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Brother Oni
2012-09-11, 01:52 AM
New Thread:


This thread is a resource for getting information about real life weapons and armor. Normally this thread would be in Friendly Banter, but the concept has always been that the information is for RPG players and DMs so they can use it to make their games better.

A few rules for this thread:

This thread is for asking questions about how weapons and armor really work. As such, it's not going to include game rule statistics. If you have such a question, especially if it stems from an answer or question in this thread, feel free to start a new thread and include a link back to here. If you do ask a rule question here, you'll be asked to move it elsewhere, and then we'll be happy to help out with it.

Any weapon or time period is open for questions. Medieval and ancient warfare questions seem to predominate, but since there are many games set in other periods as well, feel free to ask about any weapon. This includes futuristic ones - but be aware that these will be likely assessed according to their real life feasibility. Thus, phasers, for example, will be talked about in real-world science and physics terms rather than the Star Trek canon. If you want to discuss a fictional weapon from a particular source according to the canonical explanation, please start a new thread for it.

Please try to cite your claims if possible. If you know of a citation for a particular piece of information, please include it. However, everyone should be aware that sometimes even the experts don't agree, so it's quite possible to have two conflicting answers to the same question. This isn't a problem; the asker of the question can examine the information and decide which side to go with. The purpose of the thread is to provide as much information as possible. Debates are fine, but be sure to keep it a friendly debate (even if the experts can't!).

No modern real-world political discussion. As the great Carl von Clausevitz once said, "War is merely the continuation of policy by other means," so poltics and war are heavily intertwined. However, politics are a big hot-button issue and one banned on these boards, so avoid political analysis if at all possible (this thread is primarily about military hardware). There's more leeway on this for anything prior to about 1800, but be very careful with all of it, and anything past 1900 is surely not open for analysis. (I know these are arbitrary dates, but any dates would be, and I feel these ones are reasonable.)

No graphic descriptions. War is violent, dirty, and horrific, and anyone discussing it should be keenly aware of that. However, on this board graphic descriptions of violence (or sexuality) are not allowed, so please avoid them.


Apologies to Thiel for borrowing (and trimming down) his original post.

Previous Threads:

Thread V (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=80863)
Thread VI (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=124683)
Thread VII (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=168432)
Thread VIII (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=192911)
Thread IX (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=217159)
Thread X (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=238042)

Brother Oni
2012-09-11, 02:03 AM
Before I started reading this thread, seeing "people can swim in mail" could have made me mistake it for plate mail, and swimming in a chain mail shirt that doesn't cover (and weigh) the arms or legs is much easier than swimming in plate.

It's still a good 20kgs worth of metal you're wearing (not including the gambeson underneath) and while it's true that swimming in a mail shirt is easier than swimming in plate, it's like saying it's better to be burnt alive on a bonfire than in a blast furnance.

What is true, is that it's much easier to get out of a mail shirt (get the belt off, then shrug out of it), so someone who's fallen in can get out in under a minute, while the guy in plate is doomed.

Hjolnai
2012-09-11, 08:05 AM
With regard to keeping rust off armour: Would beeswax have been the best option, or would some suitable oils have been available? Alternatively, how well could it last if it got wet without such a coating, but was regularly cleaned and dried?

Galloglaich
2012-09-11, 10:04 AM
It's still a good 20kgs worth of metal you're wearing (not including the gambeson underneath) and while it's true that swimming in a mail shirt is easier than swimming in plate, it's like saying it's better to be burnt alive on a bonfire than in a blast furnance.

What is true, is that it's much easier to get out of a mail shirt (get the belt off, then shrug out of it), so someone who's fallen in can get out in under a minute, while the guy in plate is doomed.

A real mail shirt may weigh as little as 12-13 lbs actually. I think 20 kgs is probably past the upper range even for cap-a-pied mail protection including leggings, full arms, coif and so on, though there is no doubt it would be much harder to swim in all that..


With regard to keeping rust off armour: Would beeswax have been the best option, or would some suitable oils have been available? Alternatively, how well could it last if it got wet without such a coating, but was regularly cleaned and dried?

Wax was used for this, and they did also have various oils, including the petroleum based type (bitumen) which then (as now) came mostly from the Middle East, but they used mostly oils which came from plant sources, pine oils and pitch from pine trees up in the Northern part of Europe, various types of olive oil down south near the Med. They had for example a type of olive oil which was inedible and was used for lamp oil exclusively.

They also made use of whale oil, which gradually began to replace plant based oil for lamps and so on starting from the late 15th Century when the Basques started the first really systematic whale harvesting. But whale oil would probably be too stinky to put on armor.

Mail armor was cleaned by putting it in a barrel with sand and shaking it to scrub off the rust. Mail without some kind of coating of wax or oil would get rusty very fast, especially if it got wet. We are used to stainless steel today but any kind of carbon steel (which is all they had back then) gets rusty fast. Salt water is even worse.

There were other ways to preserve the armor, it could be blackened, blued or bronzed to give it a patina that could help keep off the elements, and in Japan mail like other forms of armor was lacquered. There has been some debate if lacquering was ever done in Europe but there is no evidence of it that I know of. Plate harness was quite often blackened in the forge as protection against the elements to help with maintenance, this became a signature look of mercenaries in fact. There are thousands of breast plates and half armors which are blackened.

But the bottom line is, having armor meant doing a lot of maintenance. Swords too, rust is always an issue which has to be dealt with. One fingerprint can start to be a problem in just a day or two if it's not wiped down right away.

G

Brother Oni
2012-09-11, 10:45 AM
A real mail shirt may weigh as little as 12-13 lbs actually. I think 20 kgs is probably past the upper range even for cap-a-pied mail protection including leggings, full arms, coif and so on, though there is no doubt it would be much harder to swim in all that..


True, it would depend on the size of the links and the pattern.

The mail shirt that I borrowed for re-enactment occasionally was about that weight, although it was 8 or 10 mm links (I think), which probably explains the weight difference.



Mail armor was cleaned by putting it in a barrel with sand and shaking it to scrub off the rust.

'Shaking' is one way of putting it. Normally they just seal the barrel and roll it down a hill a couple times. :smalltongue:

GraaEminense
2012-09-11, 04:34 PM
There has been some debate if lacquering was ever done in Europe but there is no evidence of it that I know of.
There are countless depictions of helmets in bright colours. Those at least were pretty obviously painted or lacquered in some way, even if it was just for the looks it would give significant protections against the elements.

For rigid armours, something similar would be possible even though I can't think of any sources on it actually being done. On the other hand, there are depictions of mails ranging from bright pink through baby blue to black, I'd like to know if they actually did that -and how...

Knaight
2012-09-11, 05:49 PM
A real mail shirt may weigh as little as 12-13 lbs actually. I think 20 kgs is probably past the upper range even for cap-a-pied mail protection including leggings, full arms, coif and so on, though there is no doubt it would be much harder to swim in all that.
The gambeson is going to be worrying as well - cloth generally absorbs a lot of water, and when you've got multiple layers of thick cloth it's bad news all on its own.

Brother Oni
2012-09-12, 07:11 AM
On the other hand, there are depictions of mails ranging from bright pink through baby blue to black, I'd like to know if they actually did that -and how...

While I can't comment on the bright pink, I can maybe shed some light on the baby blue/black. Depending on the type of steel used to make the wire for the links, the colour can vary and depending on how the light catches it, it can appear black to almost blue.

The reason why swords and other types of armour don't do the same, is that they're significantly easier to clean and polish, so you tend to have a more uniform shiny appearance (I wonder if an apprentice being made to polish every link of a mail shirt was the medieval equivalent of hazing the new guy?).

inexorabletruth
2012-09-12, 10:25 AM
What are the strategic disadvantages to wearing gauntlets while fighting hand to hand?

I've worn sparring gloves
http://revival.us/ProductImages/light_sparring_glove_red_black.jpg
(but not metal gauntlets) and found them to be easy enough to grab with and punch with, but intricate finger dexterity was a bit of a challenge, so attacking nerve clusters, or grabbing small items or smooth items was a bit of a challenge, and not really feasible in combat. And anything that required finger and hand sensitivity was right out.

Would you say it's the same, more so, or less so for steel gauntlets?

Yora
2012-09-12, 10:40 AM
Might work quite well for boxing, but in that case the opponent would probably want to grapple and then not being able to grab his clothes would probably be a considerable drawback.

Spiryt
2012-09-12, 10:51 AM
There was a lot of different gauntlet designs, so it's really hard to tell.

Still, inside of the hand wasn't usually even covered with mail, so there was still a lot of dexterity.

Attempting some really precise stuff is hard enough even in woolen glove, so it's obviously out of question, but combat with armor and stuff isn't really about sleight of hand.

Dead_Jester
2012-09-12, 10:51 AM
What are the strategic disadvantages to wearing gauntlets while fighting hand to hand?

I've worn sparring gloves (but not metal gauntlets) and found them to be easy enough to grab with and punch with, but intricate finger dexterity was a bit of a challenge, so attacking nerve clusters, or grabbing small items or smooth items was a bit of a challenge, and not really feasible in combat. And anything that required finger and hand sensitivity was right out.

Would you say it's the same, more so, or less so for steel gauntlets?

The thicker and the stiffer the gloves, the less manual dexterity you have; plate mittens, for instance, radically reduce the possible hand movements, but, if well designed, should not reduce the ability to grip small rounded objects too much (you do lose out on different finger placement though).On the other hand, even badly fitted work gloves tend to make any precise movements difficult, or even impossible; however the added grip somewhat makes grabbing smooth objects easier.

From my experience, any gloves that are thick enough to give some protection to the fingers reduce your ability to perform precise grabbing techniques (such as grabbing the collar bone or applying pressure on the metacarpus), and mittens make they all but impossible; however, in combat, especially with a trained opponent, those techniques are of little value (and all but useless if he is also wearing armor). Most grappling should still be doable with anything but the heaviest of gloves (talking boxing gloves here), and most precision based finger techniques (eye gouging, ear ripping, stabbing thumbs between the ribs, etc.), should still be easy to do, although may be hampered by the extra thickness.

inexorabletruth
2012-09-12, 11:12 PM
Thanks! :smallsmile:

Thiel
2012-09-13, 01:41 AM
And lets not forget that you're carrying a nice piece of very stiff metal at the end of your arms. This should provide all kinds of advantages if facing someone who isn't completely armoured. Say someone wearing an open-faced helmet for instance.

Daremonai
2012-09-13, 02:44 AM
A lot of grappling can be done without actually grabbing - major joint locks/breaks can be performed by hooking with the wrist and good body positioning. I'm no mediaeval combat expert, but I have little doubt that I could do them in my steel gauntlets just as easily. That doesn't mean it WAS done, but it's certainly possible.

DrewID
2012-09-13, 10:43 AM
For RPG purposes, is the following a reasonable division of Medieval European steel weapons into four categories based on penetration?

Picks and War Hammers and some Maces
Maces, War Axes, Pole Axes, and War spears
Morning Stars, Throwing or Wood Axes, Hammers or Clubs, Cut-and-thrust swords, and Hunting (Broad Point) Spears
Slashing Swords

DrewID

Spiryt
2012-09-13, 11:06 AM
Well, most clubs and maces won't really penetrate anything.... :smallwink:

But assuming it's of 'direct anti armor' qualification, that's seems about alright for RPG needs.

Although particular weapon being one or two handed, and generally overall dimensions, weight and handling will cause huge variation among particular 'type'.

Conners
2012-09-13, 12:19 PM
How much does one's skill effect he damage you accomplish? Based off Tatami mats, it seems the skills guys can cut them in half pretty easily, but those who aren't so skilled have trouble getting more than half-way through (even if they're bigger and stronger).

Is it just a matter of learning basic cutting techniques, then everyone does roughly the same damage? Or would masters get through much more flesh than journeymen of the sword?

Spiryt
2012-09-13, 12:38 PM
Master swordman most certainly can cut way more mat/meat/bamboo, however actual 'damage' in combat will pretty much never depend on some perfect 'take an aim and swing' blows.

Conners
2012-09-13, 12:42 PM
Doesn't cutting the Tatami train your cutting technique for fighting?

Spiryt
2012-09-13, 12:48 PM
Doesn't cutting the Tatami train your cutting technique for fighting?

I'm pretty sure that a lot of tatami was 'sword test' originally.

Anyway, it can most certainly train cutting technique, but 'stay square and cut' ones that's usually performed by enthusiasts just won't happen in combat all too often.

Some more serious cutting in competitions etc. out there looks like it's about some more 'realistic' cutting.

Edge of Dreams
2012-09-13, 01:26 PM
Question about ranged weapons and rate of fire:

In Runequest, which I am playing soon, ranged weapons such as bow, crossbow, and sling all have a "load" quality which tells you how many actions it takes to reload. This is designed to compensate for the fact that melee characters often have to spend actions actively defending themselves or maneuvering, while ranged attackers are more likely to be able to use all their actions on reloading and shooting as fast as they can.

* Bows have load time of 2 actions.
* Crossbows are 4 or 5 actions depending on size
* Slings are 3 actions.

Most characters get 2 to 4 actions per 5-second round, and remember, some of those actions will be spent parrying or dodging incoming attacks.

So, are those load times realistic? The bow and crossbow I'm okay with, but I'm not sure Slings should be slower than a bow. I mean, how long does it really take to grab the other end of the sling and drop a new rock/bullet in the pouch?

Knaight
2012-09-13, 01:37 PM
So, are those load times realistic? The bow and crossbow I'm okay with, but I'm not sure Slings should be slower than a bow. I mean, how long does it really take to grab the other end of the sling and drop a new rock/bullet in the pouch?

I'd actually say it takes longer than reloading a bow generally does. You have to retrieve the other end, transfer the end to the hand holding the sling (knots and toggles make this take relatively little time, but it's still a step), then put a stone or glande in the pouch properly. Assuming that people are decent at knocking arrows, the sling is a hair slower.

Spiryt
2012-09-13, 01:40 PM
Assuming that those actions are purely 'load', so don't involve aiming and shooting, they can be alright, but still on the way fast side...

Particularly reloading any heavier crossbows, with say, gaffe, goat's foot or similar lever in 5 seconds doesn't seem entirely realistic.

Straybow
2012-09-13, 06:38 PM
Hand-spanning a ~125 lb crossbow gives, at best, about 8 shots/min. Using belt hooks or a lever for heavier crossbows is significantly slower. A cranequin or winch for really powerful crossbows (400-800 lb or more) has to be attached, cranked, and detached and stowed, which could take a minute or two.

Galloglaich
2012-09-13, 07:22 PM
Skill definitely effects your ability to cut (cause damage with a sword). If you don't know what you are doing you can in some cases barely cause any damage at all, it's pretty easy to slap with the flat, to hit and pull back right away, to where you can't even cut a plastic water bottle (it will just fly away) or a pool noodle. On the other hand if you do know what you are doing, you can

Tatami are pretty hard to cut, and are used (at least today) to improve your cutting skill.

People lining up cuts in youtube videos are not particularly skilled at cutting (myself included) but they are starting to have more realistic cutting contests now in HEMA circles.

Here you can see Mike Edelson doing some Mastercuts on Tatami

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNEBpu8eDsU

and here some quicker ones

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4ucqArlmpk&feature=relmfu

In Japanese and Korean martial arts circles that has been going on already for a long time and they have it down to a science, I think this is as fast as in any real fight.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHNjKu1Kx9c

Here is a fairly realistic test showing rate of shots for a longbow vs. a relatively low powered (about 180 lbs) crossbow. That is about the lowest grade for military use historically, most would be much stronger and as Spiryt said, require spanning devices.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HagCuGXJgUs

These weapons were used in very different ways though. One of the many differences between them is that infantry crossbowmen were often deployed behind a pavise ('tower shield', more or less, in most RPG's) and two weapons were used, one being spanned by an assistant while the other was aimed by the shooter. The other way was mounted on horseback where they would shoot and move out of distance, more similar to the way pistols were used.

They were also used less often for 'area fire' for lack of a better word (bad term since bows aren't 'fired') though they were also used that way ... bows tended to be used more for 'lofted' shots and crossbows were more specialized at direct shots. The crossbow tends to have a much longer direct-shot range for individual targets, and is more accurate, but the longbow shoots a lot further at small areas (where the rate of shots is much more important)




G

Edge of Dreams
2012-09-14, 01:04 AM
Thanks for all the bow/crossbow/sling info. Based on that, it looks like the rules I'm working off of may not be perfectly realistic, but they represent the relative advantages and drawbacks of each weapon well enough for my table.

Matthew
2012-09-14, 04:02 AM
I have seen a belt hook crossbow reloaded and shot nine times in sixty seconds, so one shot per round would not be too far off what is possible. I would not be inclined to class that as a "heavy" crossbow, though.

Spiryt
2012-09-14, 04:39 AM
Hand-spanning a ~125 lb crossbow gives, at best, about 8 shots/min. Using belt hooks or a lever for heavier crossbows is significantly slower. A cranequin or winch for really powerful crossbows (400-800 lb or more) has to be attached, cranked, and detached and stowed, which could take a minute or two.

Minute or more would be mostly very lazy rate, vast majority of bows probably didn't require that much time, with enough effort.

http://crossbows.republika.pl/cr/crannequin2.jpg

Unless sad remains of my German are failing me, this cranequin allows to draw about 1100 pounds over 140mm, in 25 seconds during which hands will cover about 20m, providing mechanical advantage.

So with a lot of effort and dextrous use one shot every 30 seconds would be good guess.

Crossbows of about 400 pounds generally weren't of winch etc. variety, save for hunting ones, where rate of fire didn't matter much anyway.

Yora
2012-09-14, 07:09 AM
Unless sad remains of my German are failing me, this cranequin allows to draw about 1100 pounds over 14mm, in 25 seconds during which hands will cover about 20m, providing mechanical advantage.
14 turns of the crank pull the string 140mm, which with a crank radius of 230mm results in 14 rotations with a combined radius of about 20m. This takes about 25 seconds, with a two-handed crank about 12 seconds.

The 1100 pounds refer to a different mechanism from a few centuries later, which I think would pull a distance of 350mm. (It says that's the mechanisms length, which seems to consist entirely of the hook with the notches, so probably more like 300mm of draw length for the string.

Galloglaich
2012-09-14, 09:09 AM
From what I understand, the spanning devices break down about as follows:

Light crossbows (yew prod) ('knottelarmbrust')
180-250 lbs draw weight
Spanned by hand

Stirrup crossbows (steel or composite prod) ('stiegelarmbrust')
250 - 350 lbs draw weight
Spanned with stirrup, and / or belt-hook

Stirrup crossbows (steel or composite prod) ('schwer stiegelarmbrust')
350 - 550 lbs draw weight
Spanned with goats-foot, or 'wippe'

'English winder' (steel or composite prod) (' Englischwickler')
500 -1500 lbs
Large, spanned with windlass

'German Winder' / 'Stinger' (' Stetchel / schwer arbalest')
800 - 1200 lbs
Small, spanned with cranequin


The price ranged from about 1/5 of a mark for the knottelarmbrust, to 1/2 mark for the stirrup crossbows, to up to 2 marks for a Stetchel with the cranequin. The latter were used by mounted crossbowmen and by knights, as well as by professional marksmen. The windlass type were long ranged and used mainly for sieges, the windlass being by far the slowest to span.

They also have the ancient Greek Gastrophetes type, but from tests I've seen done the shooters seem to get worn out using these pretty fast.

G

Galloglaich
2012-09-14, 09:14 AM
Thought some folks here might find this interesting, how war-horses and cavalry were trained (late 16th / early 17thC):

http://www.hroarr.com/knightly-arts-a-true-hearted-letter/

G

Matthew
2012-09-14, 09:21 AM
Good stuff; looks like some over-interpretation as to "commanding the warhorse to attack/run down", but since the videos are no longer working I cannot see how the horse gets all four of its legs up in the air. :smallbiggrin:

Conners
2012-09-14, 11:56 AM
Trying to work something out... Are anti-plate similarly effective against cloth armour?

Was wondering if a stiletto would be better or worse for puncturing cloth armour than a more "bladey" dagger. On one hand, the stiletto tranfers all its force on a narrow point--but a more obtuse, sharp-edged point might slice through the cloth better with a stab.

I'm pretty sure a sword performs better against cloth armour than a warhammer does. But I could be wrong.

fusilier
2012-09-14, 12:21 PM
Tatami are pretty hard to cut, and are used (at least today) to improve your cutting skill.

There are swords designed specifically for this kind of cutting. I don't think the type of sword has a particular name, but it is straighter, and has a longer and wider blade than a normal katana. A friend of mine teaches Japanese sword fighting, and occasionally would have "cutting parties". I went to one, and the first time swinging this sword, after a few seconds of instructions, I made a nice cut. I proceeded to do two more cuts of the tatami mat, all of them nice and clean. My form wasn't perfect (especially at the end of the swing), nor was I attempting to do anything fancy. The sword was also very well made, and as I said specifically designed for this. My friend had more difficulty when using his standard katana. Interestingly, I did better than a lot of his students, who were probably over-thinking it.

So, sword design is a part of the equation. But for me, tatami mat cutting seemed surprisingly easy! I never got a chance to try my falchion on one though. :-)

Yora
2012-09-14, 12:48 PM
I've read about working transportable passive radar that has been presented, which can detect anythign in the air, regarless of stealth construction.

Does anyone know more about it?

Though it sounds simple enough. Instead of sending out beams or pulses and monitoring their deflection from objects in the air, the system just listens to whatever signals are around in the area and monitors not just echos but also shadows.
And with all the wireless communication including TV and radio, you have lots of background signals to monitor in almost every place, which can not be shut down. Unless you are able to shut down all devices in a large radius, since for example radio waves can travel very far and remain clear.

Galloglaich
2012-09-14, 01:16 PM
So, sword design is a part of the equation. But for me, tatami mat cutting seemed surprisingly easy! I never got a chance to try my falchion on one though. :-)

Some people just have the knack right out of the gate. I was an 'ok' cutter the first time I cut*, but I used to do landscaping for a living for a while, so I was already pretty used to cutting things with a machete... Some guys in my group cut much better than me their first time, others took months before they could cut anything other than a milk jug (milk jugs are super easy).

I'd liken it to shooting. Some people just get it intuitively the first time, others have a little trouble and have to be shown certain things to do or not do; don't jerk the trigger, remember to breathe (exhale before squeezing the trigger), don't 'limp wrist' (when shooting pistols), hold the stock firmly against your shoulder (for rifles) and so on.

Also there are tatami and then there are tatami, it depends first of all how thick they are - I've seen anywhere from 2" to 7". There is also a difference in the mat itself, or so I've been told. We usually just use regular cheap rice mats, but the 'official' tatami are a little harder, and you may or may not put a dowell or a bamboo pole inside of them which also adds some difficulty. Of course they are supposed to be moist when you cut them too needless to say.

But you don't even need to bother with all that. From what I've seen, if you can consistently cut through a (water filled) 2 liter soda bottle with your blade without knocking the bottom over, you can cut tatami. Then the trick is to cut like that without a long preparation; to do it like you would in a fight, quick with no hesitation or telegraph... that's hard!

G

(*I've got a bit better since then but I'm still basically mediocre. Nothing like as good as Edelson is in those videos.)

Brother Oni
2012-09-14, 03:21 PM
I've read about working transportable passive radar that has been presented, which can detect anythign in the air, regarless of stealth construction.

The only thing I've heard was several years ago and that the American military were supposedly trying to suppress or stop the research as it obsoleted all current design stealth bombers and ships at the time.

Needless to say, take the above rumours with a large pinch of salt or tin foil hat, depending on preference.

Yora
2012-09-14, 03:49 PM
That would be hilariously stupid since they are not the only ones working on it. It seems that there are lots of companies in other countries working on such things and the new mobile truck mounted one was made by EADS.

It would seem a much smarter move to instead halt further development on active radar stealth technology and instead focus more on getting your own passive radar tech up to date. Because other countries working with passive radar will also be working on ideas to foil it. And then you want to be the one with the best passive radar system around.

However, it seems that the long term consequences of field ready passive radar could end up much more complicated and drastic. Not only does it become harder to get to air defense stations without being spotted too soon. It seems that finding those stations heavily relies on aiming at the source of the radar pulses of the active radar devices. And passive radar does not emit any of those, making them almost invisible themselves.
Put a tarp over the truck with the passive radar device and you can't even see it from spy planes or satelites. Also don't try drones, those just get shot down. :smallbiggrin:

In one german article one unspecified expert even was quotes as "say goodbye to air superiority". And that would really change things a lot if you lose close air support.

But that brings to mind the current development of hypersonic drones. It doesn't matter if you are completely visible when you can just outrun everything shot at you.

Or alternatively, you need to use superheavy powered exoskeletons for ground assault. I've been saying that those will be the type of mecha we'll be seing in the next couple of decades. :smallbiggrin:

fusilier
2012-09-14, 04:16 PM
Galloglaich:


They had for example a type of olive oil which was inedible and was used for lamp oil exclusively.

Do you have any more information on this oil? I've used olive oil in a old style "grease lamp". All I had was a fairly high quality dipping oil, but it worked very well. The wick I used was a bit thick, it took about thirty seconds to get it started burning, but once started it burned very well.

Yora
2012-09-14, 04:22 PM
I would assume it tasted awful but burned better than the kitchen variants.
You could burn the kitchen oil and you most probably could digest the lamp oil.

Just like you can drink and will get drunk from industrial cleaning ethanol.

Norsesmithy
2012-09-14, 04:50 PM
It's called Bi Static radar, and it uses several receivers, and compares the background "noise" "take" from each and can then produces tracking data with Doppler effects.

It's not fool proof, but the advantage that Bi Static radar has over standard radar installations is that you don't have to pour thousands of watts into the air making yourself a target for anti radiation missiles (HARMs, et al). The reason why it is more effective against stealth designs than standard radar is that since you aren't sending and receiving on reciprocal tracks, the stealth aircraft cannot present a chosen view to the radar (Stealth Aircraft are not equally stealthy in all directions).

However without the addition of a powerful transmitter as a third set, it's not very precise, can't be used for missile guidance, and can be foiled in all the same ways any large Doppler set can be, and we've been training to fight Doppler radar equipped foes for decades, so it's not like there isn't doctrine available to combat folks so equipped already.

Both the US and the Czech Republic have bi static radars or radars with bi static capability already in production, and the Czechs, in particular, are trying to sell them to everyone. The American Bi Static radars are designed to work with a third set with a powerful transmitter instead of simple background noise, generally using an AWACs or J-STAR for the transmitter set, but also sometimes a AGEIS ship.

Other "anti-stealth" radar technologies include high powered digital VHF radars, the lower frequency means that a VHF radar is less affected by the use of Radar Absorbing materials, and the digital signal processing means that the set will do a better job eliminating the signal ghosts that are so prevalent with VHF radar sets. Biggest issue with them is that they are still much easier to jam than a UHF or Microwave band set.

The Bi Static radars are a big threat not because they have a higher likelihood of detecting reduced radar cross section aircraft, but because they can provide raid warning without the need to be broadcasting with a powerful transmitter, and that makes them much more difficult to target than a traditional radar set.

Edit to add, the Bi Static capability of certain American radars has been around for decades. It's Bi Static radar able to run simply on background noise that's fairly new.

Brother Oni
2012-09-14, 09:16 PM
Just like you can drink and will get drunk from industrial cleaning ethanol.

Theoretically you could, but then the additives they add to make it unfit for human consumption will either cause you to vomit it all up or put you into hospital/the morgue.

Yora
2012-09-15, 02:03 PM
How much does wood stop bullets? Both pistols, rifles, and machine guns and of course depending on type and thickness of the wood.

After all, wood can take a lot of deformation before splintering and even then there's still the fibre structure holding everything together. I think it might actually take bullet impacts very well.

Spiryt
2012-09-15, 02:43 PM
How much does wood stop bullets? Both pistols, rifles, and machine guns and of course depending on type and thickness of the wood.

After all, wood can take a lot of deformation before splintering and even then there's still the fibre structure holding everything together. I think it might actually take bullet impacts very well.

I'm pretty sure that one can find some rough penetration tables for popular bullets in the Internet, such as

here (http://www.mountainmolds.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=229)

Generally, wood will vary so much depending on species, particular tree/shrub, it's part, moisture, angle of impact (with grain? against it?) etc. that it's hard to tell.

Soft, light wood like dry pine is for example pretty poor at stopping even airgun lead pellets, and even 'stocky' pistol 9mm will carve a path in it easily AFAIR.

Daosus
2012-09-16, 10:50 PM
Theoretically you could, but then the additives they add to make it unfit for human consumption will either cause you to vomit it all up or put you into hospital/the morgue.

Well, in the "civilized world" they add stuff to make it unfit for consumption. In the Soviet Union, industrial alcohol was a common piece of contraband and bartering item.

Brother Oni
2012-09-17, 06:55 AM
Well, in the "civilized world" they add stuff to make it unfit for consumption. In the Soviet Union, industrial alcohol was a common piece of contraband and bartering item.

I can't speak for the manufacturing practices in the old Soviet Union, but over here, stuff is added so that they can avoid it being classed as an 'alcoholic beverage' and avoid the tax on it.

For comparison, a 2.5L bottle of ~95% pure ethanol for laboratory use costs about 30UKP, with duty, it's closer to 200UKP. It also doesn't have any additives (otherwise it couldn't be that pure), but industrial ethanol for cleaning purposes doesn't have that restriction.

TimeWizard
2012-09-17, 09:29 AM
Maximilian Armor, aka "fluted". Why are there ridges in the armor? what do they serve?

Spiryt
2012-09-17, 09:49 AM
Mostly for aesthetics, probably.

Substantial fluting could give more rigid surface for the same weight, I guess, if it was required. Actually 'wrinkled' surface wouldn't get damaged as easily by heavy impacts, but I'm not sure if this effect was really visible in most armor pieces.

Galloglaich
2012-09-17, 12:47 PM
My understanding was that the 'fluting' (ridges) were to make it stronger / lighter. A lot of that Maximillian harness, the stuff made in Augsburg and Innsbruck anyway, was very thin tempered steel (and so very light, as armor goes), and I'd been given to understand that the fluting was part of it. But I never precisely understood how that works.

