Lady of Legend
Stairs
Location | Types | Newel Stairs | Trick Stairs
Location
- Primarily in curtain walls or castle towers, but also in multi-floored manors
Photo by Keith Evans
Photo by Buetal
Types
- Straight or spiraling
- See Newel Stairs
- Castles often had Trick Stairs
Photo by Wusel007
Newel Stairs
- A spiral staircase consisting of a central column/post around which the stairs would wind
- Stairs would wind in a clockwise direction
- Forced attacking soldiers trying to climb the staircase to expose their body in order to fight, since all soldiers/knights were trained to be right-handed (being left-handed was seen as being satanic)
- This gave the advantage to those defending the staircase
- Required minimal space
- Very common
Trick Stairs
- a.k.a. Stumble Stairs
- Were a defensive structure
- Steps on the stairs would have different heights or step-depths (the width of the place where one would step)
- Made people (attackers) running up the stairs stumble or fall, slowing them down
