunnel. Possible they thought about it but decided not to use it for some reason. From what I remember of the early seasons I watched, if it didn't involve intrigue or softcore porn the show wasn't worried about historical accuracy.
As always, a great video.
i imagine thats on purpose, the realm wouldnt want the castles of the wall to either be able to rebel against the south or become a stronghold for any wildlings that may over take the wall.
Since there's dozens of comments referring to the TOTAL lack of walls in book Castle Black I'll mention the tunnel. Book tunnel differs from TV tunnel in three important ways: 1) It has 2 right angle turns with gates at each turn. 2) It's narrow. It's only wide enough to get 1 wagon through. In fact, in the attack on the wall in the books, on man barricaded the tunnel and held it against attack for hours. 3) Book tunnel has murder holes. The murder holes are a means of killing attackers and can be used to seal the tunnel by simply flooding it and letting the water freeze.
I'm guessing here Shad, but I assume that the reason why the south end of the castle is less defended, is because people are actually more concerned about being able to get OUT via the south, than they are about anyone else getting IN. Given the scenario Castle Black is in, they'd only really be worried about White Walkers coming in through the Wall gatehouse potentially; everyone is going to be running south in order to get away from said Walkers. So if they built up those walls, they might actually create obstacles to an orderly and fast retreat if it became necessary.
Well, two things... presumably the original assumption was that they didn't need stronger defences on the other side of the wall simply because getting over the wall used to be much harder. Because back in the day the nights watch was large enough to man all of the fortresses along the wall and cover the entire wall. So just climbing over wouldn't have been a good option. Aside from how dangerous it is, people would see you and sound the alarm. In the present, that's no longer the case. In addition, in the books there IS an additional reason for why Castle Black's defences are poor on the outside. Now granted, this is a TV-show video and the book version doesn't even have walls at all, but this explanation could still be true for the TV-show as well... Namely that the leaders of Westeros didn't want that part to be defended because it stops people that command the nights watch from trying to use it to gain power over the rest of Westeros or involve themselves in its struggles. Because if there aren't defences on the side of the wall towards Westeros, you have no way to pull back to a strong hub. So, two reasons why I don't think it was so much about arrogance as about other, more practical things.
_"back in the day the nights watch was large enough to man all of the fortresses along the wall and cover the entire wall. "_
Even when they were properly manned the Night's Watch couldn'tve patrolled all 300 miles of the Wall.
A mile is 1,760 yards, so even if you spaced them out 10 yards apart you'd need 176x300 = 32,800 Crows to man it's entire length!
They had maybe a tenth of that number for most of their history which works out at a Crow every 100 yards, so there were always unmanned sections along the Wall large enough for Wildling raiding parties to slip through, but these were too small for an army to approach/pass undetected.
The truth is that Wall was never intended to keep out Wildlings.
I am enjoying what you are doing about castles. I do like to visit the "real" ones when I can, but usually just end up drawing (pencil and paper) them. Really like your points about the double gates at the entry.Have you any information about the transitions from "Mote and bailey" to castles with stone curtain walls? Wasn't there a period when defensive wall were mostly wood and stone came "later"? Certainly I'd prefer stone.
Hey, could you talk about the castles and keeps from Skyrim? As well as the generall defenses of the cities?
I think that would be kind of cool.
The problem with any Bethesda setting settlement is that each is severely truncated.
A more in-story version of each would be much larger, i.e. main cities having thousands of people, not dozens.
The games give the basic layout and feel along with key structures, but as-is the cities and towns are non-starters in terms of size.
A *realistically* scaled Skyrim would be virtually unplayable as travel from one side of the country to the other would take way too long.
If we'd take an overly simplified calculation of the length of days in-game and get their ratio to an actual 24h day, we might be getting close to the scale at which Bethesda settings are miniaturized, for the lack of a better term. A full rotation in Skyrim is 72 minutes real-time. A real day is 24h = 1440min. The time ratio would be 72:1440, so a scale of 1:20.
The length of Skyrim is 119 cells of 57.6 metres; 6854,4 meters in total. So using the time scale as a yardstick, Skyrim would be 137,1 kilometers in length. Still small in the grand scheme of things (just under 15k square kilometers, 1/3 the size of Switzerland), but it would make more sense than the distances in-game taken at face value.
Then again, Dagerfall had a map of 161k square kilometers, and a rough estimation puts it around 2/5 of the size of Skyrim, if we keep the same scale on the Tamrielic map, so Skyrim would be closer to 400k square kilometers in actual scale. That's larger than Germany. And that would lead to the scale being even more crazy, 3:1600.
TL;DR Bethesda fucks with the scale of everything in order to make crafted open worlds without them being overwhelmingly huge to play.
