Medieval Sieges On Castles Infodump! n_n

Just like the 4th blinkie on the interests section of my page says, this is infodump central! Castle walls would be made of ashlar (large stones) with chains, flint, rubble and mortar between them, so as strong as they (workers that'd for free a.k.a. they were forced to) could make them. During a siege all villagers would be brought into castle for protection. The gate was the weakest part of a castle and often wooden as well. Prisoners in dungeons would be decapitated and their heads put on stakes outside the castle as a warning against anyone considering storming the castle. Roofs would be made of slate/tile to prevent burning. Any surfaces that were wooden, would be covered in wet animal skins to avoid damage from fires. Talking about hot stuff, buckets of burning tar would be poured from crenellations. Crenellations are the large stone blocks on the tops of the towers that you could hide behind for protection. Some very clever designs had the crenellations extended off of the walls, with big gaps between (definitely enough to fall through). That's where the tar'd be poured out, if the crenellations were on top of the walls and not extended off the tar'd just be poured over it. Murder holes were holes between gates to pick off people storming a castle with bows and arrows. They're also called loopholes, it's very difficult for an archer on the ground to shoot through but easy for an archer in the castle to shoot. Sally ports were doors in walls of castles which can be used to ambush an attacking army’s camp; the ambush would be called a sally (for obvious reasons). Stairs would go up clockwise because most people are right handed and it makes it difficult to fight while while climbing. If you weren't right handed you were probably dead. There would be long sticks to shove ladders away as well. All this makes it extremely difficult to besiege a castle and it's very unlikely you'd get to the keep (aka donjon), where valuables were kept, and where the royalty was. Thanks for reading all this if you did! :3c