Artillery changed sieges & that changed warfare

Looking at many period illustrations of defenses with their plethora of particulars leaves one wondering: "What is going on?  Where is what?"  Each artillery fort constructed was unique due to many factors, including placement, construction materials, whether or not a moat was present, whether or not it surrounded a pre-existing community, extent of outer defenses, etc., etc.  And each siege of an artillery fort was unique due to the nature of the ground, the size of the defenses, condition of both forces, supplies available to both sides, weather, number of artillery pieces, etc., etc.

But there were principles that applied to all.

These Web pages will focus on those principles, to distinguish general concept from particular application. Therefore, models and computer renderings are extensively used to, in essence, separate the wheat from the chaff, the feature from the incidental -  ultimately to help one be able to grasp what a profound effect the artillery fort had on the evolution of warfare and armies during this period.

This set of Web pages is designed to flow like a television documentary but at your pace.  At the bottom of each primary page is a link that lets you access the next page - plus allows you the opportunity to step back a page if you wish.  You can get the gist of siege warfare by going from one primary page to the next.  In addition, though, there are secondary pages that offer details and interesting side-trips from the primary pages. By clicking the little "Dig down" link on a primary page, you can see an associated support page.

Each primary page also has links top and bottom back to this menu page if you would like to work from a menu.

So - let's start!