G

Daosus
2012-09-17, 12:52 PM
Maximilian Armor, aka "fluted". Why are there ridges in the armor? what do they serve?

Flutes increase resistance to bending (ie, impact weapons) by increasing the second moment of inertia on the cross section. This can be done without adding much weight.

kardar233
2012-09-17, 01:58 PM
How much does wood stop bullets? Both pistols, rifles, and machine guns and of course depending on type and thickness of the wood.

After all, wood can take a lot of deformation before splintering and even then there's still the fibre structure holding everything together. I think it might actually take bullet impacts very well.

I wouldn't know when dealing with trees and such, but The Box of Truth (http://theboxotruth.com/docs/bot1.htm) did a penetration test with 3/4" pine boards in which they were pretty small defense.

DrewID
2012-09-17, 02:46 PM
Flutes increase resistance to bending (ie, impact weapons) by increasing the second moment of inertia on the cross section. This can be done without adding much weight.

Similar in effect to the middle layer of corrugated cardboard.

DrewID

headwarpage
2012-09-17, 05:49 PM
Hey all,

My boss has an old sword just laying around his office. He doesn't know anything about it, other than that it's been in his family forever and his forebears traveled quite a bit. He said it was ok if I asked around, so I was curious what you guys could tell me as far as age, origins, etc. Overall length is somewhere around 28", blade is about 22". Pictures below.

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170313.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170330.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170349.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170401.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170420.jpg

zlefin
2012-09-17, 08:53 PM
how hard is it to throw a weapon (e.g. grenade, throwing knife) while prone?

Straybow
2012-09-17, 10:34 PM
Minute or more would be mostly very lazy rate, vast majority of bows probably didn't require that much time, with enough effort.

http://crossbows.republika.pl/cr/crannequin2.jpg

Unless sad remains of my German are failing me, this cranequin allows to draw about 1100 pounds over 140mm, in 25 seconds during which hands will cover about 20m, providing mechanical advantage.

So with a lot of effort and dextrous use one shot every 30 seconds would be good guess.

Crossbows of about 400 pounds generally weren't of winch etc. variety, save for hunting ones, where rate of fire didn't matter much anyway. Yes, I seem to be off on draw by a factor of two. Cranking the cranquin is 25 seconds, but you've neglected the time of retrieving the device, attaching it to the stock, setting the catch, and then carefully detaching the device from the crossbow (no "safety" switch to prevent accidental release) and stowing it (you don't just drop it to the ground, where dirt can get in the gears and speed corrosion).

Diamondeye
2012-09-18, 02:09 AM
how hard is it to throw a weapon (e.g. grenade, throwing knife) while prone?

Not very easy. I can't speak to a throwing knife, but grenades are significantly heavier than most people realize who have not handled one. Prone is not really an ideal position to make throwing motions since you can only use the arm to throw, not the whole body.

With a grenade, you overcome some of that by lobbing it up into the air in a high arc. This also has the side benefit of getting it over obstacles and giving the fuse time to burn.

Yora
2012-09-18, 03:53 AM
Hey all,

My boss has an old sword just laying around his office. He doesn't know anything about it, other than that it's been in his family forever and his forebears traveled quite a bit. He said it was ok if I asked around, so I was curious what you guys could tell me as far as age, origins, etc. Overall length is somewhere around 28", blade is about 22". Pictures below.

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170313.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170330.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170349.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170401.jpg

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p104/headwarpage/2012-09-17170420.jpg
Funny you mention this know. I just learned about this kind of sword some weeks ago.
I am pretty sure it's a Yatagan, the base of the grip makes it quite distinctive and the blade shape also matches. Size seems about average. Most yatagans were made from the 1750s to the 1850s in Turkey, but it could be older or more recent, or from a completely different place.
The insciption is probably arabic, maybe it has some useful information as well. It looks somewhat unusual though, but I can't read any form of arabic.
Given the amount of decoration, it's probably a private item and not mass produced for the military. But from a first glance, it still looks completely functional. The decorations look kind of painted on on the photos, so my guess would be that it was not a terribly expensive custom made sword for a rich person. But I don't know anything about price ranges for swords in the otoman empire, so it's a total guess. Though I would assume it's for someone who can afford a more expensive sword that the common man, but still does not have a bottomless purse.

I think the best way to learn more would be find someone who can descipher the inscription on the blade.
Also, it should be cleaned of the rust. It will only get worse if left in this state.

TimeWizard
2012-09-18, 06:36 AM
Ah, Yora beat me to it. That is a Yatagan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yatagan). Its the starting sword in Assassins Creed Revelations too, if you wanted to see it in action.

headwarpage
2012-09-18, 06:48 AM
Thanks for the info. It's a cool looking sword, hopefully he'll clean it up a bit.

Spiryt
2012-09-18, 07:15 AM
Yes, I seem to be off on draw by a factor of two. Cranking the cranquin is 25 seconds, but you've neglected the time of retrieving the device, attaching it to the stock, setting the catch, and then carefully detaching the device from the crossbow (no "safety" switch to prevent accidental release) and stowing it (you don't just drop it to the ground, where dirt can get in the gears and speed corrosion).

Well, actually, safety switch were present in crossbows at least since late 15th century, though obviosuly they were mostly present in hunting examples, where additional complication wasn't really a problem.

And general maneuvering the cranequin is easy, and one can even shoot with one still attached, if really needed.

Windlass is more of a problem here.

Galloglaich
2012-09-18, 08:50 AM
Funny you mention this know. I just learned about this kind of sword some weeks ago.
I am pretty sure it's a Yatagan, the base of the grip makes it quite distinctive and the blade shape also matches. Size seems about average. Most yatagans were made from the 1750s to the 1850s in Turkey, but it could be older or more recent, or from a completely different place.
The insciption is probably arabic, maybe it has some useful information as well. It looks somewhat unusual though, but I can't read any form of arabic.
Given the amount of decoration, it's probably a private item and not mass produced for the military. But from a first glance, it still looks completely functional. The decorations look kind of painted on on the photos, so my guess would be that it was not a terribly expensive custom made sword for a rich person. But I don't know anything about price ranges for swords in the otoman empire, so it's a total guess. Though I would assume it's for someone who can afford a more expensive sword that the common man, but still does not have a bottomless purse.

I think the best way to learn more would be find someone who can descipher the inscription on the blade.
Also, it should be cleaned of the rust. It will only get worse if left in this state.

Yes that is a Yataghan (they actually date back from at least the 14th Century, but I agree this one is probably 18th or 19th) it looks like a pretty nice one to me, and it's in a fairly bad state of rust. It's worth at least a few hundred dollars, could be much more. But you would need to have it cleaned by someone who knows what they are doing. Yora is right if you leave it in that state it will be ruined pretty soon.

G

Mike_G
2012-09-19, 11:39 AM
how hard is it to throw a weapon (e.g. grenade, throwing knife) while prone?

The technique for throwing a grenade prone is to roll on your back, pull the pin, take the grenade in your right hand, grab some ground with your left and then roll to your left as you whip your right hand, releasing near the top of the arc.

This lets the roll add some momentum and adds some distance to your throw. It's ok, but not as far as you could throw from standing.

Best hope you are prone behind some cover, since you won't be able to throw an average hand grenade beyond it's casualty radius like this.

It's not bad for tossing over the enemy's cover, when he's close enough that you want to stay prone and don't feel safe enough to come up to your knees for a better throw.

Beleriphon
2012-09-19, 03:10 PM
Are there any unarmed martial art techniques that would functionally allow a single, or small group (say four), eight year old children fight and defeat an armed (say a halberd with a dagger as backup) and armoured adult? Armour wise pick something made of metal and comman to an era where halberds were used.

Spiryt
2012-09-19, 03:27 PM
Little guys shoot for the legs, as quickly and with good timing as they can, and hope that mass attack and confusion connected with it will mean that guy won't have time to hit anyone with halberd, I guess.

Of course with coordination, from all directions if possible, to not give much chance. Then somebody grabs said dagger, the rest is obvious...

Even if one is unfairly bigger, stronger and more skilled, grappling four opponents will be rather impossible.


Though wrestling shot against something with groin at your head height would be rather funny.

http://cdn0.sbnation.com/imported_assets/767921/takedown.gif

Lapak
2012-09-19, 03:30 PM
Are there any unarmed martial art techniques that would functionally allow a single, or small group (say four), eight year old children fight and defeat an armed (say a halberd with a dagger as backup) and armoured adult? Armour wise pick something made of metal and comman to an era where halberds were used.Assuming that the halberd-bearer isn't a complete novice, probably not. Their opponent is unarmed (major disadvantage), a couple of feet shorter with proportionally shorter reach (major disadvantage) and hugely inferior weight (major disadvantage in unarmed combat especially), AND what height and weight they have isn't optimally developed yet in terms of applied strength - their body is still geared for growth, not for power/labor.

I know that we're used to a D&D environment where a four-foot-tall halfling can somehow apply just as much power as a human adult, but realistically this is not a winnable fight. Any given child has neither the strength to do damage directly nor even the strength to apply holds or joint-based damage through leverage; he's going to get at absolute minimum one attack before they close to striking distance, and almost every blow from halberd or dagger will be incapacitating or fatal.

I mean, it's not completely impossible, but it would involve the adult making at least a couple of GIGANTIC mistakes.

Thiel
2012-09-19, 04:13 PM
Are there any unarmed martial art techniques that would functionally allow a single, or small group (say four), eight year old children fight and defeat an armed (say a halberd with a dagger as backup) and armoured adult? Armour wise pick something made of metal and comman to an era where halberds were used.

Crossbows.

DrewID
2012-09-19, 10:08 PM
Are there any unarmed martial art techniques that would functionally allow a single, or small group (say four), eight year old children fight and defeat an armed (say a halberd with a dagger as backup) and armoured adult? Armour wise pick something made of metal and comman to an era where halberds were used.

Plot immunity-fu.

Other than that, get him to chase one of you and have a trip wire ambush set up.

DrewID

Thiel
2012-09-20, 04:28 AM
Plot immunity-fu.

Other than that, get him to chase one of you and have a trip wire ambush set up.

DrewID

A pitfall, pitch, a torch and a couple of stout clubs and/or shovels to keep him in the hole should do nicely as well.

Galloglaich
2012-09-21, 11:22 AM
Are there any unarmed martial art techniques that would functionally allow a single, or small group (say four), eight year old children fight and defeat an armed (say a halberd with a dagger as backup) and armoured adult? Armour wise pick something made of metal and comman to an era where halberds were used.

No, they will be chopped up into sashimi.

G

Yora
2012-09-22, 07:54 AM
I guess most people know the bullet into water tests by mythbusters, which do explain things quite well and don't leave much questions, at least to me.

Now I was looking into sandbags as bullet stoppers and found some info at Box of Truth (http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot7.htm). And there seems to be something similar going on. Pistol bullets penetrate about 6 inch before stopping and rifle bullets just shatter on impact.
I don't know what difference hollow point or FMJ would make and I don't think they say which they used, but it was the same effect on shotgun slugs, so it probably doesn't matter.

But why does sand work so exceptionally well while cinderblocks and wood don't?

Storm Bringer
2012-09-22, 09:15 AM
I guess most people know the bullet into water tests by mythbusters, which do explain things quite well and don't leave much questions, at least to me.

Now I was looking into sandbags as bullet stoppers and found some info at Box of Truth (http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot7.htm). And there seems to be something similar going on. Pistol bullets penetrate about 6 inch before stopping and rifle bullets just shatter on impact.
I don't know what difference hollow point or FMJ would make and I don't think they say which they used, but it was the same effect on shotgun slugs, so it probably doesn't matter.

But why does sand work so exceptionally well while cinderblocks and wood don't?

short answer is sand "bends" when wood "brakes", i.e. a bag of sand will deform under the impact, absorbing energy all the way. the bullet has to physically push the sand out of the way, whereas with wood, once it;s pushed past it's strucutal limits it breaks and doesn't really resist the bullet

Beleriphon
2012-09-22, 03:51 PM
IBut why does sand work so exceptionally well while cinderblocks and wood don't?

Same reason the Mythbusters found that a .50cal round makes a gawdawful splash but doesn't go very far into the water. Functionally when dealing with bullet impacts the more that a substance can absorb the energy and deform under the impact the more resistant it will be to penetration.

Really sand has more incommon with fluids than it does with most solids. I'd really like to see what a non-Newtonian fluid would do to a bullet. Something like equal parts corn starch and water.

Yora
2012-09-22, 04:52 PM
So it's because sand does not snap or splinter, moving itself out of the bullets path?

Spiryt
2012-09-22, 04:56 PM
Millions of sand grains pretty much cause millions of individual momentum reductions, acting from different directions.

That's how I understand dynamics of such substances.

Plus, sand is usually pretty dense.

Beleriphon
2012-09-22, 05:39 PM
So it's because sand does not snap or splinter, moving itself out of the bullets path?

Its more that each individual grain of sand absorbs energy by itself and also transfers energy away from a bullet to each of the grains of sand touching it until there isn't enough energy to move grains of sand anymore. You could get the same result using a bag of anything that was ground down to the same size as sand particles.

The easiest way to think of it is that each grain of said slows the bullet down a little bit, because the density of the sand is so high the bullet is being slowed down dramatically because it contacts hundreds, if not thousands of grains of sand. Sand is after all just millions of tiny rocks.

As an aside if yo were to take a piece of wood that was a similar volume to a sand bag it would stop a bullet just as well. The wood would be more badly damaged than the sand bag, but that's an issue of each substance's phsyical properties.

Straybow
2012-09-23, 08:27 PM
They had for example a type of olive oil which was inedible and was used for lamp oil exclusively.


Do you have any more information on this oil? I've used olive oil in a old style "grease lamp". All I had was a fairly high quality dipping oil, but it worked very well. The wick I used was a bit thick, it took about thirty seconds to get it started burning, but once started it burned very well.

Olives are naturally very bitter, often described as inedible. They must be soaked in a lye solution to leach out and chemically break down the bitter substances. They are then soaked in salt brine to remove the lye.

I suppose that some olive oils may also be extremely bitter, depending on when the olive was picked.

fusilier
2012-09-24, 12:53 AM
Olives are naturally very bitter, often described as inedible. They must be soaked in a lye solution to leach out and chemically break down the bitter substances. They are then soaked in salt brine to remove the lye.

I suppose that some olive oils may also be extremely bitter, depending on when the olive was picked.

I'm really more interested in what the specific kind of olive oil was that was used for lamps. Because, I've used olive oil for lamps! :-)

Also, I think traditionally, "oil-cured" olives were more common than the brine cured variety. The olives are packed in olive oil and salt. Where I live they are typically referred to as "sicilian olives", but that's kind of misnomer. I like them, but they can be too salty at times.

Another use for olive oil is as a leather restorer (I have a friend who swears by it), and French and Italians seem to have used it to oil guns even in the 20th century (another friend who claims that he has disassembled old military rifles and they smell of olive oil). About the only thing I haven't heard of olive oil being used for is engine lubricant . . . but it wouldn't surprise me! :-)

Thiel
2012-09-24, 01:58 AM
About the only thing I haven't heard of olive oil being used for is engine lubricant . . . but it wouldn't surprise me! :-)

There's been experiments with it, but organic oils breaks down too fast to be of much use.

Mike_G
2012-09-24, 10:18 AM
I have a friend who converted a diesel truck to run on used vegetable oil. Not exclusively olive oil, but he has used that, as well as corn, canola and soybean oil.

The truck works juts fine, but it smells like french fries.

headwarpage
2012-09-24, 10:31 AM
Automatic transmission fluid used to contain whale oil.

I had to double-check wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_transmission_fluid) to be sure my dad didn't make that up.

Galloglaich
2012-09-24, 01:30 PM
I'm really more interested in what the specific kind of olive oil was that was used for lamps. Because, I've used olive oil for lamps! :-)

Also, I think traditionally, "oil-cured" olives were more common than the brine cured variety. The olives are packed in olive oil and salt. Where I live they are typically referred to as "sicilian olives", but that's kind of misnomer. I like them, but they can be too salty at times.

Another use for olive oil is as a leather restorer (I have a friend who swears by it), and French and Italians seem to have used it to oil guns even in the 20th century (another friend who claims that he has disassembled old military rifles and they smell of olive oil). About the only thing I haven't heard of olive oil being used for is engine lubricant . . . but it wouldn't surprise me! :-)

There is a grade of olive oil used for lamps called 'lampante', but I'm not sure if it's the same as the older stuff (from a specific species of olive tree bred for lamp oil)

http://www.oliviersandco.com/lampante-oil-for-olive-oil-lamp.html

G

fusilier
2012-09-24, 02:31 PM
There is a grade of olive oil used for lamps called 'lampante', but I'm not sure if it's the same as the older stuff (from a specific species of olive tree bred for lamp oil)

http://www.oliviersandco.com/lampante-oil-for-olive-oil-lamp.html

G

Thanks G! I'll look around for it -- might be able to get it locally.

fusilier
2012-09-24, 02:34 PM
There's been experiments with it, but organic oils breaks down too fast to be of much use.

I've heard very good things about castor oil. It was the oil of choice during WW1. Even when it breaks down, it goes through several stages some of which are decent lubricants in their own right. The problem is that it forms gums. It's not an issue when the engine has to be rebuilt on a regular basis (like WW1 aircraft engines).

fusilier
2012-09-24, 02:42 PM
There is a grade of olive oil used for lamps called 'lampante', but I'm not sure if it's the same as the older stuff (from a specific species of olive tree bred for lamp oil)

http://www.oliviersandco.com/lampante-oil-for-olive-oil-lamp.html

G

After doing some more research, lampante seems to be a catch all term. It basically refers to a substandard oil that doesn't taste well. It can sometimes be refined and mixed with a virgin oil to be made acceptable for consumption. One source notes that it's made from the olives that have fallen to the ground, and other "low quality" olives. So it's basically "bad" olive oil. I suspect that this may have been historical lamp oil as well -- no point in wasting good olive oil in lamps, if non-palatable oil is available.

If they did breed a specific kind of olive for lamp oil, it's probably long gone by now. :-(

Joran
2012-09-24, 03:45 PM
Really sand has more incommon with fluids than it does with most solids. I'd really like to see what a non-Newtonian fluid would do to a bullet. Something like equal parts corn starch and water.

Adam Savage tested bags of corn starch and water, when the Mythbusters were putting together their own bullet resistant vest.

It worked decently well, but I think the final design involved ceramic tiles.

Yora
2012-09-25, 10:06 AM
This is pure curiosity and just intended to see if anyone knows any historic sources: How was the perception of PTSD and other stress related psychological illnesses in soldiers and warriors in premodern time? With a rather aimless google search, the Napoleonic Wars are often referenced as the turning point in warfare, when the stress on soldiers changed in character from short violent clashes to drawn out "high intensity" campaigns.

And to very carefully get a bit more contempory, does there seem to be a tendency for symptoms turning significantly worse once "the war is over", or does being around people who know the stress themselves not do much to keep people more stable?
Because my uneducated guess would be that being part of a continous warrior-subculture might help to retain a sense of "normality" by being in an environment in which the experiences are part of everyones life. Even though they are hundreds of miles away from harm, drone controllers seem to suffer extreme stress from being in the field and providing surveilance data to troops under fire for 8 hours and day, and then going back home helping the kids with the homework and mowing the lawn. Lack of downtime with other soldiers to digest the experiences would probably be a major factor in that.

Essence_of_War
2012-09-25, 10:36 AM
I don't know much from a medical perspective, but have you ever read the play "Ajax" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajax_(Sophocles)) or Philoctetes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philoctetes_(Sophocles)), both by Sophocles?

Both plays deal with the physical, emotional, and psychological damage that war can inflict on the warrior. "Ajax" is basically about a descent of a once mighty warrior into madness and suicide after he returns home from war. "Philoctetes" deals with the trauma associated with wounds that don't heal, and the feelings of isolation surrounding a warrior who can't fight.

This is the sort of thing that we would certainly interpret as PTSD in the modern day.

You can read about their modern interpretations in the Philoctetes Project (http://bulletin.kenyon.edu/x2901.xml).

Dienekes
2012-09-25, 11:39 AM
I don't know much from a medical perspective, but have you ever read the play "Ajax" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajax_(Sophocles)) or Philoctetes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philoctetes_(Sophocles)), both by Sophocles?

Both plays deal with the physical, emotional, and psychological damage that war can inflict on the warrior. "Ajax" is basically about a descent of a once mighty warrior into madness and suicide after he returns home from war. "Philoctetes" deals with the trauma associated with wounds that don't heal, and the feelings of isolation surrounding a warrior who can't fight.

This is the sort of thing that we would certainly interpret as PTSD in the modern day.

You can read about their modern interpretations in the Philoctetes Project (http://bulletin.kenyon.edu/x2901.xml).

Minor quibble Ajax was still still at Troy and his madness was specifically caused by Athena since he was going to attack Odysseus who may (depending on version of the story) cheated him out of Achilles armor, as well as consistently making him into a fool in front of the other soldiers, and generally being the giant **** that Odysseus is.

Brother Oni
2012-09-25, 12:12 PM
This is pure curiosity and just intended to see if anyone knows any historic sources: How was the perception of PTSD and other stress related psychological illnesses in soldiers and warriors in premodern time?


Prior to Vietnam where the term PTSD was first coined, it was known as shell shock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_shock) (particularly during WWI) or Combat Stress Reaction (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_stress_reaction), which may help guide your research.

fusilier
2012-09-25, 02:15 PM
Sometime around the American Civil War (I think a little before), the term "cannon fever" was used to refer to "a strong desire to get away from the front lines", basically PTSD.

GraaEminense
2012-09-25, 04:12 PM
I'm sure I read something in a previous thread about a Medieval text giving advice on how a knight should deal with what is essentially PTSD? Gonna have a look.

Essence_of_War
2012-09-25, 05:05 PM
Minor quibble Ajax was still still at Troy and his madness was specifically caused by Athena since he was going to attack Odysseus who may (depending on version of the story) cheated him out of Achilles armor, as well as consistently making him into a fool in front of the other soldiers, and generally being the giant **** that Odysseus is.

Yes, the plots of the plays do involve the intervention of allegedly supernatural agents:smalltongue:

That being said, I think the folks over at the Philoctetes project (http://www.outsidethewirellc.com/projects/theater-of-war/overview) say it well:


It has been suggested that ancient Greek drama was a form of storytelling, communal therapy, and ritual reintegration for combat veterans by combat veterans. Sophocles himself was a general. At the time Aeschylus wrote and produced his famous Oresteia, Athens was at war on six fronts. The audiences for whom these plays were performed were undoubtedly comprised of citizen-soldiers. Also, the performers themselves were most likely veterans or cadets. Seen through this lens, ancient Greek drama appears to have been an elaborate ritual aimed at helping combat veterans return to civilian life after deployments during a century that saw 80 years of war.

Plays like Sophocles’ Ajax and Philoctetes read like textbook descriptions of wounded warriors, struggling under the weight of psychological and physical injuries to maintain their dignity, identity, and honor. Given this context, it seemed natural that military audiences today might have something to teach us about the impulses behind these ancient stories. It also seemed like these ancient stories would have something important and relevant to say to military audiences today.


I think it would be ignorant of the modern reader to overlook the psychological torment of Ajax, the returning veteran, because his madness is said to be caused by Athena.

Dienekes
2012-09-25, 05:11 PM
Yes, the plots of the plays do involve the intervention of allegedly supernatural agents:smalltongue:

That being said, I think the folks over at the Philoctetes project (http://www.outsidethewirellc.com/projects/theater-of-war/overview) say it well:

I think it would be ignorant of the modern reader to overlook the psychological torment of Ajax, the returning veteran, because his madness is said to be caused by Athena.

He wasn't returning anywhere. But despite that, I mentioned Athena and attacking Odysseus because as far as I'm aware (and I admittedly am no expert) Ajax doesn't act like a PTSD victim, more like the bullied kid who brings a gun to school. The flashback and anxiety from trauma are absent from the play. Instead we see Ajax getting pissed over Odysseus pulling one over on him again, and thinking it's about time to end the bugger once and for all.

Essence_of_War
2012-09-26, 09:34 AM
There seems to be a lull in the conversation, so I thought this might be a good opportunity to ask a question.

I was interested in how modern stab vests work, specifically what sort of materials they're constructed of, and how they're tested. There is a little on the wikipedia article, but it isn't terribly in-depth. Could anyone direct me to additional reading sources on this subject?

I was mostly interested in the topic since I know at various points in history, people have solved the "how do I prevent the pointy/sharp end of that person's weapon from getting into me?" issue through methods like mail, brigandine, coat-of-plates etc.

Do modern stab vests incorporate components like mail into them? If not, why? I know mail is still used by butchers and slaughterhouse workers because it's so dang good at preventing sharp things from getting at squishy bits. Are there simply better (lighter and more efficient?) materials and construction methods that are used instead?

Thanks!

Galloglaich
2012-09-26, 10:04 AM
Yes they do incorporate mail, apparently it's the only thing that really works.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_(armour)#Stab-proof_vests

They tend to be pretty secretive about how they are made so it's hard to find much detail online, from what I understand they have some kind of mail in all of the 'high level' (threat level 3 I think?) stab-vests, made by companies in Germany and a few other places. This was after a long period of experimentation with different types of armor, things that looked like lamellar and brigandine and so on. In the end they came back to mail in most (not all) cases.

My understanding is that mail doesn't protect though against things like syringes with very thin needles, so you need other materials for that kind of threat. Sharp knives also perform differently than spikes or ice picks. Kevlar and so on can't stop a really hard stab with a long knife... so the vests designed for this kind of threat typically incorporate mail.

Here is a government report on stab vests with a lot of interesting data

https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/183652.pdf

G

Spiryt
2012-09-26, 10:07 AM
http://www.nij.gov/nij/pubs-sum/183652.htm


I think that this pdf has quite solid description of testing procedures etc.

As far as mail goes - hard to know for sure, but it quite probably wouldn't be practical for such applications.

It most certainly wouldn't stop any bullets of decent energy, protection against spears and stuff is hardly relevant, and few good kg of clanging iron probably isn't considered worth it for knives.

But I'm pretty sure that there are some mail supplemented vest around.

Conners
2012-09-27, 06:15 AM
Sometimes, you hear legends of people who kill tigers with their barehanded and such as that. This brought me to wondering... how would you deal with fighting creatures such as gnolls, or wild beasts in general?

A lot of fighting techniques include wrestling, in such a way that your opponent can't stab you or get at your eyes. However, I don't know if they often make provision for them having a set of predatory teeth and jaws.

With armoured parts, being bitten wouldn't be that much of a concern, of course--but still, I can imagine a lizardman biting someone's face off.

eulmanis12
2012-09-27, 10:06 AM
everything has a vulnerable spot. EVERYTHING. there would be different techniques for close quarters combat with a gnoll than with a lizardman but there would be techniques. There will be somewhere that a well placed boot will cause severe pain. And while lack of claws/sharp teeth are a disadvantage for humans, it is not a disadvantage that training can't balance.

My real life example is people who deal with gators and Crocodiles, while the gator has the advantage of extreemly sharp teeth and powerfull jaws, there are techniques that allow these people to subdue the gator with little more than their bare hands.

gkathellar
2012-09-27, 12:02 PM
Sometimes, you hear legends of people who kill tigers with their barehanded and such as that.

Emphasis mine. If someone tries to take on a large, powerful predator in its specialty (predation) without using the human specialty (tool use) they are going to get badly hurt, and very likely killed. I doubt even someone like Masutatsu Oyama could have taken on a tiger barehanded.


This brought me to wondering... how would you deal with fighting creatures such as gnolls, or wild beasts in general?

Traps, projectile weapons, plate mail armor, spears, shields, and knives, in that order of priority.

If we're talking fantasy humanoids like gnolls, there is one bit of good news — bipeds have a large set of well-understood weaknesses that are relatively easy to exploit. You might also be able to exploit field of vision, depending. The bad news is that they'd be exploiting all of the same weaknesses on you, and copying your tool use.

(The other good news is that these creatures are largely impossible for structural reasons, so we're already in the realm of the ridiculous even sincerely considering them).


A lot of fighting techniques include wrestling, in such a way that your opponent can't stab you or get at your eyes. However, I don't know if they often make provision for them having a set of predatory teeth and jaws.

If you're forced to confront a toothed, clawed, big humanoid with your bare hands, then yes, grappling would probably be your best bet. A lot of locks and holds would effectively neutralize the advantages of teeth and claws. The problem is, first you'd have to go through the teeth and the claws.


everything has a vulnerable spot. EVERYTHING. there would be different techniques for close quarters combat with a gnoll than with a lizardman but there would be techniques. There will be somewhere that a well placed boot will cause severe pain. And while lack of claws/sharp teeth are a disadvantage for humans, it is not a disadvantage that training can't balance.

It is if whatever you're up against also has training. It's like that old saw, "training in X can allow you to defeat bigger opponents and use your opponent's size against them." Well, yeah, unless your bigger opponent has the same training. Then you're not in such a great boat.


My real life example is people who deal with gators and Crocodiles, while the gator has the advantage of extreemly sharp teeth and powerfull jaws, there are techniques that allow these people to subdue the gator with little more than their bare hands.

Crocodiles are easy. They bite harder than anything else alive, but the muscles they use to open their jaws are weak enough that you can hold them shut with rubber bands. Many animals have no such obvious weakness — trying something like that on something like a hyena, a bear, a tiger, a wild gaur or (god forbid) a hippo? That's a recipe for disaster.

Spiryt
2012-09-27, 03:59 PM
Well, Brazilian name for rear choke is mata leon, after all. :smallbiggrin:

Even huge dangerous animals could be certainly defeated by securing good positions and choking them out, or attacking throat/eyes in some way.

There are legends about African tribesmen like Masai killing lions unarmed, but not sure if there are any documented ones.

In any case, technique would be probably secondary to outright stupidly cold blood, experience, and generally aggressive and fearless mentality, because there's 914 things that may go very wrong in any second.

gkathellar
2012-09-27, 07:55 PM
Even huge dangerous animals could be certainly defeated by securing good positions and choking them out, or attacking throat/eyes in some way.

