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In fortification, a banquette is a small bank at the foot of a parapet, from which the defenders can safely fire over the parapet. The height of the parapet above the banquette was usually about 1.3 meters; the breadth of the banquette about one or two metres according to the number of ranks to occupy it. Banquettes were frequently made double, that is, a second was made still lower.
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A barbette was formerly an earthen platform inside a parapet, from which heavy guns could fire over the top. In modern warfare, a barbette is a remotely controlled housing for defensive guns.
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Breastwork is a defensive work or parapet of moderate height, hastily thrown up, of earth or other material made for protection against the shot of the enemy.
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Brisure is a term applied to any part of a rampart or parapet of a fortification which deviates from the general direction.
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In fortifications a caponiere is a work made across or in a ditch, to protect it from the enemy, or to serve as a covered passageway. When there is a parapet on one side only it is called a demi-caponiere.
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In fortifications, a cavalier is an elevation of earth of different shapes, situated ordinarily in the gorge of a bastion, bordered with a parapet, and cut into more or less embrasures, according to the capacity of the cavalier.
Cavaliers are a double defence for the faces of the opposite bastion: they defend the ditch, break the besiegers galleries, command the traverses in dry moats, scour the salient angle of the counterscarp where the besiegers have their counter-batteries, and interfere with the enemies trenches. Cavaliers are likewise very useful in defending the breach, and the retrenchments of the besieged.
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A chandelier was a former movable parapet, used to support fascines to cover pioneers.
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In military terms, circumvallation describes a line of field-works consisting of a rampart or parapet, with a trench surrounding a besieged place, or the camp of a besieging army.
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In fortifications a contravallation was a trench guarded with a parapet, constructed by besiegers, to secure themselves and check sallies of the besieged.
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In fortifications the curtain is that part of the rampart and parapet which is between two bastions or two gates.
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The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
©1993 - 2009 The Probert Encyclopaedia
Southampton, United Kingdom
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Abbreviations
