 Hi, during these trying times of the pandemic, the City of Columbia Parks and Recreation Department realizes that choices can be limited in enhancing one's physical, social, and mental well-being. The Parks and Recreation staff have been involved in developing a number of videos in which citizens can participate in and enjoy in the privacy of their own home. These videos consist of arts and crafts, gardening, physical activity, and sports instruction, with many more to come as we work through this pandemic. Our videos will be available to you on a number of our social media outlets. We hope you enjoy, and thank you very much. Hi, welcome back to the City of Columbia. Thanks for joining us again in our virtual videos. This is Lorek Park, and I'm Desha Marie Tisdale, Daisy, because that's a mouthful. Today, what I'm going to do is one of my favorite things to do, one of the things I've been doing a lot during the pandemic, and that is read a book. Just for fun, not because it's a school assignment or because somebody made you, and the one I picked today is Fly Guy Presents Castles. A boy had a pet fly named Fly Guy. Fly Guy could say the boy's name, Buzz. Buzz and Fly Guy were visiting a castle. Whoa, said Buzz, this place is amazing. Fly Guy wondered what it would be like to live in a castle, so they headed inside to find out. Castles are fancy homes. Castles are fortresses, too. They're designed to keep those inside safe. They have defenses like draw bridges and gates to keep enemies out. People have used forts for protection since ancient times, but the first true castles of Europe were built in 10th century France. That's more than a thousand years ago. I like it when you randomly learn something. Most of the castles we admire today were built in Europe during the Middle Ages, around 500 to 1500 AD. Here is one in France built around 950. The first castles built in France from earth and wood. Wood burns easily, so castles were soon built from stone. Most stone castles have walls that are at least eight feet thick. In 1066, William the Conqueror invaded England from France and became king. He started building the Tower of London as a large square stone fortress. In 1180, Dover Castle in England is one of the first concentric castles. That means one big ring of stone or wall is built around another wall. The Middle Ages also were called the medieval period. Between 1180 and the 1400s, many castles were built in France. These castles looked fancier than English castles. Many have tall, round towers with cone-shaped roofs. If an enemy wanted to take over an area of land, they had to take control of the castle on that land. Every part of a castle's ground was designed to keep the enemy from getting inside. This is called a parapet. It's a low wall around the top of the tower. The gatehouse is the main entrance, so it's like the front door. Except if your house has a front door and then say a foyer or another room before you get into the main part of the house. The watchtower is a lookout point. You guys could see for miles up there, because they're very high up in the sky. A keep is the castle's main building. That's where everyone would live. There's the tall hill and a moat, which is a deep ditch around the castle, and it's often filled with water. And back then you know it wasn't clean. Outer curtain is the outer wall, and the inner curtain is the inner wall. That's pretty self-explanatory. We're good with that one. Castles were often attacked, so they had many defenses built into their walls. A drawbridge could be raised to block enemies for entering the castle. A portcullis is the heavy wooden or metal gate. It was lowered to keep enemies out. Roofs were made of slate or tile to protect the castle from flaming arrows. Please do not shoot flaming arrows at your neighbors to see if their roofs are made of slate or tile. Cranals were tooth-like gaps in the parapet. Guards could keep an eye out for attackers, and murder holes were holes in the ceiling. Guards used them to shoot arrows or boil or pour boiling water or hot sand on enemies' heads. An arrow loop or arrow slit was thin vertical slit in the castle wall, so guards could safely shoot arrows at their enemies. So they would stand behind and then just shoot out of that little crevice so that they had cover, but the enemy didn't. Attackers used different weapons to try to take control of the castle. A mongo was a catapult. It was used to throw heavy objects at castle walls. A tretch bucket was a machine that flung objects like heavy stones, beehives, or animal poop up and over the castle walls. That could throw a lot of poop. Yuck. A valista was a cross between a giant bow and a catapult. It was used to launch sharp, heavy darts at a target. And a battering ram was a hanging tree trunk that attackers slammed into the castle's wooden gates. A siege tower was a tall wooden tower with wheels. Men pushed it close to the castle so they could climb over the wall, so they actually built on wheels like an early version of a tank, basically, like the Trojan horse. They were inside and they pushed it up so they could get over it. Life inside a castle depended on who you were. The king and queen ruled over everyone in the country, and there was a lot of land to protect, so the king often gave land to a rich friend called the Lord. As the king's friend, the Lord was allowed to build a castle to protect that land. The Lord and Lady lived in one of the castle's towers, and their children learned to read and write. Boys might learn to play an instrument, ride horses, fly hawks, or play chess. And girls learned to sing, sew, and help run the household. I would have been bad at pretty much all of the girl things back then. They wouldn't know what to do with me. Singing is not something I can do. Knights also lived in the castle. They worked for the ruler to defend the castle. A boy began training at age seven. That's the same age as some of you. And then when he became 21, he became a knight. See, a ruler would tap the young man on the shoulders with the flat side of his sword to make him a knight. And they still do that in some countries, like in the U.K. where they have a queen. Some people are still knighted, but it's not quite the same ceremony. And it doesn't hold quite the same responsibility. Knights rode horses into battle. They practiced their skills by jousting. Two knights raced towards each other, carrying long wooden poles called lances. Each knight tried to knock the other off of his horse first. I recall my brothers and sisters and I doing something similar, and we got into a lot of trouble, so don't do that. And no, you cannot ride a dog like a horse. Won't work. A coat of arms let others know. Which king or lord the knight fought for? See that on his tunic here? His is a unicorn, so that symbol