ABSTRACT
The fourteenth century, from about 1310 to 1400, presents a number of features of significance. In the first place, owing to the wars of Edward I, Wales and the Welsh border were pacified to a very large extent, while the Scottish frontier, hitherto much quieter, became bitterly disturbed. Invasions of northern England by the main European style of the south are naturally more frequent and more important. They are relatively common in the rebuildings of major castles, especially in Yorkshire and Lancashire. The wet defences are often most impressive, and the few quadrangular castles which have only dry ditches seem very inadequate. Wet moats, indeed, form a major part of the defences of castles of the fourteenth century — and the fifteenth, for that matter — and this is particularly the case in the south. Dudley was licensed in 1263, but was certainly being built in 1311, and is considered to be essentially a castle of the early fourteenth century.
