dungeon

[steph]

in the middle age.........what is the utility of a dungeon ?? why nobles and kings buits this??

stef

[CourtFool]

...now, about those pesky dragons...

 

I am not a historian, but my guess would be to torture and hold people. No one can hear you scream from the bowels of the dungeon.

[ShinDangaioh]

Re: dungeon

 

For the catacombs underneath Paris, as a means of escape and a place to hide.

 

Central Casting: Dungeons did some answering of this.

 

Underground cities, escape routes, hiding from plauges, mining, troop garrisons, places to hide weapon making.

[Curufea]

Re: dungeon

 

Places to store prisoners of war or criminals. What you think of as "jail" or "prison" these days is pretty much what dungeons were used for.

 

There weren't underground cities in the middle ages

[assault]

Re: dungeon

 

Places to store prisoners of war or criminals. What you think of as "jail" or "prison" these days is pretty much what dungeons were used for.

 

There weren't underground cities in the middle ages

 

Yes. In the strict sense, dungeons were prisons. Not all that interesting from an adventuring point of view, except as part of a larger complex.

 

In the sense of "underground places of mystery", there are all kinds of good reasons for things to exist.

 

While the Cappadocian underground cities had been abandoned during the middle ages, they still existed, and that actually makes them more useful as an adventuring site. "Abandoned underground complex" - hmm...

 

On a smaller scale, it was quite normal for churches to have substantial crypts beneath them. The bigger the church, the bigger the crypt. A big abandoned church could have quite an interesting crypt.

 

There are also odd possibilities. Maybe there are areas underneath the streets of a Venice-like city that aren't flooded at low tide...

[phookz]

Re: dungeon

 

You could also use non-dungeons as dungeons. I saw a program on the history channel that showed what's underneath Istanbul - once known as Constantinople. Fascinating stuff - the main square of the city is built above a gigantic cistern (I may have the term wrong, but it's a butt-load of water - millions of gallons) and supported by ornately carved columns. This goes on for multiple rooms - it's huge.

 

The idea of a new city built on top of an old is not a stretch at all; far more believable than an elaborate dungeon.

[assault]

Re: dungeon

 

You could also use non-dungeons as dungeons. I saw a program on the history channel that showed what's underneath Istanbul - once known as Constantinople. Fascinating stuff - the main square of the city is built above a gigantic cistern (I may have the term wrong' date=' but it's a butt-load of water - millions of gallons) and supported by ornately carved columns. This goes on for multiple rooms - it's huge.[/quote']

 

Exactly.

 

And repped, because that is one of my favourite places.

[phookz]

Re: dungeon

 

The History Channel has a regular show on called "Cities of the Underworld": http://www.history.com/minisites/citiesoftheunderworld

 

This show is specifically about the things that are underneath some of our modern cities. I've only seen one episode so far, but it looks like their site has some content available - if nothing else, the visuals alone are worth a look, and just thinking about how a realistic labyrinth of tunnels and passageways could be under another city. Great stuff for the fantasy genre.

[Markdoc]

Re: dungeon

 

You could also use non-dungeons as dungeons. I saw a program on the history channel that showed what's underneath Istanbul - once known as Constantinople. Fascinating stuff - the main square of the city is built above a gigantic cistern (I may have the term wrong' date=' but it's a butt-load of water - millions of gallons) and supported by ornately carved columns. This goes on for multiple rooms - it's huge.[/quote']

 

There are actually multiple cisterns like this still existing - and you are right, they are HUGE. I've have some pretty cool photos I took in the one you refer to above - there's another, not so large but much deeper, near the walls of the Tokapi palace - that's been turned into a restaurant, so you go about 40 metres down underground and eat your meal in this huge underground space lit only by candles. Even with scores of candles it was dark enough (and big enough) that you couldn't see any of the walls from our table so it was like we were sitting in this huge open - but dark and enclosed - space.