shows which group he belongs to. Their helmets were metal, and their male armor was a layer of tiny, linked metal rings arrows couldn't poke through. So think of a necklace like it with tiny, tiny little rings, except it covered their whole chest. It usually came down to about mid-five. Knights had a shield and a sword, and a dagger, shorter than the sword that was used for stabbing. A full suit of armor weighed as much as three bowling balls, so you're walking around with all of that gear on all day in the heat, in the snow, in the cold. Servants and other workers lived in the castle too. This included kitchen workers, gardeners, blacksmiths, tailors, priests, doctors, gestures, or other entertainers. The blacksmith made horseshoes, tools, nails, and weapons. The tailor made clothing from wool or silk. The gesture told jokes and played instruments, sang, juggled, and did magic tricks. Many pets lived in castles. Cats kept rats in mice away. Falcons or hawks were trained to catch small animals. Pigeons sometimes carried messages to other castles. Where I'm from in New York, pigeons just stand on the sidewalk and pretend like you're not trying to get through. Dogs, such as beagles, were used to hunt rabbits. Horses were used for travel, battles, hunts, and farm work. Flies lived in castles too. Like I said, back then sanitation, not a real big thing. Most parts of a castle were crowded shared spaces. Only the ruling family had its own rooms. These rooms smelled good because fresh herbs hung from the wall so they would actually go out and cut the herbs that they grew and hang them to let them dry so they can smell them. Sometimes maybe your mom or grandma will have potpourri or something like that in your house. The castle toilet was called a garter robe. It was wooden or stone with a hole in the middle. Waste fell down a chute and no one liked shoveling it out, but someone had to do it. This person was called the gong farmer. That does not sound pleasant. Does that sound like something one of y'all would like to know that all, not even a little bit. No. The dungeon was often at the very bottom of the castle below the basement. Some dungeons were rooms in high towers and prisoners were held here. The only way in or out was through a trap door in the floor. Celebrations were held in the castle's main room. That was called the great hall. Fish from fish ponds or the moat might be served at the feast along with beef and lamb. Wild birds would be baked into pies. You might have heard some nursery rhymes about that. Desserts included custards and fruit tarts, and they were usually sweetened with honey. Food was eaten off plates made of wood or pottery, and they were called trenches. Sometimes stale pieces of bread were used. Everyone had a spoon and a knife, but back then there were no forks. Who eats forks? There are castles and buildings all around the world. Many of them were built after the Middle Ages. The Kremlin in Russia has five palaces and four cathedrals. Haimji Castle in Japan is known as White Ygret Castle. It looks like a beautiful bird, and someone who knows how to pronounce that properly, please comment and let me know. I know I butchered it. I'm so sorry. Alcazar de Segovia in Spain looks like the bow of a ship, and the Chateau de Villange in France is famous for its gardens. The Red Fort in India is named for its red sandstone walls. Castles are everywhere. Castles have inspired many works of artists and authors. This castle in Germany inspired the artist Walt Disney to build Sleeping Beauty's castle at Disneyland Park. Brian Castle in Romania is also called Dracula's Castle. Bram Stoker wrote Dracula in 1897, and many people believe this castle was his inspiration. Castles today are often museums. Some are still home to modern families. Frog Castle is home to the Czech president. Windsor Castle is the oldest in the world to still have people living in it. At Blarney Castle visitors kiss the Blarney Stone. My sister's been there. They actually have to hold you upside down over a ledge in order to kiss the stone, and she did it. It's supposed to be good luck. There's even a castle in New York City. Belvedere Castle is actually a weather station. That's where I'm from. See we have castles too. It was fun to learn about castles Buzz told Fly Guy. It's even more fun to make our own. See they're at the beach making their sand castles. Buzz and Fly Guy could not wait for their next field trip, and that was Fly Guy Presents Castles, and I know it was pretty long, but I hope you were interested or at least interested enough to get creative. So what I'd like to see and you can send us a comment or a picture on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, or Instagram. We are all connected and show me what you can come up with. This is what I came up with. Got a little creative. I tried to only use materials you could find at home or the Dollar Tree. I did not have little gnomes, but I thought they deserved to live in this cute little polka dot castle. That's my favorite. I actually used an old gift bag to cover up a box and some toilet paper tubes. This box was one big box and I know you've probably been getting a lot of boxes lately, a lot of things delivered, especially during the pandemic and right now during Christmas. So make sure you save those boxes so you can do something creative with them yourself. We're going to, I'm going to show you some of the other things that you can use at home to make your own castle. And the first and most important thing to remember though is to ask your parents before you start touching anything. So here are some of the supplies that you can use to make your very own castle at home or work with a partner. These are just some boxes that I actually found at a store. Sometimes if you go to a store or your parents are out while you're safe at home and they're unloading, they will let you have the boxes for free and they come in all different sizes. This is just an old ice cream box, some tissue paper, scissors, glue. These little guys, I got at the Dollar Tree, tape, which you probably have a lot of around your house right now. Like I said, I covered the other castle with an old gift bag. And these, I drew the bricks directly on. As you can see, I'm still working on this one, but it is made all out of cereal boxes. And I know you've got some of these at home. And yes, in case you didn't know, do come with marshmallows now and they are delicious. Birthday hats, popsicle sticks, brown paper, twine. And don't forget your book. If you know what book you think we should read next, go ahead and leave that there. If you know a different craft or art project that we could do with the same book, you can let us know. Contact us on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Thank you and I'll see you next time.