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old hand
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I wonder how the latrine definition in my post above this one came to mean wardrobe...???This is mere speculation, of course, but it does seem from the latrine description to be somewhat like what we call a closet in North America. Which serves the same purpose a wardrobe does in Europe. Hmm, maybe when castles got modernized facilities all the ladies, princesses, etc., looked at the garderobes, thought if they got their servants to sterilize them they could have a few more inches of closet space!  
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not to mention the water closet
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And on the sidewalk it's "gardeloo!"
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[people who might be inclined to look up 'gardeloo' will have more luck with the normalized version 'gardyloo']
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Dear tsuwm: take a look at the description of "machicolation" in paragraph below, and see if you think it could have referred to some kind of mortar cement. In the 13th century, defense changed from passive to active with the additions of lofty towers, crenellations, merlons, hoardings, alures, parapets, arrow slits, and machicolations. Hoardings, also known as bretêches, were walkways projecting out from the edge of a tower or wall with holes or doors in the floor in order to afford the defender the opportunity to drop offensive materials (missiles, molten lead, pitch) onto the attackers below. Machicolations (from the French machi = melted matter + coulis = flowing) were stone equivalents to bretêches. http://www.manitoulin-link.com/medieval/castles.html#construction
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I think you've just got to put it all down to usage. Originally, most of the castles didn't have anything resembling toilets, but they did have storage cupboards built into the walls. There were latrines for most people, usually just longdrops within the bailey with a plank which fitted all comers. This was shifted as the holes, um, filled up. The fortunate occupants of the keep used buckets and the "lucky" servants got to carry them out and empty them into the latrine in the morning (for the lords and ladies). The men-at-arms and servants within the keep had to shift for themselves - perhaps the bucket brigade again.
Later on, castles were designed slightly differently so that the garderobes were extended out from the walls and became latrines. In fact, Edward I, from memory, specified that this should be so, and he was the champion castle-builder. Usually they were on the outside walls and in many castles the strategic vents were located directly over the moat. I don't know what happened where there was no moat, presumably it just hit the ground and ... er ... decomposed over time.
Some sieges were broken when dysentery and probably hepatitis broke out within the beseiged castle. It isn't difficult to speculate that the sanitary arrangements within the castle walls, primitive at the best of times, became overloaded and broke down completely during sieges.
So the alcoves kept their name - garderobe - while the usage changed or, at least, some garderobes may have retained their original function while others became privies. That's all there is to it, really.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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When I see the word "Louvre" I think of the beautiful palace museum in which so many art treasures are displayed. I was surprised to find that a thousand years ago it referred to a hole in the roof of the castle through which smoke escaped, because chimneys had not been invented. Chaucer is quoted as saying that smoke in the house was one reason for men leaving home.
I wonder when the chimney was invented.
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Hoardings, also known as bretêches, were walkways projecting out from the edge of a tower or wall with holes or doors in the floor in order to afford the defender the opportunity to drop offensive materials (missiles, molten lead, pitch) onto the attackers below. Machicolations (from the French machi = melted matter + coulis = flowing) were stone equivalents to bretêches...see if you think it could have referred to some kind of mortar cement.
bill, the way I read it, the 'flowing melted matter' refers to what was dropped as opposed to the makeup of the stucture. (if that's what you're asking)
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