 

cheers, Mark

[phookz]

Re: dungeon

 

There are actually multiple cisterns like this still existing - and you are right, they are HUGE. I've have some pretty cool photos I took in the one you refer to above - there's another, not so large but much deeper, near the walls of the Tokapi palace - that's been turned into a restaurant, so you go about 40 metres down underground and eat your meal in this huge underground space lit only by candles. Even with scores of candles it was dark enough (and big enough) that you couldn't see any of the walls from our table so it was like we were sitting in this huge open - but dark and enclosed - space.

 

cheers, Mark

 

Damn, that is cool.

[assault]

Re: dungeon

 

So, there are several of these cisterns... Presumably they are connected to aqueducts to bring the water in.

 

From memory, Rome itself, at least, had a drainage system of a sort (a pretty poor one). So there are more tunnels there.

 

Add catacombs and/or church/temple crypts. The odd Mithraeum or similar underground religious complex would be possible too - possibly associated with a cult that doesn't meet the approval of the authorities.

 

You could add a few underground settlements, like those which existed in Edinburgh a few centuries ago too. Just build up the population density high enough, and you can have whole regions of the city that never see the light of day... This would add new meaning to the term "dark alley".

 

Finally, add a few connections between these various sections of the urban underworld, and you have a massive dungeon. Populate to taste.

[phookz]

Re: dungeon

 

So, there are several of these cisterns... Presumably they are connected to aqueducts to bring the water in.

 

From memory, Rome itself, at least, had a drainage system of a sort (a pretty poor one). So there are more tunnels there.

 

Add catacombs and/or church/temple crypts. The odd Mithraeum or similar underground religious complex would be possible too - possibly associated with a cult that doesn't meet the approval of the authorities.

 

You could add a few underground settlements, like those which existed in Edinburgh a few centuries ago too. Just build up the population density high enough, and you can have whole regions of the city that never see the light of day... This would add new meaning to the term "dark alley".

 

Finally, add a few connections between these various sections of the urban underworld, and you have a massive dungeon. Populate to taste.

 

That's cool - I like it. I would make most sections uninhabited, but have the occasional odd noise and rumors about it. "We don't go to the undercroft below the abbey anymore... there are strange goings on there." You now have some mystery, populate it with some unsavory people, or a monster type, and you're good to go.

[Markdoc]

Re: dungeon

 

So' date=' there are several of these cisterns... Presumably they are connected to aqueducts to bring the water in.[/quote']

 

Nope - there is an aqueduct (which is still there, and in pretty good condition) but it ends in the city below the Topkapi palace (today it's a slightly seedy commercial area - I guess it would have been the port/business area back then). The cisterns were built up on the ridge and collected rainwater.

 

From memory' date=' Rome itself, at least, had a drainage system of a sort (a pretty poor one). So there are more tunnels there.[/quote']

 

Actually the patrician part of Rome had pretty good drains (even back then they were a tourist attraction) - they ran down the middle of the road with frequent manhole covers to give access. You had a roughly square tunnel almost high enough to stand upright in, with a trench down the centre for ... ahhh ... waste and pipes leading in from the various houses and businesses. Public fountains and bathhouses discharged their overflow into these to help flush wastes out and slaves were routinely sent down there to keep all the drains unblocked. These flowed into the Cloaca Maxima (the biggest sewer line: there were three major ones) which was 3.2 metres wide and 4.2 metres high - about 10 feet by 15 feet - at its upper end and a good deal wider where it emptied into the Tiber - the aediles' slaves apparently used boats to keep the lower end clear.

 

Poorer people used public toilets when out but used pots at home and they were expected to take 'em out and dump then down the nearest sewer hole - they could be fined if they just tossed the stuff in the street and it was one of the jobs of the Aediles to supervise waste removal and keep the drains in good order.

 

As Rome lost power, the maintenance dropped off and with the breakage of the aqueducts there was no longer excess water for flushing so the whole system silted up and stopped functioning - by the early middle ages it was back to throwing your waste in the street. But the sewers were still there......

