Arrows v artillary

[Didz]

Defensively they were no more a weakness than arrow slits. Not a great arc of fire admittedly but handy for the odd shot at attacking forces.

True, studying the overview image it appears these ports had a pretty poor field of fire but its interesting to see that some owners did insert gunports into the lower walls of their towers. Mind you looking at the overview image it seems that even here they were careful to place an apron wall around the tower to prevent the enemy getting too close. http://www.castlewales.com/raglan1.html

It says they were based upon French designs so perhaps this was more common on the continent.

However, if I am reading this site correctly the building of this castle was not started until 1435 and not completed until 1589, so its really one of those rare examples of a building designed and built on the fringes of a major technological revolution where tradition still held sway over common sense, and it only held out for eleven weeks under seige.