Against many large animals, a chokehold wouldn't be feasible. A person would need to be absurdly strong to choke a gaur, for instance, considering not just the size of its neck, but how much muscle is packed onto that neck. Humans don't use their heads as a primary weapon, so our necks are comparatively weak. Even if a person could choke whatever animal, they'd be trying to hold onto something that, unlike their flimsy biped body, is built for weight and power. There's a reason that it's difficult to stay on a bull for even eight seconds. So if a hippo wants to buck you, it will buck you. And other animals may have other options, too. If you get on a tiger's back, it can always just roll over, and crush you under five hundred pounds of cat. A grizzly may try to scratch you off against a tree. Things like that.

Attacks to the throat are slightly better bets, again, assuming you're actually strong enough to hurt one of these animals at all. The problem is twofold: first, many large animals have weaponized heads, meaning getting to the throat is hard. Second, most can also attack quite lethally with their forelimbs (in that respect, canines are probably more manageable, since most don't have fighting claws). Eyes are probably the best you could do, assuming that your attempt to poke out the tiger's eye doesn't end with your hand in the tiger's mouth.

But the best option is still to arm yourself, since humans are tool users. We have fantastic fine muscle control and our muscles are second only to chimpanzees in terms of strength per pound, we have good visual range and are highly maneuverable, and our manipulating digits are second to none. Asking a human not to use tools would be like asking the tiger not to use its claws or teeth.

Salbazier
2012-09-30, 04:39 PM
I'm aware that D&D weapon categories is...not quite right, but say I have a shortsword, a longsword, a bastard sword, and a greatsword as D&D define them, what possibly the approximate length of each of them?

Spiryt
2012-09-30, 05:11 PM
I'm aware that D&D weapon categories is...not quite right, but say I have a shortsword, a longsword, a bastard sword, and a greatsword as D&D define them, what possibly the approximate length of each of them?

Shortsword up to 70cm of length

Longsword from around that 70 to 1m, sometimes a bit more

Bastard sword up to 120 cm

And Greatsword for all above that

Would probably be just fine for what D&D 3.5 was trying to get across.

Salbazier
2012-09-30, 05:22 PM
Shortsword up to 70cm of length

Longsword from around that 70 to 1m, sometimes a bit more

Bastard sword up to 120 cm

And Greatsword for all above that

Would probably be just fine for what D&D 3.5 was trying to get across.

Thank you. are those just the blade length or with the grip as well?

Spiryt
2012-09-30, 05:23 PM
Overall length.

Conners
2012-10-01, 02:13 AM
With dual wielding: What are the problems involved with using two weapons of the same length (two katana, two daggers, two rapiers, etc.)?

Matthew
2012-10-01, 07:46 AM
Overall length.

Yes, indeed. Gygax actually provided the lengths he imagined for us, and they are pretty much as Spiryt outlines.

Spiryt
2012-10-01, 10:06 AM
With dual wielding: What are the problems involved with using two weapons of the same length (two katana, two daggers, two rapiers, etc.)?

As far as I understand, there's just not much point to do so.

Wielding weapons like that requires rather spectacular coordination, for no good purpose.

With most famous case of rapier and dagger, it was apparently considered practical, and covered accordingly, because short, nimble dagger with proper hand protection could cover completely different angles and distances than rapier or side sword, and thus be used to guard body, deflect enemy thrusts, bind his weapon and so on.

Apparently, there were some attempts at using two identical weapons like that, as well, but didn't seem to be really popular.



Two katanas particularly doesn't have sense, being mainly two handed weapon, and with their long handles and handling properties trying to operate two of them at the same time wouldn't really have any sense.

kardar233
2012-10-01, 11:23 AM
There is a paired-rapier style called Florentine, which I've tried but don't see much point to.

Rapier and dagger is feasible because you are basically using the dagger as a buckler; I've rarely seen anyone actually stab with their off-hand weapon.

Yora
2012-10-01, 11:37 AM
Shortsword up to 70cm of length

Longsword from around that 70 to 1m, sometimes a bit more

Bastard sword up to 120 cm

And Greatsword for all above that

Would probably be just fine for what D&D 3.5 was trying to get across.
Which actually matches quite well for what we would consider a generic short sword or greatsword.
The length of a Roman gladius was about 65 to 80cm, the 14th century longswords are about 120cm and up. The Roman spatha is given on Wikipedia as about 70 to 100cm.

Hawkfrost000
2012-10-01, 03:56 PM
With dual wielding: What are the problems involved with using two weapons of the same length (two katana, two daggers, two rapiers, etc.)?

The biggest problem, especially with cutting weapons is that in order to swing a cutting weapon you need a lot of room, throwing it a second cut just makes it harder. You find yourself cutting around the weapon the same way you would cut around a shield, or having both weapons in motion at the same time. Usually you use one sword to defend and one to attack. This makes things a great deal easier.


There is a paired-rapier style called Florentine, which I've tried but don't see much point to.

Rapier and dagger is feasible because you are basically using the dagger as a buckler; I've rarely seen anyone actually stab with their off-hand weapon.

Florentine is a fighting style usually used between superb fighters. In a duel a person who is well trained with single sword should defeat a person who is less well trained with two swords.

However if someone has mastered single sword, then sword and dagger and then gone on to master a case of swords (fancy speak for two swords) then you will probably need two swords to beat them.

With respect to rapier and dagger, the dagger is used more as a longer, sharper, less vulnerable off hand than a buckler, at least in rapier.

DM

gkathellar
2012-10-01, 03:59 PM
With dual wielding: What are the problems involved with using two weapons of the same length (two katana, two daggers, two rapiers, etc.)?

Well, first of all, let's draw a line: there's a difference between using two daggers and using two rapiers. Two knives or daggers is reasonably practical and relatively straightforward — but two long or even mid-length blades is a distinct sort of challenge.

As to the problems of using two long blades? There are a lot of them.

The real standout is lack of versatility. No matter how good you are at fighting with two long weapons, there's not much you can do with them that couldn't be done better with a single long blade or a long blade and a short blade, and plenty of things you can't do that those styles can. There are some long weapons better suited to paired use, but none that really reap huge advantages from it, because ultimately, you are only going to attack with one blade at a time no matter what you use.

Coordination is another one, as Spiryt mentions. Two long blades can get in each other's way like nobody's business. As a subset of coordination, there's the question of attention — that is to say, where is your mind in the fight? With single sword or sword-and-dagger, you focus on attack and defense with one weapon, and have a small second weapon or a free hand held back for quick defense or binds when the opportunity presents itself. With two equal-length weapons, the second weapon doesn't necessarily have a role. It's just sort of there. (This is something my own teacher has emphasized to me when I brought the question up with him — to paraphrase, "you can use one sword for offense and one sword for defense, but I'd rather just focus on the one weapon and use it twice as well.")

There's also a basic physiological problem — to actually use two long weapons, as opposed to just hold them, you need to keep both of your shoulders forward, and your feet in a position to drive either arm at any given time. For many weapons (though not all), this goes against doctrine. A profile or half-profile presents a narrower, more easily defended target. Placing your feet in a position to drive either hand usually slows defensive footwork. There's a lot of defensive compromise for a limited amount of offensive gain.


Apparently, there were some attempts at using two identical weapons like that, as well, but didn't seem to be really popular.

My understanding is that Florentine duelists usually managed to die in the process of killing their opponent. One can imagine how that wouldn't really catch on.


Two katanas particularly doesn't have sense, being mainly two handed weapon, and with their long handles and handling properties trying to operate two of them at the same time wouldn't really have any sense.

Indeed. The closest you'll find to historical precedent on that is Musashi. He actually advocated that warriors should become familiar with using a long blade their left hand, their right hand, and each hand, as part of the training for long blade-and-short blade. But he never advocated a pair of long blades in battle, as far as I can tell; my limited understanding is that for him, even sword-and-dagger was primarily for dealing with multiple opponents.

I have heard that the Japanese did occasionally use paired mid-length blades (kodachi), with one held in a reversed grip for defense, but I've never seen anything to indicate that actually happened.

Turning a bit East, China does appear to have some paired saber and paired sword traditions, of ... questionable efficacy. Having encountered legitimate Chinese traditional martial arts, I've never yet seen shuang dao or shuang jian that looked like it was doing anything a single sword couldn't do while keeping the other arm available for balance and hand techniques.

Knaight
2012-10-01, 04:14 PM
However if someone has mastered single sword, then sword and dagger and then gone on to master a case of swords (fancy speak for two swords) then you will probably need two swords to beat them.

Or any number of projectile weapons, or a polearm, or a two handed sword, etc.

Spiryt
2012-10-01, 04:29 PM
There's also a basic physiological problem — to actually use two long weapons, as opposed to just hold them, you need to keep both of your shoulders forward, and your feet in a position to drive either arm at any given time. For many weapons (though not all), this goes against doctrine. A profile or half-profile presents a narrower, more easily defended target. Placing your feet in a position to drive either hand usually slows defensive footwork. There's a lot of defensive compromise for a limited amount of offensive gain.


You can just square your stance, and have both weapons roughly in range though.

Getting any meaningful swing with both at roughly the same time is however just awkward - one can take a swing in one direction, step onto one leg, shift his body weight etc. in one direction, attempt at two at the same time will be rather counterproductive, from obvious reasons. :smallbiggrin:

I guess that's why people were attempting double rapiers - with weapons of such strictly thrusting dynamics, one could try to make it work.


My understanding is that Florentine duelists usually managed to die in the process of killing their opponent. One can imagine how that wouldn't really catch on.

Case of rapiers was described in manuals from all around the Italy, so this wasn't some very isolated idea.

Probably used mostly by people who were desperate for adrenaline still.

gkathellar
2012-10-01, 04:29 PM
However if someone has mastered single sword, then sword and dagger and then gone on to master a case of swords (fancy speak for two swords) then you will probably need two swords to beat them.

Unless you're better with your single sword than they are with two swords, because you've been working on your single sword for two to three times as long.


You can just square your stance, and have both weapons roughly in range though.

Most of the sword work I know uses a square stance to strike and sometimes defend, though, and I still can't figure out how you'd push two blades around from a footwork perspective without ruining your ability to retreat.


Getting any meaningful swing with both at roughly the same time is however just awkward - one can take a swing in one direction, step onto one leg, shift his body weight etc. in one direction, attempt at two at the same time will be rather counterproductive, from obvious reasons. :smallbiggrin:

Yeah, basically. What I've seen of shuang dao uses the big motions of the saber to set up one movement while executing the other, but even that seems like it doesn't do anything using one saber with greater flow couldn't. Plus, it weakens the individual techniques, since there's no left hand for support.


I guess that's why people were attempting double rapiers - with weapons of such strictly thrusting dynamics, one could try to make it work.

Yeah. The problem is that weapons like the rapier, where that doesn't matter as much, are exactly the kind of weapons that really don't seem to like square stances. :smallwink:


Case of rapiers was described in manuals from all around the Italy, so this wasn't some very isolated idea.

Probably used mostly by people who were desperate for adrenaline still.

That seems plausible. I only know it by its name, but I'm sure it showed up here and there. And I'm sure it had roughly the same outcome a good portion of the time.

Hawkfrost000
2012-10-01, 08:58 PM
Unless you're better with your single sword than they are with two swords, because you've been working on your single sword for two to three times as long.

But mechanically it is extremely difficult to win a fight if your opponent has two rapiers and is properly trained with them. A skilled fighter can simply use one hand to keep your sword busy and stab you with the second one.

You cant just say: "I'm better with my single sword than you are with two swords, therefore i should win." I get beaten by people who are "worse" than me all the time, usually because i did calisthenics-from-hell in the class before, and i beat people who are "better" than me all the time, just not consistently.

DM

gkathellar
2012-10-01, 10:40 PM
But mechanically it is extremely difficult to win a fight if your opponent has two rapiers and is properly trained with them. A skilled fighter can simply use one hand to keep your sword busy and stab you with the second one.

A buckler, or a dagger, or a well-made leather glove can keep your opponent's sword just as busy, and do so without requiring you to keep all the fighting within one range while your attention is divided.

Hawkfrost000
2012-10-01, 11:15 PM
A buckler, or a dagger, or a well-made leather glove can keep your opponent's sword just as busy, and do so without requiring you to keep all the fighting within one range while your attention is divided.

No, they cant constrain the sword effectively.

By constrain i mean to force your opponent to take an action that will give you an opportunity to strike, this action is often predictable or controlled by the constraining weapon.

A dagger is about 1/10th as long as a sword, requiring you to be in closer and thus be closer to harm, it is also far harder to effectively constrain your opponent with than a full length sword.

A buckler is hard to use to control the sword, it can certainly deflect a thrust, but that often simply moves the point of impact from one hurty bit to another one.

As an avid user of the off hand in rapier combat i can firmly state that the offhand is not only limited by its tiny reach, how slow it is compared to a sword, and its inability to constrain on its own, but its also your hand a piece of meat and bone, and it gets hurt accordingly.

Nothing constrains better than a sword, two swords constrain almost twice as well with proper training. I don't mean to say that two swords is always better, but someone with proper training and understanding of how two swords work and how one sword works will have an advantage over an opponent only using one sword.

DM

kardar233
2012-10-01, 11:33 PM
No, they cant constrain the sword effectively.

By constrain i mean to force your opponent to take an action that will give you an opportunity to strike, this action is often predictable or controlled by the constraining weapon.

A dagger is about 1/10th as long as a sword, requiring you to be in closer and thus be closer to harm, it is also far harder to effectively constrain your opponent with than a full length sword.

A buckler is hard to use to control the sword, it can certainly deflect a thrust, but that often simply moves the point of impact from one hurty bit to another one.

As an avid user of the off hand in rapier combat i can firmly state that the offhand is not only limited by its tiny reach, how slow it is compared to a sword, and its inability to constrain on its own, but its also your hand a piece of meat and bone, and it gets hurt accordingly.

Nothing constrains better than a sword, two swords constrain almost twice as well with proper training. I don't mean to say that two swords is always better, but someone with proper training and understanding of how two swords work and how one sword works will have an advantage over an opponent only using one sword.

DM

G, while your rapier-centric viewpoint is good for a counterpoint (but usually just a laugh), this bit clearly illustrates why you need to take some Wednesdays off and go to Sidesword Focus.

A buckler doesn't necessarily need to lengthwise constrain your opponent's sword (in the way that another sword does) in order to give you strike openings, that's you thinking in rapier/rapier combat exclusively. In misura stretta a buckler can neutralize nearly any of the mandretti, forcing your opponent to take a dui tempi to get an actual strike on you from that side.

Only at misura larga is the off-hand useless in that respect.

When I get back this weekend I'll show you.

Haruspex_Pariah
2012-10-02, 12:12 AM
How hard, or how uncommon was it for smiths to diversify their skills. Did medieval societies need one person to make swords, one person to make other types of weapons, one person to make armor, and one other person to make arrowheads? Or could one person do all that? :smallconfused:

Wikipedia has a blacksmith make basically anything out of iron, but how feasible was this historically? Personally I don't know what kind of training is involved in these things.

Hawkfrost000
2012-10-02, 12:22 AM
G, while your rapier-centric viewpoint is good for a counterpoint (but usually just a laugh), this bit clearly illustrates why you need to take some Wednesdays off and go to Sidesword Focus.

A buckler doesn't necessarily need to lengthwise constrain your opponent's sword (in the way that another sword does) in order to give you strike openings, that's you thinking in rapier/rapier combat exclusively. In misura stretta a buckler can neutralize nearly any of the mandretti, forcing your opponent to take a dui tempi to get an actual strike on you from that side.

Only at misura larga is the off-hand useless in that respect.

When I get back this weekend I'll show you.

I could say the same about your sidesword-centric viewpoint :smalltongue: Also, I've been at Sidesword Focus every Wednesday for the last 3 months, while you've run off to Uni.

Yes my posts are rapier-centric as it is the weapon i have the most theoretical and practical experience with. I still maintain that the long rapier defeats all shorter weapons.

You have a good point with Bucker, it can constrain the sword effectively. My point was just that a sword does it better.

I would however note your use of Misura Stretta, yes you can neutralized any cutting, but a good rapier fighter (and i'm speaking of someone like Devon or Clint, not me :smalltongue:) has several good opportunities to kill you before you get there, and even if you do get to Stretta, unless you can constrain both the swords effectively (ie without any finding at all on their part) you will die in the tempo it takes for you do regain control.

This is possible with sidesword and bucker, or rapier and dagger. But its really frakking hard.

DM

EDIT: your going to be back this weekend? when?

Knaight
2012-10-02, 12:26 AM
Wikipedia has a blacksmith make basically anything out of iron, but how feasible was this historically? Personally I don't know what kind of training is involved in these things.

The really, really short version: Basic blacksmithing was largely diversified, but that means stuff like horseshoes, cookware, etc. Weapons tended to require more specialization, with swords needing a bit more than small weapon heads and such. This has a notable time component - in the early iron age, blacksmiths were likely working in comparatively small groups, with a wide skill base, but by the later medieval period the whole image of the "lone blacksmith" somewhere is completely and utterly ridiculous, with guilds and such being predominant.

fusilier
2012-10-02, 12:52 AM
The really, really short version: Basic blacksmithing was largely diversified, but that means stuff like horseshoes, cookware, etc. Weapons tended to require more specialization, with swords needing a bit more than small weapon heads and such. This has a notable time component - in the early iron age, blacksmiths were likely working in comparatively small groups, with a wide skill base, but by the later medieval period the whole image of the "lone blacksmith" somewhere is completely and utterly ridiculous, with guilds and such being predominant.

I should double check this, but I believe that an armorer would have to master all the basics of blacksmithing before being able to make good swords. So an armorer should be able to make some basic useful tools that any competent blacksmith should be able to make. Not necessarily as well as a blacksmith that specializes in such tools, but still something useful. A fairly general blacksmith, could probably make a sword as well -- the blacksmiths I've met can usually make a utility knife, and what's a sword but a big knife. ;-)

As the term armorer seems to be fairly common, I again suspect that most specialized on the broader category of "weapons", although some were probably known for making a particular weapon. (I've seen pictures of spear-heads with the same maker's marks as musket barrels).

Spiryt
2012-10-02, 07:00 AM
How hard, or how uncommon was it for smiths to diversify their skills. Did medieval societies need one person to make swords, one person to make other types of weapons, one person to make armor, and one other person to make arrowheads? Or could one person do all that? :smallconfused:

Wikipedia has a blacksmith make basically anything out of iron, but how feasible was this historically? Personally I don't know what kind of training is involved in these things.

Towards the end of the Medieval in Europe (although I'm not the one to give more detailed dates) swords were pretty much usually made by few people, often from completely different places.

One guy was preparing the billet for the blade, blade maker was making blades out of it, someone else was mounting the sword with proper pommel and hilt.

Blades were exported far away to be mounted locally as early as in 9th century.

Similarly, at some point people who were making mail rings usually didn't put the mail together from them.

Smith with good skills and understanding of metals, and solid equipment could certainly make pretty much everything, but he usually wasn't - it was quite apparently much better to specialize somehow.

Haruspex_Pariah
2012-10-02, 07:05 AM
I've heard that a proper sword is not just a sharp metal thing but required some complicated process with the blunt side (?) being softer than the cutting edge and whatnot.

On the other hand, knives and other non-combat cutting tools could be just sharpened metal. Correct me if I'm wrong.

gkathellar
2012-10-02, 08:05 AM
I've heard that a proper sword is not just a sharp metal thing but required some complicated process with the blunt side (?) being softer than the cutting edge and whatnot.

On the other hand, knives and other non-combat cutting tools could be just sharpened metal. Correct me if I'm wrong.

That would depend on the quality of the knife or sword in question. Many high quality blades, knife or sword, have a softer, more flexible flat to a harder, more rigid edge - this helps to absorb impacts better while ensuring a strong cutting edge. Obviously, the specifics vary throughout the world, but design principles of this type are relatively common.

That said, you're going to find more swords made with proper design principles than you are knives, because most knives are everyday tools, not weapons of war. Unless we're talking a genuine fighting dagger, all a knife really needs to do is cut things, not absorb impacts or keep a rigid tip (that's nice, mind, but not essential). Your village smith is going to know how to make knives, because everyone needs them, regardless of whether he's a skill bladesmith or not.


Towards the end of the Medieval in Europe (although I'm not the one to give more detailed dates) swords were pretty much usually made by few people, often from completely different places.

I can verify that this isn't a uniquely European phenomenon. The Japanese definitely did it as well, with the construction of blades, sheaths, hilts and guards all being different areas of expertise (even sharpening a blade was a unique skill set, I believe, though that's no surprise considering how ritualized the Japanese could get about these things). I'm not sure whether you saw a similar breakdown of skills in other parts of Asia, but I wouldn't be surprised.


By constrain i mean to force your opponent to take an action that will give you an opportunity to strike, this action is often predictable or controlled by the constraining weapon.

Whereas I mean "physically bind the opponent's weapon or displace it in a fashion that leaves them unable to attack and/or defend effectively."


A dagger is about 1/10th as long as a sword, requiring you to be in closer and thus be closer to harm, it is also far harder to effectively constrain your opponent with than a full length sword.

Why would the dagger require you to be closer? It's used farther back than the sword. The whole point is that you can use it effectively at ranges the sword is less useful at.


A buckler is hard to use to control the sword, it can certainly deflect a thrust, but that often simply moves the point of impact from one hurty bit to another one.

Having seen the buckler used for disarms against weapons much heavier than the rapier, I find this doubtful.


As an avid user of the off hand in rapier combat i can firmly state that the offhand is not only limited by its tiny reach, how slow it is compared to a sword, and its inability to constrain on its own, but its also your hand a piece of meat and bone, and it gets hurt accordingly.

Emphasis mine. What? Hands grasp things, I'm not sure you can constrain an opponent more effectively than by grabbing his weapon and potentially levering it out of his hand. If you expect to actually block a blade head on with your hand, you can get away with doing it gloved or bare-handed, you should probably be wearing a gauntlet.


Nothing constrains better than a sword, two swords constrain almost twice as well with proper training. I don't mean to say that two swords is always better, but someone with proper training and understanding of how two swords work and how one sword works will have an advantage over an opponent only using one sword.

Plenty of things constrain better than a sword, by virtue of making it physically difficult to move the sword. It's possible there's a difference in the doctrine of late European dueling swords, but unless you're physically attacking with both blades at once, there's nothing you can do with two swords that you can't do with one by just keeping it on the center line and making good use of footwork.

Yora
2012-10-02, 08:15 AM
I can verify that this isn't a uniquely European phenomenon. The Japanese definitely did it as well, with the construction of blades, sheaths, hilts and guards all being different areas of expertise (even sharpening a blade was a unique skill set, I believe, though that's no surprise considering how ritualized the Japanese could get about these things).
Sharpening always takes forever if you include the grinding after the blade left the forge. I think I've seen some bladesmiths says making blades is 4 hours at the forge followed by 10 days of making steel dust.

How hard, or how uncommon was it for smiths to diversify their skills. Did medieval societies need one person to make swords, one person to make other types of weapons, one person to make armor, and one other person to make arrowheads? Or could one person do all that? :smallconfused:
I think the market that you are supplying is a major factor in this. If you produce military equipment on contract for a local lord, you won't be making one sword or spearhead, but dozens of them and probably never have to make anything else.
If you're in some backwater town where your forge is the only one in the area, you would be much more likely to make pots, horseshoes, nails, and replacement parts for broken doorhinges or barrel bands.

And it also depends on how well connected to trade the town is. If you can get quality parts in two days from the next town, it's more likely that you do that instead of having the smith do a single doorhinge. But if it would take two weeks to get it and you had to pay for the transportation costs as well, then you would go to your local smith and ask if he can make you something that does the job.
Generally speaking, the more rare and expensive an item is and the bigger the settlement, the more likely it would be to find expert specialists. For cheap items where quality isn't of great importance or getting the item from the next specialist isn't economical, you probably have an allround craftsman.

Spiryt
2012-10-02, 08:44 AM
That would depend on the quality of the knife or sword in question. Many high quality blades, knife or sword, have a softer, more flexible flat to a harder, more rigid edge - this helps to absorb impacts better while ensuring a strong cutting edge. Obviously, the specifics vary throughout the world, but design principles of this type are relatively common.



Pretty much any competently made sword will be like that, from the simple reason that thin edges will behave differently during heat threat than ares where there's a lot of material.

"Quality' here would be understanding, controlling and using this process, among others.



I've heard that a proper sword is not just a sharp metal thing but required some complicated process with the blunt side (?) being softer than the cutting edge and whatnot.

On the other hand, knives and other non-combat cutting tools could be just sharpened metal. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Sword was definitely "just sharp metal thing", but the whole point it's that this is nothing simple or crude by any means.

There were clunkers, and there were fantastic swords out there, but generally sword was a bit of metal that was very carefully shaped and treated for specific function. Even replicating them today, with electrical grinding tools, computer operated furnaces etc. is not easy.

eulmanis12
2012-10-02, 09:55 AM
for blacksmiths and specialization it depended on a lot of factors. For the most part any competant blacksmith could make a useable sword and any more specialized swordsmith was still capable of making other things at the forge. In cities and large towns, you would see a specialized swordsmith, armorer, and so on. In smaller towns and villages, there might only be one or two blacksmiths in the town and as such they would do metalwork of all types.

If you think about it this makes sense on a buisness level. If there is nobody else working metal you work on having a generalized skill set and being fairly good at making items of all types. If there are lots of other smiths you would want to specialize and become very good at a specific item, so that you can garuntee that people will come buy that item from you and not from other smiths.

gkathellar
2012-10-02, 04:13 PM
Pretty much any competently made sword will be like that, from the simple reason that thin edges will behave differently during heat threat than ares where there's a lot of material.

"Quality' here would be understanding, controlling and using this process, among others.

Absolutely. Most smiths probably would have been able to make a long, sharp piece of metal — exactly how much carbon to get into the metal and how to do it, how to concentrate arsenic compounds in the edges to harden them, how to fuse pieces of steel precisely to strengthen the spine, etc. etc. blah blah blah, would have been a less common skill set.

Galloglaich
2012-10-08, 04:43 PM
Towards the end of the Medieval in Europe (although I'm not the one to give more detailed dates) swords were pretty much usually made by few people, often from completely different places.

One guy was preparing the billet for the blade, blade maker was making blades out of it, someone else was mounting the sword with proper pommel and hilt.

Blades were exported far away to be mounted locally as early as in 9th century.

Similarly, at some point people who were making mail rings usually didn't put the mail together from them.

Smith with good skills and understanding of metals, and solid equipment could certainly make pretty much everything, but he usually wasn't - it was quite apparently much better to specialize somehow.

To build upon what Spiryt said:

Craft guilds (to be distinguished from merchant guilds, religious guilds, fencing guilds and other types of guilds) were fairly specialized and tended to get more so over time. They were also sort of grouped into clusters of related industries. So for example, dyers, carders, shearers and weavers of wool were grouped together, as were those for linen, fustian, cotton and other textiles. This was done on the basis of subcontracting, kind of as a way to get around strict guild rules limiting the size of each workshop, and still allowing skilled individual craftsmanship to be used in making each item, while at the same time allowing for an economy of scale.

There was also very much a hierarchy of the skill level and wealth (and power) of the different crafts. Some crafts were over others, even within the same 'cluster'. Certain towns tended to be known for certain industries as well. Milan, Brescia, Augsburg, and later Innsbruck, were all major centers of armor production in the Medieval world. Probably half the armor in Europe was made in those first three towns, up to around 1500 AD. But it is important to note: an armorer did not make swords.

By the late Medieval period (14th Century onward) in Central Europe sword making seems to have been overseen by the messerschmidt or cutler, who designed the sword and in turn subcontracted out to ironmongers who made the iron or steel billets, bladesmiths, handle makers, sword polishers and so on. Interestingly, the messerschmidt is also one of thoese crafts which seems to be closely associated with the fencing guilds. The famous fencing master and fechtbuch author Joachim Meyer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joachim_Meyer) was a messerschmidt, as were several of the masters of the federfechter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federfechter) fencing guild.

I'm not sure how it worked in places like England or France but they imported a lot of their swords and almost all of their armor from Central Europe or Italy. For that matter as far back as the Viking age wootz crucible steel (what people mistakenly call 'damascus' steel) was being imported for swordmaking into Scandinavia and northern Germany from all the way in what is now India and Sri Lanka, as far back as the 8th Century. At the same time the arabs were importing Frankish and Norse blades by the 9th Century at the latest. We have written records of it from the 10th Century.

This is a cutler or a swordsmith from the Balthasar Behem Codex (1505, Krakow)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bc/Balthasar_Behem_Codex01.jpg

This messerschmidt from an almshouse in Nuremberg (also 16th Century) had a dual career of 'cutler' and landskencht (mercenary) that is also supposed to be him outside the window.

http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317b-21-r/large

Whereas any swordsmith or cutler should be able to make a horse-shoe, nails, or an iron knife, an iron pot and so on, the reverse was not necessarily true; i.e. a blacksmith could not necessarily make a sword at all. Making a sword requires a bit more skill (and could earn you more money).

A lot of 'common' weapons were made with fairly simple iron blades compared to a sword, but sometimes these as well were made by specialists. We have Viking era axe and spear -heads which have steel edges forge-welded (or even pattern welded) onto them, and we know that in the later Medieval period the Swiss were using steel blades on their halberds.


G

Galloglaich
2012-10-08, 04:52 PM
This is possible with sidesword and bucker, or rapier and dagger. But its really frakking hard.

DM

EDIT: your going to be back this weekend? when?

Almost every rapier manual published or produced includes techniquqes for rapier with dagger, which was the most popular way to actually use the weapon. Most also show techniques for rapier with cloak, buckler, and the off-hand. The latter sometimes augmented by mail-lined gloves.

Case of rapier is comparatively rare but was also used.