I found this really interesting, however I think you could still talk about the structures' defenses adequately, just how they defend a smaller population.
"TL;DR Bethesda fucks with the scale of everything in order to make
crafted open worlds without them being overwhelmingly huge to play." and also impossible to made, to fill all that space with content more than the tens of gb the game weighs, and much more time and work, by the time they have finished the game the game graphics would already be outdated. But maybe in the future we will have a game set in the whole Tamriel not just one province.
ARX 351
I wonder how a game would work as a mix of oldschool and current gen: overmap travel between locations and those locations have highly detailed AND realistically scaled environments?
Imagine a Fallout 4 version of Fallout 2.
Tounushi
those kind of mechanics always took me out of the game and I never liked them.
I'd honestly rather have an unreasonbly big world that takes ages to cross.
Wait a moment, I thought the wall was there to defend against the others, not the wildlings. What gives shad?
Well given that for much of the Night's Watch's history they themselves have forgotten the true purpose of the Wall it's and easy mistake to make :)
"The Night's Watch has forgotten it's true purpose!" - Jeor Mormont.
How to break the wall: Have a dragon burp fire into it
Castle black did have defences on its other walls when it was built but then one of the lord commanders (can't remember which one) married a female white walker and then took over the nights watch. When they were defeated the North decided that to stop this from happening again they would take down the southern defences of castle black.
However, the fact that the main entrances to Castle Black are east and west but the Kingsroad (on the map) approaches from the south, the south facing buildings just outside the small south wall and the way the cliff appears to be dug out rather than natural suggests that there used to be another wall that surrounded Castle Black that was destroyed/removed.
I saw you did the video of Whiterun's defences so could you do a video on the cities and castles in Witcher 3? That's be really cool 'cos they're a lot larger than the stuff in Skyrim
Great video! Can you do an analysis of the fortresses, weapons and vehicles from Avatar: The Last Airbender/The Legend of Korra?
It's important to note that Caste Black was originally built as more of a minor outpost of the Night Watch then one of its many fortress. There is like... 27 various structures in thatnside of the world, ranging from things built to be simple outposts like the 3 'castles' manned now, all the way to the city/fortress like 'Capital' which was called the Nightfort, of something like that. However that was ruined when the Nightswatch wa stead againts the Seven Kingdoms millennia ago, and the rest of the larger castles fall into dis-repair and ruin as the Nightwatch grew less and less important and valued to the rest of Westeros.
Niiiice video Shad :D
I think the fire ball would be even larger than that actually, those barrels must be travelling at least 120 kph when they hit the ground, the barrels would break, causing the oil to ignite quickly, pushing out the surely flaming shards of wood everywhere, as well as sending the oil flying outwards.
could you make a video about the castello visconti of Pavia it's the castle of my hometown and I would like to know how good it is.
im new but love these videos. I know game of thrones wise you stick to the tv show, but could you do a video on how a army could possibly take winterfell but winterfell from the books? It seems impossible, Crossing the 1st wall then somehow the moat and on to the 2nd larger wall. Then the multiple baileys all flanked by towers.. idk how it could be done. pls and thank you
nice video man! keep it up :)
Will do and thanks ^_^
Your opinion being so, how would YOU have made such a castle/fortress? In answering this question in full, please provide a visual representation of your ideal version of such a place.
In the process, would you kindly make a 3d render of a castle/fortress like honour-guard?
Nice vid. Small correction: your effective cover is wrong: an archer standing in the center, or at the far end, can shoot into the red area on the other side.
I just have more a question but burning arrows seems pretty useless, maybe you fire one arrow to start a fire or something.
But i was thinking, at night there is no way of seeing were your arrows hit.
You dont't know if you have to aim higher or lower when firing.
So is it some what usefull if your first three-ish arrows were burning?
Or does that not matter at all?
Greate Video
7:00 I would add a deep pit in front of the second gate inside the tunnel. Like a dry partial moat in front of gates of some "mountain" castles. So before the enemy will attempt to break the gate he will have to bridge the ditch.
What do You think ?
7:40 I think this is actually clever solusion If the fortress is captured it will be easier for us to recapture.
Some bunkers were designed in such a way.
And don't forget Night Watch is composed mostly of criminals so the risk of rebellion is quite high.
Besides, it seems to me that Night Watch can't have large fortifications in south of the wall.
Has your research brought to your attention any of the castles here in Ireland? And if so, have you found any particularly interesting?
But thickness is constrained by the building materials. If it is stone or hard materials like marble. Then the wall doesnt need to be that thick. But if it is clay and mud, which often happened in ancient China, the the wall needs to be much thicker with the thickest layer on the bottom.
