Keep

Central and best defended part of an English feudal castle. It is commonly a ma ive tower, rectangular or round. The basement (donjon-keep) was used for a prison and storehouse. An intermediate story contained the guard-room, and above this was the hall, which fulfilled all the purposes divided, in modern buildings, among the dining-room or banquet-hall, the drawing-room and the ball-room. Sometimes this apartment was divided by columns into a nave and suites, sometimes open from wall to wall. The keep was separated from the outworks by a moat, furnished with a drawbridge, and was intended to stand a siege even after the outworks had been captured and destroyed.