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TOOT-TOOT!

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Some years ago, I met
the gentleman who owns this engine.

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He lives in a castle,

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and
he invited me to have a look at it.

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It's not a proper castle,

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it's a country house
built to look like a castle,

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with battlements and everything.

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But it's never been under siege.

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'Its owner is James Harvey Bathurst.

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'We got friendly because
he's a traction engine enthusiast

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'and a railway enthusiast.'

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That's happened to me.

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'I helped him restore
one of his engines, Atlas,

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'which once resided in Manchester,

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'but now it lives here,
on the forecourt of Eastnor Castle.'

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Here we are in the Great Hall,

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but it looks a lot more comfy
than a proper castle.

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Castles are cold, draughty places,

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and this is lovely and comfortable.

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James, the owner, will tell us all
about it, and how it all came about.

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It's a bit surprising, isn't it?

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It does look like a castle
from a distance,

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and, in 1800, people
were looking back to medieval times.

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My family had been here 200 years

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and, to show
they were a really old family,

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they wanted an impressive building.

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Revival castles - this one's Norman
revival - seemed to be the fashion.

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It's the sheer size of this room
to impress people, eh?

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It's incredibly impressive, yes.

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So this pretend castle
was never put to the test in war.

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Real castles had a serious purpose.

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They were built
to keep attacking armies out.

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So how did something so functional

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turn into
something as ornate as this?

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BELL TOLLS

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In this series, we'll be looking at
how and why things were built,

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what materials and tools were used,

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and how buildings

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were adapted to meet changing needs.

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We'll visit
some of my favourite castles,

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cathedrals and great houses,

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as well as bridges, tunnels,
and other great engineering marvels,

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all different in style and purpose.

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But what they have in common for me

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is the craft skills
involved in designing,

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building and decorating them.

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From some of our most mysterious
and ancient monuments

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to a shiny, futuristic structure
like the Lloyds Building in London,

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the skills of architects
and builders are there to be seen.

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But I'm starting off by
going to see something very simple.

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Man's most basic need
was to defend himself,

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and our earliest constructions

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were earthworks
like the banks and ditches

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surrounding Old Sarum in Wiltshire.

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These huge earthworks were built
in the Iron Age,

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you know, 500 years BC.

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It defies all wonder when you think
they had no machinery, you know.

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It were built
by basic tools and muscle power.

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When you think, to get up there
where the defenders were,

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you'd to come up
this banking over here

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with whatever you were going to
throw at 'em... You'd be knackered!

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Then
you've to descend into the valley,

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with men up there
throwing rocks at you,

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and attempt to get up.
It must have been a pretty...

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you know, impossible place to take.

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And when you think,
all that time ago, you know...

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Like the forerunner of a castle.

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But it was all pretty basic.

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To see real engineering skills
on a truly grand scale,

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you have to wait for the Romans.

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When the Romans came to Britain,

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they brought
more complex building techniques

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than we'd ever had before, you know.

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Hadrian's Wall is the biggest
monument they left behind for us.

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It stretches
across northern England

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from Bowness on the Solway Firth
to Wallsend.

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Its purpose was to stop
marauding Scots crossing the border,

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or as Hadrian put it,

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to stop the barbarians
getting towards the Romans.

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Work started in 122AD,

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and it took six years to build.

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They worked bloody hard, you know.

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It's an amazing piece of work.

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You can't help but notice
how the quality varies

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as you go from area to area.

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In places, it follows
the contours of the land,
and other places, it's level,

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as though that section
had some sort of levelling gear.

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Of all the forts
along Hadrian's Wall,

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Housesteads is
one of the best preserved,
with examples of nearly everything:

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the governor's house,
the granary, the latrines.

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This is rather a splendid pillar

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that I think once upon a time
must have supported two arches

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in what's left
of the northern gateway.

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Beautiful chisel marks still here...

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It's amazing after all these years,
all these centuries.

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These two towers, one on each side,

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the far one were once
the guard room, I've heard tell.

