noun
definition
A rampart or other defensive entrenchment that entirely encircles the position being defended.
Examples of circumvallation in a Sentence
Hearing that the Roman province was threatened, he marched westward, defeated Vercingetorix near Dijon and shut him up in Alesia (Mont-Auxois),which he surrounded with lines of circumvallation.
In the 10th century it began to feel a lack of room within the limits of its fortifications; and accordingly, in the middle of the 12th century, it was found necessary to extend the line of circumvallation.
The present line of circumvallation dates from 1626-1632, the period when the independence of Genoa was threatened by the dukes of Savoy.
Portions of the old walls survive, but the greater part of the former circumvallation has been converted into promenades and gardens, outside which a modern town has sprung up. The finest of its squares are the market-place and the so-called Sand.
In a few cases, indeed, we find very complicated systems of fortification - a wall of circumvallation with towers at the corners, protecting a small settlement of nuraghe-like buildings, as in the case of the Nuraghe Losa near Abbasanta and the Nuraghe Saurecci near Guspini; 2 or, as in the It has been widely believed that the Shardana, who occur as foreign mercenaries in Egypt from the time of Rameses II.
In 1300 the outer ring of walls was completed, the earlier circumvallation being marked by the limit of the Altstadt (old city).