A bartizan or guerite is an overhanging, wall-mounted turret

Turret

In architecture, a turret is a small tower that projects vertically from the wall of a building such as a medieval castle. Turrets were used to provide a projecting defensive position allowing covering fire to the adjacent wall in the days of military fortification...

 projecting from the walls of medieval fortification

Fortification

Fortifications are military constructions and buildings designed for defence in warfare and military bases. Humans have constructed defensive works for many thousands of years, in a variety of increasingly complex designs...

s from the early 14th century up to the 16th century. They protect a warder and enable him to see around him. Bartizans generally are furnished with oylets or arrow slits.

As part of the Gothic Revival in Victorian Architecture

Victorian architecture

The term Victorian architecture refers collectively to several architectural styles employed predominantly during the middle and late 19th century. The period that it indicates may slightly overlap the actual reign, 20 June 1837 – 22 January 1901, of Queen Victoria. This represents the British and...

, the bartizan was incorporated into many notable examples of Scots Baronial Style architecture in Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. In the architecture of Aberdeen

Architecture of Aberdeen

The Architecture of Aberdeen is known for the use of granite as the principal construction material. The stone, which has been quarried in and around the city, has given Aberdeen the epithet The Granite City, or more romantically, and less commonly used, the Silver City, after the mica in the stone...

, the new Town House built in 1868-74, incorporates bartizans in the West Tower.

See also

• bretèche
  Bretèche
  In medieval fortresses, a bretèche or brattice is a small balcony with machicolations, usually built over a gate and sometimes in the corners of the fortress' wall, with the purpose of enabling defenders to shoot or throw objects at the attackers huddled under the wall. Depending on whether they...
  
  
• garret
  Garret
  A garret is generally synonymous in modern usage with a habitable attic or small living space at the top of a house. It entered Middle English via Old French with a military connotation of a watchtower or something akin to a garrison, in other words a place for guards or soldiers to be quartered...
  
  - an attic or top floor room in the military sense; a watchtower from the French word garite.

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