In "Siege Warfare," Christopher Duffy sets the fortress at the center of history between 1494-1660, the time when gunpowder changed the shape of warfare. He explains and clarifies the elaborate calculations which lie behind fortress construction, showing how the period was shaped, in both its town planning and urban life, by the art of fortress building.
The narrative begins in Renaissance Italy, considers the engineering of the Dutch and Spanish during the Eighty Years War, and covers the state-of-the-art in Britain, Scandinavia, Muscovy and Turkey. Duffy demonstrates the implications of the fortress for military organization, strategy, geography, law, architectural values, town life and symbolism, making it the first integrated survey of the phenomenon of siege warfare during its most creative period.
