Well, if it tends to be the inside that is vitrified and this happens immediately prior to abandonment then it implies of of two things.
1) ritual
2) rendering it useless to anyone else
If this carries on i'll never go out!
On the subject of interior vitrification, perhaps the assailants used a Greek Fire derivative and cooked the fort - creating a firestorm (a la WW2 Dresden bombing) or the whole lot was torched ritually after it was pillaged.