When laying siege to a fortified city, town or castle in the middle Ages, the attackers follow tactics very similar to those that the Romans used. Sieges usually went through a certain order, depending on resources, terrain, forces and the diplomatic situation, but they often went in this order:
1) Surround – Surround the city and order it to surrender
2) Escalade – An attack is launched on the walls with ladders
3) Settle and Blockade – If the attack failed, then a ditch would be dug around the besieged castle, temporary accommodation would be set up for the attackers.
4) Bombardment – Heavy projectiles would be launched at the walls, trying to breach or damage them.
5) Breach – Rams would then be used to destroy walls, gates and towers at close range.
6) Mining – The city or castle would then be undermined by digging a tunnel underneath the wall’s or towers.
7) Tower Escalade – Siege towers were wheeled walls and then a bloody battle for the ramparts would begin.
8) Starvation – The city would be surrounded and the defenders would die of starvation or surrender.
9) Trickery – Used all the way through the siege to try and gain entrance to the city through trick or ruse.
10) Retreat – If everything failed and the city still remained standing, then there is nothing else to do but give up and retreat.
Surround – Prior to a siege, the attacking army will surround the city or castle and enter into negotiations and ultimatums for surrender. If the defenders refuse to surrender, then the attacking force will yell taunting abuse at the defenders and begin the siege in proper.
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Escalade – This is the most direct and most dangerous of assaults. The general idea is that the attackers make their way up to the walls and place ladders up against them, attached to the ladders were usually iron hooks or clamps to grip the parapet. Meanwhile the defenders would be harassing the opposition by pushing down the ladders, throwing rocks, and loosing arrows. Archers, slingers and crossbowmen on the attacking side would give covering fire to the storming troops from behind large wooded shields known as ‘Pavises’, which were propped up and gave the archers protection while firing.
Eventually, if the attackers could whether the storm of rocks, arrows, quicklime, boiling water and oil, as well as the forked poles used to push away the ladders, they would make ground on the wall top and be continually be reinforced from below. If they could force their way to the gate, then they could open it for the rest of their comrades, but this is not as easy as first suspected. If the attackers do make their way onto the battlements, any further advance is hindered by the defenders making a fighting retreat to towers punctuating the curtain wall, thus isolating the storming troops and continuing the defence of the adjacent towers. The attackers would have to bring siege equipment up the ladders to breach the towers, leaving them in a very exposed position. After a few failed escalades, the attackers would fall back and move on to the next stage.
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Settle and Blockade – The attackers now settled down and began the lengthy siege process. The attackers now built a temporary encampment or “Siege City” made of tents and huts of straw or wood. They dug inner and outer ditches strengthened by stockades to protect from sorties out of the stronghold.
In the Crusades, the siege of Damascus went so badly that the defending army marched out of the city and besieged the Crusader army, although a Crusader charge finally broke the Moslem defenders’ formation.
The attackers in a siege blockaded and surrounded they city, not allowing in or out, although this was a lengthy, time and resource consuming process.
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Bombardment – The attacking force would then begin to build siege weapons to bombard the city’s walls.
Siege engines such as Mangonels and Trebuchets were employed to throw missiles against the walls and even into the city streets or castle grounds. They were also used to throw putrefying corpses of horses and cattle into the stronghold to spread disease – an early form of biological warfare – or containers of combustible mixtures, such as the dreaded Greek Fire, a flaming concoction of Naphtha and other substances. Incendiary devices were also attached to cats, dogs, and even birds to ser fire to the besieged city.
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Breach – The next stage was to try and destroy the walls and gates manually with battering rams. The battering ram was a crude but effective device for smashing and breaching a wall, or breaking down a gate or portcullis. It was essentially a large log or tree with an iron capped end – affectionately fashioned into the shape of a ram’s head. As the wielders of the ram would be under constant fire from the defenders on the walls, a wooden shelter, or ‘sow’, was used to shelter them while they made their way to the walls.
In most circumstances the ram was actually suspended from the inside of the roof of the shelter, rather then being held by the men, because if it was suspended, all the efforts of the men would be put into swinging the ram forward against the walls, rather then just carrying it.