G

Hawkfrost000
2012-10-08, 05:00 PM
Almost every rapier manual published or produced includes techniquqes for rapier with dagger, which was the most popular way to actually use the weapon. Most also show techniques for rapier with cloak, buckler, and the off-hand. The latter sometimes augmented by mail-lined gloves.

Case of rapier is comparatively rare but was also used.

G

This is true, in the segment of my post that you quoted i was referring to the practice of constraint at Misura Stretta (or narrow measure). It is harder to survive such constraint when your opponent is using two swords, as you must deal with two full length striking and controlling weapons.

It is possible to attain this effect with any number of weapons, but it is hard to do so with the effectiveness of two swords. That is what that sentence refers too.

DM

fusilier
2012-10-09, 12:43 AM
But it is important to note: an armorer did not make swords.

Armorer is a generic term for someone who makes weapons (and/or armor). It's not limited to those who only manufacture armor. Could you please elaborate on this comment, and explain why it would be inappropriate to call someone who makes swords an armorer (as swords are clearly arms)?

LordErebus12
2012-10-09, 01:49 AM
A real mail shirt may weigh as little as 12-13 lbs actually. I think 20 kgs is probably past the upper range even for cap-a-pied mail protection including leggings, full arms, coif and so on, though there is no doubt it would be much harder to swim in all that..


In the player's handbook (assuming we are talking 3.5), we have this:

Chain Shirt: A chain shirt protects your torso while leaving your limbs free and mobile. It includes a layer of quilted fabric worn underneath to prevent chafing and to cushion the impact of blows. A chain shirt comes with a steel cap.

so a thick padding, a coat of chains, and a heavy metal cap...

if we are talking chainmail armor, it would include the above, plus a leather skirt or chainmail leggings, gloves or vambraces. heavy boots. all of which needs padding... which sucks up moisture and gets even heavier... i think the penalties for swimming in full chainmail is a tad low. and i cant imagine the smell of moldy and rusty chainmail after a long, wet swampy adventure...

Brother Oni
2012-10-09, 02:32 AM
and i cant imagine the smell of moldy and rusty chainmail after a long, wet swampy adventure...

Don't forget to add the smell of unwashed adventurer.

After a cold wet winter's day of practice, I wish I could only imagine the smell. :smallsigh:

Galloglaich
2012-10-09, 07:36 AM
Armorer is a generic term for someone who makes weapons (and/or armor). It's not limited to those who only manufacture armor. Could you please elaborate on this comment, and explain why it would be inappropriate to call someone who makes swords an armorer (as swords are clearly arms)?

I can site scores of examples of individuals whose job it was to make armor, and scores of examples of individuals whose job it was to make swords, bows, guns, halberds or other weapons. I don't know of any examples from Medieval Europe of people who made both armor and weapons.

In the regions I'm familiar with (Italy and the German-speaking part of Europe) the terms used were not in English, so I'm not sure about the etymology of 'arms'. In Germany they distinguished between plate makers and mail makers, in Milan they further distinguished between specialists of various parts of the harness. But none of those people made swords.

G

Galloglaich
2012-10-09, 09:44 AM
For example if you look here:

http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/index.php?do=page&mo=8

at a list of craftsmen from Nuremberg across about 3 or 4 centuries, you'll see there are 2 terms they correlate with 'armourer': Harnischmacher (Harness maker, harness being a late Medieval euphemism for armor), and Plattner, plate maker. There is also Harnischpolierer, a harness polisher.

Like this guy Bernhard platner (http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-42-r/data) who died in 1423

http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-42-r/small

...or this guy 'Gorg' (http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-7-v/data) who died in 1414

http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-7-v/small

There are also several terms for mail makers: "Kettenhemdmacher" like this guy Seycz han (http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-10-r/data) who died in 1473, "Panzerhemdenmacher" (I know panzer means armor), and Salwirt or Salwürker.

http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-10-r/data

If you click on any of those links you will see portraits of the individuals doing their jobs. I haven't looked at all of these but I never saw any of the armorers making anything other than armor.

The cutlers, on the other hand, seem to be making all kinds of bladed weapons, like this guy making swords and daggers.

http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-279-14-r

...who interestingly enough has the Lion of St. Mark above him.


I find these images fascinating as they give us a little insight into the lives of these people.

G

Storm Bringer
2012-10-09, 11:41 AM
"Panzerhemdenmacher" google translates into "armoured shirt maker", which frankly could either mean mail or padded shirts.

fusilier
2012-10-09, 05:57 PM
It seems like most of the information being presented on the manufacture of arms and armor is from the renaissance period 1400s - early 1500s, and specifically of centers of manufacture. Was the level of specialization as great in earlier time periods? Were there smiths who liked to control the process from beginning to end?

Some of my studies of later periods (1500s - 1600s) would indicate that a particular "smith" could produce a variety of weapons, and not simply specialize in one particular kind. This makes me wonder if they were perhaps organized in a hierarchical way, so that while different individuals/shops were turning out specific pieces and weapons, they all fell under the auspices of a head smith who marked everything with his mark.

The first reference to a Spanish royal gunsmith, was somebody who was responsible for organizing the production of guns via contractors in a particular region (he was referred to as an "armero").

On the other hand, even in gunmaking, there seems to have been a lot of specialization, with gunstocks, barrels, and locks being produced by different people (but I'm not sure who was responsible for the finally assembly -- I suspect the lock maker). However, just because a the gunmaker didn't make the barrel, doesn't mean that the barrel maker only made barrels.

gkathellar
2012-10-09, 07:12 PM
I don't know a lot about this, but would it be fair to assume that in larger centers of production, you'd get more specialized smiths on account of simply having more people? Presumably if you could afford get someone making a specific thing and nothing else, they'd get really good at that one thing, which would be more efficient.

Galloglaich
2012-10-09, 10:33 PM
We get more records from the 1400's and 1500's for the simple reason that there are a lot more records from that period - both because paper (and interestingly enough, iron and steel) seem to disintegrate rapidly after about 500 years... and because they had a lot more records in that period.

That said we do also have records (and blades) from earlier in the Medieval period and we know there was quite a bit of craft guild specialization already by the 12th Century, in fact it may have been a big part of what contributed to the so called 'early renaissance'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_of_the_12th_century

Complexity of production did increase over time though without a doubt, even as the economy itself diversified and took advantage of more technological innovations and so on, and by the 15th century you also have journeymen's associations which are kind of the precursors of unions, as well as fencing guilds and konstafler societies and so forth.

Also Fusilier I think things were indeed different in some places like Spain where you had pseudo-State like institutions. Even in the republic / city-state of Venice you had the Arsenal which was a centrally controlled factory of immense scale.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venice_Arsenal

G

fusilier
2012-10-10, 01:35 AM
Also Fusilier I think things were indeed different in some places like Spain where you had pseudo-State like institutions. Even in the republic / city-state of Venice you had the Arsenal which was a centrally controlled factory of immense scale.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venice_Arsenal

G

The Arsenal seems to have been a very centralized military production center, from an early date (making just about everything as far as I can tell), and the Spanish, in the 16th century at least, seem to have been employing a more centralized approach as well.

Galloglaich
2012-10-10, 09:24 AM
The Arsenal seems to have been a very centralized military production center, from an early date (making just about everything as far as I can tell), and the Spanish, in the 16th century at least, seem to have been employing a more centralized approach as well.

Yes, I agree, though in the case of Venice thy also relied heavily on the guild system with its corresponding specialization; I learned recently from a new academic book on guilds that Venice had more craft guilds than any other city in Italy.

So you seem to have in some cases both specialization and huge government enterprises making arms. I think later on nd in other places, like Austria and probably parts of Spain and France, guilds diminihed in importance within some of the Royal workshops, or the guild rules changed so that for example you could buy your way in rather than having to go through apprenticeship and journeyman 'waltz'. I gather ths may have had something to do with the decline of sword production in Toledo. On the other hand sometimes guilds were re introduced or re strengthened by the Monarchies as France apparently did in the 17th and 18th Centuries to compete with Venice in the lacemaking and glass industries.

G

fusilier
2012-10-10, 07:04 PM
I did some studying of the details of Venetian arsenal, but it was a while ago and I don't have the details in front of me. As I recall, the Arsenal both worked within and outside of the guilds of Venice. Basically, the Arsenal wasn't really designed as full time employment. Instead, if accepted, a master could work whenever he felt like it (in theory; in practice the Arsenal wasn't open all the time) -- usually when he didn't have other work available in the private industry. As long as a master showed up in the morning, he was payed for the day, which I think worked something as a pension for the elderly. While belonging to an external guild, the masters inside the Arsenal were organized into specific guilds as well, which sometimes acted a bit more like modern unions -- which isn't too surprising as the conditions in the Arsenal shared some aspects with an industrial era factory.

It was actually quite a fascinating organization, and now I want to go and study its organization again.

Galloglaich
2012-10-11, 04:19 PM
There are a lot of smaller examples of that all around Europe, most of the towns had big water mills and other industrial complexes which were shared by different guilds.

The Arsenal was a huge complex, they may not have been building everything all the time (except when they had foreign or domestic contracts), but some things, namely ships, were I think constantly under construction. Venice maintained a fleet of the amazing size of 3,000 "ships", and I know galleys in particular tended to have a fairly short lifespan. I think at it's height the Arsenal was able to finish almost a galley a day? If I remember correctly.

G

fusilier
2012-10-11, 06:03 PM
There are a lot of smaller examples of that all around Europe, most of the towns had big water mills and other industrial complexes which were shared by different guilds.

The Arsenal was a huge complex, they may not have been building everything all the time (except when they had foreign or domestic contracts), but some things, namely ships, were I think constantly under construction. Venice maintained a fleet of the amazing size of 3,000 "ships", and I know galleys in particular tended to have a fairly short lifespan. I think at it's height the Arsenal was able to finish almost a galley a day? If I remember correctly.

G

I'll have to double check the 3,000 ships (my suspicion is that includes the "merchant marine" and the navy, and possibly a lot of small supporting vessels). When the Arsenal was running full out, it apparently could produce one completely armed galley a day -- but I think this is more of an assembly, as pre-cut parts and weapons were kept on hand. Still very impressive. Not that it was something that was done all the time, but that was part of the flexibility of the Arsenal -- in an emergency they could draft shipwrights into the complex.

Changing subjects:

Did anybody else watch PBS last night: NOVA: Secrets of the Viking Sword? I enjoyed it, and found it interesting.

Conners
2012-10-12, 12:23 AM
How defenceless were peasants and citizens in ancient times? You see them being totally helpless against enemies in a lot of things--but in some cases, you'd think they'd be rather tough. The question is, how much was common across Europe.

Spiryt
2012-10-12, 02:17 AM
That's not really answerable...

So many different 'peasants' and 'citizens' in different places and times, some of them very warlike from whatever reason, some of them savagely punished for having any weapon.

Other than that it depends against what would someone be 'defenseless'.

fusilier
2012-10-12, 02:30 AM
How defenceless were peasants and citizens in ancient times? You see them being totally helpless against enemies in a lot of things--but in some cases, you'd think they'd be rather tough. The question is, how much was common across Europe.

What do you mean by defenseless? Are we talking about an invading army, or merely raiders/marauders? Or simply bandits/criminals? When and where is going to matter too. Rome at its height was pretty secure place to live: Pax Romana.

I'm reminded of a story my father tells about what his ancient history professor told him. Concerning the annual war against the "helots" by the Spartans: the professor pointed out that while the helots were not typically armed, they had numbers on their side, and a lot of farm implements are comparatively dangerous to somebody wielding a sword or spear. Unlike modern soldiers equipped with machine guns and artillery, Spartans had to get in amongst the helots to fight them. A quick glance at the wikipedia article for more details would indicate that trickery was sometimes resorted to, rather than outright combat.

Conners
2012-10-12, 04:25 AM
What I mean is, in RPGs, movies, games, everything, farmers and citizens are the weakest of the weak. Generally, anything can kill two or three farmers, by their viewpoint.

I don't consider that to be the case. Certainly, some citizens might be unusually non-violent and basically get slaughtered if something violent comes along. But then, I'm not sure that's often the case.

Farmers have tough lives. They have to deal with critters, weather, hard work, and sometimes with people.
Citizens weren't always wimps either. There are quite a few cases where they were required to keep watch on the walls, and help defend the city or stronghold if it came under siege.

Spiryt
2012-10-12, 04:36 AM
What I mean is, in RPGs, movies, games, everything, farmers and citizens are the weakest of the weak. Generally, anything can kill two or three farmers, by their viewpoint.

I don't consider that to be the case. Certainly, some citizens might be unusually non-violent and basically get slaughtered if something violent comes along. But then, I'm not sure that's often the case.

Farmers have tough lives. They have to deal with critters, weather, hard work, and sometimes with people.
Citizens weren't always wimps either. There are quite a few cases where they were required to keep watch on the walls, and help defend the city or stronghold if it came under siege.

Well, that's still very unclear...

Generally they were "the weakest of the weak". Considering that such broad category as "citizens" leaves pretty much only professional warriors/soldiers and marauders and what not beside them - those would be from definition more warlike.


Farmers have tough lives. They have to deal with critters, weather, hard work, and sometimes with people.

Hard work, weather, elements and poverty by no means prepare someone for violence alone.

Together with some other circumstances, they might, but that can't be answered generally.

eulmanis12
2012-10-12, 10:29 AM
Peasents were not necesarily helpless, there were many skills that peasents develope that could turn out to be usefull in battle (I'm looking at you english peasent archers) but they were definitly not what anyone would consider equal to a professional soldier/maurader.
So yes there are plently of cases some very famous of peasents defeating proffessional soldiers but they do not by any means make up the majority of cases.
Generally (though not always) peasents tended to preform just as well sometimes better at range as proffessional soldiers but were much worse in close. This makes a lot of logical sense. Archery is a skill that takes a lifetime of training to develop, A peasent archer spends a lot of time in the woods hunting food, learning to avoid detection by his prey and to hit the target reliably at distance, In battle the only difference is that the target is shaped differently, and so the skills translate fairly well. The same goes for the shepherd boy who must constantly use a sling to fend off wolves (or possibly lions depending on the part of the world). The skills that a peasent generaly does not learn are those related to hand to hand combat as usually there is not use for them in a peasent's life. Also, most professional soldiers in medieval times did most of their training with hand to hand weapons. The mercenary archers that were available tended to have been peasents and learned their skills that way then decided that there was more money in fighting than in living on a dirt farm.

Galloglaich
2012-10-12, 11:04 AM
@Fusilier yes the 3,000 number does include merchant ships, but there was always a gray area in the Venetian fleet between military and civilian vessels since galleys were routinely used to carry passengers and cargo (particularly in dangerous areas) and merchant vessels were almost always heavily armed.

I saw the Viking sword thing, it was interesting on some levels but also (to me) disappointing on others. There is a good thread about it on Myarmoury with comments by Petter Johnnson among other experts.

http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=26994

As for Citizens in warfare

The former is something, if you define 'Citizens' as townfolks, which I've been trying to explain on this forum and others for a few years now. Townsfolks were tough, especially those from the Free Cities and Republics. The (by todays standards) very small town of Venice which Fusilier and I have been discussing was a military power on an equal footing with the Kingdoms of France, Spain, the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire.

The other question and Peasants in Warfare

...it's actually a good question. One I've been trying to figure out for a while.

My short answer is this: In places which were hard to get into by large armies: craggy hills, mountains, deep forests, marshes, you often had quite tough peasants. In more easily accessible areas, open land, rolling hills, large valleys... peasants tended to get 'tamed' into the status at or near serfdom (basically slaves to the land) and once they got disarmed, they tended to be pretty easy to defeat by real soldiers. There were also areas which were kind of mixed or in between.

More complex answer:
there is a difference between what I'd call "Clansmen", and Free Peasants, and Serfs, and Outlaws. Clansmen are people from places which were never fully Christianized / Feudalized during the early Medieval period (by which I mean, roughly 800- 1000 AD- some people use different time frames). Vikings for example, in that exact period, were mostly essentialy farmers (i.e. peasants) or fishermen or simple traders, who also fought as what amounted to a clan militia. In places like the (relatively inaccessible) highlands of Scotland and certain other parts of Europe this went on well into the Feudal period and beyond, into the Early Modern Era (1500-1800), it was the same in parts of Lithuania, which didn't become Christianized until the 1400's, and in Albania and in the Carpathians and the Pyrennes and some other wild places. We know how tough the Scotts were, and not just in 'missile combat' - in fact like a lot of peasant infantry the excelled in close-quarters fighting. Others like the Samogitians (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samogitia#History) in Lithuania were even tougher, arguably, having resisted over 200 invasions by the Teutonic Knights and ultimately defeated them.

Then you have free peasants. These are people who agree to pay rent to some Lord or Prelate (a 'prince of the Church' like a Bishop or Abbot) but who are still armed and live in relatively inaccessible areas. This contributes to them being pretty tough as well. These folks would include the cantons of Zug and Uri and Schwys in the Swiss Confederation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Swiss_Confederacy), the Saxons of the Dithmarschen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dithmarschen#History) the Chodovs of Bohemia the Gorali in Poland. In Sweden and Norway peasants proved to be tough enough that they were brought into the national diet or assembly in the 15th Century after the Dalarna uprising (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalarna#History). They started out with the benefit of their terrain (very deep forests and tough winter conditions) and after decades of attempts to surpress them had aquired so much military kit from their enemies that they had become a powerful military force. These types of Peasants could be very tough indeed, in fact they tended to dominate warfare in some areas, especially when they formed powerful military alliances with towns like in the Swiss Eidgenossenschaft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eidgenossenschaft) or in the Hussite uprising.

Finally you also get groups of runaway peasants like the Zaparozhian Cossacks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaporozhian_Cossacks) who become very powerful outlaw nations.

But this is for the most part the exception, and particularly in strong Monarchies like France and England, the peasantry is very much under the thumb of the Lords, and peasant uprisings like the Jacquerie (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacquerie) led to disaster for the peasants. even though in England famously there were Yeoman archers, peasant rebellions like Wat Tyler's uprising of 1381 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peasants%27_Revolt) were viciously crushed, though they did lead to some softening of conditions for peasants. Even in the Holy Roman Empire the big peasant revolt (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Peasants%27_War) of the 1520's was smashed.

The rule seems to be, once the 'peasants' in question got disarmed by some landlord or other, they lost their military culture, and it was very hard to get that back once gone. Usually from that point onward they were ground down in poverty, more and more, all the way up to the French Revolution when the peasants were finally able to overturn one authoritarian social order, only to quickly create another (the Empire of Napoleon)


The bottom line though, for the most part the 'push-over' status of peasants, or commoners in general, is a myth propagated by people writing in the pay of nobility in France and England which, like a lot of other myths of the pre-industrial period, (the 30 lbs blunt European sword, the lack of European martial arts, the 20 year life span, everybody muddy and illiterate and so on) has been happily propagated by RPG's and computer games and popular film. Which is a little ironic since these forms of entertainment are based on interest in the period by their audiences. It's always been a bit of a paradox to me.

G

Conners
2012-10-12, 12:53 PM
Awesome post! Thanks Galloglaich!

fusilier
2012-10-12, 01:17 PM
@Fusilier yes the 3,000 number does include merchant ships, but there was always a gray area in the Venetian fleet between military and civilian vessels since galleys were routinely used to carry passengers and cargo (particularly in dangerous areas) and merchant vessels were almost always heavily armed.

Yes. At the time, civilian ships were often pressed into service as needed. But this is probably more true in Northern Europe than it was in the Mediterranean where the galley dominated warfare. There were privately operated galleys, but most, as I understand it, were owned by the government. And the "great galleys" used for merchant work, weren't the same as the "ordinary galleys", and numerous smaller vessels, which made up the usual military fleet. This is not to say that sailing vessels weren't also pressed into service in the Mediterranean as needed.


I saw the Viking sword thing, it was interesting on some levels but also (to me) disappointing on others. There is a good thread about it on Myarmoury with comments by Petter Johnnson among other experts.

http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=26994

Thanks for the link. I'm going to make one comment, my recollection of the discussion of the origin of the Ulfberht swords was that they weren't actually sure, and they floated a couple of different theories -- including Frankish origins.


As for Citizens in warfare . . .

The original post did mention "ancient times", although I'm not sure exactly what was intended. I think to a certain extent, under serfdom, peasants were assumed to be servile, and that gets translated into "weak". In theory serfs gave up certain freedoms and they were guaranteed protection by the lord - so fighting becomes less necessary. Certainly a lack of combat training and limited access to weapons would put them at a disadvantage to professional soldiers. However, it should be remembered that marauders and the like typically plan surprise attacks -- and if the local watchmen are on their guard, the militia might be able to react in time. Freemen living in border areas probably had more fighting experience. Indeed, in certain time periods everybody was required to have a weapon. City militias were common, and sometimes surprisingly effective. Of course, the Republic of Rome relied upon a citizen army.

Galloglaich
2012-10-12, 01:49 PM
In theory serfs gave up certain freedoms and they were guaranteed protection by the lord - so fighting becomes less necessary. Certainly a lack of combat training and limited access to weapons would put them at a disadvantage to professional soldiers.

With the exception of serf-knights (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministeriales) and other armed mercenaries recruited or developed from the serf class, serfs (notably serf-levies) were almost always useless in battle. This is the source, in fact, of the myth that peasants were useless in battle when generally they were far from it.

This is related to another common mistake / trope is to conflate townsfolk with peasants. Big difference! Townsfolk in Medieval Europe were priviliged, basically the middle class and upper-middle class of their time. Some peasants were wealthy as well, though most were not.


City militias were common, and sometimes surprisingly effective. Of course, the Republic of Rome relied upon a citizen army.

City militias were usually extremely effective, they tended to be the best infantry in every era... sometimes I wonder if I hallucinated all the carefully researched posts I've made on this. As with the serfs, it made a big difference if the cities were autonomous or not. Free Cities or City-States typically had excellent militias.

In ancient times, Athens and Sparta - largely urban militias.

Etruscans - urban militias.

Rome - urban militia.

Carthage - urban miltiias (plus mercenaries).

In the Medieval era, probably the most obvious glaring example of formidable urban militias are the Swiss Confederation, in which both the rural militia of Uri, Schwyz and so on, and the urban militias of Berne and Zurich especially were dominant in both the armies of the confederation themselves, particularly in their victory during the Burgundian Wars (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burgundian_Wars) in which they ended the most powerful Dynasty in late Medieval Europe, as well as the subsequent defeat of the powerful Emperor Maximillian I and basically anyone else who crossed them. But also the (for some reason more famous) "Swiss Mercenaries" who were the toughest infantry in Europe for at least 100 years.

Also the urban militias of the Northern Italian Lombard League (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lombard_league) which defeated the Emperor of Germany twice, the urban militias of Flanders (today Belgium and Holland) which wiped out the cream of French Chivalry in the Battle of Golden Spurs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Golden_Spurs), the Hanseatic League (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanseatic_league) which defeated England and Denmark among other opponents, the Bohemian towns like Prague during the Hussite rebellion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussite_wars), which repeatedly defeated German / Austrian / Hungarian Crusader armies. The Dutch against the Spanish in the 16th Century. And too many others to mention.


However, it should be remembered that marauders and the like typically plan surprise attacks -- and if the local watchmen are on their guard, the militia might be able to react in time. Freemen living in border areas probably had more fighting experience. Indeed, in certain time periods everybody was required to have a weapon.

This is definitely true, but Freemen were by definition not serfs. In places where fighting was common, strong rural miltias were typically obligated to keep arms ready. For example in Scandinavia the Leidang required every farmer to keep arms and armor ready in case of raids.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leidang

There were similar laws in many parts of Poland and Bohemia and throughout Germany and Austria, in Spain and in many other places. But these guys were Free Peasants, not serfs. Serfs were sometimes armed, and even made into soldiers, even knights, but they typically didn't own their own weapons if they were. The vast majority of serfs never had any military training or weapons and were not effective in combat, or meant to be.

The idea of serfdom is that they work and the knights do the necessary fighting, though it often didn't work out very well for the serfs. In practice what happened is that a lot of feudal warfare consisted of knight A killing and robbing the serfs of knight B (who hides in his castle), and then knight B killing and robbing the serfs of knight A in return (while A hides in his castle). The serfs, lacking castles, would hide in the woods or holes in the ground (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erdstall) if they were lucky, that was about their only recourse.

Peasants or towns by contrast would punish violent neighbors, (knights, prelates or other towns) when necessary, and try to forge commercial links with those that were friendly, thereby seeking to create a zone of peace so that they could conduct commerce in their district and protect lines of trade. This was called the landfried (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landfrieden). (you have to read German for that article, sadly) The idea though was to establish what was called the 'peace of the roads', this is the origin of the English Common Law concept of the Justice of the Peace (of the roads). In Medieval Central and Northern Europe those were people appointed to oversee the punishment (typically execution) of people involved in robbery and raiding in protected zones (like major roads and waterways)

That was the way it worked in Central Europe anyway. In Italy, the towns had more serious rivalries and tended to get in wars with each other which drew in powerful neighbors like the Kings of Spain and France (to the ultimate detriment of Italy). In France and England the towns were subordinate to the King and the other powerful Princes who might be vying for the Kingship. In Iberia (Spain and Portugal) it was kind of a combination of all of the above.

G

fusilier
2012-10-13, 02:41 AM
This is definitely true, but Freemen were by definition not serfs.

But they can still be peasants, which is why I mentioned them. I think we are in general in agreement. Civic militias weren't always the best forces around, but there were periods where they were.

The discussions of serfdom, and how abused serfs were, reminded me of a book I read recently: Slavery from Roman Times to the Early Transatlantic Trade. In the discussion about how slaves became serfs, the author points that free peasants also became serfs. Basically, toward the end of the Roman Empire the legal foundations for serfdom were laid, but this still left many free peasants, and while slavery was declining, it still left slaves. In short rural slaves became serfs, because it was easier for their lords -- by granting them some autonomy they were less likely to run away. There were fewer outlets (i.e. cities) for produced goods, so lords just needed to make sure that their basic needs were taken care of with a little surplus to sell at the limited markets.

What's really interesting is that free peasants also gradually became serfs. How that happened isn't entirely clear in the work: all that is mentioned is that it rarely happened by choice on the part of the peasant, but that there were gradual, incremental changes of the relationship between peasant and lord that took place over generations.

Raum
2012-10-13, 10:21 AM
What's really interesting is that free peasants also gradually became serfs. How that happened isn't entirely clear in the work: all that is mentioned is that it rarely happened by choice on the part of the peasant, but that there were gradual, incremental changes of the relationship between peasant and lord that took place over generations.Usually through a combination of inheritance laws and debt bondage. When land passed on to the next generation wasn't enough to support the family, they didn't have many options.

Regarding peasants' fighting capabilities, I think we need to define what class of people we're including as well as culture and time. Are we limiting it to laborers or including landowners? Britain's yeoman class often made up the bulk of available military. But we're talking about landowners generally successful enough to hire labor and purchase their own weapons.

Conners
2012-10-13, 11:02 AM
Did Yeomen often train in fighting?

Spiryt
2012-10-13, 11:04 AM
Did Yeomen often train in fighting?

Yeomen were obliged to train with bow at least every Sunday since 14th century, and then formed the bulk of English longbowmen.

Conners
2012-10-13, 11:10 AM
Were they inclined to train with melee weapons?

Spiryt
2012-10-13, 11:26 AM
Were they inclined to train with melee weapons?

I'm not aware of any tradition of training.

There are accounts of them joining the melee after arrow volleys were no longer feasible, but I can't think about anything mentioning that they were in any way particularly skilled.

Thiel
2012-10-14, 04:28 AM
I'd be surprised if they didn't have at least some basic training.
After all, they knew they were going to be called upon to go to war at some point. Besides, something like a staff is probably better at warding of highway men.

Brother Oni
2012-10-14, 05:46 PM
Bear in mind that because of their constant archery training, these yeoman are likely to be fairly strong (or at least their backs and right arms were), so brute force usually made up for the lack of any formal training.

Spiryt
2012-10-15, 03:54 AM
I'd be surprised if they didn't have at least some basic training.
After all, they knew they were going to be called upon to go to war at some point. Besides, something like a staff is probably better at warding of highway men.

Oh, staff, some wrestling and generally some brawling was most probably expected from young free peasant.

But this isn't really the same like fighting with battle weapons, in large groups with coordination etc.



Bear in mind that because of their constant archery training, these yeoman are likely to be fairly strong (or at least their backs and right arms were), so brute force usually made up for the lack of any formal training.

Bow training certainly could help a lot, but there's no way that fairly static, slow, pulling/pushing exertion like that would develop 'brute force' as far as hitting, wrestling, struggling goes...

Really different types of strengths.

And obviously no amount of it can make up for lack of training...

English archers were certainly more than capable of taking their swords/axes/mallets and charging already shaken Frenchmen at Agincourt, to help in breaking them completely - at least that's what most essay's mention, but nothing about actual 'fighting skill'.

Certainly mallet for stakes driving wouldn't be very sane weapon against opposing opponent anyway. :smallbiggrin:

Mike_G
2012-10-15, 08:53 AM
Strength and endurance are nice, as is a bit of wrestling or staff sparring. But fighting in battle requires technique, unit co-ordination and discipline.

Think of it like a team sport. You can pull 11 farmers or fishermen who have never played soccer and put them on a field, give them a ball and say "go for it." They may beat 11 receptionists who've never played soccer, because they will probably be in better physical shape, but any school or club team in the world --let alone any professional team-- will mop the floor with them because technique and teamwork and strategy matter.

Strong, active peasants may have a good foundation for militia training, but without training, they will usually lose badly to professional if they try to play the professionals' game.

Guerrilla warfare, ambushes, raids and other less set piece situations can even up those odds and reduce the advantage of professional armies who train for open battle, playing to the skills of men who might be hunters, and rough terrain can limit the advantages of troops used to fighting in formation, but there's no substitute for actually learning how to fight.

Conners
2012-10-15, 09:15 AM
Here's a question for the laughs:

If Hollywood was right, and armour did function like cardboard, what would the effect be on the medieval/ancient world?

Knaight
2012-10-15, 09:17 AM
Here's a question for the laughs:

If Hollywood was right, and armour did function like cardboard, what would the effect be on the medieval/ancient world?