 

Add catacombs and/or church/temple crypts. The odd Mithraeum or similar underground religious complex would be possible too - possibly associated with a cult that doesn't meet the approval of the authorities.

 

You could add a few underground settlements, like those which existed in Edinburgh a few centuries ago too. Just build up the population density high enough, and you can have whole regions of the city that never see the light of day... This would add new meaning to the term "dark alley".

 

Finally, add a few connections between these various sections of the urban underworld, and you have a massive dungeon. Populate to taste.

 

Yeps.

 

cheers, Mark

[The Monster]

Re: dungeon

 

The best rationale - non-historical mind you - I've ever seen for large dungeon complexes is Empire of the Petal Throne, where every so often (i.e., lifetimes or centuries) a new city would be built on the ruins of an old one - whether because the old one was abandoned, or because some emperor decreed such. The half-razed, now-underground remains of previous iterations of the city were the "dungeons" of that world, and some areas were still used by secretive cults for worship and other nefarious purposes.

 

The idea of cities built on the remains of older cities isn't fiction, though: some old cities of the Middle East are constantly discovering chambers and streets of ancient construction, dating back hundreds and thousands of years.

 

A purpose-built D&D type dungeon? No such animal that I've ever heard of in rela life. You can find some things that are vaguely similar: catacombs under Rome and Paris, the cliff-dweller cities of the American Southwest, that kind of thing. Maybe you could adapt some of the mine complexes of Europe that, even in medieval/renaissance times, could go pretty deep and convoluted, but those weren't dug so much for storage of goods or people as for pulling useful stuff out of the ground. But no ten-by-ten-foot rooms with thirty-foot corridors leading due east...

[tkdguy]

Re: dungeon

 

This series can give you some ideas for underground cities:

 

http://www.history.com/minisites/citiesoftheunderworld

 

If you're asking about dungeons in particular, here's the Wikipedia entry:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeon

[John Desmarais]

Re: dungeon

 

You'll probably get this too late, but right now on the History Channel:

 

Cities Of The Underworld : 02 - City of Caves Airs on Tuesday May 22 01:00 AM

Discover an ancient secret that dates back to the dawn of time lurking beneath the city of Budapest, Hungary. The caves beneath Budapest were formed during the Ice Age and everyone from the cavemen to the communists has moved their city into the depths of this parallel world. Join host Eric Geller as he gains special access into this sealed-up time capsule where he'll uncover a top secret World War II hospital, find the source of the boiling healing water used by both the Romans and the Turks, and see the layers of support added throughout the centuries to keep today's world from falling into the one buried below. Watch as the technological marvels that allowed construction of one city upon another are revealed.

I'm sure it will get repeated though.

[Vestnik]

Re: dungeon

 

 

A purpose-built D&D type dungeon? No such animal that I've ever heard of in rela life. You can find some things that are vaguely similar: catacombs under Rome and Paris, the cliff-dweller cities of the American Southwest, that kind of thing. Maybe you could adapt some of the mine complexes of Europe that, even in medieval/renaissance times, could go pretty deep and convoluted, but those weren't dug so much for storage of goods or people as for pulling useful stuff out of the ground. But no ten-by-ten-foot rooms with thirty-foot corridors leading due east...

 

They just haven't been discovered yet. People used to think Troy was mythical too. You just wait until some hardy Schliemann equivalent braves the mockery from the academy, following the clues left for him by Gary Gygax in the dungeon module, discovers and unearths the Tomb of Horrors.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: dungeon

 

Yeah, but if Schliemann's in charge he's going to mistake a Hackmaster module for the actual Tomb of Horrors.

[Captain Obvious]

Re: dungeon

 

If anyone ever actually finds the Tomb of Horrors, they'll die with no saving throw allowed, so the rest of us will never know anyway.

[The Monster]

Re: dungeon

 

No, then we'll find out who is a REAL archaeologist and who is just a poser.

 

You throw me the idol, I throw you the whip....