From simple palisades to sophisticated fortress-palaces, this book explains how castles evolved to meet the demands of feudal society and improving technology. While centred on British castles, the book constantly sets them in a wider background and makes stimulating comparisons with developments in other countries to show the influences that affected castle builders. Conrad Cairns pays special attention to smaller castles, including the tower-houses of Scotland and Ireland and shows how the castle was also a residential construction. He describes how the changes which brought the Middle Ages to a close made the castle obsolete and how the name was inherited by forts and country houses.