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"During this passage, Felton related everything to Milady--how, instead of going to London, he had chartered the little vessel; how he had returned; how he had scaled the wall by fastening cramps in the interstices of the stones, as he ascended, to give him foothold; and how, when he had reached the bars, he fastened his ladder. Milady knew the rest. "
Again the translator seems to have made a poor word choice. I find no definition that fits well.
cramp 1
n.
5ME crampe < OFr, bent, twisted < Frank *kramp; akin to MDu & MLowG krampe: for IE base see CRADLE6
1 a sudden, painful, involuntary contraction of a muscle or muscles from chill, strain, etc.
2 partial local paralysis, as from excessive use of muscles
3 [usually pl.] abdominal or uterine spasms and pain
vt.
to cause a cramp or cramps in: often in the passive
cramp 2
n.
5MDu krampe, lit., bent in, hence anything bent in; akin to prec.6
1 a metal bar bent to form a right angle at each end, for holding together blocks of stone, timbers, etc.: also called cramp iron
2 a device for clasping or fastening things together; a clamp
3 anything that confines or hampers
4 a cramped condition or part
vt.
1 to fasten with or as with a cramp
2 to confine; hamper; restrain
3 to turn (the front wheels of an automobile, etc.) sharply
adj.
CRAMPED
cramp one‘s style [Slang] to hamper one‘s usual skill or confidence in doing something
Perhaps the mountain climbing device called "piton" would be closer.Except I doubt there was that kind of mountain climbing at the time of the story.
piton
n.,
pl. 3tons# 73t9nz#; 3tbn$8 5Fr < MFr, a spike, pointed object, akin to OIt pizza, a point6 a metal spike with an eye to which a rope can be secured: it is driven into rock or ice for support in mountain climbing
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isn't there a mountain climbing 'bit' called a cramp-on? or is that for ice climing.. (and tree climbing)?
Cramp-on's are worn over your shoes, they have metal points that stick out (on the inside of shoe), and a metal sheild that covers the side of your calf, and that also supports the upper strap that hold the cramp-on on your foot/shoe.
the pointed edge, can be heel kicked into a tree, and allows you to climp up the tree, the same style is used to heel kick into ice when climbing on glaciers.
certainly people have been climbing (and skiing, and farming and herding) in the Alps for ages.. and tools that would help them are nothing new.
i suspect some come from scandinavia, too, people there had to sometimes cross glaciers, or climb on ice .
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Dear of troy: The story seems to say the deluded Felton
climbed up the outside of the castle, with aid of metal
pieces inserted into cracks. I haven't found the French version, so I can't tell the original word. I am using a brand new computer, and am having problems getting used to it.
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1) n :an iron spike attached to the shoe to prevent slipping on ice when walking or climbing
Which allows the ascent of mountains of chopped liver... 
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I was thinking of thin metal wedges, that are wedged into the spaces between stones, and allow you to 'build' a step stairs up the side of a stone face.. they don't get hammered in, the slip in and are held in place by gravity..
(i don't know much about climbing like that, but i remember Clavell, in the story 'ShoGun' has his 'pilot' marvel at one of the Japanese fortresses, since the wall is so smooth, and rocks so carefully cut, you would not be able to scale the walls with...(some sort of climbing equipment)
Thinking about it, even if people didn't go rock climbing for pleasure in the past, i suspect, that anyone who had a skill as doing it, would be a good person to attempt a sneak attach on a castle or fortress. and if people did it, they devised tool and equipment to do it better.
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Mav, i know you posted hours before me, but honest, you post wasn't there when i first opened the page, (not now, earlier)
this time, i raced pasted your post--and only when i was looking again did i notice the number of posts had jumped... so in this case, you really were wearing a mantle of invisiblity! (and not being chopped liver!) Please let me remove it.. (and thanks! i knew there were some sort of things for climbing, that sounded like cramp(on)(oons)cramp somethings!
Oh, that i had a figure like Demi, i'd have you as my Ashton!
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In reply to:
Thinking about it, even if people didn't go rock climbing for pleasure in the past, i suspect, that anyone who had a skill as doing it, would be a good person to attempt a sneak attach on a castle or fortress. and if people did it, they devised tool and equipment to do it better.
From Plutarch's Life of Crassus:
Afterwards Clodius, the praetor, took the command against them with a body of three thousand men from Rome, and besieged them within a mountain, accessible only by one narrow and difficult passage, which Clodius kept guarded, encompassed on all other sides with steep and slippery precipices. Upon the top, however, grew a great many wild vines, and cutting down as many of their boughs as they had need of, they twisted them into strong ladders long enough to reach from thence to the bottom, by which, without any danger, they got down all but one, who stayed there to throw them down their arms, and after this succeeded in saving himself.
http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/bl/bl_text_plutarch_crassus.htm
(The 'they' btw is Spartacus and his men. I don't remember if this was in the film.)
Alexander the Great's capture of the Sogdian Rock:
There were some 300 men who in previous sieges had had experience in rock-climbing. These now assembled. They had provided themselves with small iron tent-pegs, which they proposed to drive into the snow, where it was frozen hard, or into any bit of bare earth they might come across, and they had attached to the pegs strong flaxen lines. The party set off under cover of darkness to the steepest part of the rock-face, which they knew was least likely to be guarded; then, driving their pegs either into bare ground or into such patches of mow as seemed most likely to hold under the strain, they hauled themselves up, wherever each could find a way. About thirty lost their lives during the ascent -falling in various places in the snow, their bodies were never recovered for burial- but the rest reached the top as dawn was breaking, and the summit of the Rock was theirs.
http://www.livius.org/aj-al/alexander/alexander_t54.html
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