A murder hole or meurtrière is a hole in the ceiling of a gateway or passageway in a fortification through which the defenders could shoot, throw or pour harmful substances or objects such as rocks, arrows, scalding water, hot sand,

quicklime Calcium oxide (CaO), commonly known as quicklime or burnt lime, is a widely used chemical compound. It is a white, caustic, alkaline, crystalline solid at room temperature. The broadly used term "''lime''" connotes calcium-containing inorganic ma ...

, or

boiling oil Early thermal weapons, which used heat or burning action to destroy or damage enemy personnel, fortifications or territories, were employed in warfare during the classical and medieval periods (approximately the 8th century BC until the mid-16th ...

, down on attackers. Boiling oil was rarely used because of its cost. Similar holes, called

machicolation A machicolation (french: mâchicoulis) is a floor opening between the supporting corbels of a battlement, through which stones or other material, such as boiling water, hot sand, quicklime or boiling cooking oil, could be dropped on attackers at t ...

s, were often located in the curtain walls of

castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified r ...

s, fortified manor houses, and city walls. The

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). Whe ...

would project over

corbel In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal jutting from a wall to carry a superincumbent weight, a type of bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in the wall, whereas a console is a piece applied to the s ...

s so that holes would be located over the exterior face of the wall, allowing the defenders to target attackers at the base of the wall. The primary difference between these two features is in their location. Murder holes were located on the interiors of castles and other fortified buildings at the entranceway. Their supposed intention was to discourage (or kill) invaders once they had breached the walls, though it has been suggested that they may have in some cases also facilitated more prosaic activities, such as communication between levels. For example, the murder hole at Audley's Castle in County Down, Northern Ireland is located not over the main threshold, but over the entry way to an interior room. In

tower house A tower house is a particular type of stone structure, built for defensive purposes as well as habitation. Tower houses began to appear in the Middle Ages, especially in mountainous or limited access areas, in order to command and defend strateg ...

s, often considered aetiologically to be small castles, the most common location for these features is located over the lobby, the effective equivalent of locating them over a

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 mos ...

in a true castle. It bears note that most, if not all, murder holes have only a restricted view of the lobbies below, supporting the idea that other uses may have been common. However, murder holes have been described in a variety of areas within fortified buildings, and there is no completely reliable formula for their placement. The murder hole in Tully Castle, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland is located in the central portion of the first floor of the house, west of a cross-wall and piercing the vault of the lower chamber.

References

Castle architecture Ceilings Holes {{Architecturalelement-stub

See also

References