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A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. This is distinct from a palace, which is not fortified; from a fortress, which was not always a residence for royalty or nobility; from a ‘pleasance’ which was a walled-in residence for nobility, but not adequately fortified; and from a fortified settlement, which was a public defence – though there are many similarities among these types of construction. Use of the term has varied over time and has been applied to structures as diverse as hill forts and country houses. Over the approximately 900 years that castles were built, they took on a great many forms with many different features, although some, such as curtain walls, arrowslits, and portcullises, were commonplace.

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The Graurheindorfer Burg is a Schloss located in the Graurheindorf district of Bonn

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The Castle of San Michele, once known as the Castel di Piero, was built in the Lazio region of Italy during the 12th century. It is located in the village of San Michele in Teverina, Civitella d'Agliano, Viterbo.

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A castle town is a settlement built adjacent to or surrounding a castle. Castle towns were common in Medieval Europe. Some examples include small towns like Alnwick and Arundel, which are still dominated by their castles. In Western Europe, and England particularly, it is common for cities and towns that were not castle towns to instead have been organized around cathedrals.

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Cherkasy Castle is a former medieval wooden castle in Cherkasy Ukraine built as a defense against enemies of the Golden Horde and later against Turks and Crimean Tatars.

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The International Castle Research Society (ICRS) was established in Aachen in 1986 as a not-for-profit organization following earlier initiatives by Bernhard Siepen, architect, who has been its president since 2000. Early supporters were the long-standing Aachen member of parliament, Dr. Hans Stercken, and Consul Cornel Renfert, of the Franco-German Chamber of Commerce, Paris. The first model, the Donjon of Coucy, was started in 1997, with a number of models following, the latest being the Castel del Monte. Whereas the earlier models were of French fortified keeps, or donjons, then Crusader castles and bazaars as well as medieval ships, for some time now ICRS has been working on creating models of palaces typical of the 9th to 12th centuries. There are also plans for a model of the imperial Aachen palace of Charlemagne, dating from around AD 800, and of historic buildings in Jerusalem.

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Ksar or qsar, plural ksars, qsars, ksour or qsour, is the North African term for "fortified village," from Arabic qaṣar (قَصَر), itself possibly loaned from Latin castrum. The term generally refers to a Berber fortified village.

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The rook is a piece in the game of chess resembling a castle. Formerly the piece was alternatively called the tower, marquess, rector, and comes. The term castle is considered to be informal, incorrect, or old-fashioned.

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Schloss Arff is a former water castle in the locality of Roggendorf/Thenhoven which belongs to Cologne. It is located 20 km northwest of Cologne city centre and directly on the border with the city of Dormagen in the Rhine district of Neuss.

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Slighting is the deliberate damage of high-status buildings to reduce their value as military, administrative or social structures. This destruction of property sometimes extended to the contents of buildings and the surrounding landscape. It is a phenomenon with complex motivations and was often used as a tool of control. Slighting spanned cultures and periods, with especially well-known examples from the English Civil War in the 17th century.