Hey there. Do you think Crow's Perch from the Witcher 3 would be a practical fortress?
wrothacker4 - Happy to see another Witcher fan. I would posit that Crows Perch is not a very good fortification and could not hold out a siege very long for two reasons:
1. the relatively shallow moat around the base of the outcrop would mean that an enemy's troops could cross the moat and attack from the bottom. While there are wooden palisaids around the place, they do not form a cohesive line until you get to the very top of the incline, where the village is located.
In addition, we should remember that the local Lord/Baron (before Phillip - the bloody baron) fled when Temeria was conquered by the Nilfgaardians.
Wil Francis That makes sense for a real life fortress. However, I personally think it is a good fortress for the world it's set in. Perfect to hold off Drowners, Nekkers, and other montsers. If you have Radovid's army, or Nilfgaard's army besieging your town, giant walls and a moat won't really do you any good. Witcher 3 is easily my all time favorite video game
I haven't heard someone say 'the wall' in so long, but still bringing back orange flashbacks.
could you maybe talk about the armor in lotr? I can't find any good videos about it
Hey, can you do a video on the Castles in WesteronCraft, they sare more like they are described in the books and are very detailed
another thing to note is that originally there where castles across the entire wall. Making sure there was no undefended part of the walls wildlings could climb over.
Another thing ofc is that the ice wall is magic and that protecting against wildlings isn't the purpose of the wall at all.
They have a good reason to use fire arrows even if they forgotten why and that is because the enemy the wall was built to repeal was the white walks, whose only weakens is fire.
The southern facing defences were demolished after the Night's king became lord commander and ruled the night's watch like a king and needing to be brought to heel by force. So it used to be a more fortified position.
A point about fire arrows: Fire arrows are *mostly* useless, but during night time battles they can actually be somewhat useful, as a kind of medieval version of a "tracer" bullet. So, at night, when it's difficult to see, fire arrows can help archers see the trajectory of their shots, and where their arrows are landing, and they can then adjust their aim accordingly. Since this battle happens at night, I would like to think that's why fire arrows were used.
Could you do something like what you did for winderfell and make Castle Black a viable castle with or without the ice wall?
Good video. I'll pose this question. As to its lack of defense. If the best way to take castle black is to engage it from the sides on the inside of the ice wall, wouldn't you have already succeeded in breaching the castle? If you found another way through the wall that would allow you to exploit it's poor defense then you might as well just forget it and continue onward. I'd assume that's why it isn't built as a proper castle and just a barracks.
what about it being designed to keep the enemy inside the bailey around the ice wall gate. I cant really tell, but I did not notice any way inside that area to get into the buildings. There looked to be a gallows in one corner, and some wooden shack structures on another, but no easy way into the stone building or out of that bailey if you got through the ice wall.
That giant archer was actually aiming at the guy next to the guy he hit.
I agree with you Shad a better name would have been compound black or Black Priory (since they lived like monks). Since the structure was not designed to be defended.
You should do a series of videos where you improve fictional castles. I think that would be very interesting.
I always figured they used fire arrows because it was night and they acted as something akin to tracer rounds when they were shot
I know that there is a reason within ASOIAF lore to explain why the castle/barracks are so poorly outfitted, however, I think there is another logical reason not to keep it weak. If, somehow, the enemy were to capture the castle through a full frontal assault (either up over the wall, or through the tunnel), then it would be a really bad idea to have them be able to use the castle themselves. Having a weaker structure would mean that it would be easier to take back from the enemy, if that were ever to happen.
There is a bit of lore that explains the lack of defenses apart from the Wall. The reason they built Castle Black was built that way was so if the Night's Watch rebelled against the crown, their stronghold would have crappy defenses to the south. This was meant to keep them focused on their role as watchers on the Wall, and to prevent kings from seeing them as a threat.
Once again a great video, I love your channel! I'd also be interested in seeing you analyze the castles in The Witcher 3, especially Kaer Morhen and Kaer Trolde. I think you might actually like them ;)
Considering the sole purpose of the Castles at the wall, you could see the lack of defense on the back sides of the castle as strategic decision. If you only looks the TV series, they seem not to think the wildlings to be clever enough to take the castle from behind. Therefore, any attack taking the castle would come from the north. In this case, the lack of defensive measures would make it much easier to retake the castle, if it would ever be necessary. ( Besides, the castle seems not to be able to house a lot of people, so if an actual army tried to movethrough the wall, it would be tedious and slow due to the tunnel and there would be no defensive advantages waiting for the biggest part of the army that does not fit inside).
