[182] The word _motte_ or _mota_ does not occur in any contemporary chronicle, as far as is known to the writer, before the 12th century; nor is the word _dangio_ to be found in any writer earlier than Ordericus. But the _thing_ certainly existed earlier.
[183] [Fulk and his son Geoffrey] "in occidentali parte montis castellum determinaverunt.... Aggerem quoque in prospectu monasterii cum turre lignea erexerunt." _Chron. St Florentii_, in Lobineau's _Bretagne_, ii., 87. Some remains of this motte are still visible. De Salies, _Foulques Nerra_, p. 263.
[184] "Elegantissimus in rebus bellicis" is the quaint language of the Angevin chronicler, 176.
[185] See De Salies, _Histoire de Foulques Nerra_, which indirectly throws considerable light on the archæological question.
[186] Salies, _Histoire de Foulques Nerra_, p. 170. M. Enlart, in his _Manuel d'Archæologie Française_, ii., 495, has been misled about this castle by the _Chronicon Andegavense_, which says: "Odo.... Fulconem expugnare speravit, et totis nisibus adorsus est. Annoque presenti (1025) Montis Budelli castellum, quod circiter annos decem retro abhinc contra civitatem Turonicam firmaverat Fulco, obsedit, et turrim ligneam miræ altitudinis super domgionem ipsius castri erexit." Bouquet, x., 176. M. Enlart takes this to be the first recorded instance of a motte. But the passage is evidently corrupt, as the other accounts of this affair show that Count Odo's wooden tower was a siege engine, employed to attack Fulk's castle, and afterwards burnt by the besieged. See the _Gesta Ambasiens. Dom._, _ibid._, p. 257, and the _Chron. St Florentii_. Probably we should read _contra_ domgionem instead of _super_. The _Chronicon Andegavense_ was written in the reign of Henry II.
[187] When Fulk invaded Bretagne in or about 992, he collected an army "tam de suis quam conductitiis." _Richerius_, edition Guadet. The editor remarks that this is perhaps the first example of the use of mercenaries since the time of the Romans (ii., 266). Spannagel, citing Peter Damian, says that mercenaries were already common at the end of the 10th century. _Zur Geschichte des Deutschen Heerwesens_, pp. 72, 73.
[188] This was always the custom in mediæval castles. See Cohausen, _Befestigungen der Vorzeit_, p. 282.