How long did people live in castles?

Rich lords or kings lived in castles in medieval times. This period lasted from the 5th century CE to the end of the 15th century. Many castles were built in Europe and the Middle East during this time. Some were simple and wooden, while others were grand stone palaces.



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During the late Middle Ages, from the 10th to the 16th centuries, kings and lords lived in castles. As well as the lord, the lady (his wife), and their family there were lots of staff. Some were important officials, such as the constable who took care of the castle when the lord was away.

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At the time of Chr tien de Troyes, the rooms where the lord of a castle, his family and his knights lived and ate and slept were in the Keep (called the Donjon), the rectangular tower inside the walls of a castle. This was meant to be the strongest and safest place.

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In the chamber – the more private rooms of the castle – there were beds with curtains, giving an extra layer of warmth, and these rooms largely had fireplaces. When there were no fireplaces rooms were heated with moveable fire stands.

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Windsor Castle is the oldest and largest inhabited castle in the world and has been the family home of British kings and queens for almost 1,000 years. It is an official residence of Her Majesty The Queen and is still very much a working royal palace today, home to around 150 people.

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By the 1600s, people didn't want to live in cold and damp castles anymore. Kings, queens and noble men wanted to show off how important and rich they were so they built palaces and great houses. Many existing castles were replaced with much grander homes.

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Castles weren't always cold and dark places to live. But, in reality, the great hall of castle had a large open hearth to provide heat and light (at least until the late 12th century) and later it had wall fireplace. The hall would also have had tapestries which would have insulated the room against too much cold.

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Castles and manor houses often smelled damp and musty. To counteract this, herbs and rushes were strewn across the floors.

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Most domestic servants would have slept in shared chambers in either the cellars or attics of the castle buildings. There might also be simple buildings outside the castle for herdsmen, mill workers, wood-cutters, and craftspeople such as rope-makers, candle-makers, potters, basket-weavers, and spinners.

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Castles were common in Europe during the Middle Ages and were often the homes of royal families or other powerful people. The main purpose of castles was to protect the people who lived there from invasions. They were also a status symbol to show other people how important a family was.

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Converted into a donjon around 950, Château de Doué-la-Fontaine in France is the oldest standing castle in Europe.

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On its website, you'll find more than 1,000 castle listings that range from 250,000 euros to 5 million euros and beyond. In USD, that's about $300,000 to $6 million plus. Sotheby's Realty. Catering to high-net-worth individuals, Sotheby's lists castles and chateaus online, most of which cost millions of dollars.

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Germany. The country with the most castles is Germany! It's thought that Germany has around 25,000 castles within its borders.

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The Czech Republic has the highest castle-density in the world. Get your fix of medieval charm with more than 2,000 around the country to Czech out.

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Following nine years of major conservation work, the National Trust's ambitious project to save Castle Drogo, one of the country's most iconic buildings, is complete. Castle Drogo is the last castle to have been built in Britain, between 1911 and 1931, by the renowned architect Edwin Lutyens.

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In the medieval period luxury castles were built with indoor toilets known as 'garderobes', and the waste dropped into a pit below.

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The first stone castles built were cold, dark, smelly and damp. Inside the castle walls, floor coverings consisted of straw rushes and, later, sweet smelling herbs to mask the smell of animal excrement, grease, rotting food and beer.

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The purpose of a moat was primarily to protect the castle from attack. As a defense mechanism, moats were very effective. Although they're usually depicted as wide, deep bodies of water, moats were often simply dry ditches.

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