There’s nothing like taking a few weeks away from work in creating a fresh approach and new perspective. While my colleagues are tolerating my jet lag, I in turn have been reflecting on some of the more unique memories of my trip to France.  As it turns out, it wasn’t the food or the wine or the French’s keen love of small dogs that held my memory, rather it was the clever problem-solving approach many castle architects took to warding off attacks.

During the Middle Ages, castles required the steepest investment of resources – funds, material, and labor.  These community-based buildings, not unlike our green building development projects,  were so central to securing and leading a thriving community that innovative engineering skills became a central part of the design.

For example, many castles had an outward sloping base, making it hard for attackers to climb the castle walls. Should a breach occur, many castles had ‘curtain walls’ -a first line of defense that often led to another wall designed with embedded defense mechanisms, like arrow slits, and portcullis – heavy, grilled doors with spikes that would come crashing down, impaling invaders.  Yikes! How’s that for clean tech?

Elements such as trick passages with “murder holes”  -cavities in the ceiling from which hot tar, stones, boiling water or molten lead could be poured through, killing the trapped invader-  and steep staircases that spiraled to the right, requiring invaders to use their awkward left arm for sword fights. Living quarters often had no sources of natural light to ensure a moment of blindness for attackers as their eyes adjusted to the dim interior – delivering a level of advantage to the defenders and a strange incentive for energy efficiency.

Creative problem solving wasn’t dedicated just to defense mechanisms, but spilled over into every day living. Even water collection was elegant in its simplicity and sophistication.  Whole sloping fields within the castle walls would be covered with leveled stone, directing rain run-off to gutters that distributed water along specific routes of the compound, nearly echoing my own approach to rain water collection (note the vertical and sloping gutters in the image to the right). 

But with all this technology, there still existed levels of vulnerability. For example, a castle’s food supply quickly became the target of an attack.  Many times a castle was so well fortified that the attacking enemy would surround the castle and simply starve the inhabitants out. This of course, took months, but often proved successful.  In response, the starving inhabitants would send out all the women, children and elderly into almost certain death or abduction in order to extend the food supply longer for the strong defenders.  I can’t help thinking our school lunch programs depend on a similar approach. 

Perhaps my captivation with Frances’ castles had to do with the poetry of finding ourselves not too far removed from our distant cousins. Our worlds – though obviously different – still utilize the asset of human ingenuity to uncover elegant solutions to common, yet complex problems.