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Judging
by the thickness of the walls,

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it must have been
maybe 30 or 40 feet high.

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Quite a nice bit of building...

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No wonder, really,
that it's lasted so long.

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If it were so well built,
why is so little of it left today?

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Well,
when the Romans left in about 400AD,

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the wall was abandoned,
and people nicked bits of stone

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to build walls, farms,
even churches and abbeys.

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But even from what's left today,

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you can see how it was built,
if you look carefully.

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This is one of the highlights

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of the whole fort,

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the communal bathtub, and
the communal toilets, or latrines.

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It's rather ingenious how
they kept the water in it, you know.

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They chiselled grooves
down the ends of each stone,

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and poured molten lead down,

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and then of course
they'd caulk it up,

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rather like they'd caulk the planks
in t'deck of a ship.

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The water from the bath
came out here

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and
was channelled into the latrines.

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It came round here,
dripped into this trough,

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than ran
the full length of the toilets,

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and back this way,

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back into the main channel
that took away all the effluent.

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The reason for the trough were that
while you sat on the thunderbox,

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you washed your sponge in the water,

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and when you'd done that,

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these sinks, the rectangular one
and the round 'un,

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were where they washed their hands.

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What became of the sponges,
I don't know,

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because all the actual planking
with the holes in's all gone.

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I suppose it ran down the hill
where the sheep are.

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It must have been
a bit stinky down there.

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What's interesting is
how they kept the water in the bath.

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Right, that's it.

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At Housesteads Fort,

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the Roman baths...

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The way they had
of keeping water in 'em, you know -

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as the stone flags came end to end,

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they actually
cut a groove down the middle,

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and poured molten lead in,

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like I've just done.

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They would maybe have had to build

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a pile of stones up at each side,

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with clay behind to stop the molten
lead shoving the clay out, you see.

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I'm lucky. I've got a moulding box,

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and sand on each side,
which has the same effect.

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I'll now dismantle the moulding box
and shift the sand,

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and we'll be able to see er...

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just how well the lead
is all the way down in the joint.

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Now, if we...

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If you imagine that
these things were three feet deep,

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the diamond-shaped slot
in the middle

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would stop the flagstones
moving in either direction.

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Blooming heck!
It's stuck, believe it or not!

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I didn't expect that. I didn't
think it would have done that.

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Erm... You know, I mean, really,

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if it were caulked,
it'd be watertight.

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I think I'll go and build
a Roman bath now! Quite good, that.

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Hadrian's Wall only
saw active service for 300 years.

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Dover Castle, one of
Europe's strongest fortresses,

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saw action from the Iron Age

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up till the atomic age, almost.

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Ken, who's the general manager,

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is going to tell me why it's
such a strategic and important spot.

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We're high up. That's a good start.

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The reason why it's so important is
out there. You can just see France,

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they can see us,
and that means they want to invade.

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This place is here to protect
this country from invasion.

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Just in case Mr Bonaparte set sail.

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Everyone landed here.
It's a natural harbour,
the cliffs are steep,

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and
it's the only place you can land.

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It probably all started
with an Iron Age fort.

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On top of that, the Romans built
a lighthouse. They landed nearby,

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wanting to invade
and go on from there.

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Iron Age fort, Roman lighthouse,
a Norman keep, both World Wars...

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It covers the whole of history.

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The 12th-C keep was built
by Henry II,

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and with a few modifications,

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it retained a military role

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right up to 1945.

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'Henry made Dover into one of
the most powerful medieval castles.
Its great strength

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'was due to the successive rings of
defensive walls protecting the keep.

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This is the last line of defence.

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To get to the keep from here,
you have to cross a drawbridge

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to get to the inner bailey,
which has a wall,
then there's the outer bailey.

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The ditches on both sides
go all the way down to the cliffs,

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which are fairly impregnable anyway.

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It's a 300-foot sheer drop.

