Bastion

A bastion (also named bulwark, derived from the Dutch name "bolwerk"), is an angular structure projecting outward from the curtain wall of an artillery fortification. The fully developed bastion consists of two faces and two flanks with fire from the flanks being able to protect the curtain wall and also the adjacent bastions. It is one element in the style of fortification dominant from the mid 16th to mid 19th centuries. Bastion fortifications offered a greater degree of passive resistance and more scope for ranged defense in the age of gunpowder artillery compared with the medieval fortifications they replaced.

Effectiveness

Bastions differ from medieval towers in a number of respects. Bastions are lower than towers and are normally of similar height to the adjacent curtain wall. The height of towers, although making them difficult to scale, also made them easy for artillery to destroy. A bastion would normally have a ditch in front, the opposite side of which would be built up above the natural level then slope away gradually. This glacis shielded most of the bastion from the attacker's cannon while the distance from the base of the ditch to the top of the bastion meant it was still difficult to scale.

Bulwark (disambiguation)

A bulwark or bastion is a feature of some fortifications.

Bulwark may also refer to:

Fiction

Maritime

Places

Other uses

Bulwark (comics)

Bulwark (Oswald Boeglin) is a fictional mutant character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character first appeared as an antagonist of Generation X in Generation X #11.

Fictional character biography

Not much is known of the mutant known as Bulwark before he was found and recruited by Emplate. This powerhouse joined a team that Emplate gathered to torment Generation X, including Murmur, Vincente, and DOA. In an uncharacteristic move, Emplate recruited not only mutants for his team but a human as well: a woman named Gayle Edgerton from Generation X member Chamber's past. When Chamber's powers first manifested he had unintentionally paralyzed Gayle and Emplate offered her a chance for revenge, turning her into one of his vampiric minions as well.

Before the young teens returned to the Massachusetts Academy from their outing into the city, they were attacked by Emplate's Hellions. Skin, who had separated from the group to drop off Synch at his parents' house was ambushed by Bulwark and brought back to the Institute. The Hellions were successful in capturing the young mutants, but M had telepathically called for help and it was answered by the X-Man Bishop. M took out her frustrations on Bulwark, punching him through the school's biodome and then flying after him. As he was about to attack M, his muscles suddenly withered away. Knowing that he was defeated, he fled along with Vincente. Leech—then a ward of Generation X and resident of the Biodome—was the one responsible for the atrophy of Bulwark's powers, and M thanked him for his help. With Penance's realigment of alliances Generation X was successful in stopping the team.