For one thing I'd expect there to be a lot less armor. Armor was generally labor intensive, resource intensive, and thus fairly expensive. This was only ever worth it because of the way armor actually worked, and quite well. If it worked as it did in Hollywood, nobody would bother.

Conners
2012-10-15, 09:24 AM
I can also imagine the popularity in ranged weapons sky-rocketing. As well as the popularity in shields.

Dienekes
2012-10-15, 09:32 AM
Here's a question for the laughs:

If Hollywood was right, and armour did function like cardboard, what would the effect be on the medieval/ancient world?

Armies would look like 300. If clothing adds no protection then all it will do is slow you down so off it goes.

If shields are also given the armor treatment then warfare becomes rocket tag and archers dominate everything. Military development goes toward making better and better bows and siege weapons while melee weapons are neglected. If not then archers will probably still gain an increase in emphasis world round, but shielded infantry would still exist, probably just relegated to standing around the archers and protecting in case anyone gets the suicidal notion to close the distance and attack the archers directly.

Lapak
2012-10-15, 09:48 AM
(If armor were useless)
Following on the 'all archers all the time' posts (though don't forget slingers in this equation, of course): I imagine you'd see military doctrine that only developed in our world after firearms became accurate, common, and able to penetrate (a lot of) body armor. Trench warfare, camouflage instead of uniforms, relatively spread out units rather than tight formations, and so on.

Galloglaich
2012-10-15, 09:58 AM
But they can still be peasants, which is why I mentioned them. I think we are in general in agreement. Civic militias weren't always the best forces around, but there were periods where they were.

I disagree in that, I think quite often the civic militias were the best forces around, generally they were the best infantry available across a very wide stretch of time.



The discussions of serfdom, and how abused serfs were, reminded me of a book I read recently: Slavery from Roman Times to the Early Transatlantic Trade. In the discussion about how slaves became serfs, the author points that free peasants also became serfs. Basically, toward the end of the Roman Empire the legal foundations for serfdom were laid, but this still left many free peasants, and while slavery was declining, it still left slaves. In short rural slaves became serfs, because it was easier for their lords -- by granting them some autonomy they were less likely to run away. There were fewer outlets (i.e. cities) for produced goods, so lords just needed to make sure that their basic needs were taken care of with a little surplus to sell at the limited markets.

What's really interesting is that free peasants also gradually became serfs. How that happened isn't entirely clear in the work: all that is mentioned is that it rarely happened by choice on the part of the peasant, but that there were gradual, incremental changes of the relationship between peasant and lord that took place over generations.

I agree that is an interesting process and something very worth looking int, which I've tried to do for a few years. I currently think more often than not, by the post-Roman era, free peasants were the ones made into serfs. This started with the Roman Latifundia model

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latifundium

During the Migration Era and into the Medieval period, as the Roman system returned and / or spread throughout the barbarain controlled zones, basically the adoptation of Christianity on a (often forcibly) converted people led directly to the introduction of Feudalism and a large portion of the formerly free population being made into serfs, with a few being elevated into nobility to help control the others. This was a standard Roman technique such as Julius Caesar described doing to the Gauls pre-Christianity. It was also common that the nobility and royal families would be converted to Chrisitanity for political reasons, but the 'people' would remain pagan. Terms like 'pagan' (pagani) and 'heathen' (of the heath) used to also be euphemisms for the common people or peasants. This put an important cultural divide between the ruled and the rulers. Even after the common people had been converted more effectively, they often practiced their religion in a different way than the nobility did.

By the later Medieval period, when most Europeans had been converted to Christianity, these giant estates or farms started being created especially in Iberia where the perpetual religious war raged, by the Spanish (Visigoth, whatever) and Moorish Kingdoms, using captive populations of the other religion. Same thing in Sicily and Southern Italy (Naples), and in the Balkans. The Latifundia system became more developed in the later era of the Reconquista contributing to the Morisco (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morisco) revolt of the 16th Century.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morisco_revolt

The Spanish transfered this system to the New World when they conquered it, applying the same treatment to many (though interestingly, not all) of the native tribes. This became the basis for the Hacienda system (Fazenda in Portuguese areas) in much of Latin America, but also in places like the Philippines and in India and China.

Starting in the 13th Century, the Teutonic Order established a similar system in Prussia called the Folwark (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folwark). In their own recors they are extremely open about how they broke up the pagan tribes of the Prussians, Livonians, Estonians and so on, and made them into serfs. "They were slaves of the Devil, let the now be the slaves of Christ" was their motto (I have lot of data on this if you are curious about it). The Lithuanians, who were stronger than the other Baltic people (and better protected by dense forests), managed to hold off the Crusades and only convert to Christianity in the late 14th Century on their own terms, and one really important rule they established was no foreign prelates (religious leaders like Bishops or Abbots) were allowed in their country. So as a result few Lithuanians were made into serfs, but Lithuania itself conquered much of the former Russian area, and those people were a different religion (Greek / Russian Orthodox vs. Latin / Catholic) and (Ruthenian /Ukranian / Belorussian) folks were rapidly forced into serfdom, on giant Latifundia style (Folwark) estates ruled by Christian Lithuanian Dukes or 'Magnates'. When Poland and Lithuania merged, Poland adopted the same system especially in her southern regions.

This in turn quickly led to a horde of escaped serfs joining escaped slaves fleeing the Tartars down into the river cataracts to form the first big Cossack gangs, which ultimately became the Zaparozhian Sich (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaporozhian_Sich).

G

Galloglaich
2012-10-15, 10:16 AM
For one thing I'd expect there to be a lot less armor. Armor was generally labor intensive, resource intensive, and thus fairly expensive. This was only ever worth it because of the way armor actually worked, and quite well. If it worked as it did in Hollywood, nobody would bother.

Yeah if armor only protected againt 'glancing blows' like in movies and a lot of History channel portrayals I don't think anyone would wear it. Or only when they were forced to. Like flak jackets in Vietnam.

G

fusilier
2012-10-15, 01:36 PM
I disagree in that, I think quite often the civic militias were the best forces around, generally they were the best infantry available across a very wide stretch of time.

The Italian urban militias declined with the rise of the Condottiere system, while they didn't disappear completely, in some areas they were very limited often just supplying pioneers (and usually from the rural militia). Condottiere forces tended to be very cavalry oriented, but infantry companies became increasingly common. I suspect something similar happened in the German states, although probably at a later date.




I agree that is an interesting process and something very worth looking int, which I've tried to do for a few years. I currently think more often than not, by the post-Roman era, free peasants were the ones made into serfs. This started with the Roman Latifundia model

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latifundium

Interestingly, by the Renaissance, I've read references to people hiring themselves out to "Latifondi" in southern Italy. So by that time, they were hiring laborers in addition to serfs.



The Spanish transfered this system to the New World when they conquered it, applying the same treatment to many (though interestingly, not all) of the native tribes. This became the basis for the Hacienda system (Fazenda in Portuguese areas) in much of Latin America, but also in places like the Philippines and in India and China.

In the New World they initially applied old systems, but fairly quickly that changed to the encomienda/repartimiento system. Note that while typically presented as two different systems, they are actually parts of the same system, but at certain times an emphasis was made on one part over another.

Galloglaich
2012-10-15, 04:20 PM
The rule of thumb was, as long as the towns remained independent, they had good militia.

In Italy, as the towns lost their independence to Signore (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signoria) usually soon afterword their militias declined. And as towns became more patrician (like say, Venice and Genoa), their militias became somewhat more cavalry oriented. But the independent towns retained strong militias well into the Early Modern era. Venice being case in point.

In 'The German States', (i.e. Central Europe north of the Alps), the towns were not at each others throats so much the way the Italian towns were, so they only really had to contend with the Princes and the Church, not with each other. They also tended to deeply mistrust mercenaries. They did use them for external conflicts, since money was always towns greatest offensive weapon against the Princes, but often would not let them inside the walls. The town militia even had to perform town watch (i.e. police) duties because they wouldn't trust foreigners with the keys to the town gate. For this reason very few of the larger Free German (or German / Slavic, or German / Norse) towns lost their independence to Signores, except in cases where the Ottomans took over the region like in Hungary.

The mercenaries themselves, the Swiss and the Landsknechten, were usually at least half or a third derived from urban militias.

So (in my opinion) the answer is no, you didn't see the same decline in the 'German' towns militia as you saw in some cases in Italy. They remained part of the army of the HRE all the way to the 18th Century. The principle limitation was they wouldn't go very far from the town gates... except on ships. Town militias were involved with the navy as well, especially in the Hanse cities. Danzig for example retained a formidable naval presence all the way into the 18th Century. Venice of course as well.

Regarding Latin America, I always wondered (but never understood) why some parts seemed to be completely stuck in a very feudal / late Roman style system with huge estates owned by a tiny minority and very, very poor population of campesinos (indios), like say Guatemala, while others seemed to get fairly urbanized fairly early on at least in parts with some kind of real middle class (Argentine say), and others kind of in between. And then you even have Costa Rica which has almost like a Swiss system of independent rural peasants, but they are a bit of an aberration. I don't know much about the history of Latin America, if you care to please elaborate, you seem to know it pretty well.

G

fusilier
2012-10-16, 02:46 AM
The rule of thumb was, as long as the towns remained independent, they had good militia.

In Italy, as the towns lost their independence to Signore (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signoria) usually soon afterword their militias declined. And as towns became more patrician (like say, Venice and Genoa), their militias became somewhat more cavalry oriented. But the independent towns retained strong militias well into the Early Modern era. Venice being case in point.

I'm not so sure about that. My study of the condottiere hasn't linked them to the rise of signore, and I'm pretty sure the decline of the militias (late 13th century) began before the rise of the powerful signore. But it varied from city to city, and I was speaking in generalities. Venice's militia was probably stronger, but that didn't prevent them from hiring many many mercenaries. And the militias seems to have gone through phases -- almost disappearing around the end of the 14th century, and then being more significant again toward the end of the 15th century (at which point, incidentally, there were also more professional forces being operated directly by the state).

Of course, in any siege, the militia is going to play a significant part, but usually only on the defensive. The besieging armies were mostly mercenary.


In 'The German States', (i.e. Central Europe north of the Alps), the towns were not at each others throats so much the way the Italian towns were, so they only really had to contend with the Princes and the Church, not with each other. They also tended to deeply mistrust mercenaries. They did use them for external conflicts, since money was always towns greatest offensive weapon against the Princes, but often would not let them inside the walls.

Italian cities often refused to allow mercenaries inside their walls, as they were seen as too disruptive. In one case permanent winter barracks, outside of town, were built for some Condottiere, but that wasn't repeated.



The town militia even had to perform town watch (i.e. police) duties because they wouldn't trust foreigners with the keys to the town gate. For this reason very few of the larger Free German (or German / Slavic, or German / Norse) towns lost their independence to Signores, except in cases where the Ottomans took over the region like in Hungary.

The use of the phrase "lost their independence" seems a bit unusual in this context. The end of the commune system and the beginning of the Signoria, doesn't mean the city-state fell under external influence (i.e. became the dependent of another country). It was a change in government style, and the term Signoria is fairly nebulous itself.


The mercenaries themselves, the Swiss and the Landsknechten, were usually at least half or a third derived from urban militias.

Now we are back to the question of when does some cease to be a militiaman and become a mercenary. However, yes, these men were often a product of the urban militias, and, as we have noted before, Genova was known for its crossbowmen.



Regarding Latin America, I always wondered (but never understood) why some parts seemed to be completely stuck in a very feudal / late Roman style system with huge estates owned by a tiny minority and very, very poor population of campesinos (indios), like say Guatemala, while others seemed to get fairly urbanized fairly early on at least in parts with some kind of real middle class (Argentine say), and others kind of in between. And then you even have Costa Rica which has almost like a Swiss system of independent rural peasants, but they are a bit of an aberration. I don't know much about the history of Latin America, if you care to please elaborate, you seem to know it pretty well.

G

Unfortunately, most of knowledge is limited to the history of New Mexico, although that required a study and understanding of the systems that were used by the Spanish crown. In short, the Spanish crown had a problem in Europe that they didn't want repeated in the "New World". Basically, their tax structure was designed so that the nobility was exempt from taxes. This meant that the tax burden fell mainly upon the middle and lower classes, which could be exhausted -- at one point in the 1500s, when asked to levy another tax, the governor of Sicily reported that there was no more money in the province to be collected; there was money, it was just in the hands of the tax-exempt nobles.

In the Americas, Spanish settlers in new lands were elevated to the lowest position of nobility (the "dons"), this gave them the legal right to "command" the indigenous peoples, and served as an incentive for settlement. But not wanting to simply recreate the situation in Europe, the Spanish crown gave various protections to the "indios", that, in theory, limited the amount of work they could be called to do, to give them enough time to be self sufficient, and required that they be *payed* for their labor. That would give the crown something to tax! ;-) That was the theory anyway: the Spanish typically would claim that circumstances were exceptional, and "required" that the indigenous populations perform more work and for less/no pay.

Again that's a very general overview of the system. There were tons of local variations, official exemptions, and differing approaches.

fusilier
2012-10-16, 03:34 AM
Ah, while reviewing my go to book on the subject, Mercenaries and their Masters, I found this:


Throughout the thirteenth century the militia armies of the Lombard and Tuscan Leagues were strengthened by the presence of a sprinkling of mercenaries. The idea that mercenaries only appeared in the next period of Italian warfare, the fourteenth century, as civic and republican spirit died and masterful 'tyrants' took over, has long since been exploded.


It is perhaps true that in northern and central Italy the large numbers of men available for communal armies led to a slower development of the role and the numbers of mercenaries than in northern Europe; . . .

It is also noted that the rural levies increasingly made up a large part of the armies of italian city-states as those states expanded their control over larger areas


The Florentine army which was defeated by the Sienese at Montaperti in 1260 contained about 1,400 communal cavalry and about 6,000 communal infantry supported by some 8,000 infantry levies from the rural areas of the Florentine state.

However, the author is not terribly impressed by the communal levies, stating that in addition to their role being primarily defensive:
they were not particularly well trained, and they owed their strength to numbers and determination rather than to skill or battle experience.

The rise of the condottiere (and specifically condottiere companies) and the decline of the communal militias has to do with a change in the political scene in Italy starting around 1250. The causes are complex. The cities were expanding, both in population and economy. Which resulted in the need to secure their hinterlands, but also the money to pay for more mercenaries. Now that the threat of invasion and meddling from German emperors was gone, the defensive alliances that had existed before turned on each other and the small communes started to quarrel and gradually be absorbed into larger and fewer states. The constant warfare made the hastily summoned, primarily defensive, militia not as effective.

Permanent specialized infantry were needed for frontier garrison duty and for effective siege warfare. Above all, professional cavalry were needed for the aggressive summer campaigns and for the ravaging attacks that were so destructive to the rival city's economy.

The author then turns to the subject of factionalism -- which was also on the rise as the result of a lack of external threats. Factionalism made it difficult to organize the militia especially for anything other than the defense of the city.

The fact that mercenaries were appearing well before the fourteenth century to some extent weakens the case for the signori as the innovators, but more importantly a study of the rise of any of the Italian signori shows that the basis for their power was consent not force. Many of the signori were the leaders of factions, and it was the factionalism which had contributed to the decline of the communal militia not the change to one man rule.

This is just one factor in many that led to the decline of the militia.

Finally the author turns to military technology. He argues that the crossbow (and long bow, and saracen bow), required more training and practice than a spear. In addition to this, they influenced armor, resulting in a shift toward more metal armor. The new weapons and equipment encouraged new tactical techniques that required more experienced troops as well. These factors together increased the gap in effectiveness of a part-time soldier versus a professional one. As an example he provides a brief description of the battle of Campaldino (1289).

Yora
2012-10-16, 08:57 AM
What can you tell me about this design of armor (http://ne3ngotam.deviantart.com/art/Dragon-Age-art-273121749?q=favby%3Ayora23%2F52302828&qo=27)? Is it based on something or pure fantasy.

On one hand, it really looks like actual armor, but on the other, this looks very unlike anything I've seen in reality.

Spiryt
2012-10-16, 09:21 AM
There's nothing stopping anyone from wearing plates of armor on the outside like that, I think there actually were few designs like that, particularly in Western Asia.

The problem here, obviously is that most plates doesn't appear to have any actual fastening visible, and they mysteriously fit here figure here and there.:smallbiggrin:

Storm Bringer
2012-10-16, 10:25 AM
What can you tell me about this design of armor (http://ne3ngotam.deviantart.com/art/Dragon-Age-art-273121749?q=favby%3Ayora23%2F52302828&qo=27)? Is it based on something or pure fantasy.

On one hand, it really looks like actual armor, but on the other, this looks very unlike anything I've seen in reality.

fantastic, but not overly so, at least to my eyes. armour simmilar to that did exist, and i can't see any obvious "shot traps" or simmilar, though obviously she'd need a helmet for actaul combat. lack of armour down the arms is notable, as she appears to have just soft leather between the shoulders and her bracers, which would quickly lead to a lot a scars form glancing blows to the arms, if on a major wound form someone targeting the unarmoured spot. however, plently of people have gone into battle with bear arms, as they feel the weight is not worth it/can't afford or make effective armour for it, and relied on "active" defense (i.e. parries and dodges) rather than passive (armour) to protect them.

that said, she;d still be vrunerable to archery

gkathellar
2012-10-16, 12:13 PM
What can you tell me about this design of armor (http://ne3ngotam.deviantart.com/art/Dragon-Age-art-273121749?q=favby%3Ayora23%2F52302828&qo=27)? Is it based on something or pure fantasy.

On one hand, it really looks like actual armor, but on the other, this looks very unlike anything I've seen in reality.

Big pauldrons are big, but not too big. Looks kinda patchwork, mostly.

Yora
2012-10-16, 12:47 PM
that said, she;d still be vrunerable to archery

Not all armor is gothic plate. :smallamused:

I was mostly interested about the cuirass. I complete forgott about the terracotta army, which seems to be pretty much armored with that very thing.

Spiryt
2012-10-16, 01:33 PM
Not all armor is gothic plate. :smallamused:

I was mostly interested about the cuirass. I complete forgott about the terracotta army, which seems to be pretty much armored with that very thing.

I'm pretty sure he mean that her arms and head are pretty much defenseless.

Galloglaich
2012-10-16, 02:46 PM
Of course, in any siege, the militia is going to play a significant part, but usually only on the defensive. The besieging armies were mostly mercenary.

This is a gross simplicification, it's nothing to do necessarily with the quality of the militia, it's simply the risk to reward of a given war. The town couldn't risk their militia on extensive long running campaigns, because if the militia took large casualties (like say from disease during a siege of some enemy stronghold) the tow n population and therefore it's money-making potential is seriously damaged, as is the towns ability to defend itself. But the history of Switzerland, Germany, Bohemia and indeed Italy is full of examples where they took the risk anyway and the militias as often as not proved more than capable of holding their own.


Now we are back to the question of when does some cease to be a militiaman and become a mercenary. However, yes, these men were often a product of the urban militias, and, as we have noted before, Genova was known for its crossbowmen.

No, I just think you don't understand the reality of Medieval life, people often had many roles. Recruiters used to hire mercenaries from Berne and and Zurich by directly approaching the town council. The men from the militia would fight for a fixed time (usually during a specific 'fighting season' which might vary from region to region, but mostly summer) and for a fixed amount of pay under fixed rules. I'm pretty sure the Genoese crossbowmen and Venetian galleys hired out under the same kind of arrangements. These men were both militia and mercenaries... and typically craftsmen as well.



However, the author is not terribly impressed by the communal levies, stating that in addition to their role being primarily defensive:

Levies are different than militia, though the two often get conflated.


The author then turns to the subject of factionalism -- which was also on the rise as the result of a lack of external threats. Factionalism made it difficult to organize the militia especially for anything other than the defense of the city.

That may be the key difference betwen the towns where the militia declined in Italy, and those where it didn't - towns like Venice and Genoa established stable governments pretty early on.

In North of the Alps on the one hand, the Gereman cities were protected from big Kingdoms like France or Spain because they were part of the HRE (or Poland, or Sweden, or Bohemia or Hungary or whatever). But on the other, the threat particularly in certain parts of Germany from nearby Lords and Prelates who believed they owned hereditry titles to the towns never went away, and this of necessity put some limit on the factionalism and urban class wars, often leading to a compromise government, usually between the Patricians and the craft guilds.


The constant warfare made the hastily summoned, primarily defensive, militia not as effective. ...

Finally the author turns to military technology. He argues that the crossbow (and long bow, and saracen bow), required more training and practice than a spear. In addition to this, they influenced armor, resulting in a shift toward more metal armor. The new weapons and equipment encouraged new tactical techniques that required more experienced troops as well. These factors together increased the gap in effectiveness of a part-time soldier versus a professional one. As an example he provides a brief description of the battle of Campaldino (1289).

I don't know who wrote the book in question or when it was published but that seems to be a rather inaccurate statement, since part-time militias were who won the Battle of Golden Spurs in 1302 and Morgarten in 1315... and 300 battles since that time. Inclu.ding in Italy. Crossbows were part of the Genoese militia (and the Berne, Zurich, Augsburg, Bruges etc. etc.) since the 12th Century.

G

fusilier
2012-10-16, 04:02 PM
\I don't know who wrote the book in question or when it was published but that seems to be a rather inaccurate statement, since part-time militias were who won the Battle of Golden Spurs in 1302 and Morgarten in 1315... and 300 battles since that time. Inclu.ding in Italy. Crossbows were part of the Genoese militia (and the Berne, Zurich, Augsburg, Bruges etc. etc.) since the 12th Century.

G

Michael Mallett wrote Mercenaries and their masters, he also wrote some books on the history of Florence, the Borgias, and collaborated with J. R. Hale on a book about the military organization of Venice. This work (Mercenaries and their masters) is considered to be the entry point to any discussion about the condottiere.

It is at times lacking in details, as it covers the subject broadly, but it remains the key work.

To refer to your specific remark about militia being integral parts of battle -- no duh! We are talking about trends that evolved slowly over time. It wasn't like somebody flipped a switch and all the communal militias suddenly became worthless, and only condottiere were effective in Italy. It was a process that occurred over generations, with militias being increasingly augmented, then displaced by mercenaries.


No, I just think you don't understand the reality of Medieval life, people often had many roles. Recruiters used to hire mercenaries from Berne and and Zurich by directly approaching the town council. The men from the militia would fight for a fixed time (usually during a specific 'fighting season' which might vary from region to region, but mostly summer) and for a fixed amount of pay under fixed rules. I'm pretty sure the Genoese crossbowmen and Venetian galleys hired out under the same kind of arrangements. These men were both militia and mercenaries... and typically craftsmen as well.

I'm not sure you understand the difference between someone who performs military service for financial reward, and someone who feels an obligation towards their state. That is the key difference between mercenary and militia, and that difference is sometimes difficult to determine as *all* soldiers were paid for their service. The convenient interpretation is to define mercenaries as foreigners -- but this can be somewhat misleading. Florence in the 13th century made a very clear separation between her mercenaries and militia, and while mercenaries were typically assumed to be foreigners, some Florentines are listed on the rolls as mercenaries.

You seem to be focusing on the exceptions, like Genoa and Venice, rather than the rule. Did Genoese crossbowmen earn their skill and reputation serving as militia or as mercenaries? The argument is pretty persuasive: mercenaries/professional soldiers would spend more time training and invest more in their equipment than militia. Genoese who hired themselves out as crossbowmen would see more action and develop better skills, than those who limited themselves only to their militia obligations. Genoa (and Pisa, who was also known for its crossbowmen), and Venice, were states with overseas colonies, who perhaps saw more conflict than usual, but also had more money to invest. They didn't *have* to invest that money in foreign troops, who were often considered unreliable, they could hire out local troops -- but while these troops aren't foreign mercenaries, they could effectively be considered "local" mercenaries, as they are performing the same function.

Finally, some states, especially the larger ones with overseas holdings (like Genoa and Venice), would still invest in their militias, and have training schemes. Venice, being so impressed by the "saracen bow", adopted it and trained up a local force in its use -- although that experiment didn't last for too long. Another militaristic state, which very quickly went to one man rule, Milan, also seems to have kept its militia in a better state, along with being an early adopter of professional, state employed, permanent soldiers.

Nonetheless, increasingly through the 13th and 14th centuries, mercenaries were hired in larger and larger numbers, displacing militias and "local" troops almost completely by the early 15th century, in Italian warfare.

G -- I've quoted what is probably the best source on the development of condottiere and the decline of the Italian militias. If you have other sources that disagree, I would love to hear them. If you are merely skeptical of some the statements, I can elaborate on them.

Galloglaich
2012-10-16, 05:16 PM
I'm not sure you understand the difference between someone who performs military service for financial reward, and someone who feels an obligation towards their state.

Many clearly felt both in equal measure.


You seem to be focusing on the exceptions, like Genoa and Venice, rather than the rule.

No, my focus is in Central Europe East of the Rhine and North of the Alps, mainly in the 15th Century, because that is what I've principally studied. But to the extent that I am familiar with Italy and with other eras, Genoa and Venice were arguably the two most powerful city-states in Italy during most of the Medieval era, in fact between them they controlled most of the trade in a huge swath of the Mediterranean. Their principle rivals Florence and Milan were at the height of their power when they still had their own miltiias.



Did Genoese crossbowmen earn their skill and reputation serving as militia or as mercenaries?

As militia in the first Crusade, (when Genoa was little more than an oversized fishing village) specifically at the Seige of Jerusalem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Jerusalem_(1099)#The_final_assault). Then again later in the third Crusade in the Battle of Jaffa. That is how they got to be famous enough that people wanted to hire them as mercenaries.



The argument is pretty persuasive: mercenaries/professional soldiers would spend more time training and invest more in their equipment than militia.

Prove it. I've got militia rolls from several cities in Northern Europe, they were very well equipped. I challenge you to find any infantry anywhere in the same era better equipped than the Bernese or Zurich militias.



Genoese who hired themselves out as crossbowmen would see more action and develop better skills, than those who limited themselves only to their militia obligations.

Again, prove it. I don't think this is the case. Have you studied how many wars, raids, sieges and other engagements the militia of any particular town actually fought in for any given era?



G -- I've quoted what is probably the best source on the development of condottiere and the decline of the Italian militias. If you have other sources that disagree, I would love to hear them. If you are merely skeptical of some the statements, I can elaborate on them.

I've indicated where I'm most skeptical, and I think some of the arguments that you already quoted from the book are problematic for the reasons I pointed out upthread. I'll go further and say that I think the whole narrative of the reasons for the decline of militias in Italy is spurious. Mercenaries were not a new invention of the 14th or 15th or 16th Centurires, when Frederick Barbarosa was invading in the 12th Century his armies were full of mercenaries. I do have plenty of sources on all of this, more for Central Europe as I've said several times but I also have some for Venice, Genoa, Florence and other towns - in detail. But I'm out of town at a conference so it will be a while before I can cite anything from my library at home. If I have time later I'll see what I can find online.

In the meantime I don't think you have refuted any of my points.

G

fusilier
2012-10-16, 05:50 PM
An example of how Milan and Venice were a bit more cutting edge in their organization of armies in the 15th century is the increasing use of permanent troops known as provisionati. These troops began as permanent garrison troops, but by the end of the 14th century some cavalry forces are being organized along similar lines, and also being referred to as provisionati (and also lanze spezzate).

However in the middle of the 15th century we start to see an increase in the number of permanent infantry (p. 114) (emphasis mine):


By 1476 Milan had 10,000 permanent infantry, including 2,000 hand-gun men . . . At this point, however, it is clear that the word provisionato was being used in a new context. Both Milan and Venice began a system of selective conscription to produce a sort of superior militia. The men selected were fully armed and commanded by professional infantry constables. They could be called out for full-time service in an emergency and otherwise for periodic training sessions. The system somewhat resembles that of the francs archers in France and probably accounts for 10,000 provisionati in Milanese pay in 1476. Certainly it is about then that one becomes aware of Venice raising troops in large numbers in this way for service against the Turks in Friuli, and they are clearly quite distinct from the ordinary militia.

All these, then, were permanent forces in the complete sense of the word.

So how we define militia again comes to fore in this question. These soldiers can be looked at as "sort" of militia, but they were kept distinct, and considered different, from the "ordinary" militia. This is why the discussion of what constitutes an urban militia is significant. These troops, were not considered "militia" at the time. While we can describe them as militia, we could also describe them as "national guard" or even "reserves" -- both terms would be anachronistic and potentially misleading.

Mercenaries still dominated warfare in Italy during this time period, and that was the point of my original comment -- urban militias weren't always the best forces around. How we define "militia" will of course influence our perspectives. So it's good that we have that discussion. If by "urban militia" you mean any soldier from an urban center (who would/could theoretically have militia obligations) -- then we need to go over our terms very carefully.

fusilier
2012-10-16, 06:31 PM
Many clearly felt both in equal measure.

Sorry to hate to do this to you: prove it!



As militia in the first Crusade, (when Genoa was little more than an oversized fishing village) specifically at the Seige of Jerusalem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Jerusalem_(1099)#The_final_assault). Then again later in the third Crusade in the Battle of Jaffa. That is how they got to be famous enough that people wanted to hire them as mercenaries.

Ok, so that's about a century or a half-a-century before the militia system started to be replaced by mercenaries . . .




Prove it. I've got militia rolls from several cities in Northern Europe, they were very well equipped. I challenge you to find any infantry anywhere in the same era better equipped than the Bernese or Zurich militias.

So you've compared these rolls to those of Italian condottiere infantry (or cavalry) companies in Italy?

I don't have such rolls, so I'm relying upon secondary sources. But more importantly, as I stated, I was referring to Italy. It's kind of pointless to compare an Italian mercenary company to a German militia, as they rarely came in conflict during the 15th century. So perhaps a comparison of forces that actually came into conflict (i.e. Italian militia rolls to Italian mercenaries).

But if you insist -- during the 15th century (prior to the French invasion of Italy at the end of the century) there were four battles between Swiss forces and Italian forces (that I am aware of). There was one German invasion in 1401 that was repulsed by Venice.