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This is the highest point, so 300ft
of cliffs, and we're about 90ft up.

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You get a good view.

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You can see France very well.

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And from across that narrow strip
of water came the greatest threats,

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so Dover Castle
was heavily fortified,

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and barracks were built.

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In the late 18th C,
when Britain was at war with France,

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conditions here became overcrowded,

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so the Royal Engineers
brought in miners

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who tunnelled into the cliffs

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to create underground barracks
for over 2,000 men.

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After the end of the Napoleonic
Wars, they were very little used.

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This is the Napoleonic staircase.
It's a double helix.

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That means there's two staircases,
one on top of the other.

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There's a triple one the other side
of the hill for Western Heights.

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'And just before the outbreak
of the Second World War in 1939,

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'they were turned into
a bomb-proof command headquarters.'

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It's very interesting down here.

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This is the command centre
for the coastal artillery.

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Each of the tunnels

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had its own use by different people.

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Next door was the Navy,
with Admiral Ramsay.

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Coastal Artillery were here,
but the guns and radar

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were all controlled from here.

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And
the gentleman who planned Dunkirk,

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somewhere in these tunnels
he had his little hideaway.

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00:14:49,780 --> 00:14:54,220
The next long tunnel along
is the Navy's tunnel,

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That's where Vice Admiral Ramsay,

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who was initially
looking after the Dover patrol,

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the Channel
and the ships going through there...

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He masterminded
the evacuation of Dunkirk.

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Altogether, 338,000 men
were evacuated from Dunkirk,

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and over 800 ships
brought them back

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to the safety of Dover.

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This is
the balcony for the secret tunnels.

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All other railings in World War II

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were melted down for guns,
but there are pictures
of Ramsay and Churchill

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and the King
coming here to observe France.

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They could see the war happening.
If there was something coming over,

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they nipped back into the tunnel
and were safe.

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What makes Dover so important
is its location,

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and the places castles were built

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00:16:02,260 --> 00:16:06,740
were usually determined
by geographical features.

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00:16:06,740 --> 00:16:09,580
The best example is in Scotland,

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so I went up to Edinburgh to see
Scotland's most famous castle.

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Edinburgh Castle stands
on the sheer crag of Castle Rock,

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the core of an extinct volcano.
It rises 435 feet above sea level,

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and it's
a pretty formidable natural defence.

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You couldn't build a castle
on better foundations,

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and so high up, that's what's
interesting, on top of this volcano.

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Even now, when
you're down in t'town and look up,

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00:16:43,460 --> 00:16:48,180
with all these escarpments
chiselled on the edge of the rock,

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it looks a hell of a long way up.

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What it must have looked like when
just this bit was stuck on top...

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I can imagine the enemy turning up,
and saying, "Sod it! We'll go."

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00:17:06,060 --> 00:17:10,420
In the 15th and 16th centuries,
this was a royal palace,

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and
it became a symbol of royal power.

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00:17:13,980 --> 00:17:19,660
And even today, Edinburgh is
more than just an historic monument.

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It still has symbolic significance,

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00:17:22,300 --> 00:17:29,020
and that's why the Scottish
National War Memorial is here.

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00:17:29,020 --> 00:17:34,900
The impressive building behind me,
the Scottish National War Memorial,

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00:17:34,900 --> 00:17:37,540
is one of the most recently built.

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00:17:37,540 --> 00:17:39,980
I've seen a few war memorials

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00:17:39,980 --> 00:17:43,860
but, believe me,
this one takes some licking.

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00:17:48,340 --> 00:17:53,060
Inside this war memorial
is this magnificent bronze

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00:17:53,060 --> 00:17:58,060
that depicts every aspect
of the 1914 War, you know,

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00:17:58,060 --> 00:18:00,860
from nurses to tank regiments,

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00:18:00,860 --> 00:18:04,260
artillery,
flying-machine men, the lot.