Instead of a ram’s head, a metal point was often fixed to the front of a ram, it was called ‘mouse’ or ‘bore’ and was used to pick away at the mortar, and lever the stones free, creating a breach.
To counter the pounding action of the battering ram, the defenders would lower wickerwork panels or padded buffers between the ram and it’s target, or lower heavy balks or timber into the ram’s protruding head, rendering it useless. The surest way to stop a ram was to drop large stones onto the protective sow, crushing the canopy and it’s occupants. But the stones of the required size were not always available, so sometimes a hook was lowered to catch the head of the ram and lift it off the ground.
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Mining – If the rams failed, then the next thing to do would be undermining. Mining was one of the best ways of breaching a wall or tower, and played a major role in siege craft, although it was slow progress.
Undermining consisted of a tunnel being dug near to the castle walls (depending on how brave the miners were; if they started digging within bowshot of the defenders, they would need the protection of a sow).
Once the tunnel was under the wall, it was extended horizontally along the wall front. The tunnel was supported by timber, and once it was of sufficient size, it was filled with combustible materials like brushwood and pig fat, and was set alight. Once the timber props had burnt away, the wall’s foundations were left with nothing to support them, and so gave way, falling into the cavity created by the miners, producing s breach.
King John used mining to good effect in capturing Rochester castle in 1215. After besieging the rebel held fortress for two months, John’s soldiers managed to breach the bailey wall, whereupon the defenders withdrew to the great stone keep, 125 feet high.
John ordered his sappers to drive a shaft under a corners of the square tower, and sent a message, dated at Rochester on the 25 th of November 1215, to Hubert de Burgh for animal fuel to feed the fire in the mine:
“We command that, with all haste, by day and by night, you send us 40 bacon pigs of the fattest and least good for eating, to bring fore under the tower”.
When the shaft was ready, the props and brushwood were covered in pig’s fat and set fire too. As planned, the corner of the keep came down and the King’s men gained entrance and finally captured the stronghold.
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Tower Escalade – This was another form of escalade, safer, more effective, but also more time consuming. Giant wooden towers or ‘belfries’ had to be constructed.
The tower had many apartments or levels, with ladders running up to the top platform, which was equipped with a drawbridge. The tower had wheels or rollers, so that it could be moved up to the castle walls, then the draw bridge would be lowered to span the gap between the tower and the walls, then storm troopers positioned inside would rush across the draw-bridge and attempt to take the walls.
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Starvation – If beaten back in all other attempts to take the town, city or castle by force of arms, then the attackers would be forced to sit down and starve their opponents into submission. Although this seemed easiest, and should’ve been done first of all, it wasn’t; if the defending city was well stocked with food and had an adequate supply of fresh water, then the defenders could well outlast the attacking army, and so the attackers would have to retreat, or keep ordering more supplies from home, which was very difficult to maintain, because after a while the Duke or Count funding the siege attempt would have to cease supplying the army, or the land would run out of food and money. The attacking army could always live off the surrounding countryside, but the defenders usually burnt all the lands around to stop this happening.
A great amount of discipline was also needed to keep the attacking force together and concentrated. For it would get bored after a while, and with nothing to do, the soldiers would desert and find other things to entertain them.
The siege of Calais in 1346 by Edmund the third of England is a classic example of a long term, properly organised starvation siege. Calais was immensely strong, had a good standing garrison, and was well provisioned. But due to outstanding leadership, flawless planning and a watertight blockade, Calais was brought to its knees.
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Trickery – All the way through a siege, the attackers would constantly try to outwit their opponent and gain entrance to the city or castle by means of a trick or ruse; such as dressing up as beggars, lost tourists, or maidens on a pilgrimage, and even pretend reinforcements for the defenders, but perhaps the most well known trick of all was the wooden horse of Troy.
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Retreat – if everything else failed, then the attacking army would most likely retreat, as they would have nothing else to stay for. An attacking army would often retreat if a relief force arrived, as it was usually better to give up the siege then suffer large losses on the battlefield.
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