The four battles versus the Swiss have the following breakdown:
The battle of Arbedo in 1422, where the Swiss pikemen were smashed by a larger condottiere force.

The battle of Giornico valley in 1478. Here the Swiss retreated before a larger force from Milan, trapped the force in a narrow valley, and rained down crossbow bolts (and probably some arquebus balls) from the steep mountain sides. The Milanese force took heavy casualties and retreated.

The battle of Ponte di Crevola in 1487, where the Milanese trapped a large Swiss force and defeated them. In this case the Milanese army was made up largely of light cavalry and the new conscript infantry.

The battle of Calliano also in 1487. Here a Venetian army was attacked by Swiss and Landsknechten while crossing a river, and it's leader killed. However, the right wing of the Venetian army crossed the river and forced back the Swiss and German infantry, gaining a local advantage.

While a mixed record, it is clear that Italians could get the better of Swiss and Germans during this period -- who you claim owe their superiority on the battlefield to their militia status?

You have claimed that urban militias were almost always superior to other forces.

I have claimed that in Italy the urban militias declined, and condottiere were more effective during a specified period, and backed that up with secondary sources, explaining the reasons why they declined.

While I can't say specifically if German or Swiss militia could be defeated by mercenary forces, as I don't have sufficient details for the battles above. The indication is that they could be and that they could also be victorious.


Again, prove it. I don't think this is the case. Have you studied how many wars, raids, sieges and other engagements the militia of any particular town actually fought in for any given era?

No, as stated above, I've relied upon the study of well respected author on the subject. If that's not sufficient for you, then I guess you "win"! Of course if you wanted to travel to Italy and pore through the various archives, I suppose you could. But I'm willing to trust Mallet's research and analysis, as most historians seem to be willing to do so.


I'll go further and say that I think the whole narrative of the reasons for the decline of militias in Italy is spurious.

Good for you, the world needs more renegades who ignore the lifetime works of respected authors!


Mercenaries were not a new invention of the 14th or 15th or 16th Centurires, when Frederick Barbarosa was invading in the 12th Century his armies were full of mercenaries.

Who's claiming that they were a new invention? Certainly not myself or Mallett.


In the meantime I don't think you have refuted any of my points.

G
Clearly!

Conners
2012-10-16, 07:25 PM
Here's another question for fun:

If Action Movie Heroes existed (the ones who can kill a hundred guys and do ludicrous stuff), how would this change the ancient world and warfare?

Galloglaich
2012-10-16, 11:39 PM
Sorry to hate to do this to you: prove it!
The 'mercenaries' from Berne and Zurich who fought so often in Italy and elsewhere remained loyal to their own towns no matter how many times they fought for other people as mercenaries. I think that says enough.


Ok, so that's about a century or a half-a-century before the militia system started to be replaced by mercenaries . . .

Which is completely beside the point. You asked how they got to be famous, as mercenaries or militia. The answer (that you clearly didn't know) is, they got famous as militia. The Genoese militia was so effective people were willing to pay a pretty penny to hire them as merecenaries. They still also remained militia. Just exactly like the Swiss (who came to fame after their militia victories against the Hapsburgs) and the Czechs (who came to fame after the drastic failure of the Hussite Crusades) and so on. They idea that they could be effectively both and still citizens with day jobs is one of the things that you (and your pal Professor Mallet, apparently) argued against.


So you've compared these rolls to those of Italian condottiere infantry (or cavalry) companies in Italy?

Some of them are pretty well documented, the White Company for example, it wouldn't be hard.



I don't have such rolls, so I'm relying upon secondary sources. But more importantly, as I stated, I was referring to Italy. It's kind of pointless to compare an Italian mercenary company to a German militia,

It wasn't that rare actually. You just cited a few of the largest battles which clearly pitted Germans or Swiss against either Milan or Venice. But German (and Swiss) militia were involved in dozens of other battles in Italy in the 14th and 15th Century on a small and large scale, as mercenaries.


The four battles versus the Swiss have the following breakdown:
The battle of Arbedo in 1422.. the battle of Giornico valley in 1478... While a mixed record, it is clear that Italians could get the better of Swiss and Germans during this period -- who you claim owe their superiority on the battlefield to their militia status?

You have claimed that urban militias were almost always superior to other forces.

You are trying, intentionally or otherwise, to change or conflate what I said. Which was: militia were often excellent troops and tended to be the best infantry. The battles you listed above were fought by Swiss infantry forces with little or no cavalry support, against strong cavalry forces, and yet as you pointed out, the result is mixed. This means the infantry was very good since most infantry alone was at a disadvantage against cavalry in that period. At Giornico, 600 [Swiss] confederates defeatd 10,000 Milanese troops. Those confederates were not 'special miltia' like they had resorted to in Milan, which was no longer a republic at that point. They were just ordinary burghers and peasants in their day jobs. And yet they were fighting at the pinnacle of power in that era, sufficient to face down one of the most powerful Princely families in Italy.



I have claimed that in Italy the urban militias declined, and condottiere were more effective during a specified period, and backed that up with secondary sources, explaining the reasons why they declined.

You actualy said, upthread, allegedly backed by your sources, that :

In addition to this, they influenced armor, resulting in a shift toward more metal armor. The new weapons and equipment encouraged new tactical techniques that required more experienced troops as well. These factors together increased the gap in effectiveness of a part-time soldier versus a professional one. and then talked about a late 13th century battle.

...which is a general statement about militia and it's gibberish since militias were using iron armor and heavy crossbows by 100 years before that time. You want sources? Here are the statutes of the militia of Bologna dating from 1236 AD, the militias were formed in 1164 with the founding of the Lombard League. Thes militias have crossbows and wear mail armor.

http://archive.org/stream/statutidellesoc02gaudgoog#page/n5/mode/2up

The statutes are written in Latin but the introduction of the book is written in modern Italian and you can translate it yourself (using google translate if necessary).



While I can't say specifically if German or Swiss militia could be defeated by mercenary forces, as I don't have sufficient details for the battles above. The indication is that they could be and that they could also be victorious.

I never said otherwise. I said militia tended to be excellent quality and made the best infantry. Not just in Italy, but all over Europe. Not just in the Middle Ages, but back into antiquity.

The militia in the Italian towns (gradually) declined when they progressively lost their republic status to Signore and then their autonomy to the Pope or some foreign King... or the stronger Republics like Venice or Genoa.. under the pressure of invasions by France, Germany and Spain. But the Swiss didn't have to resort to creating semi-professional armies because their part-time militias remained sufficient to protect their towns, and when they wanted to, invade foreign nations, just like with those of the Flemish towns, the German, the Dutch, the Czech, the Polish and so on which remained autonomous.

These towns still used mercenaries anyway, just like the Italian towns before their loss of autonomy, for the simple for the simple reason that towns had more money than men.

The fact is though that

1) the entire saga of the city-states in Italy started with a series of victories by the militia of the Lombard League against the invading armies of the German Emperors, including thousands of mercenaries.

2) throughout the Medieval period, in Italy, the most sought-after infantry remained Swiss militia. The next most sought after were German militia. Calling them 'mercenaries' as if they appeared out of thin air doesn't change what their actual origin was (or what their day job was)

3) During this same period, the most powerful military entities in Italy were Genoa and Venice, both of which relied heavily on their own militias. Venice rose to power in fact largely because their naval fleets included rowers recruited from their own towns, who could fight when the galleys crashed together, unlike everyone else who used slaves or prisoners.

You also simply don't understand (or won't accept) the reality in the Medieval world, in Italy and everywhere else, that most people didn't have one job as a soldier, or an artisan, or a farmer, or a seaman, or a merchant for their entire life, but did many of the above things at different times, and yet they could still do them all well. This was the definition of a "Renaissance Man". Just like people do today but even more so. Even in the mercenary companies, it was mostly the leadership who were truly professional. Their armies tended to be seasonal.



No, as stated above, I've relied upon the study of well respected author on the subject.

You cited one guy who hasn't published since 1988 and who made some comments which clearly missed the mark. "The increasing use of metal armor"? In the 13th Century? Armies were using 'metal armor' on a large scale since the first Crusade! And it may be news to you but there are scores of military historians (and even experts on mercenaries) and many of them disagree. So I guess these guys are 'renegades' who ignore each others lifetimes of research.



Who's claiming that they were a new invention? Certainly not myself or Mallett.

See my reposted quote above. You said crossbows and armor were the reason why militias couldn't 'keep up' with mercenaries. Crossbows and armor, (and militias )... were around since the first strife between the Italian towns and the German Emperors as you said yourself well before any of the Italian communes lost their militias. So your theory falls flat.

G

Matthew
2012-10-17, 02:12 AM
I have no idea what you two are arguing about. Are the statements "militia were not always the best troops" and "militia were often the best troops" mutually exclusive? Sounds like you are virtually in agreement to me.

fusilier
2012-10-17, 04:01 AM
This response is really long. If you want a summary skip to the bottom.


See my reposted quote above. You said crossbows and armor were the reason why militias couldn't 'keep up' with mercenaries. Crossbows and armor, (and militias )... were around since the first strife between the Italian towns and the German Emperors as you said yourself well before any of the Italian communes lost their militias. So your theory falls flat.

G

It was one, among many factors. It wasn't *the* reason. It was *a* reason. Just like factionalism isn't *the* reason, it's *a* reason for the decline of the militias. The system is complex enough, that it doesn't hinge upon one of these factors, but I will quote Mallett:


All of these developments made it increasingly necessary to think in terms of professional and specialist troops. Plate armour was both more costly, and more physically demanding to wear; it was the armour of the professional not of the feudal or 'city' knight. It was innovations like these which widened the gap between part-time and professional soldiers, and made it ever more necessary for employers to seek the latter if they could afford them.

Also, it wasn't just that the new equipment was more expensive -- as the crossbow had become very popular across all of Italy -- it's that it allowed more sophisticated tactics, it was those tactics that required more training, and therefore gave more edge to those who could afford to spend more time training. The battle of Montaperti Campaldino is an example of this -- the outnumbered Ghibelline force used more sophisticated tactics to defeat a larger Guelf force. While both forces were comprised mostly of militia, the Ghibelline force was "stiffened" by a core of mercenaries. It represents an early stage of mercenary influence on the development of Italian warfare.


You asked how they got to be famous, as mercenaries or militia. The answer (that you clearly didn't know) is, they got famous as militia.

Ok, this raises another question that I will ask below. I also want to tie into this statement:


You also simply don't understand (or won't accept) the reality in the Medieval world, in Italy and everywhere else, that most people didn't have one job as a soldier, or an artisan, . . .

I've ignored this line of reasoning, not because I don't accept or understand the premise (I do). I argue that it's bearing isn't significant. Why? Because the amount of time spent soldiering is the factor here. I understand that soldiering wasn't a full time job, even for people who were considered "full-time" soldiers. But I would argue, that the *more* time spent soldiering, the better the soldier (theoretically speaking, all other things being equal). Perhaps, more importantly, the more time the "company" spends in the field the better the company, as it has more time to refine and practice tactics, beyond individual fighting. Remember that the context is that developments in weaponry, have allowed more complex tactics to development, that require more time to master.

So, my question to you is: how many months did the Genoese crossbowmen who went on the Crusades spend actually in the crusades? (Months out of a year). And how does that compare to those crossbowmen, who did *not* campaign in the Crusades? Also, at which point, i.e. how much time must a man spend away from his home, other job(s), or simply his town, before his role ceases to be one of mere militia obligation, and he can be considered a full time soldier? Understanding, that doing "a stint" as a full time soldier, doesn't make one a full time/professional soldier for the rest of his life.

An aside: In Italy the campaigning season had two breaks, the longer one being winter. By the 15th century mercenaries were being called out of winter quarters with increasing frequency, leaving even less time for other employment. Likewise during the Italian Wars, many of the French/German/Spanish/Swiss soldiers must have been far away from their homes for years.

My question, is how much of an affect their "extra-curricular" military activities had on their effectiveness. I would suspect that it would enhance the performance of the militia, by sharing their experiences with those who didn't participate in the larger campaigns.

In that sense, did the later Swiss and German mercenaries, also have a similar affect on their home militias improving them with their experience?

I feel that treating them "solely" as militia, seems to be denying that by some of their members performing duties beyond that of the typical militiaman, enhanced their military prowess.

But now I'm digressing from the central discussion.


It wasn't that rare actually. You just cited a few of the largest battles which clearly pitted Germans or Swiss against either Milan or Venice. But German (and Swiss) militia were involved in dozens of other battles in Italy in the 14th and 15th Century on a small and large scale, as mercenaries.

In the 14th century foreign mercenary companies were common in Italy, but by the 15th century, most of the mercenary companies in Italy could rightly be considered "Italian" -- they were typically led by Italians (not always, and foreigners were a bit more common among the infantry constables). Foreigners still made up a large portion of the rank-and-file mercenaries, but they didn't bring their tactics, weapons, and organization to the company. Those remained "Italian" in that sense. So a Swiss or German serving in Condottiere company, wouldn't be trained or equipped like a Swiss or German serving in his militia back home. Also, part of the strength of these mercenary companies was their permanence -- they didn't disband at the end of every campaigning season, with their members scattering toward their various homes. Instead, they usually went into Winter quarters, (where they may be called out, with extra pay), and then reformed, in theory replenished and refreshed in the Spring.

While there were certainly border skirmishes, major incursions by significant external forces weren't too common in northern Italy. The French sent some forces on a couple of campaigns, but nobody seems to have been terribly impressed by them. In southern Italy, French and Spanish intervention had been fairly common, and even the Turks got in there (the siege of Otranto). Italian mercenaries also served outside of Italy, but I couldn't dig up much information on them. The stradiots were hired into the Italian system late in the 15th century. But I'm not aware of any Swiss companies being hired by the Italians during that period.


You are trying, intentionally or otherwise, to change or conflate what I said. Which was: militia were often excellent troops and tended to be the best infantry.

Ah, ok, we are talking about who had the best *infantry*. I don't have specific information about the Germans, but in Italy, I claim that the militias were not the best infantry around, during *certain* phases.


The battles you listed above were fought by Swiss infantry forces with little or no cavalry support, against strong cavalry forces, and yet as you pointed out, the result is mixed. This means the infantry was very good since most infantry alone was at a disadvantage against cavalry in that period. At Giornico, 600 [Swiss] confederates defeatd 10,000 Milanese troops. Those confederates were not 'special miltia' like they had resorted to in Milan, which was no longer a republic at that point. They were just ordinary burghers and peasants in their day jobs. And yet they were fighting at the pinnacle of power in that era, sufficient to face down one of the most powerful Princely families in Italy.


Well lets get something straight about Giornico -- that was a tactical disaster from the Milanese perspective. The Milanese could have assault rifles, and the Swiss nothing more than slings and the result would have been similar. -- Ok, that's a bit hyperbolic -- Let's say if you switched the armies' positions, the Swiss would have been in for a world of hurt. Any army that finds itself in such a position would have been in serious trouble. Cavalry and infantry don't really play into it. It was a brilliant maneuver by the Swiss pure and simple.

As for the claim about cavalry vs. infantry -- at Arbedo the Condottiere cavalry dismounted to attack the Swiss, who had formed up in pike squares.


The militia in the Italian towns (gradually) declined when they progressively lost their republic status to Signore and then their autonomy to the Pope or some foreign King... or the stronger Republics like Venice or Genoa.. under the pressure of invasions by France, Germany and Spain.

There were two things going on. An enlarging of the Italian states, at the cost of the smaller communes. And the external interference of non-Italian kings (German, Spanish, and French) on those states. Those are different phases in history. Basically, prior to about the 13th century, the various Italian communes banded together to resist foreign invaders. When that pressure let up, they started quarrelling among themselves, which led to a consolidation of power in a few larger states (but still Italian states). [Note, this is the period that Mallett claims the communal militias began to decline] Then, beginning with the invasion of Italy by the French in 1494, foreign invaders starting messing about again, and the now larger Italian states, failed to put together a truly effective league to stop them. Leading to the Italian Wars of the 16th century.

For more information on these wars, I suggest Christine Shaw's and Michael Mallett's work released this year: The Italian Wars of 1494-1559. It's unfortunately something of a light treatment (there's a lot of ground to cover), but it claims to be the only work to study the wars as a whole (at least in English).


1) the entire saga of the city-states in Italy started with a series of victories by the militia of the Lombard League against the invading armies of the German Emperors, including thousands of mercenaries.

I agree.


2) throughout the Medieval period, in Italy, the most sought-after infantry remained Swiss militia. The next most sought after were German militia. Calling them 'mercenaries' as if they appeared out of thin air doesn't change what their actual origin was (or what their day job was)

No idea what you are talking about.

In the 14th century a lot of the foreign mercenaries were veterans of the 100 years war (John Hawkwood is a favorite among English sources). National affiliation doesn't seem to be very strong, but German cavalry was well respected if I recall correctly.

In the fifteenth century, infantry tended to have more foreigners than Italians when compared to the cavalry. Germans and Hungarians were popular leaders with the hand-gun companies, but not exclusively. The Romagna was considered one of the best regions to recruit infantry.

Only in the sixteenth century, with the foreign invasions of the French and Spanish, do Swiss, and then Germans become the most sought after infantry in Italy(and they commanded the highest pay, even if they were sometimes not terribly reliable). In that period, the Swiss and Germans may indeed be able to claim to be the best infantry around -- but before then, they were not noted in Italy, and their record against the Italian states (what little there was) was mixed. In Italy some of the best recruiting grounds for infantry were in the Umbria and Romagna valleys. Milan and Venice were considered to have the best developed professional infantry forces.

Mallett does have this to say, however:

Infantry forces, therefore, formed a significant part of fifteenth-century Italian armies. It is true that there were was no disciplined pike infantry of the Swiss type, which was enjoying brief, but lastingly significant success beyond the Alps. It is also true that, because the nature of the Italian mercenary system, the companies tended to be small an unused to operating en masse. But large numbers of specialist and well trained infantry were available and played an increasing part in the warfare.

The Italian condottiere infantry seemed to have put more emphasis on crossbowmen (later hand-gun men), and they started experimenting with light sword and buckler type troops from a fairly early date (1416). They don't seem to have ever developed a local disciplined pike force. However, remember the effectiveness of Cordoba in 1503 at Cerignola. Pikes made a big impact in the wars in the 16th century -- and Italy was clearly hurting there -- but combined arms was a better solution, and Italy did have a tradition of effective "mercenary" companies of light infantry and missile troops.

As for the make up of the infantry mercenary companies, active in Italy during the 15th century (Mallett):


These men did not command integrated companies of their own nationals, and it seems to be true that the proportion of foreigners amongst the leaders was higher than amongst the rank and file.

(Galloglaich:)

3) During this same period, the most powerful military entities in Italy were Genoa and Venice, both of which relied heavily on their own militias. Venice rose to power in fact largely because their naval fleets included rowers recruited from their own towns, who could fight when the galleys crashed together, unlike everyone else who used slaves or prisoners.

Not so sure about that. Venice is definitely up there in the list, but Genoa had been weakened after loosing some wars to Venice in the 14th century. Milan, was militarily, very significant during that period, more so than Genova during the 15th century. Florence, can't be ignored as a major player, but tended to be pretty backward militarily speaking. Both Milan and Venice hired mercenary infantry, and developed provisionati infantry, but they tended to be commanded by mercenaries.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Speaking in broad terms. The mercenary forces in Italy, developed in response to a gradual decrease in the effectiveness of urban militias, which declined for a variety of complex reasons. The mercenaries adopted more sophisticated tactics, which allowed them to be more effective than the militias -- partly because they could spend more time training than the militias. While originally, they were mostly cavalry, sophisticated mercenary infantry also developed. The condottiere system gradually shifted toward one of a permanent employment, via lengthening contracts, and a tradition of renewing contracts. Concurrent with that development, was the rise of true permanent soldiers in the Italian states. The Italian system of warfare ran into problems with the French Invasion of 1494. There were several reasons for this, including the inability of the Italian states to form an effective league. However, one of the reasons for the loss at Fornovo, which can be instructive as failure of the Italian system of warfare, is that the Italian plan was too complicated, too sophisticated, for the large number of forces that had, eventually, been gathered. Italian tactics were, in short, too complicated to scale up well. And the armies of the Italian Wars would be very big compared to the armies of the previous century. It is at this point that disciplined pikemen, become the mainstay of almost any effective army. Pikemen, that, perhaps, weren't as tactically sophisticated as their earlier Italian counterparts, could be fielded in very large numbers.

fusilier
2012-10-17, 04:07 AM
I have no idea what you two are arguing about. Are the statements "militia were not always the best troops" and "militia were often the best troops" mutually exclusive? Sounds like you are virtually in agreement to me.

Yeah, my last post took way too long to write. The conversation seems to be over all the place. I think we are arguing about whether or not militia were usually the best infantry? I contend that there was a period of time, at least in Italy, where mercenaries were better.

And then, I think there's disagreement about what constitutes a militia, for example should we consider Genoese crossbowmen serving in the Crusades militia?

I think it's resulting in a confused and convoluted argument, that's quickly disintegrating into a mass of individual tangentally related discussions and references to battles.

Storm Bringer
2012-10-17, 02:43 PM
Yeah, my last post took way too long to write. The conversation seems to be over all the place. I think we are arguing about whether or not militia were usually the best infantry? I contend that there was a period of time, at least in Italy, where mercenaries were better.

And then, I think there's disagreement about what constitutes a militia, for example should we consider Genoese crossbowmen serving in the Crusades militia?

I think it's resulting in a confused and convoluted argument, that's quickly disintegrating into a mass of individual tangentally related discussions and references to battles.

but, unlike most arguments on the internet, has not slipped into a series of snide put downs of the other mans points, so i think your're both doing rather well.

fusilier
2012-10-17, 03:30 PM
but, unlike most arguments on the internet, has not slipped into a series of snide put downs of the other mans points, so i think your're both doing rather well.

Thanks.

While there are clearly some historical details to be hammered out -- there's also I think a disagreement on what can rightly be called militia.

Crossbowmen are an interesting example. Across most of Italy, urban and rural men had an obligation to learn how to use a crossbow. And I think that's what Galloglaich is getting at -- those people ostensibly developed their skills as crossbowmen from their militia obligations.

But, while the use of an individual weapon may have been the result of militia obligations, more sophisticated tactical training was obtained by those individuals who spent more time in the field, and, perhaps more importantly, by those companies who stayed together. That was achieved by the mercenary units operating in Italy, and not by the urban militias.

To a certain extent, that's the thesis of Mallett's work. In Italy (starting in about the 13th century), the mercenary units became more sophisticated in their tactics -- partly because they could stay employed year round. They influenced the entire system of warfare in Italy, and beyond. They raised the bar for the level of professionalism in the military, and they influenced the development of truly permanent forces. They were a product of rather unique conditions, and the system did have its flaws. But they were not anachronistic and backward, as they have often been characterized.

Sadly, until recently, Mallett's work wasn't very accessible. It seemed to be known to academics who specifically focused on the Italian condottiere -- which in English there doesn't seem to have been many (significantly Mallett's work was translated into Italian and was popular). And known to dopes like me, who happened to stumble across a reference to the book and were lucky enough to find a copy at a university library! :-)

As a result, the popular opinion of condotierre hasn't really changed. For example in the Borgias TV series, where somebody remarks: "we Italians have no word for cannon" -- sigh.

Anyway the book is now in print, with a nice foreword by William Cafferro (an author of a couple of recent books dealing with condottiere in a more narrow field), and should be available on Amazon. I know of no other work that treats the Italian condottiere so comprehensively. I would like to find a copy of Mallett's and Hale's work on the Venetian military, I think that would be a good read.

GraaEminense
2012-10-17, 05:25 PM
Since I have nothing to add regarding militias and mercenaries... Speculation time!


If Action Movie Heroes existed (the ones who can kill a hundred guys and do ludicrous stuff), how would this change the ancient world and warfare?
The first thing that springs to mind is actually logistics: how important it would be to find any available Heroes and get them into the army, so they're not wasted as carpenters or whatever. I would expect some kind of "warrior caste" or feudal system to develop, to give Heroes lives of leisure and luxury in return for their services. Something like the Mamlukes perhaps, where the Heroes form a military/ruling class, or a lot of small princedoms ruled by a Hero.

I also imagine a lot of searching for the Chosen Ones, in the best of fantasy traditions. Can they be bred or created? Perhaps murdering their parents at an early age would do the trick? There would be a lot of experimentation, I'd guess.

That aside, if there are supermen around your average soldier is kind of pointless. He's just Hero-fodder, and "mundanes" should probably just be kept off the battlefield doing something useful, like farming. This leaves battle to a chosen few, and in a pre-modern society I'd expect highly ritualized combat between chosen champions with the loser (being very valuable) perhaps being ransomed.

In a modern society, with every soldier being Rambo I don't know what to expect. With these Ramboes being infiltrators and demolition-men, the war would consist of Heroes trying to blow up important buildings or stop the bomb at the last second?

Galloglaich
2012-10-17, 09:59 PM
I agree the discussion between Fusilier and I has become a little bit too scattered and maybe slightly too heated, but we both respect each other and we have both remained civil. I also think some of the points under contention here are very interesting and a few are even pretty important.

And I've also learned a few things such as about these semi-professional militias in Milan and Venice.

Maybe we can try to pare down the tendrils of this discussion into the key points where we seem to disagree.

1) Were part - time militias just as effective as ostensibly full - time mercenaries (and were mercenaries actually full-time?)


2) How did fighting effectiveness improve in Medieval armies? How did Medieval warriors learn to use better tactics and more sophisticated weapons?


3) Did militia actually decline in just in some towns in Italy or everywhere in Europe? And if so, when and why?


4) Was the reason for the purported decline, as Fusilier has shown us that Mallett seems to be saying, somehow related to the introduction of complex weapons like crossbows and in the use of metal and / or plate armor contributing ?

#1 is kind of hard to prove either way definitively though I think we could learn something and have some fun pursing it (it would take some time) I think #2 is a really interesting and important question. #3 is worth looking at a bit further but again, it will take some time. #4 can help us ground the debate in reality a bit more perhaps with somewhat left effort.

Does this sound like a reasonable summary?

I'd like to reach something close to a consensus before I make any effort to clarify my positions further since I have (frustratingly!) very limited computer access for the next few days since I'm stuck at a conference right now.

G

fusilier
2012-10-18, 01:15 AM
I will be leaving and will be gone over the weekend and will not have internet access. So I'll try to address these now.


I agree the discussion between Fusilier and I has become a little bit too scattered and maybe slightly too heated, but we both respect each other and we have both remained civil. I also think some of the points under contention here are very interesting and a few are even pretty important.

And I've also learned a few things such as about these semi-professional militias in Milan and Venice.

Maybe we can try to pare down the tendrils of this discussion into the key points where we seem to disagree.


I1) Were part - time militias just as effective as ostensibly full - time mercenaries (and were mercenaries actually full-time?)

1) As you pointed out, the Italian urban militias were able to deal with mercenaries during the 11th - 12th centuries.

Was there a change, and if so, why?

For the first question, something clearly changed in Italy. I think the traditional response is that the militias were neglected, ignored or suppressed by the Signori (I'm not actually sure, I've never seen the complete argument). However, Mallett writing in the 1970s considered that view to have "long since been exploded". Part of the reason was that where Signori took control, they did so without force, so there was no need to suppress the militia. Also, other states which didn't go to one man rule, did switch to employing mercenaries on a large scale.

I got into the reasons why in previous posts and do not wish to repeat all that material here. I think the most objectionable reason was new equipment -- but that reason is fairly complicated in itself, and ties into the next question.

As I have been reviewing the source(s), I'm willing to walk back my claim that the mercenaries were not truly full time soldiers, but with some caveats. In the early stages (14th century), the campaigning seasons in Italy wouldn't have left foreign mercenaries which much time to return home, without the companies being disbanded. Once companies were well established entities, the 14th century was known as the time of the great companies, they would typically overwinter at some place they conquered, and then see who wanted to hire them in the Spring.

During the 15th century, there were more "Italians" (I don't want to say "locals") among the rank-and-file, but they were typically sent to winter quarters -- and certain things were expected of them during that time period (including repairing and replenishing equipment), in addition to them being "on call" for a potential winter campaign. The nature of Italian warfare meant that "foreign" troops couldn't be simply be sent back to their homes, to wait until they were needed -- there wouldn't be enough time to recall them. So these soldiers really could be considered full-time.


2) How did fighting effectiveness improve in Medieval armies? How did Medieval warriors learn to use better tactics and more sophisticated weapons?

2) This is getting tricky -- the time of the Condottiere in Italy, is generally considered the Renaissance, although to see properly their roots one has to go back a little bit further.

Also, there's a difference in terminology. Where I would say "soldiers," you say "warriors." To me this is a potentially fundamental disagreement. In my mind warriors are individuals who fight as individuals. Soldiers, band together into units and fight as part of a larger whole. It's not a difference in physical presence, but in mentality. So to me, part of being a good soldier has a lot to do with understanding drills and tactics, and individual prowess with a particular weapon (or weapons) is a secondary consideration. For a warrior it would be reversed -- individual prowess with a weapon is the primary focus.

For the training of condottiere, I will turn to a source I'm usually loathe to go to: The Osprey book on the subject (Osprey can be real hit or miss) -- I do this only because the index in Mallett's book isn't that good, and I don't feel like scouring his pages at the moment.

They note that the early condottiere were assumed to be trained, experience men, because they were typically veterans of other wars.

However, after that, young men received their training within the company itself, as squires and pages (and this held for the infantry companies too). It also stated that they preferred to hire soldiers who at least some training. In the case of crossbowmen, places like Venice and Genova would certainly be good places to recruit, because everybody was required to train with a crossbow.

Unfortunately, the work doesn't get into the details of how training occurred at the unit level. Apparently some condottiere ran what were de fact military schools that taught tactics in addition to basic fighting skills. Also, that different styles would require different training schemes:

Some preferred to dismount their men and use them in tight infantry formations. If they wanted their men to be supported by the fire of archers or crossbowmen, this required different training and coordination if it was to be done effectively.
They further claim that effective condottiere must have required constant training (specifically referring to the cavalry).