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00:18:06,220 --> 00:18:10,860
The whole lot of this bronze
were first carved in wood

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00:18:10,860 --> 00:18:13,460
by Alice and Morris
Meredith-Williams.

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00:18:13,460 --> 00:18:15,900
Must have been Welsh.

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00:18:15,900 --> 00:18:18,980
And
after it had been carved in wood,

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00:18:18,980 --> 00:18:22,860
it went to the foundry
to be used as a pattern

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00:18:22,860 --> 00:18:25,100
to cast the bronze.

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00:18:25,100 --> 00:18:28,940
It certainly
captured the sadness of it all.

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00:18:28,940 --> 00:18:31,420
There's nobody smiling, you know,

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00:18:31,420 --> 00:18:35,540
in any of the faces,
and it's all very sad.

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00:18:37,980 --> 00:18:41,380
Inside this iron casket

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00:18:41,380 --> 00:18:45,820
are the names
of 150,000 Scots men and women

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00:18:45,820 --> 00:18:48,460
who died in the First World War.

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00:18:52,820 --> 00:18:54,940
BAGPIPE MARCH

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00:18:58,220 --> 00:19:02,460
Military tradition and pageantry
are still strong here.

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00:19:02,460 --> 00:19:08,220
I've seen the Tattoo on TV
and been impressed. On my visit,

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I had an appointment with a man
who keeps another tradition going.

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00:19:49,820 --> 00:19:54,460
That were exciting. Hello, Tam.
How are you doing? Very well.

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00:19:54,460 --> 00:19:58,860
This is Tam the Gun,
and every day for the last 21 years

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00:19:58,860 --> 00:20:01,820
he's done that. Why do you do it?

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00:20:01,820 --> 00:20:07,420
It dates from 1861, Fred.
They started it
for shipping in the Forth

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00:20:07,420 --> 00:20:12,140
so ships' captains could set their
chronometers. It's a lovely gun.

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00:20:12,140 --> 00:20:15,700
Actually, it was designed in 1936,

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00:20:15,700 --> 00:20:18,500
put into production in 1939,

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00:20:18,500 --> 00:20:22,100
and
it's been going strong ever since.

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00:20:22,100 --> 00:20:26,500
I found it exhilarating,
the build-up to one o'clock.

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00:20:26,500 --> 00:20:30,820
It were like when
we're knocking a big chimney down,

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00:20:30,820 --> 00:20:33,660
the same exciting feeling, you know.

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00:20:33,660 --> 00:20:37,700
Give it a good welly, Fred.
Will do! I'll do that.

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00:20:39,580 --> 00:20:41,740
CLANG!

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00:20:41,740 --> 00:20:43,980
You can imagine that in 1914!

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00:20:44,940 --> 00:20:47,300
Did you enjoy that? Yeah! Good.

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00:20:49,500 --> 00:20:52,140
People have them by t'fireplace

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00:20:52,140 --> 00:20:55,700
as poker stands. Do they?
THEY BOTH LAUGH

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00:20:57,100 --> 00:21:00,660
From ceremony and pageantry
in Scotland,

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00:21:00,660 --> 00:21:05,540
I went to Wales to see an awesome
symbol of military domination.

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00:21:07,580 --> 00:21:12,140
Conwy is a classic example
of the invincible medieval castle.

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00:21:12,140 --> 00:21:18,140
Edward I was by far our greatest
castle builder, and his memorial

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00:21:18,140 --> 00:21:22,500
is the great chain
of eight great stone fortresses

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00:21:22,500 --> 00:21:26,860
he built in north Wales
in the space of 25 years.

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00:21:26,860 --> 00:21:31,620
It was the greatest feat of
royal building in British history.

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00:21:31,620 --> 00:21:35,700
The castles
were a symbol of Edward's power,

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00:21:35,700 --> 00:21:40,100
an ultimate weapon against
any threat of a Welsh uprising.

