A barbican (from ) is a fortified outpost or

fortified gateway A fortified gateway is an element of a variety of fortified structures, such as a castle or city wall, walled town. Fortified gates or gateways appear in the Bronze Age and reach into the modern times. City gate Gatehouse ''Torburg'' In Ger ...

, such as at an outer

defense Defense or defence may refer to: Tactical, martial, and political acts or groups * Defense (military), forces primarily intended for warfare * Civil defense, the organizing of civilians to deal with emergencies or enemy attacks * Defense industr ...

perimeter of a city or castle, or any tower situated over a gate or bridge which was used for defensive purposes.

Europe

Medieval Europeans typically built barbicans outside, or at the edge of, a main line of defenses, and connected them to

defensive wall A defensive wall is a fortification usually used to protect a city, town or other settlement from potential aggressors. The walls can range from simple palisades or earthworks to extensive military fortifications such as curtain walls with t ...

s with a walled road called ''the neck''. Barbicans would thus control the entrance to a city or castle at the "

choke point In military strategy, a choke point (or chokepoint), or sometimes bottleneck, is a geographical feature on land such as a valley, defile or bridge, or maritime passage through a critical waterway such as a strait, which an armed force is for ...

". In the 15th century, as

siege A siege () . is a military blockade of a city, or fortress, with the intent of conquering by attrition, or by well-prepared assault. Siege warfare (also called siegecrafts or poliorcetics) is a form of constant, low-intensity conflict charact ...

tactics and

artillery Artillery consists of ranged weapons that launch Ammunition, munitions far beyond the range and power of infantry firearms. Early artillery development focused on the ability to breach defensive walls and fortifications during sieges, and l ...

developed, barbicans began to lose their significance, but new barbicans were built well into the 16th century. Fortified or mock-fortified

gatehouse A gatehouse is a type of fortified gateway, an entry control point building, enclosing or accompanying a gateway for a town, religious house, castle, manor house, or other fortification building of importance. Gatehouses are typically the most ...

s remained a feature of ambitious French and English residences well into the 17th century. Portuguese medieval fortification nomenclature uses the term "barbican" ("") for any wall outside of and lower than the main defensive wall that forms a second barrier. The barrier may be complete, extensive or only protect particularly weak areas. The more restrictive term ''gate barbican'' refers to structures protecting gates.

Arab world

The origin of the English word barbican is thought to be found in either Persian or Arabic (see

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(1888–1974) interpreted the Arabic word 'bashura as used in 13th-century chronicles to mean barbican, a defensive structure placed ahead of a gate but this has been debunked, 'bashura' denoting rather an entire section of the outer fortifications, which may include a barbican but also a bastion, gate, tower or all of these.

South Asia

Barbicans were also used in South Asian fortifications where some of their purposes were to protect the main gate from being rammed by

war elephants A war elephant is an elephant that is trained and guided by humans for combat purposes. Historically, the war elephant's main use was to charge the enemy, break their ranks, and instill terror and fear. Elephantry is a term for specific mil ...

East Asia

Fortifications in

East Asia East Asia is a geocultural region of Asia. It includes China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan, plus two special administrative regions of China, Hong Kong and Macau. The economies of Economy of China, China, Economy of Ja ...

also feature similar high structures. In particular, gates in

Chinese city wall Chinese city walls () refer to defensive walls built to protect important towns and cities in pre-modern China. In addition to walls, Chinese city defenses also included fortified towers and city gate, gates, as well as moats and rampart (fortif ...

s were often defended by an additional "archery tower" in front of the main

, with the two towers connected by walls extending out from the main fortification. Literally called " jar walls", they are often referred to as "barbicans" in English.

References

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External links

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Barbican
at Location Textures
Barbican, A Fortified Outpost Of Old Town Of Krakow, Poland
on DreamSite

Krakow Barbican – The Last Remains of the City’s Medieval Defences
on Absolute Tours
Barbican
on

Encyclopædia Britannica The is a general knowledge, general-knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It has been published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. since 1768, although the company has changed ownership seven times. The 2010 version of the 15th edition, ...