The Mingary Castle restoration blog was written by Jon Haylett, who lives in the local village of Kilchoan. Now that restoration is almost complete Holly and Chris Bull will take over to report on bringing the Castle back to life.

Saturday, 8 June 2013

The Smallest Rooms - 2

The second garderobe is also built in to the outer wall, this time the west wall, and was accessed through this door, which stands at the top of a short flight of steps rising out of the passage from the courtyard to the main gate.  When one steps through the door, one stands directly over the castle dungeon.

It's much smaller than the first, of much more substantial construction, and it's a proper seat rather than just a (rather large) hole in the floor.  While it may have made for a cold session as the seat is made of a block of stone, there is considerably less danger than in the first of falling to the rocks below.   The walls appear to have been plastered, and it was very much less public.

Part of the lower corner of the room has fallen, but anyone sitting on the stone seat would have looked....

....out of a small window in the opposite wall into the courtyard.  While this may have made time in this small room more interesting, it's also possible that the room would have come into use had attackers broken in to the courtyard.

One of the garderobes is in the east wall, one in the west.  How much each was used may, in part, have depended upon the wind direction.

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