Bridge castle
Encyclopedia
A bridge castle is a type of castle that was built to provide military observation and security for a river crossing. In the narrower sense it refers to castle
Castle
A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...
s that are built directly on or next to a bridge
Bridge
A bridge is a structure built to span physical obstacles such as a body of water, valley, or road, for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle...
. Sometimes, however, castles close to a bridge are referred to as bridge castles.
These fortifications were often designed as toll castle
Toll castle
A toll castle is a castle that, in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Era guarded a customs post and was intended to control it. It thus always stood in the vicinity of an important long-distance trade route over, for example, the Alpine passes or the Middle Rhine...
s and were occupied only by a guard force. In Europe several examples of bridge castles have survived, especially in the south and southeast of the continent.
The bridge castle type - which is only rarely mentioned in detail in the specialist literature - is not always clearly distinguishable from the "fortified bridge". In medieval Europe, numerous river crossings were protected by tower structures and outworks.
Examples
The Hohenstaufen double tower gate on the Roman bridge across the VolturnoVolturno
The Volturno is a river in south-central Italy.-Geography:It rises in the Abruzzese central Apennines of Samnium near Rocchetta a Volturno and flows southeast as far as its junction with the Calore River near Caiazzo and runs south as far as Venafro, and then turns southwest, past Capua, to...
in Capua
Capua
Capua is a city and comune in the province of Caserta, Campania, southern Italy, situated 25 km north of Naples, on the northeastern edge of the Campanian plain. Ancient Capua was situated where Santa Maria Capua Vetere is now...
, Italy, is classified as a bridge castle. Frederick II of Hohenstaufen built here a representative "state building" as the gateway to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, commonly known as the Two Sicilies even before formally coming into being, was the largest and wealthiest of the Italian states before Italian unification...
, whose surviving ruins give little indication of its former importance.
The largest preserved bridge castle is the rectangular edifice of Valeggio sul Mincio
Valeggio sul Mincio
Valeggio sul Mincio is a comune in the Province of Verona in the Italian region Veneto, located about 120 km west of Venice and about 25 km southwest of Verona. It is crossed by the Mincio river....
(Province of Verona
Province of Verona
The Province of Verona is a province in the Veneto region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Verona.-Overview:The province has an area of 3,109 km², and a total population of 912,981...
, North Italy). In the Late Middle Ages
Late Middle Ages
The Late Middle Ages was the period of European history generally comprising the 14th to the 16th century . The Late Middle Ages followed the High Middle Ages and preceded the onset of the early modern era ....
, Gian Galeazzo Visconti
Gian Galeazzo Visconti
Gian Galeazzo Visconti , son of Galeazzo II Visconti and Bianca of Savoy, was the first Duke of Milan and ruled the late-medieval city just before the dawn of the Renaissance...
ordered the construction of a mighty bridge fortress under the four-winged inner bailey of the local castle between Mantua
Mantua
Mantua is a city and comune in Lombardy, Italy and capital of the province of the same name. Mantua's historic power and influence under the Gonzaga family, made it one of the main artistic, cultural and notably musical hubs of Northern Italy and the country as a whole...
and Lake Garda
Lake Garda
Lake Garda is the largest lake in Italy. It is located in Northern Italy, about half-way between Brescia and Verona, and between Venice and Milan. Glaciers formed this alpine region at the end of the last ice age...
. The bridge fort lies about 100 metres in height below the hill castle
Hill castle
A hill castle is a castle built on a natural feature that stands above the surrounding terrain. It is a term derived from the German Höhenburg used in categorising castle sites by their topographical location...
. Three gateways were linked by curtain wall
Curtain wall
A curtain wall is an outer covering of a building in which the outer walls are non-structural, but merely keep out the weather. As the curtain wall is non-structural it can be made of a lightweight material reducing construction costs. When glass is used as the curtain wall, a great advantage is...
s to 14 demi-bastions. The gate tower below the hill castle is of a strikingly weak design. The living rooms of the guards were in the central gateway. This gateway barred access to the crossing in a similar way to the rear gateway with a massive crossbeam.
The famous bridge castle of Stari most
Stari most
Stari Most is a 16th century Ottoman bridge in the city of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina that crosses the river Neretva and connects two parts of the city. The Old Bridge stood for 427 years, until it was destroyed on November 9, 1993 during the Croat-Bosniak War...
in Mostar
Mostar
Mostar is a city and municipality in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the largest and one of the most important cities in the Herzegovina region and the center of the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton of the Federation. Mostar is situated on the Neretva river and is the fifth-largest city in the country...
(Bosnia-Herzegovina) was partly destroyed in 1993 by Bosnian-Croatian troops, but was rebuilt. Originally, around 1450, two great fortified tower
Fortified tower
A fortified tower is one of the defensive structures used in fortifications, such as castles, along with curtain walls...
s on both sides of the river guarded a suspension bridge, which was replaced in 1566 by a stone arch bridge.
Fortified bridges
A typical example of a fortified bridge is the Pont ValentréPont Valentré
The Pont Valentré is a fourteenth century six-span fortified stone arch bridge crossing the Lot River to the west of Cahors, in France. It has become a symbol of the city....
near Cahors
Cahors
Cahors is the capital of the Lot department in south-western France.Its site is dramatic being contained on three sides within an udder shaped twist in the river Lot known as a 'presqu'île' or peninsula...
(Midi-Pyrénées
Midi-Pyrénées
Midi-Pyrénées is the largest region of metropolitan France by area, larger than the Netherlands or Denmark.Midi-Pyrénées has no historical or geographical unity...
) in Southern France
Southern France
Southern France , colloquially known as le Midi is defined geographical area consisting of the regions of France that border the Atlantic Ocean south of the Gironde, Spain, the Mediterranean, and Italy...
. The site is almost totally preserved apart from the eastern barbican
Barbican
A barbican, from medieval Latin barbecana, signifying the "outer fortification of a city or castle," with cognates in the Romance languages A barbican, from medieval Latin barbecana, signifying the "outer fortification of a city or castle," with cognates in the Romance languages A barbican, from...
(fortified gate) which was removed in the 19th century. In Germany and Central Europe only ruins of bridge fortifications have generally survived. Usually there are only the individual gate towers, for example as on the Stone Bridge
Stone Bridge
Stone Bridge may refer to:Bridges by that name:* Stone Bridge , the bridge across the Seyhan River in Adana, Turkey.* Stone Bridge , the bridge across Griboedov Canal in Saint Petersburg, Russia....
in Regensburg
Regensburg
Regensburg is a city in Bavaria, Germany, located at the confluence of the Danube and Regen rivers, at the northernmost bend in the Danube. To the east lies the Bavarian Forest. Regensburg is the capital of the Bavarian administrative region Upper Palatinate...
and the Charles Bridge
Charles Bridge
The Charles Bridge is a famous historic bridge that crosses the Vltava river in Prague, Czech Republic. Its construction started in 1357 under the auspices of King Charles IV, and finished in the beginning of the 15th century...
in Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
.