Not sure what I unleashed when I posted the original mail on Vauban- 
clearly a lot of closet fortress buffs out there but one should note 
garrisons often included families and had considerable impact on 
civilian populations going far beyond the obvious concentrations of 
brothels. For those who can read French a short introduction with lots 
of illustrations is* Places fortes: Bastions du pouvoir *by Nicolas 
Faucherre published by Rempart. In fact I highly recommend all his 
publications on French fortifications. I suspect he is already at work 
on the French submission re World heritage status. The book *Patrimoine 
Militaire* by Francois Dallemeagne et al, Editions Scala  puts Vauban in 
a wider context of French military architecture of all types not just 
fortifications and has superb photographs. To lighten things up (snooks 
to the over serious members of Histarch- archaeology should be fun or 
why bother) I  went with my wife on a trek around the fortifications of 
Brittany and nearby seafood restaurants a few years ago and stopped on a 
minor road to view  a c19 brick fortified line across a peninsula. My 
wife offered to jump over the fence to get a better photo but I pointed 
out a) a sign saying something like Military Zone - entry forbidden and 
b) remembered that the French special forces trained in the area and not 
the 18 year old conscripts one so often met on trains. At that moment a 
car screamed to a halt on the gravelly road and a hard looking guy guy 
in civvies but clearly army stared at us until we got back in the car 
and departed. Talking of which has anyone a digital image of the C18 
barracks in St Augustine used by the modern National Guard- my nerve 
failed me at the sight of so many armed guards outside though I should 
have asked nicely.


paul courtney
Leicester, UK