FORTIFICATION. During the early ages, when the property of individuals was less valuable, or that, owing to the little progress made by mankind in the arts of despoliation and of seizing upon the possessions of their neighbours, the only fences in use were such as sufficed to restrain the depredations of wild beasts, and to prevent cattle, &c. from straying among the scattered patches of cultiva tion, or into the wilderness. In pro portion, however, as commerce, or com munication with others, and the plea sures of society, induced men to build towns and to congregate more generally, the various passions inducing to the com mission of that variety of trespasses, which have even, within our own time, increased rapidly, rendered it prudent for each individual to secure his own habitation from clandestine or open as sault, and caused the little communities, which every where began to appear, to adopt general means for personal de fence, and for the curb of whatever en croachments might be attempted by others in their vicinity.
At a time when the great simpli city of manners gave a limit to the ambition even of the most aspiring, and when science was yet in the womb of time, we may reasonably conclude, that the means of control and of resistance, then in use, were neither costly, laborious, nor very effectual. The details furnished in scrip. ture prove incontestibly, that even the circumvallations used at their date were inadequate to the purposes of security and duration. In fact, the events that shone conspicuous in those times were, with very few exceptions, pitched battles in the open plain, ambuscades, and trea sonable conspiracies! Nor do we find in the more recent his tories of Rome, of Greece, of Asia, or of other parts then holding any rank in the military world, much to support the opi nion of the ancients having knowledge of fortification. The few places that made any resistance, appear to have been principally maintained by the personal prowess of their defenders. Their walls were indeed, sometimes of great mo ment, as we see in the instance of Troy ; which, if existing in the eighteenth cen tury, would probably capitulate at the first summons.
It was not to be expected that, where the powers of demolition were insignifi cant, the means of resistance would be extended beyond the quantum absolutely necessary. The catapulta, the battering ram, the tower, and such devices, were opposed by heavy masses of stone or of other adequate materials, on which the besieged mounted, to repel the assault. The various contrivances whereby those machines received additional vigour, and the necessity that arose for opposing to their progress more resistance than could be accumulated immediately in their front, (of the tower in particular) first gave rise to the introduction of projec tions from the even line of the wall, whereby the besiegers could be annoyed laterally, as well as immediately front to front.
Still the engineer confined himself to small projections, generally semicircular, which, for the most part, appear to have been added to the old walls, impending like our modern balcony windows. In the sequel, these towers were built the same as the other parts of the circum vallation, and, like the modern bastion, rested on the terra firma. It however seems doubtful, whether the former mode was not the best, considering every cir cumstance attendant upon the ancient mode of assault, and the nature of their weapons.
The invention of gunpowder does not appear to have made any important change for several years, nor indeed until heavy artillery formed a part of the as sailant's means, as may be proved by an examination of the remaining castles, towers, keeps, &c. the dates may he tra ced beyond the middle of the fourteenth century. Such were the solidity and the hardness of many ancient buildings, that the stone shots, originally used, pro duced a very slight effect ; nor was it un til iron balls were brought into use, that the powers of cannon were, in any mea sure, ascertained.