I was able to quickly look up tournaments in Mallett's work, but the section was primarily about soldiers and society. Tournaments typically included mock battles, which would seem a logical place to look for more training. Florence had many tournaments, one a year after the defeat of Pisa in 1406, but they were primarily for the Florentines themselves -- a chance for the political mercantile class to show off. On the other hand Venice didn't have as many tournaments, but theirs were more practical. Venetians didn't actually participate in the mock battles of the 15th century, instead it was the professional, non-Venetian (i.e. mercenary) soldiers that fought in these battles. That way the Venetians could evaluate the effectiveness of their mercenaries.



3) Did militia actually decline in just in some towns in Italy or everywhere in Europe? And if so, when and why?

3) That's a good question. I'm convinced that they declined in Italy at least, staring around the 13th century, and this was a general trend across all of Italy, but not an equal one. Like above I don't want to go over all the reasons again, but the need to keep troops in the field all the time, was part of it. However, it was a slow decline, militias gradually faded and mercenaries came to the fore.


4) Was the reason for the purported decline, as Fusilier has shown us that Mallett seems to be saying, somehow related to the introduction of complex weapons like crossbows and in the use of metal and / or plate armor contributing ?

4) This is where things get "complex", and we need to carefully interlock the various pieces. I'll try to do that briefly, and off the top of my head (so challenge what *I* say first, so I can double check it against Mallett).

I. The constant warfare of the 13th century necessitated the use of permanent troops, both for garrisons and to carry out the economically devastating raids. Turning to mercenaries was an effective solution, when there were experienced veterans available.

II. Correct me if I'm wrong, the increasingly use of increasingly(?) more powerful crossbows, led to more armor (specifically plate armor, but during the 15th century also more horse armor). This was an added expense for the cavalry. Mallett also claims that more armor required more physical conditioning (which seems logical to me). Those are requirements that probably benefit those who could spend more time training.

III. Foreign mercenaries could spend more time training. They needed to at least be on call most of the year, but unlike militia they were too far from their homes to return to them when nothing else was going on.

IV. Mallett feels that the crossbow had more offensive opportunities -- it was still primarily a defensive weapon -- I assume he's comparing it to a spear -- and that some more sophisticated tactics could be used with it.

V. By the 15th century, Italian condottiere were known for using very sophisticated tactics, rotating troops in and out of battle, and mixing forces (cavalry, crossbowmen, light infantry, heavy infantry, even artillery). If we accept that, then there must have been a transition from more simplistic tactics to more sophisticated ones -- and as mercenaries became popular, there may have been something about them, that allowed them to master such sophisticated tactics that militias had trouble with.

The opposite side, I suppose, would be to argue that militia could master such tactics, but they didn't for other reasons. But that doesn't seem to square with what is known. Venice and Genova didn't go to one man rule, and kept their militia obligations fairly strong, but still hired mercenaries to fill out their armies, and Venice, at least, developed provisionati to augment their forces.

I would like to point that mercenaries in Italian warfare, were increasingly being hired for long stints during peace time. There was a huge array of contract types, some which allowed a condottiere to hire his company out to other states, but he could be recalled at any time! So it's not easy to cover everything.

Much of Mallett's book concerns the relationship between condottiere and their employers, and the institutions that were put in place to manage these relationships. He presents Milan and Venice as being very advanced in this regard, and Florence as being particularly backward.

----------------------------------------------------
I guess I'm having trouble writing nice concise answers, because I feel the subject matter is complex, and will be ill-served by too short an answer. :-/

Lea Plath
2012-10-18, 06:25 AM
OK, I've got a question.

I'm designing armor for a 6 armed character (see my avatar). I wanted something stylish that didn't just wind up being fantasy armor. My insipration was the kinda generic stereotype of the spanish conquistador of the breast plate and chain mail shirt.

The idea, as it stands is a long hole on each side for the 3 arms, the breast plate being solid, no bumps some "female armors" have that direct weapons to the heart but some basic engraving on it and under it, a tight layer of sci fi type padding/kevlar stuff.

gkathellar
2012-10-18, 10:27 AM
I'm designing armor for a 6 armed character (see my avatar). I wanted something stylish that didn't just wind up being fantasy armor. My insipration was the kinda generic stereotype of the spanish conquistador of the breast plate and chain mail shirt.

Can you tell us exactly where the secondary and tertiary sets of arms protrude? Just straight down the side, shoulderblades, what are we dealing with here? (This is important to the question of arm and shoulder protection.)


no bumps some "female armors" have that direct weapons to the heart

In this thread, that should be a given.:smallwink:


under it, a tight layer of sci fi type padding/kevlar stuff.

Unless you expect this kevlar material to stop something the breast plate wouldn't, or cushion impacts or some such, there wouldn't be a huge amount of point to it as a secondary layer.

Autolykos
2012-10-18, 10:53 AM
Sounds pretty sane so far.

Unless you expect this kevlar material to stop something the breast plate wouldn't, or cushion impacts or some such, there wouldn't be a huge amount of point to it as a secondary layer.That would be the most critical point: What should this armor actually defend against? Solid projectiles (firearms, railguns, etc)? Lasers? Concentrated very hot stuff (Some sort of "plasma gun" or lightsaber)? Spread out moderately hot stuff (like flamethrowers)? Melee weapons? All of the above?
A description of the most common weapons in your setting and how they work (at least the rough concept) would be quite useful.

Knaight
2012-10-18, 11:14 AM
Unless you expect this kevlar material to stop something the breast plate wouldn't, or cushion impacts or some such, there wouldn't be a huge amount of point to it as a secondary layer.

It probably would help to distribute impacts yet further, which is always a good thing. The downside is that kevlar is fairly heavy once there is enough of it to be worth something, and putting a heavy layer inside armor that is already on the heavier side is less than ideal. Being seriously weighed down in combat is a problem (hence the generally minimal leg protection seen on infantry in just about all eras), as is having to carry a lot of gear around on the march.

On other questions: What's the general consensus among historians on the quality of the book From Sumer to Rome: The Military Capabilities of Ancient Armies. It seemed mostly solid, with some very glaring problems in the use of modern comparisons (due mostly to a lack of understanding of modern warfare) and in the actual tests done. Are there other problems I should be aware of?

Fortinbras
2012-10-18, 11:35 AM
I have a couple questions about professionalism in Medieval armies.

First off, would it be fair to say that housecarls where essentially an early incarnation of knights? If not, what are the important differences between knights and housecarls?

What about ministerales? Functionally, what where the differences between ministerales and "free" knights in places like England?

Yora
2012-10-18, 12:46 PM
This really is just a wild guess with no substential facts backing it, so take it with a grain of salt. But I think militias would probably be the precursors of standing conscript armies, as opposed to low ranking nobles and peasants.
A militia would be outfitted and trained by the community, and even if they would only be what we now call reserves, this seems to be a better context to develop more advanced and professional organization.
If a rich city like Bern, Zurich, or Prague is outfitting its entire militia, they can order weapons and armor in bulk and pay for it from the defense budget. Not sure how it was for knights at that time, but the popular image is that of each knight being responsible for the training and equipment of his lance of six to eight men, and having to pay for it with his own funds. That probably would make armies of knights look a lot more ragtag, and wouldn't lead to a lot of training in large unit tactics. And I think both the Swiss and the Czechs were quite famous for their exceptional use of large cohesive units. Quite similar to what made the Roman legions great.
Also, militias are defending their home or at least fighting battles so a shared enemy never makes it to their own home if they can stop them in an allies territory. Knights and their men would be fighting because their lord had some political ambitions or even just for pay if they were freelancers.

Galloglaich
2012-10-18, 12:51 PM
Ok so, I was kind of hoping to just define terms before launching back into really long detailed arguments, but since you already did that I'll attempt to be systematic. I'm going to start with number 4 since I think it's the easiest one to settle.

Did complex weapons and metal and / or plate armor make warfare too sophisticated for militias to handle?

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and I've already probably been too long winded on this argument, so here are some images with brief descriptions.

Mid- 14th Century depiction of the "Battle of Golden Spurs" from 1302, in which the town militia of the cities of Bruges, Ypres and Ghent in Flanders, with a little help from regional knights, smashed the French nobility.

http://medieval2.heavengames.com/m2tw/history/faction_histories/flanders/kortrijk
That is the victorious militia on the right, using their characteristic weapon 'the Godendag' which I'll get into more in a minute. Note they are depicted by the period artist, wearing the latest armor of that period (transitional harness with coat of plates)

Communal skirmish in Bologna between Guelphs and Ghibellines, 1369 AD
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Communal_fight_in_Bologna_%28Sercambi%29.jpg
It's hard to tell with the shields but the heavy infantry appear to be wearing heavy armor, certainly they all have helmets and some appear to have gauntlets. The crossbowmen are wearing lighter armor, possibly mail or just textile.

Militia from the town of Prague in a wagonberg of War Wagons, 1420
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Wagenburg.jpg
Note some kind of armor on all of the fighters, coat of plates in my opinion, plus crossbows, firearms, and flails, all of which the Czechs advanced in this period.

Miltia from the towns of Prague and Tabor in a tabor or War Wagon during the Hussite wars (1422-1440's), painting is from mid to late 15th Century.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=56249&stc=1
Note they are wearing plate armor and using the latest weapons of that era.

Italian Carroccio, mid 15th Century not sure the specific town or the battle but it could be Milan or Florence. As you are probably aware, these special ox-drawn carts were usually manned by militia, they often carried the standard of the town.

http://warandgame.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/sdffrr.jpg
Note again, they are wearing plate armor and carrying a heavy crossbow.

Berne militia praying before the battle of Laupen (14th Century, painting from the 15th century) Diebold Schilling
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d0/Schilling_Gebet_vor_Schlacht_bei_Laupen.jpg/658px-Schilling_Gebet_vor_Schlacht_bei_Laupen.jpg
Note, plate armor nearly universal, longswords for sidearms. Note the Berne standard behind them. And the crossbow standard I don't know whose that is.

Armed militia from Zurich, relieving a siege, Diebold Schilling, 15th Century
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Diebold_schilling_pikemen_from_zurich.jpg
Note, plate armor nearly universal, guns and pikes.

Militia from Berne, Zug, Uri, Schwyz and Zurich praying again after another battle, 15th Century.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8e/Schilling_Spiezer_Chronik_17.jpg/439px-Schilling_Spiezer_Chronik_17.jpg
Note plate armor and longsword sidearms (usually associated with knights) seem to be universal.



Now according to my sources, in Central and Northern Europe, individual members of the militia were required to own both arms and armor by the town ordinances, and also by their guilds (since the guilds usually formed the core of the infantry and often some of the cavalry too - the Butchers of Rostock for example were required to own warhorses as well). I think the guild connection is particularly significant as regards training, though I'll get to that in another post. But we have guild regulations from Flanders in the 13th Century (the oldest I have is from the skinners guild of Arras in 1236) stipulating that all guild members must have specific armor and weapons.

Even in rural militia in many areas, not just weapons but armor was required by all free men. For example the original Law of the Gulating, in Norway, required arms only in the 11th Century, but by the 12th Century the Law had been updated to include "helmet, mail hauberk, shield, spear and sword" for the wealthier peasants and all burghers.

From what I understand it was the same in Italy by the time of the formation of the Lombard League. The regulations of those fighting guilds in Bologna that I linked upthread required armor, bucklers, weapons (spears and swords) from all their members, and in some case horses as well (for the more affluent).

Crosbows, similarly, were ubiquitious particularly in urban militias. In Flanders like in Bologna, they had specific military guilds which were formed to augment the town defenses. The first two on record were the Guild of St. George (in Ghent and then Bruges) which was a crossbow guild, and the guild of St. Sebastian which was an archers guild (the Flemish used English style longbows). These date back to the mid -13th Century. In the 14th Century the St. Michels Guild was formed, and a second St. George guild for the new type of crossbows, and then in the 15th Century the St. Barbara's guild was formed for firearms.

The Swiss are of course, famous for their crossbows, as were the Czechs, and the Germans. Tactical Crossbow training even shows up in some German fencing manuals from the 15th century

http://www.marbles.frothersunite.com/imag/phpBB2/MTDXbow.jpg

http://198.58.99.35/wiktenauer/images/3/39/Cod.icon._394a_135r.jpg

http://198.58.99.35/wiktenauer/images/b/b6/Cod.icon._394a_135v.jpg

http://198.58.99.35/wiktenauer/images/2/23/Cod.icon._394a_136r.jpg

In fact I think it's clear that far from falling behind military technology and tactics, the urban miltiias tended to be major innovators of both, setting shockwaves through Eurpean history and carving out crucial landmarks in the development of hand to hand weapons (like the Flemish Godendag (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goedendag), mentioned above, the Swiss Halberd, the Czech war-flail, and the Swiss pike), crossbows (which were vastly improved by the Genoese, the Swiss, the Czechs who were I think the first to make large scale use of mounted crossbowmen, and the Flemish who were the first to use steel prods), firearms and cannon (both vastly improved by the Czechs), and complex combined-arms systems, some of which are barely known in the English speaking world, like the Hussite style war-wagon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_wagon), which turned out to be particularly decisive against the Turks, as well as confounding to the German and Western Knights; and the pike / halberd and crossbow tactics developed by the Swiss as just two examples.

So in light of all this, I think the argument that militias couldn't handle more sophisticated weapons, or armor, or tactics, is bogus. If some or all the urban miltiias in Italy got to the point where they couldn't handle these things, I suspect it means something else was going on. Either factional disputes or too much pressure from outside or the Signore system and loss of citizen autonomy or some other factor. Too much olive oil in their diet ;)

But to be honest I'm actually fairly dubious it was such a factor in Italy, I think the popular narrative about this is off and probably based on some very old data.

G

Archpaladin Zousha
2012-10-18, 02:40 PM
What, in terms of historical context, would be the difference between a heavy and light shield? I know tower shields are generally like the pavise, but I'm not exactly certain how big one or the other of the two other kinds of shields are. I know in terms of game rules one is easier to shield bash with than the other, but what would a knight, like, say, King Arthur and his Knights (fictional, I know, but it provides the context I'm looking for) have used?

gkathellar
2012-10-18, 02:55 PM
What, in terms of historical context, would be the difference between a heavy and light shield? I know tower shields are generally like the pavise, but I'm not exactly certain how big one or the other of the two other kinds of shields are. I know in terms of game rules one is easier to shield bash with than the other, but what would a knight, like, say, King Arthur and his Knights (fictional, I know, but it provides the context I'm looking for) have used?

That would depend on the time period, region, and what kind of fight the knight was expecting. I mean, you would have seen heavier shields on the battlefield than in civilian combat, but beyond that there's a lot of variation between any given country and any given century. The knights of the round table are pretty ahistorical, so that doesn't give much context.

Spiryt
2012-10-18, 03:16 PM
What, in terms of historical context, would be the difference between a heavy and light shield? I know tower shields are generally like the pavise, but I'm not exactly certain how big one or the other of the two other kinds of shields are. I know in terms of game rules one is easier to shield bash with than the other, but what would a knight, like, say, King Arthur and his Knights (fictional, I know, but it provides the context I'm looking for) have used?

In historical context it's impossible to divide anything into "heavy and light shields".

Those D&D terms are for simple representation of bigger and smaller shields. It doesn't really do to good of a job at it, either.

Shields were generally coming in all shapes and sizes, together with overall bulk and construction there were a lot of weight/coverage combinations.

King Arthur, as actual theoretical British warlord could probably use Roman style shields, or more 'local' types, I'm not sure.

King Arthur's as 'medieval' knight shield would obviously depend on period of depiction/tale. :smallwink:

Probably most famous depiction of early 'knights' - Bayeux Tapestry shows large, 'kite' shields, popular all around Europe for riders and more 'serious' infantry as well.

http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Homework/bt/

In later period, kite shields generally are getting shorter and more acutely shaped, giving birth to typical 'heater' shield.


http://www.medievaltymes.com/courtyard/images/maciejowski/leaf39/otm39ra&b.gif


Around the break of 12th/13th century, knightly shields generally cease to be gripped by central grip - they instead are getting more and more often strapped to forearm - it's pretty much standard way of using shields in 13th and 14th century

http://manuscriptminiatures.com/static/miniatures/original/142-8.jpg


On the other hand, all kinds of round shields, centrally gripped shields, really large shields never go away completely - there would be a lot of regional variety, obviously.

13th century round shields from Norway (http://www.vikverir.no/ressurser/hist_mus_oslo_no_medieval/?dir=&page=3)


14th-15th (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LAYh8S0URgI/TinxEjqsfAI/AAAAAAAAAhA/mDg1HYnZT0s/s1600/5b2ab7307af0.gif) century Prussian/Latvian/Mazovian small 'pavise' with central bulge. Later became popular all over Europe.

Galloglaich
2012-10-18, 03:20 PM
I have a couple questions about professionalism in Medieval armies.

First off, would it be fair to say that housecarls where essentially an early incarnation of knights? If not, what are the important differences between knights and housecarls?

I think there are actually some close similarities. The most significant difference is that the huskarl is usually infantry whereas knights are typically cavalry. There are some other social and legal differences in status, which in some ways would be equivalent, but huskarls from my understanding are typically also part of the immediate entourage of a given Lord (a Thegn or an Eorl) whereas knights might be the foreman or manager of a distant fiefdom or his own estate independently or semi-independently.

You know Vikings were active in the East as well as the British Isles and the West, and in Russia there was an interesting kind of in-between status called the Druzhina.

http://www.1186-583.org/IMG/jpg/piotr2_int-2.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Druzhina

Rathere than being independent like the Varjag / Varangian groups, these guys were the Vassals of a Kynaz (Prince) and they fought as cavarly.

This is a pattern you will see a lot, infantry tends to come from towns (especially) and from free peasants. Cavalry is associated with the nobility and their henchmen.


What about ministerales? Functionally, what where the differences between ministerales and "free" knights in places like England?

Depends on the time period. A ministeriales in the early days were part of a direct entourage of some Lord or Estate, but later on they were often more independent. That dividing arrives when the henchmen in question gets put in part of a stronghold which has some real defensive value. Then inevitably, they tend to become a little more autonomous, may swich allegiences and so on.

But overall I think there may not have been all that much difference. These terms tend to be less precise in period.

G

Archpaladin Zousha
2012-10-18, 03:28 PM
Okay, that's good context. What kind of shield would be used more for "shield bashing?"

Spiryt
2012-10-18, 03:46 PM
I don't think any sources are that specific (someone will correct me, I guess?)...

What we can guess from basic mechanics and modern combat reenacting is that shields will be suitable for different 'bashing' obviously.

With small buckler on the end of an arm, one can actually punch someone, from different angles, into different places, with different effect.

With Roman style large shield, actually putting your whole weight behind the shield and slamming into something would be more 'natural' - even though strikes with edges and boss in different ways are also possible.

Galloglaich
2012-10-18, 03:51 PM
What, in terms of historical context, would be the difference between a heavy and light shield? I know tower shields are generally like the pavise, but I'm not exactly certain how big one or the other of the two other kinds of shields are. I know in terms of game rules one is easier to shield bash with than the other, but what would a knight, like, say, King Arthur and his Knights (fictional, I know, but it provides the context I'm looking for) have used?

http://www.4hoplites.com/Pelta%20Front.JPG
Light Common all over the world from the Bronze Age through the 19th Century in some places.
Made of wicker / rawhide ala peltasts, zulu shields etc.

Medium composite
Thin (usually linden) wood with steel boss and rawhide rim and / or cover, ala Viking Shield, Roman Scutum. Good to stop darts, javelins, spears and lighter bows.

http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/6456/leishi228fg.jpg
Heavy composite
Not well known in the West, heavier composite shields made to contend with bullets and high velocity crossbows. Best typified by the 'mini pavise' of the Lithuanians.

Medium composite Buckler
Steel boss, thick wood + rawhide very common throughout the Medieval period

http://img.webme.com/pic/o/osmanli-devleti1299/kalkan3.gif
Ottoman Shield

http://bottega.avalonceltic.com/rep_immagini/prod/rotella_romano.jpg
Rotella replica
Full steel shields, usually bullet proof.
Steel bucklers appeared pretty early, but as metalurgy improved, larger steel shields became increasingly common, by the late 15th Century Ottoman Jannisaries were using them in significant numbers. They spread to Italy and then to Spain and the rest of Europe, known as rotella as well as other names.

Arthur could have been using Roman or Viking type, or light type shields. Probably the former as Spyrit said.

G

gkathellar
2012-10-18, 05:04 PM
As long as we're on the topic of shields, I've read that one of the advantages of the wooden shield over the steel shield is that an opponent's edge weapons will sometimes get stuck in the wood, allowing you to disarm or restrain them. Is that true? (And more specifically, was that something people would have actually counted on being able to do?)


Okay, that's good context. What kind of shield would be used more for "shield bashing?"

Literally any shield that could hold up under the strain would have been suitable for hitting people with, though obviously the shape, size and weight would influence how easily and with how much variety you could manage this. But really, if you've got a big piece of wood/metal strapped to your arm, and you see an opportunity to ram it into the other guy's face, you are probably going to do that.

Spiryt
2012-10-18, 05:18 PM
As long as we're on the topic of shields, I've read that one of the advantages of the wooden shield over the steel shield is that an opponent's edge weapons will sometimes get stuck in the wood, allowing you to disarm or restrain them. Is that true? (And more specifically, was that something people would have actually counted on being able to do?)


Hacking and stabbing shield's replicas suggest that it's indeed the case.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeBPDVfi_DI

Given the way thin planks of wood tend to behave, it's not surprising at all.

If somebody wanted to give a good hit to the shield, he certainly had to be vary of possibility that his edge will get stopped.

As far as metal shields go, main problem is big expense of metal, so weren't generally considered worthwhile trough most of the shields history, until state of metallurgical industry made them more accessible.

They will also tend to end heavy for the size, steel is dense, and must still have proper thickness and bulk to not bend to easily.

gkathellar
2012-10-18, 06:28 PM
Thanks. Assuming that's an accurate representation, I guess a secondary question would be: was the blade-catching feature of a shield ever designed for? For instance, might shield-makers have arranged the grain of the wood to make it more likely to catch an opponent's weapon?

That may or may not be beyond the scope of available evidence, but it would be interesting to find out.

fusilier
2012-10-18, 08:15 PM
I literally don't have the time to get to details for once. I'm going to try some short responses, to hopefully clear up some confusion.


Ok so, I was kind of hoping to just define terms before launching back into really long detailed arguments, but since you already did that I'll attempt to be systematic. I'm going to start with number 4 since I think it's the easiest one to settle.

Did complex weapons and metal and / or plate armor make warfare too sophisticated for militias to handle?

It's not that militia couldn't use the weapons and equipment (although in the case of plate armor cost may have been a factor) -- it was the more advanced tactics that the weapons allowed, that gave an edge to professional soldiers. This is not to say the weapons couldn't be used with more basic tactics -- they were and had been according to the narrative.

fusilier
2012-10-18, 08:22 PM
Communal skirmish in Bologna between Guelphs and Ghibellines, 1369 AD
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Communal_fight_in_Bologna_%28Sercambi%29.jpg
It's hard to tell with the shields but the heavy infantry appear to be wearing heavy armor, certainly they all have helmets and some appear to have gauntlets. The crossbowmen are wearing lighter armor, possibly mail or just textile.

I can't really tell if they are wearing heavy army, but we need to be careful with period pictures, as often they are idealized or stylized -- not always, however.

This is interesting for something I just came across last night -- for most of the 14th century, the militia in Italian armies was called up first, and only if the war or campaign bogged down would they turn to hiring mercenary companies. (That's not to say however, that there were no mercenaries involved in the opening stages of campaigns, as small mercenary companies or individually hired mercenaries were still common, just that the bulk of the army remained militia).

fusilier
2012-10-18, 08:36 PM
But to be honest I'm actually fairly dubious it was such a factor in Italy, I think the popular narrative about this is off and probably based on some very old data.

What do you mean by popular narrative? I think "the rise of the signori" is the popular narrative. (I'll have to double check Machiavelli, when I have the chance).

What I've been presenting is, to the best of my knowledge, the "current" narrative. As for being based on "very old data" -- well, if by that you mean a careful study of the period sources and archives, then yes! ;-) If you mean that more current research has overturned the narrative -- then I'm more than willing to look at that research.

Can you suggest *another* source on the rise of the Condottiere in Italy -- which I will limit my claims to from here on. Pictures of battles don't really constitute a detailed study. I wish I could find a copy of Mallett's and Hale's book on Venice, as that sounds like its a more detailed study of a state which even Mallett claims benefitted from the best trained militia in Italy (supporting its mercenary armies).

Possibly some of William Caferro's works would be useful here, not only are they recent, but they deal with the early period of mercenaries.

fusilier
2012-10-18, 08:49 PM
Italian Carroccio, mid 15th Century not sure the specific town or the battle but it could be Milan or Florence. As you are probably aware, these special ox-drawn carts were usually manned by militia, they often carried the standard of the town.


I don't think that's actually a Carroccio. But if it was, that's exactly where you would expect the professional soldiers that had existed for a long time -- the permanent guards that were hired even by the republics (they're basically the equivalent of "household" guards -- I'm not sure if there's a better term). Also that's where the important nobles and politicians would also be there. But, I'm pretty sure it's not a Carroccio. Not sure what it is -- I know there were experiments with war wagons and carts, but little more than that.

Galloglaich
2012-10-18, 10:38 PM
Well, I assumed it was an associated device since Italy is the only place I know of where they pulled war wagons with oxen.

As for the rest of it on #4, I think you and I just need to disagree. I think it's patently obvious that not only miltiias could handle technology and new tactics, they actually introduced probably at least half of the most important military innovations of the 14th-16th Centuries, both in terms of equipment (I mentioned several specific examples, though I could elaborate further, I didn't think it was necessary) and tactics (same).

Furthermore, if Mallet thinks plate armor or heavy crossbows were somehow new to the world during the rise of the Conditerri, I think he's lacking in basic understanding of war in that period at the individual / micro-level (which wouldn't be unusual).

By "old data" I mean, that guy published in an era in which a lot of the military history is now considered dated by Academia, but I'm not an expert on Italy by a long shot and I'm not about to start a crash course on it. If you really want some other books to read there are some classics and a lot of new work, I could ask a buddy who is an expert to recommend some things.

G

Brother Oni
2012-10-19, 02:49 AM
I don't think any sources are that specific (someone will correct me, I guess?)...

What we can guess from basic mechanics and modern combat reenacting is that shields will be suitable for different 'bashing' obviously.

From my experience, almost any shield can be used to push or bash, but you need a certain level of grip and control to do anything more than just a straight forward shoving match (which also opens you up to someone reaching around the top of you and scoring a hit with their sword or axe).

I haven't used anything as small as a heater shield, just Norman era kite and round shields, but both of these shields were held by straps and/or a sling, making more complex bashing techniques rather difficult.

This would imply that central grip shields are better for bashing, since you have a larger range of movement and can adjust the angle of your grip to enable attacks better.

Deadmeat.GW
2012-10-19, 04:14 AM
Ok so, I was kind of hoping to just define terms before launching back into really long detailed arguments, but since you already did that I'll attempt to be systematic. I'm going to start with number 4 since I think it's the easiest one to settle.

Did complex weapons and metal and / or plate armor make warfare too sophisticated for militias to handle?

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and I've already probably been too long winded on this argument, so here are some images with brief descriptions.

Mid- 14th Century depiction of the "Battle of Golden Spurs" from 1302, in which the town militia of the cities of Bruges, Ypres and Ghent in Flanders, with a little help from regional knights, smashed the French nobility.

http://medieval2.heavengames.com/m2tw/history/faction_histories/flanders/kortrijk
That is the victorious militia on the right, using their characteristic weapon 'the Godendag' which I'll get into more in a minute. Note they are depicted by the period artist, wearing the latest armor of that period (transitional harness with coat of plates)

Communal skirmish in Bologna between Guelphs and Ghibellines, 1369 AD
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Communal_fight_in_Bologna_%28Sercambi%29.jpg
It's hard to tell with the shields but the heavy infantry appear to be wearing heavy armor, certainly they all have helmets and some appear to have gauntlets. The crossbowmen are wearing lighter armor, possibly mail or just textile.

Militia from the town of Prague in a wagonberg of War Wagons, 1420
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Wagenburg.jpg
Note some kind of armor on all of the fighters, coat of plates in my opinion, plus crossbows, firearms, and flails, all of which the Czechs advanced in this period.

Miltia from the towns of Prague and Tabor in a tabor or War Wagon during the Hussite wars (1422-1440's), painting is from mid to late 15th Century.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=56249&stc=1
Note they are wearing plate armor and using the latest weapons of that era.

Italian Carroccio, mid 15th Century not sure the specific town or the battle but it could be Milan or Florence. As you are probably aware, these special ox-drawn carts were usually manned by militia, they often carried the standard of the town.

http://warandgame.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/sdffrr.jpg
Note again, they are wearing plate armor and carrying a heavy crossbow.

Berne militia praying before the battle of Laupen (14th Century, painting from the 15th century) Diebold Schilling
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d0/Schilling_Gebet_vor_Schlacht_bei_Laupen.jpg/658px-Schilling_Gebet_vor_Schlacht_bei_Laupen.jpg
Note, plate armor nearly universal, longswords for sidearms. Note the Berne standard behind them. And the crossbow standard I don't know whose that is.

Armed militia from Zurich, relieving a siege, Diebold Schilling, 15th Century
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Diebold_schilling_pikemen_from_zurich.jpg
Note, plate armor nearly universal, guns and pikes.

Militia from Berne, Zug, Uri, Schwyz and Zurich praying again after another battle, 15th Century.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8e/Schilling_Spiezer_Chronik_17.jpg/439px-Schilling_Spiezer_Chronik_17.jpg
Note plate armor and longsword sidearms (usually associated with knights) seem to be universal.