The fire arrows in game of thrones have a sharp point at the front so it still will dig in to objects so I think the fire part is like a tracer shot it tells you where the arrow hit
if I remember my game of thrones lore correctly, a few hundred years before the series starts, one of the night watch generals along with few other generals of some other wall castles (there were about 11 proper castles without the problems you mentioned back then if I remember correctly), rebelled and tried to concur the 7 kingdoms.
the one that started the rebellion called him self the night king. they were defeated at great coat in the end.
the castles were destroyed and then new castles with almost no defence were created... so that if the night watch ever rebelled again they would not have such a defective position.
the castle are designed to be able to withstand a small raiding party, but not be able to withstand a full size proper army on the 7 kingdoms side of the wall.
so the way the castle is build it's a sigh of distrust not trust shadiversity.
p.s. sorry for my bad english, not my first language and also typing on phone with small screen :(
what do you think of this :) makes sense now
Too my knowlegde you are correct, exept i believe they only destroyed the walls, not the entire castle ;)
but then they could build a second castle on the other sides of the gates with no one the wiser.
Jabun The Wanderer expept for the wildlings and giants and random white walkers of course ... which would know and would attack ... plus a castle is not something you build over night and it cost quite a bit.
it would not work and also what would be the point.
it makes sense actually why even bother building defenses against the side where the 7 kingdoms lie, it's the wildlings who you need to hold back
There are a total of 19 castles along the Wall. One of them is called Nightfort, and as the story goes, there was once a Lord Commander of the Nightfort who broke the rules and made it his personal castle, using the Night's Watch brothers as his own garrison and army. He warred against the other castles, then the Starks and northern lords had to go defeat him. It wasn't easy because the castles along the Wall were originally built with full fortifications all the way around. After that incident, the castles along the Wall aren't allowed to be fortified on the southern side anymore, lest another Lord Commander gets any wise ideas and the Starks need to deal with him again. Unfortunately this leaves the south side of the castles vulnerable to any wildling raiders who manage to go around, under, or over the Wall.
Yay! New videos from Shad. Considering your streak into architecture, why don't you check out Dark Souls architecture? It is simply beautiful and an architectural marvel. A lot of it also makes sense for its purpose, but is blocked off for game play purposes. I just want a video where we can all join in appreciation for the architecture and nit pick it.
3:24 is in Locarno, Switzerland, right?
what is that in the background?
The lore actually talks of the 13th Lord Commander betrayal, and after he was defeated, the King in the North ordered them no never again keep fortifications facing south/ south side of the wall. In the event of another betrayal by a Lord Commander
I want to hear some explaination about how does the lift works?
"WHY IS EVERYONE SO OBSESSED WITH FUCKING FIRE ARROWS?!"
Can you give me a link to the fire arrow video?
In defense of castle Black they had dozens of manned castles originally and every castle would have 24/7 patrols on the walls making it near impossible to get on the other side. The problem is that at the time of the show the Nights watch is probably at around 1% of it's fomer manpower (at best) with only 3 manned castles left.
The reason Skyrim has the loading screens in abundance was because the game was coded with accommodating the 7 gen consoles (xbox 360/ps3) which were limited to 500mb of memory. Dragon Age Inquisition and other later games were designed for the 8th gen consoles and pc which don't have those memory limitations.
which is why when making a game for 8th gen consoles fallout 4 also had an abundance of loading screens
What about the paucity of battlements on the ice wall itself? There are a few wooden ones we see built onto the wall, but most of the soldiers are standing on bare ice shelves. While battlements aren't necessary for cover, the slip and fall hazard is immense.
fire arrows are a great thing. they were on top of the wall in the middle of the night they need to see where they were shooting so they could adjust.
1:54
I don't know if it's totally fair to take away the ice wall when judging it. A lot of castles would be useless without the natural barriers that they are built into. Like, the Castello del Pietra in Italy on its own without its mountains would be pretty undefensible structures otherwise. Fortifications are built for their situation.
6:49 In the books I am pretty sure they mention that the tunnel is full of arrow slits and murderholes.
What season are those combat scenes from?
My biggest gripe is the sheer size of the tunnel. It was made in a time when the Nights watch numbered in the thousands, now they are fewer than a thousand, even before Mormont's expedition. They should have narrowed it, to funnel the attackers, and to prevent any giants from getting through at any reasonable speed.
Also, it's vulnerable from behind by design. The Lord Commander is not allowed to set up defenses to the south, as one Lord Commander once declared himself king and took up arms against the south. In the books, the defenses are even more lackluster. At best, there are some wooden barriers to keep any wildlife out. Castle Black is also much larger in the books, with allot of buildings abandoned. Also, the name comes from when it actually was a castle, the defenses were presumably dismantled after the Nights Watch attacked the south.
Keep in mind that this is ancient history in the books, thousands of years old. The author acknowledge that most, if not all of the history from thousands of years ago is made up.
can you do a video explaining the points/uses of curved swords throughout history