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Literacy (especially among noble and architects) was not at all uncommon before 1902. We're not talking exactly neolithic age.

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Fair, but there may have been security reasons for not recording something like this (if the swordsman theory is true), you wouldnt want enemy castles to be built as well, so you might not write down any defensive design strategies in an effort to horde your knowledge.

Oh come, this is truely gasping at straws.

People were not stupid; if there was an actual technical benefit, it would have been known and shared, the same way that people knew and shared other castle construction techniques amongst craftsmen.

Tangibly, the absence of evidence for something can’t be magicked away by the “but what if they didn’t record it for a reason because it was a secret!?”.

If there’s no evidence, there’s no evidence. You can ponder all day, but it still boils down to, bluntly: there is no evidence that conjecture is correct.

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