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00:21:40,100 --> 00:21:44,340
Their defences
needed to be very sophisticated,

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00:21:44,340 --> 00:21:48,940
so, to carry out the work,
Edward employed a Frenchman,

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00:21:48,940 --> 00:21:53,660
James of St George, the greatest
military architect of his age.

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00:21:53,660 --> 00:21:57,300
And
in these outposts of English power,

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00:21:57,300 --> 00:22:01,820
the art of castle building
reached its peak.

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00:22:01,820 --> 00:22:04,260
They were all built to withstand

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00:22:04,260 --> 00:22:09,300
any pounding from any siege weapon
that had been devised at the time,

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00:22:09,300 --> 00:22:13,380
and made any form of attack
difficult and dangerous.

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00:22:13,380 --> 00:22:17,260
There are eight main towers,

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00:22:17,260 --> 00:22:23,980
but the four more smaller towers at
this end were the king's quarters.

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00:22:23,980 --> 00:22:27,780
The only way in...
It's really two halves.

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00:22:27,780 --> 00:22:30,660
The only way
into the king's quarters

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00:22:30,660 --> 00:22:36,540
were by battling through the
main body of the castle, or by sea.

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00:22:36,540 --> 00:22:41,220
As you can see, it would have been
a heck of a job scaling the walls,

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00:22:41,220 --> 00:22:45,580
especially with
people pouring boiling tar on you,

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00:22:45,580 --> 00:22:49,140
throwing all sorts of stuff,
bows and arrows.

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00:22:49,140 --> 00:22:55,460
It's not as if you could dig under
it. It's all based on solid rock.

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00:22:55,460 --> 00:22:58,860
It's
a piece of monumental engineering,

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00:22:58,860 --> 00:23:04,380
a massive achievement for its time,
and when you look closely

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00:23:04,380 --> 00:23:09,420
at the walls and towers, you get
some clues as to how it was built.

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00:23:11,900 --> 00:23:14,220
That's a big stone, that.

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00:23:14,220 --> 00:23:17,860
Apparently,
when they built these castles,

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00:23:17,860 --> 00:23:24,860
in-between the flat, level decks
of scaffolding,
they had these inclined planes

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00:23:24,860 --> 00:23:28,460
they dragged the rocks up.
So it's odd,

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00:23:28,460 --> 00:23:32,180
when you study castles
and look at 'em,

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00:23:32,180 --> 00:23:34,860
some appear to have no putlog holes.

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00:23:34,860 --> 00:23:37,300
That's these little black holes

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00:23:37,300 --> 00:23:43,180
where a piece of timber, a short
length called a putlog, went in.

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00:23:43,180 --> 00:23:45,620
Tied to the end were fir poles,

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00:23:45,620 --> 00:23:49,220
or tree trunks,
for want of a better name,

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00:23:49,220 --> 00:23:54,540
and of course lashed with rope, and
the planks rested on the putlogs.

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00:23:54,540 --> 00:24:00,660
They sawed them off as they went
back down, and then most castles

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00:24:00,660 --> 00:24:03,340
were cement-rendered
and lime-washed.

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00:24:03,340 --> 00:24:07,580
You can imagine
the rendering over a bit of wood,

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00:24:07,580 --> 00:24:10,220
and 500 years later the wood rots.

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00:24:10,220 --> 00:24:15,420
Some of them look like currant cake,
there's so many putlog holes in 'em.

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00:24:21,140 --> 00:24:25,020
But what was it like
to attack one of these places?

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00:24:25,020 --> 00:24:29,300
I went to Warwick
for a practical demonstration.

335
00:24:33,460 --> 00:24:35,860
Tell us a bit about....

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00:24:35,860 --> 00:24:39,620
how you'd get in here.
Well, Master Frederick,

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00:24:39,620 --> 00:24:42,260
you're well within archer range.

338
00:24:42,260 --> 00:24:46,540
Below 200 yards, you're taking
your life in your hands.

339
00:24:46,540 --> 00:24:52,220
Look across the crenellations
at the top of the castle.

