https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFvDV5j3Q5s
The video contains the bulk of the info, but for more detail, check out these comments:
@supertapis7357 wrote:Being a little french frog I may be able to give a more precise definition of some of the terms discussed here.
Actually, the word "château" in french wasn't synonymous of "castle" or "fortress" at all until the XVIth century. Before this period, castles in french were actually reffered to as "forteresses" (transparent translation) or "castels" (singular: "castel" which led in english to the word "castle"). And the exact definition of a "château" is a building with a living room, a bedroom and a kitchen (there could be more rooms obviously). So the french word actually insisted on the residential function of the building without any consideration for a defensive purpose. Thus, in medieval times in France, "le château" usually reffered to the part of the castle were people (the lord owning it and his relatives) lived while the entire complex would be reffered to as a "forteresse" or "castel". I know a very precise exemple : the local castle of my town (Montargis in the middle of France, at the south of Paris), which was a royal castle built by the king Phillippe Auguste had a specific building separated from the rest of the structure which would accomodate the royal children. This specific building had a living room, a kitchen and two to three bedrooms and was called "le château". This distinction was mostly influenced by the difference between such a building with various rooms having a precise purpose, and popular houses often composed of one huge and only room where an entire family would live (which was standart in rural areas). Fun fact then is that nowadays, many people could claim that they live in a castle according to the historical definition of the term. During the XVIth century, writers began to reffer to every prestigious buildings as "châteaux" (which is why we translate it in english using the word "castle") by convenience and distinguished the heavyly fortified medieval castles as "forts châteaux" or in a more actual formulation "châteaux-forts". Thus, Versailles, Chenonceaux or Chambord are "châteaux" and the castle of Caen or the high koenigsbourg for instance are "châteaux-forts". This also implies that in french, the dinstinction between a fortress, a castle or a mansion is very difficult to establish, even if defensive buildings dating back from the XVIth, the XVIIth or later centuries may be reffered more often as "forteresses" and not as "châteaux" anymore. Then, english speaking authors would pick the word "château" to reffer to prestigious buildings according to the most recent use of the term in french.
@MoonfaceMartin88 wrote:In Germany we call castles that were renovated to be more comfortable subsequent to being made largely obsolete as fortresses "Wohnburg", which literally translates to "living-castle". A building stylized as a medieval structure that was never actually used as a fortress would be a "Schloss", although the term can also refer to actual former castles that were changed so much they are practically a completely new building.
https://www.italki.com/en/post/question-260349
Jim wrote:A fort usually means a structure with walls and other defensive measures made to withstand an attack by an enemy. A fortress can be the same thing but usually means a larger area like a city built into a fortress with a wall surrounding the whole city. I built a fort but we made our city a fortress. Fortress would also be more commonly used to describe something you are building very stout. "You are building your house like a fortress" They are both nouns and have very very similar meanings, so the difference is very minor if anything at all.
https://www.differencebetween.info/diff ... d-fortress
Difference Between wrote:Key Difference: Forts are very similar to castles but they were exclusively used for military purposes. A fortress is a very large fort.
We'll need to know this stuff soon because city-building is coming to Battlegrounds. And it will be the most complex city-building in any game ever.
