Each floor had a fireplace with a slanted flue
going through the wall to the outside. There were latrines in the
corner walls with a pit or shaft down the exterior of the wall,
sometimes to the moat. Furs and wool clothes were hung on the
walls there in the summer to deter the moths. The first floor had
only arrow slits in the walls, but the higher floors had small
windows.
Some curtain-wall castles did not have a central building. In
these, the hall was built along the inside of the walls, as were
other continuous buildings. The kitchens and chapels were in the
towers. Lodgings were in buildings along the curtain-walls, or on
several floors of the towers.
The great hall was the main room of the castle. The hall was used
for meals and meetings at which the lord received homages,
recovered fees, and held the view of frankpledge [free pledge in
Latin], in which freemen agreed to be sureties for each other. At
the main table, the lord and his lady sat on benches with backs or
chairs. The table was covered first with a wool cloth that reached
to the floor, and then by a smaller white linen cloth. Everyone
else sat on benches at trestle tables, which could be folded up,
e.g. at night. Over the main door were the family arms. On the
upper parts of the walls could be foxskins and perhaps a polecat
skin, and keepers' and huntsmen's poles. There were often hawk
perches overhead.
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