340
00:24:52,220 --> 00:24:56,100
I have my men positioned
in each of the archer loops

341
00:24:56,100 --> 00:25:00,340
to look down on
anyone attacking the gateway.

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00:25:00,340 --> 00:25:02,700
Once we got to the drawbridge...

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00:25:02,700 --> 00:25:06,980
Presumably they had
something to shelter behind,

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00:25:06,980 --> 00:25:09,300
while we started work on it.

345
00:25:09,300 --> 00:25:14,180
Once you'd got to the portcullis,
it'd be a bit tough even then.

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00:25:14,180 --> 00:25:17,220
It's the castle's strongest point,

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00:25:17,220 --> 00:25:22,500
this barbican. You'd
almost be insane to attack here.

348
00:25:22,500 --> 00:25:26,580
If you got this far,
you'd look like a pincushion!

349
00:25:29,820 --> 00:25:34,300
Right, Master Frederick.
We're in the barbican itself,

350
00:25:34,300 --> 00:25:39,180
and assuming the enemy had made it
through the mighty oaken doors

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00:25:39,180 --> 00:25:42,620
that rest upon these hinges there...

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00:25:42,620 --> 00:25:46,500
While they're trying
to batter through those,

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00:25:46,500 --> 00:25:51,780
look up,
and you're below murder holes,
from which in the floor above

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00:25:51,780 --> 00:25:59,060
people could pour boiling sand,
or quicklime, or burning oil
onto the attackers.

355
00:25:59,060 --> 00:26:02,500
But once you're through
THIS portcullis,

356
00:26:02,500 --> 00:26:05,060
doorways surround this bottom level!

357
00:26:05,060 --> 00:26:07,020
YELLING

358
00:26:23,940 --> 00:26:26,100
I didn't like THAT.

359
00:26:27,500 --> 00:26:29,620
Bloody hell!

360
00:26:29,620 --> 00:26:33,180
The Middle Ages
were turbulent times,

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00:26:33,180 --> 00:26:36,460
but most castles
last saw real action

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00:26:36,460 --> 00:26:40,420
at the end of the Civil War.

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00:26:40,420 --> 00:26:44,580
Many of them
became palaces and stately homes.

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00:26:44,580 --> 00:26:48,660
Warwick is a good example
of how they changed.

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00:26:48,660 --> 00:26:52,980
It's one of the finest medieval
castles in England,

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00:26:52,980 --> 00:26:57,380
but within its walls
is a magnificent country house.

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00:26:58,980 --> 00:27:02,540
By the 1890s,
it was a favourite retreat

368
00:27:02,540 --> 00:27:07,100
for some of the most important
figures in Victorian society.

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00:27:07,100 --> 00:27:10,380
In some of the castle's rooms

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00:27:10,380 --> 00:27:16,060
is a re-creation of a house party
including a young Winston Churchill.

371
00:27:18,500 --> 00:27:21,340
This is really my period, you know,

372
00:27:21,340 --> 00:27:23,980
the beauty and splendour of it all.

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00:27:23,980 --> 00:27:27,740
I'd like to have been
a maintenance man here,

374
00:27:27,740 --> 00:27:32,460
coming to work every morning
and fettling bits of furniture.

375
00:27:32,460 --> 00:27:35,980
I believe
you've got a squeaky caster.

376
00:27:35,980 --> 00:27:38,500
Ah, Dibnah. Remove your cap, please.

377
00:27:38,500 --> 00:27:40,620
Thank you.

378
00:27:40,620 --> 00:27:44,660
I think there's something wrong
with this caster.

379
00:27:46,740 --> 00:27:49,060
Excuse me, Mr Churchill,

380
00:27:49,060 --> 00:27:51,580
while I fettle this here table leg.

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00:28:08,540 --> 00:28:13,540
Subtitles by Paul Murray, ITFC,
for BBC Subtitling - 2000

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00:28:13,540 --> 00:28:16,700
E-mail us at subtitling@bbc.co.uk