Gunpowder and cannons

The style of warfare employed in England also had an effect on the importance of castles. Up until the Barons' War in the 1260s warfare had been a matter of the siege and defence of castles, with battles taking place up against the walls as the attacking side fought for control of the castle. It was rare for a pitched battle to take place in open countryside between two opposing foes. The Barons' War caused battles to be moved away from the confines of the castle and they were often fought on the move from one area to another. This resulted in the castle no longer being the centre of disputes, and so it became less important in the battle for supremacy.

The military aspect of the castle had changed. Now the emphasis was on the castle as a domestic home rather than a defensive fortress. Semi-fortified manor houses with crenellations and gatehouses were the nobility's new answer to castles and the symbol of aristocracy that they had once been. The "castles" of the later medieval era were designed to say more about the wealth and social status of the owner than the need for defence.

Castles also suffered as they were not developed to withstand the new forms of artillery. The introduction of gunpowder and the development of more sophisticated artillery called for more advanced castle design and many more of the smaller timber-framed castles became useless.

Cannons were developed in the 14th century and by the 15th century were widespread in Europe. These cannons could do serious damage to smaller castles. In the 15th century ammunition for cannons took the form of round stone balls, however methods changed and soon cast iron shot became the ammunition of choice. Cast iron has a density almost three times that of stone and is very hard. When fired against masonry it did not shatter on impact as stone balls often did and it could cause much greater damage. Gunpowder had first been mixed by the alchemists of the 13th century, and by the 14th and 15th centuries the grade of gunpowder and the experience of those using it had greatly improved, making it a much more effective form of attack.

The solution to cannon attack was to rebuild the masonry walls of the castle so that they were thicker. Again this required time and expense, which many castle owners did not have. Also castles that had been modified and adapted were no substitute for castles and other buildings that had been designed and built specifically to carry and withstand artillery.

The final nail in the coffin for castles in the Marches and Herefordshire came about because of their independence as separate Marcher lordships. To the successive monarchs of England the fact that on the borderland lords were ruling their own estates as quasi-kings, with no deference to the sovereign, was one that grated. The dissolution of these castles and estates came about in the 15th and 16th centuries when the Crown acquired many Marcher estates as a result of the Wars of the Roses. In effect this made the king the most powerful and far-reaching Marcher lord. This meant that many of the castles of the Marches now became uninhabited and began to fall into disrepair, and were fit neither for war nor residence.

As the king began to absorb more and more land it became less and less necessary to have so many administrative centres, and so many of the castles of Herefordshire and the borderlands became redundant.

Castles had been expensive to build and maintain, so as the necessity for military defence subsided after the 13th and 14th centuries men of rank began to look for  less burdensome and costly structures. These requirements were met in the form of the manor house. These large houses still displayed the trappings of high rank and status but were somewhat more comfortable and more affordable.

[Original author: Miranda Greene, 2002]