s built with stubborn materials, and on
rocky sites, where there was little inducement to indulge in
decoration. Dunstaffnage or Kilchurn Castles may be referred to as
examples of these plain, gloomy keeps with their stepped gables, small
loops for windows, and sometimes angle turrets.

The classic elements of the style were not drawn (as had been the case
in England) direct from Italy, but came from France. The Scotch,
during their long struggles with the English, became intimately allied
with the French, and it is therefore not surprising that Scottish
Baronial architecture should resemble the early Renaissance of French
chateaux very closely. The hardness of the stone in which the Scotch
masons wrought forbade their attempting the extremely delicate detail
of the Francois I. ornament, executed as it is in fine, easily-worked
stone of smooth texture; and the difference in the climate of the two
countries justified in Scotland a boldness which would have appeared
exaggerated and extreme in France. Accordingly the style in passing
from one country to the other has changed its details to no
inconsiderable extent.

Many castles were erected in the sixteenth and following centuries in
Scotland, or were enlarged and altered; the most characteristic
features in almost all of them are short round angle turrets, thrown
out upon bold corbellings near the upper part of towers and other
square masses. These are often capped by pointed roofs; and the
corbels which carry them, and which are always of bold, vigorous
character, are frequently enriched by a kind of cable ornament, which
is very distinctive. Towers of circular plan, like bastions, and
projecting from the general line of the walls, or at the angles,
constantly occur. They are frequently crowned by conical roofs, but
sometimes (as at Fyvie Castle) they are made square near the top by
means of a series of corbels, and finished with gables or otherwise.
Parapets are in general use, and are almost always battlemented.
Roofs, when visible, are of steep pitch, and their gables are almost
always of stepped outline, while dormer windows, frequently of
fantastic form, are not infrequent. Chimneys are prominent and lofty.
Windows are square-headed, and, as a rule, small; sometimes they
retain the Gothic mullions and transom, but in many cases these
features are absent. Doorways are generally arched, and not often
highly ornamented.

Cawdor Castle, Glamis Castle, Fyvie Castle,