Fortification
Roman Frontier: The River Euphrates
The fort at Hân al-Manqoûra (Syria) from the air. Map of the northern section of the eastern frontier in Cappadocia and Syria. To turn from the Occident to the Orient is to enter a new world. Here, Rome took over long-established kingdoms and inherited their frontiers. Equally significantly, she faced a dangerous foe, the only other major power which…
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ROMAN FRONTIER DEFENSE
Fort at Vindolanda, AD 105. The fort housed the First Tungrian cohort and a Batavian cohort. WALL OF HADRIAN By far the most famous defensive barrier in the Roman Empire; served for nearly 300 years as one of the major dividing lines between Roman Britain and the barbarians of Caledonia.…
Fortification in the Sixteenth Century
THE SIEGE OF A FORTRESS, BY ALBRECHT DÜRER, 1527 In 1527, Dürer published a treatise on fortification that proposed walls dominated by massive squat roundrels, towers that would also provide gun platforms. Strengthened by earth and timber, such squat towers were better able to take bombardment than high walls. This…
Roman Army Life in Britain III
Barrack blocks for the infantry could have up to sixteen pairs of rooms. The layout of these barrack blocks can be seen at Caerleon where the foundations consist of pairs of long narrow blocks 74 m (243 ft) long, facing each other and reflecting the division of the legions into…
The Building of ‘the Tower’
Illustration of how the Tower may have looked, c1300 by Ivan Lapper. Moving slowly, and savagely stamping out sparks of resistance as he went, William took until mid-December to reach Southwark on the south bank of the Thames. He found the wooden London Bridge – the only river crossing –…
Features of an Atlantic Wall Bunker
Features of an Atlantic Wall Bunker The bunker was primarily an instrument of defence. For that purpose, most but not all Regelbauten included a number of standard features. The fortress engineer staff selected designs they needed and adapted them to local conditions. As a result, some bunkers in areas that…
Atlantic Wall: Bunkers and Organization for Defence
Regelbau M162a fire-control bunker for gun battery at Frederikshavn, Denmark, in the summer of 1945. This photo was taken by Frits G. Tillisch, a Danish army officer serving in the Danish Resistance. Cross-section of one of Mirus Battery’s gun emplacements. Modified drawing from Report on German Fortifications (Office of Chief…