Now according to my sources, in Central and Northern Europe, individual members of the militia were required to own both arms and armor by the town ordinances, and also by their guilds (since the guilds usually formed the core of the infantry and often some of the cavalry too - the Butchers of Rostock for example were required to own warhorses as well). I think the guild connection is particularly significant as regards training, though I'll get to that in another post. But we have guild regulations from Flanders in the 13th Century (the oldest I have is from the skinners guild of Arras in 1236) stipulating that all guild members must have specific armor and weapons.

Even in rural militia in many areas, not just weapons but armor was required by all free men. For example the original Law of the Gulating, in Norway, required arms only in the 11th Century, but by the 12th Century the Law had been updated to include "helmet, mail hauberk, shield, spear and sword" for the wealthier peasants and all burghers.

From what I understand it was the same in Italy by the time of the formation of the Lombard League. The regulations of those fighting guilds in Bologna that I linked upthread required armor, bucklers, weapons (spears and swords) from all their members, and in some case horses as well (for the more affluent).

Crosbows, similarly, were ubiquitious particularly in urban militias. In Flanders like in Bologna, they had specific military guilds which were formed to augment the town defenses. The first two on record were the Guild of St. George (in Ghent and then Bruges) which was a crossbow guild, and the guild of St. Sebastian which was an archers guild (the Flemish used English style longbows). These date back to the mid -13th Century. In the 14th Century the St. Michels Guild was formed, and a second St. George guild for the new type of crossbows, and then in the 15th Century the St. Barbara's guild was formed for firearms.

The Swiss are of course, famous for their crossbows, as were the Czechs, and the Germans. Tactical Crossbow training even shows up in some German fencing manuals from the 15th century

http://www.marbles.frothersunite.com/imag/phpBB2/MTDXbow.jpg

http://198.58.99.35/wiktenauer/images/3/39/Cod.icon._394a_135r.jpg

http://198.58.99.35/wiktenauer/images/b/b6/Cod.icon._394a_135v.jpg

http://198.58.99.35/wiktenauer/images/2/23/Cod.icon._394a_136r.jpg

In fact I think it's clear that far from falling behind military technology and tactics, the urban miltiias tended to be major innovators of both, setting shockwaves through Eurpean history and carving out crucial landmarks in the development of hand to hand weapons (like the Flemish Godendag (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goedendag), mentioned above, the Swiss Halberd, the Czech war-flail, and the Swiss pike), crossbows (which were vastly improved by the Genoese, the Swiss, the Czechs who were I think the first to make large scale use of mounted crossbowmen, and the Flemish who were the first to use steel prods), firearms and cannon (both vastly improved by the Czechs), and complex combined-arms systems, some of which are barely known in the English speaking world, like the Hussite style war-wagon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_wagon), which turned out to be particularly decisive against the Turks, as well as confounding to the German and Western Knights; and the pike / halberd and crossbow tactics developed by the Swiss as just two examples.

So in light of all this, I think the argument that militias couldn't handle more sophisticated weapons, or armor, or tactics, is bogus. If some or all the urban miltiias in Italy got to the point where they couldn't handle these things, I suspect it means something else was going on. Either factional disputes or too much pressure from outside or the Signore system and loss of citizen autonomy or some other factor. Too much olive oil in their diet ;)

But to be honest I'm actually fairly dubious it was such a factor in Italy, I think the popular narrative about this is off and probably based on some very old data.

G



As Galloglaich has pointed out advanced weapons and armour were in the end a requirement for the militias in the different cities in Flanders, keep in mind that Flanders was in the time period obscenely rich and that for instance Brugge (Bruges I think in English) was nicknamed the Venice of the North with its own fleet.

This only declined when the Spanish pretty much smashed any and all potential enemies down to the bedrock (where we get the split between what is now Belgium and the Netherlands from) to stop the continual uprisings.

The resources that France, Austria-Hungary, Spain and several other wanna be rulers of this region spend on keeping order ended up being quite influential on the decline of said states.

France for example had more troops fighting in Flanders (recorded by both French and local sources, not just by the 'victors' like for a certain Anglo-French battle...) then they had against their traditional enemy England.

One of the emperors of Austria-Hungary has been quite famous locally for having said that Flanders was the death of him to the representatives that were send to him to negotiate a cease-fire on his deathbed.

That last bit however could be romantiscised of course.

Berenger
2012-10-20, 07:13 PM
I was answering to a post from Beleriphon, but this post seems to be gone? :smallconfused:

Beleriphon
I think the image of the unarmed rabble being completely over run by an armed group of attackers is what's being asked. In essence would a 12th century German village be able to effectively defend themselves from an armed group of attackers?



In 12th century germany, there are incredibly huge differences depending on time, place, ruler and political / military context.

In ancient times, all free german men were required by law to keep weapons for the purpose of defending their community. This changed with the advance of feudalism and serfdom, which, at least in theory, involved servitude to a lord as a trade-off for military protection provided by said lord an his men. For villagers, this "taming" removed the need or even right to bear arms, thus retarding their military ability. Note that it took until well after the Thirty Years' War of 1618-1648 (during which groups of desperate peasants banded together and butchered entire platoons of marauding mercenaries) until serfdom was completely established throughout all of germany. Also note that (free) cities are very different from villages.


Off the top of my head, I think there were at least three types of peasants / villagers (in matters of military strength) in the 12th century:


1. Wehrbauern (~defending peasants, not to be confused with the nazi attempt to revive that concept)

Mostly colonists near hostile borders, these men have the right and duty to keep weapons. Many have a military background of some kind. In case of an attack, it is their express purpose to defend their territory until their liege assembles a more powerful force. I guess this involves the defense of fortified places and skirmishing.


2. Freisassen (~yeomanry)

Those are free men possessing property, often in wild, untamed regions and independend from a lord protecting them. As such, they should have a vested interest in defending themselves. I would expect a well-off estate to have some weapons or dangerous implements such as axes or hunting bows and at least a handful men of age ready to use them in an emergency.


3. Leibeigene (~bond-slaves)

Generally speaking the most defenseless group, if their lord for whatever reason neglects his duty to protect them. They are often quite poor and have to work hard, so they have little resources to spend on proper weapons or training to use them.

Knaight
2012-10-20, 07:51 PM
A point that hasn't been made is that raid results are going to be lopsided towards raiders in most cases regardless of results for a few reasons. The obvious one is that raiders generally pick their targets, which means that the presence of particularly strong villages or towns isn't always all that relevant, as those would be the places they don't generally attack (there are obvious exceptions here, such as the various attacks on Constantinople). Instead, you would usually see softer targets picked - in the late early to central middle ages, this meant Magyar attacks on central villages, Viking attacks that often focused on monasteries (which were often coastal, relatively poorly defended, and full of lucre), and general Mediterranean piracy and coastal attacks away from more militarized areas. Similarly, raiders generally have the advantage of surprise. This counts for quite a bit, to the point where forces that were generally technologically and numerically inferior would have had an advantage provided that the margins were small. Disorganized people not expecting an attack tend not to do the best defending against them for a lot of reasons - local numerical inferiority, the general uselessness of armor when you aren't actually wearing it, etc. Then, on top of this, there is the matter of where the "barbarians" were coming from and who they were. The Vikings had impressive metallurgy, high grade weapons, a decent amount of armor, and essentially unrivaled ships for most of the second age of invasions. The Magyar had high quality horses and generally better horse related technology, good bows, and effective raiding parties. Most of those pirates were coming from lands controlled by the Ummayad or Abbasid Caliphates, depending on period. These were regional superpowers that generally put the Byzantine empire to shame, let alone western Europe.

The point is this - even a lot of well armed, fairly well trained people could fall comparatively easily, due to the nature of raiding in general and the nature of the particular raiders. The presence of successful raids, massacres, etc. by no means indicates that the targets of them were incompetent, or that they would have much issue dealing with the raid on better terms (if, for instance, they were on the attack).

Storm Bringer
2012-10-21, 03:29 AM
That does bring up a good question. If a village was threatened, how able would they be to defend themselves? I don't imagine they'd have many weapons which aren't improvised. One of the main factors would be how organized a village is capable of becoming against the attack.

I think the key is to understand the preditor mindset of raiders, which would, as pointed out, avoid "hard" targets, in the same way a loin will not attack prey that can fight back if easier targets are available. A village would rely on three things:

1) an alert watchkeeter of some sort to provide warning.

2) an overt appearance of readyness to scare off the raiders

3) a easy to access, defenedable location, like a tower house (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_house)or fortifed farmstead (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastle_house), where most valueable goods were stored and which, while not able to stop a determined attack, would make storming it (and the getting the goods inside) far to diffcult for the raiders.


the aim is too be to much effort to take, as the raidesr won't waste time on a hard target.

Galloglaich
2012-10-21, 06:19 PM
I was answering to a post from Beleriphon, but this post seems to be gone? :smallconfused:

I'm glad you rewrote it, because I just want to say, this is a great post.




In 12th century germany, there are incredibly huge differences depending on time, place, ruler and political / military context.

In ancient times, all free german men were required by law to keep weapons for the purpose of defending their community. This changed with the advance of feudalism and serfdom, which, at least in theory, involved servitude to a lord as a trade-off for military protection provided by said lord an his men. For villagers, this "taming" removed the need or even right to bear arms, thus retarding their military ability. Note that it took until well after the Thirty Years' War of 1618-1648 (during which groups of desperate peasants banded together and butchered entire platoons of marauding mercenaries) until serfdom was completely established throughout all of germany. Also note that (free) cities are very different from villages.

Yep...and there were also a lot of smaller towns (mediatstadt) which were kind of in between. For example, check out this wonderful map of Silesia drawn by Martin Helwig's in 1561

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Helwig-Silesia.jpg

Click here for more detail:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/29/Landkarte_von_Schlesien.jpg

There is one 'big' town on that map, Breslau (now and aka Wroclaw) which was essentially a free city, that turned out to have near impregnable defenses. But the dozens of other settlements shown on that corner of the map like the wonderfully named 'monsterburg' and 'frankenstein' are small towns or villages incorporated with castles which in both cases did have some fortifications and defensive abilities, (since Silesia was a dangerous frontier area) but often only the citadels and the big free cities could resist major invasions.



Off the top of my head, I think there were at least three types of peasants / villagers (in matters of military strength) in the 12th century:


1. Wehrbauern (~defending peasants, not to be confused with the nazi attempt to revive that concept)

Mostly colonists near hostile borders, these men have the right and duty to keep weapons. Many have a military background of some kind. In case of an attack, it is their express purpose to defend their territory until their liege assembles a more powerful force. I guess this involves the defense of fortified places and skirmishing.

Moving especially into the 13th -15th Centuries you would see more and more of these kinds of peasants brought into basically the entire eastern half of Germany and in large numbers into the Eastern Central European regions like Silesia, Poland, Prussia, the Baltic areas (Livonia), Czech, Hungary and etc. Events like Mongol invasions starting in the 1240's would leave large areas depopulated, tougher peasants were lured from places like Saxony and Swabia (and also from Slavic zones like Bohemia and Poland, and even further afield such as Sweden and Flanders) with special offers of rights and land grands (no money down! First year interest free!)

These folks ended up being pretty tough, but relied both on fortifying their towns and on natural defenses such as forests, hills, and rivers (many settlements were made on river islands)

Another way they survived during times of real danger, which I think gamers should generally find very interesting, are so called Earth-stalls or Erdstall. Don't have time to get all into it but I recommend further research

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erdstall

https://www.google.com/search?q=erdstall&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=C4KEUKHSOqWO2QW5uoDYDg&biw=1366&bih=577&sei=M4KEUJzpKeTc2AWO1IDYDg



2. Freisassen (~yeomanry)

Those are free men possessing property, often in wild, untamed regions and independend from a lord protecting them. As such, they should have a vested interest in defending themselves. I would expect a well-off estate to have some weapons or dangerous implements such as axes or hunting bows and at least a handful men of age ready to use them in an emergency.

The Teutonic Knights made use of a lot of men like this in Prussia, Livonia and surrounding areas.



3. Leibeigene (~bond-slaves)

Generally speaking the most defenseless group, if their lord for whatever reason neglects his duty to protect them. They are often quite poor and have to work hard, so they have little resources to spend on proper weapons or training to use them.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/ff/Hausbuch_Wolfegg_13r_Mars.jpg/358px-Hausbuch_Wolfegg_13r_Mars.jpg

An example of a typical raid on a more or less defenseless village from 1480, but it probably holds true for 1180 as well. Note that most of the villagers are holding out in the church ... usually whatever stone or brick buildings like the church or the granary doubled as a fort.

G

Galloglaich
2012-10-22, 10:42 AM
Fusilier, I think you have the answers right in front of you, if you'll just look at the data without preconceptions.



Once companies were well established entities, the 14th century was known as the time of the great companies, they would typically overwinter at some place they conquered, and then see who wanted to hire them in the Spring.

I think if you look deeper into this you will find that the condotierri companies shrank dramatically (as in 90% or more in most cases) in size during the Winter season, (sometimes before the fall harvest) and most of the warriors filtered away to their homes and to other places. Most contracts for ordinary soldiers were for short terms, one or at the most three seasons. I have information on such contracts from Swiss and south German (Swabian) sources. The process would reverse in the spring as warriors would be re-hired.



Where I would say "soldiers," you say "warriors." To me this is a potentially fundamental disagreement. In my mind warriors are individuals who fight as individuals. Soldiers, band together into units and fight as part of a larger whole. It's not a difference in physical presence, but in mentality. So to me, part of being a good soldier has a lot to do with understanding drills and tactics, and individual prowess with a particular weapon (or weapons) is a secondary consideration. For a warrior it would be reversed -- individual prowess with a weapon is the primary focus.

I chose my words carefully. Soldier implies a true professional working for a State, such as you really didn't see on a large scale in Europe (outside of Byzantium) until after 1648, and arguably not until the French revolution. Both mercenaries and militia are distinct from soldiers, per se, though there was some overlap in well organized States like France or the Venetian Republic. Most militia and part time mercenaries of course did have excellent understanding of drills and tactics, this is in fact one of the main things you and I have been arguing about.



They note that the early condottiere were assumed to be trained, experience men, because they were typically veterans of other wars. (snip) It also stated that they preferred to hire soldiers who at least some training. In the case of crossbowmen, places like Venice and Genova would certainly be good places to recruit, because everybody was required to train with a crossbow.


In the early days of mercenaries throughout Europe, the standard for recruiting was that someone showed up with a weapon and armor. You could not generally carry weapons and armor unless you had the Right to use them, and if you had the Right, you were assumed (not always correctly) to have the necessary skill. In the second part of your statement above, you basically hit upon the point that I've been making all along. Yes they hired crossbowmen from places like Venice and Genoa (and Pisa, and Padua, and Brescia, and Berne and Zurich and Augsburg and Stuttgart and so on) because they were trained in the militia. Militia training was the basis for training most 'soldiers' and mercenaries. It was the same for pikemen, swordsmen and halberdiers.

You have made the assumption that combat experience is the only thing that really made for quality troops - if that was true Somali's would be the best infantry on the planet. But there is clearly also a training component, and we know for a fact that could be extremely effective, or else we would not see stunning victories of relatively inexperienced militias against knights and mercenaries so often, like the Battle of Legnano (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Legnano) or Golden spurs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Golden_Spurs) or Morgarten (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_morgarten) or Kutna hora (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kutna_Hora)

The interesting question is how were they trained? The truth is, we don't really know that much detail yet, but we have a hint in the existence of special fighting guilds like the ones I mentioned in Flanders and Bologna (whose statutes I posted upthread), and later on, the famous Marxbruder (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxbruder) and Federfechter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federfechter) of Germany and Czech, who we know used to certify Dopplesoldner (double-pay) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doppels%C3%B6ldner) mercenaries for the Landsknecht companies.

I think I've already posted in this thread some images of craftsmen who were also Landsknechts, which was usually the case in fact.



What do you mean by popular narrative? (snip)
What I've been presenting is, to the best of my knowledge, the "current" narrative. As for being based on "very old data" -- well, if by that you mean a careful study of the period sources and archives, then yes! ;-) If you mean that more current research has overturned the narrative -- then I'm more than willing to look at that research.

Pictures of battles don't really constitute a detailed study. I wish I could find a copy of Mallett's and Hale's book on Venice, as that sounds like its a more detailed study of a state which even Mallett claims benefitted from the best trained militia in Italy (supporting its mercenary armies).

One of the really important things that has changed in the last 30 years is that we now know a great deal more about actual armor, weapons, and martial arts today than we did then.

30 years ago even in Academia there was still a great deal of mythology about 200 lbs armor and 10 lbs semi-blunt swords, wielded with crude bashing and hacking (since virtually nobody had any idea of the existence of European Martial Arts). Now thanks to the efforts of guys like Alan Williams on armor, Ewart Oakeshott (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ewart_Oakeshott) on swords and Sydney Anglo and various others on Medieval fencing manuals - we have a much more realistic idea of what Medieval and Renaissance combat was actually like.

From some of the comments that you summarized here I think it's quite clear that Mallett was unaware of some of these realities.

There have also been a lot of detailed studies, archival evidence and even archeological field work done on many major Medieval battles since the 1980s which have greatly expanded our general understanding since that time.

As for pictures not giving us a detailed study, with the exception of that one image of urban strife from Bologna, all of the battles I linked images to are very well understood now and I have plenty of source material on them, just let me know if you want more detail or challenge the narrative of any of them and I'll be glad to provide it.



This is interesting for something I just came across last night -- for most of the 14th century, the militia in Italian armies was called up first, and only if the war or campaign bogged down would they turn to hiring mercenary companies. (That's not to say however, that there were no mercenaries involved in the opening stages of campaigns, as small mercenary companies or individually hired mercenaries were still common, just that the bulk of the army remained militia).

Here again, I think the reality is right in front of your nose. Yes they used the militia by preference, because it was better trusted. In a longer campaign, particularly a siege, they would hire more mercenaries for this simple reason: the town could not afford large casualties from their militias, since the militias were the skilled craftsmen and merchants of the town itself, and if they died in large numbers, the town would be mortally wounded. Long sieges were very deadly due to disease, primarily, outbreaks of plague were common and by the turn of the 16th Century a whole host of new foreign diseases (from syphilis to Typhoid fever) added to the danger. So for a rich town it becomes an obvious choice to hire mercenaries instead.


G

fusilier
2012-10-22, 03:46 PM
Well, I assumed it was an associated device since Italy is the only place I know of where they pulled war wagons with oxen.

As for the rest of it on #4, I think you and I just need to disagree. I think it's patently obvious that not only miltiias could handle technology and new tactics, they actually introduced probably at least half of the most important military innovations of the 14th-16th Centuries, both in terms of equipment (I mentioned several specific examples, though I could elaborate further, I didn't think it was necessary) and tactics (same).

Furthermore, if Mallet thinks plate armor or heavy crossbows were somehow new to the world during the rise of the Conditerri, I think he's lacking in basic understanding of war in that period at the individual / micro-level (which wouldn't be unusual).

By "old data" I mean, that guy published in an era in which a lot of the military history is now considered dated by Academia, but I'm not an expert on Italy by a long shot and I'm not about to start a crash course on it. If you really want some other books to read there are some classics and a lot of new work, I could ask a buddy who is an expert to recommend some things.

G

While, his work may be a bit dated -- you haven't really refuted anything with data. It appears that you just have a different "impression" of things.

As for condottiere companies shrinking, that trend was gone by the 15th century. The contracts were too long-term to allow it to happen, and the increasingly frequency of mercenaries being activated during the winter season would have made it impractical. I'll have to go through Mallett with a fine toothed comb, I have vague memories of some examples of captains being fined for failing to maintain the contracted number of mercenaries.

You are correct, that experience can be trumped up by tactics and numbers -- but the condottiere period allowed the mercenaries to develop pretty sophisticated tactics. And in a sense, it's that *experience*, that allows experimentation with different tactics.

As for weapons -- I think you may have misinterpreted what I said about them. Most importantly I still get the feeling that you believe the only thing that matters with a weapon is personal prowess -- at which point you would be right, militia could handle the weapons just as well as mercenaries.

As for his data about weapons being outdated, it's not really evident, because those details don't bear too much on the discussion. I.e. Condottiere used field artillery, crossbows, handguns, and their heavy cavalry was very well armored. If you want to quibble over weather or not militia cavalry could be just as well armored as a mercenary company, then fine. It doesn't detract from the overall argument, that the Condottiere were experimenting with new weapons, which the militias certainly would have access to, and new tactics.

Finally, if militia could could be on par with mercenaries, why would Venice -- who are generally agreed to have some of the best trained militia -- have hired mercenary infantry on long term contracts?

From an academia standpoint, I know of no better work on the subject. If you have something to recommend, or can dig something up, I would be most interested. It's possible that new information may state that the militia impact on Italian warfare was larger in the mid-15th century than previously thought, and that the militia was very capable. But, so far, I haven't been able to find anything to that effect, and Mallet's research is very thorough.

Raum
2012-10-22, 05:32 PM
Finally, if militia could could be on par with mercenaries, why would Venice -- who are generally agreed to have some of the best trained militia -- have hired mercenary infantry on long term contracts?
There are lots of potential reasons to use mercenaries - you may not want to risk your own citizens, you may simply not be able to afford the economic cost of having a large portion of your work force gone for an extended period, you may not have one or more specialty troops (cavalry, siege engineers, etc), or you may simply need more troops than you have.

On the flip side, permanent professional armies have almost always been better than militia. It's the difference between making a living at something and doing it part time.

I don't know the era well enough to have a strong opinion on which may have been better - but even if they were equal they might still have hired mercenaries.

fusilier
2012-10-22, 05:59 PM
There are lots of potential reasons to use mercenaries - you may not want to risk your own citizens, you may simply not be able to afford the economic cost of having a large portion of your work force gone for an extended period, you may not have one or more specialty troops (cavalry, siege engineers, etc), or you may simply need more troops than you have.

Oh yes. There are plenty of reasons. One of them is that the militia may not be able to stay in the field for too long (before it starts to hurt the livelihoods of the militia members, and potentially the economy of the state).

But there was something that changed in Italy starting around the 13th century, and maturing by the 15th. Venice, which maintained and trained its militia to much higher standard, still found it necessary to employ mercenaries -- and these were year round mercenaries, not just the ones hired for a particular campaign.


On the flip side, permanent professional armies have almost always been better than militia. It's the difference between making a living at something and doing it part time.

I don't know the era well enough to have a strong opinion on which may have been better - but even if they were equal they might still have hired mercenaries.

The first part is really what Mallett's work drives at. The Condottiere system in Italy was one where temporary mercenary service evolved into permanent professional armies. The evolution wasn't that straight-forward, and there would obviously be intermediate stages. But the Condottiere gradually became more and more like professional permanent soldiers. Mallett considers their development over the period to be a key in understanding how professional armies developed.

As for the second part. Yes. Sometimes just to bolster the number of forces, or to make it easier to maintain a long campaign. But, by the fifteenth century, the mercenaries (in Italy) were making up the bulk of the forces, and they were the lead -- militia might be raised to bolster a mercenary army, rather than the other way around.

Traab
2012-10-22, 09:08 PM
Hacking and stabbing shield's replicas suggest that it's indeed the case.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeBPDVfi_DI

Given the way thin planks of wood tend to behave, it's not surprising at all.

If somebody wanted to give a good hit to the shield, he certainly had to be vary of possibility that his edge will get stopped.

As far as metal shields go, main problem is big expense of metal, so weren't generally considered worthwhile trough most of the shields history, until state of metallurgical industry made them more accessible.

They will also tend to end heavy for the size, steel is dense, and must still have proper thickness and bulk to not bend to easily.

When it comes to metal versus wood shields, wouldnt longevity play a role as well in their buying decisions? I mean, wooden shields from all I have seen tend to take damage much easier than metal shields. As has been stated, they may even be designed to do so in order to trap weapons in them. But metal shields are more durable. Harder to penetrate, break, or even deform, so while you might go through several wooden shields over the course of a campaign, a single metal shield would seem more likely to last you the entire time.

I know, we hate deadliest warriors, but thats what made this thought pop into my head. Samurai versus viking, the kanabo smashed the viking shield. Samurai versus spartan. He took a few really solid whacks, and barely dimpled the shield at all. It was still fully functional despite taking MASSIVE psi impacts. I guess to me it feels like making a choice between buying a cheap used car or buying a new car. The cheapo is cheap and easy to pay for sure, but its going to break down much faster and more often than a brand new car would. The new car costs way more, but its the only car you will likely need for the next decade or so.

Same for shields. That wood shield is going to break on you. Probably every time you go into battle, (Or maybe not, im not certain how fragile they are) But metal shields would be able to take far more punishment and last longer between replacements.

Thiel
2012-10-23, 02:40 AM
As I understand it wooden shields were largely considered discardable.
They were cheap enough that the average soldier/warrior could afford to go through several in a campaign.
Also, I suspect wooden shield were a great deal tougher than DW makes them out to be. If not then I doubt wooden shields would have seen much use in melee at all since every dude with a big club, quite probably the most common weapon in history, would wade through them.

Spiryt
2012-10-23, 03:26 AM
I know, we hate deadliest warriors, but thats what made this thought pop into my head. Samurai versus viking, the kanabo smashed the viking shield. Samurai versus spartan. He took a few really solid whacks, and barely dimpled the shield at all. It was still fully functional despite taking MASSIVE psi impacts. I guess to me it feels like making a choice between buying a cheap used car or buying a new car. The cheapo is cheap and easy to pay for sure, but its going to break down much faster and more often than a brand new car would. The new car costs way more, but its the only car you will likely need for the next decade or so.

Same for shields. That wood shield is going to break on you. Probably every time you go into battle, (Or maybe not, im not certain how fragile they are) But metal shields would be able to take far more punishment and last longer between replacements.

Dunno what was DW take on this, but "Spartans" definitely used wooden shields though. A lot of them had thin layer of Bronze on it, but it was definitely wooden construction.

Anyway, for majority of shield users over the history, there wasn't any choice like that, simply because they didn't have access to any actually metal shields. At least bigger than buckler.

Like mentioned, it was Early Renaissance invention.

Wooden shields can be made in various amount of ways, from various woods and to be of different bulk, so it all will affect their function.

Roman scuta were pretty expensive pieces, carefully constructed, rather heavy, and they were indeed expected to last a while - carried in sheaths, and so on.

A lot of Dark Age shields that were found indeed appear to be designed as very disposable - take a few arrows and whacks, and take new shield.



Harder to penetrate, break, or even deform

Well, actually, thin metal 'bowls' will tend to deform, so Full Metal Shields probably weren't above certain size for that reason. To keep weight realistic as well.

Galloglaich
2012-10-23, 09:41 AM
While, his work may be a bit dated -- you haven't really refuted anything with data. It appears that you just have a different "impression" of things.

I pointed out, with facts, that his theory that "armor and crossbows" made war too complex for militias was patently ridiculous. I think this was broad enough of a hole in his argument (the principle one that you quoted) that I didn't need to elaborate further, but I can if you want.


As for condottiere companies shrinking, that trend was gone by the 15th century. (snip), I have vague memories of some examples of captains being fined for failing to maintain the contracted number of mercenaries.

If they got fined, one assumes there was a reason...



You are correct, that experience can be trumped up by tactics and numbers -

No- you are missing the point. Experience can be trumped by technology, training and esprit de corps, as the militia of the Flemish, the Germans, the Swiss and the Czechs repeatedly proved. And as did the Venetians and the Italians of the Lombard League and many others.



- but the condottiere period allowed the mercenaries to develop pretty sophisticated tactics. And in a sense, it's that *experience*, that allows experimentation with different tactics.

In some cases yes it does, but quite often experimentation with different tactics comes from training, which happens with militias as often or more often than with mercenaries. See below. Familiarity with new weapon technologies also tends to come from the places where the technology is itself produced. For example in the Medieval period the best armor, and most of the better quality armor used throughout Europe, came from Augsburg, Milan, and Brescia. So militias from these areas knew how to use the stuff. The best fighting ships came from Venice, which similarly gave them a major advantage in naval warfare. And so on.



As for weapons -- I think you may have misinterpreted what I said about them. Most importantly I still get the feeling that you believe the only thing that matters with a weapon is personal prowess -- at which point you would be right, militia could handle the weapons just as well as mercenaries.

The only way you could have this feeling is if you didn't read all my other posts, let alone follow all the links and so on. I don't necessarily blame you, they were long and we don't agree on just about any of this so you probably didn't want to read it. But you are once again completely missing the point as a result.

I mentioned personal weapon training as one aspect of understanding of Medieval Warfare that Mallett obviously didn't understand, (and contrary to your assertion, the effectiveness and weight and so on of armor and crossbows and guns and swords does matter on a larger scale because these things do percolate up - and these are things - the weight of armor- that you and Mallett mentioned) and which has changed dramatically since his era. But it's only one of several things that have in terms of our understanding. I already pointed out at length the major tactical and operational innovations of the militias during the Medieval period, which you seem to have glossed over or ignored.

But regarding armor, maybe Mallett thought it was too much for militias because he thought it weighed a lot more than it did.



As for his data about weapons being outdated, it's not really evident, because those details don't bear too much on the discussion. (snip) It doesn't detract from the overall argument, that the Condottiere were experimenting with new weapons, which the militias certainly would have access to, and new tactics.

As I've pointed out repeatedly, militias pioneered many if not most of the principle military tactical innovations of the late Medieval period, including but not limited to, halberd squares (the Swiss) pike squares (the Swiss) firearms (the Czechs) gun wagons (the Czechs) field howitzers (the Czechs) and the most sophisticated tactics of integrating crossbows with heavy infantry, which you alluded to (via Mallett) several times upthread, were pioneered by the Genoese, the Flemish, the Swiss, and the Czechs. Militias.

As for cavalry, I've pointed out several times that militias tended to make good infantry, often the best available - whereas the best cavalry comes from the Feudal Aristocracy. It's always been that way, going back to Alexander.



Finally, if militia could could be on par with mercenaries, why would Venice -- who are generally agreed to have some of the best trained militia -- have hired mercenary infantry on long term contracts?

If they weren't, why did you yourself say that Venice used the militia first, and usually brought in the mercenaries after the war 'bogged down' as you put it (i.e. in most cases, became a siege)? And you are continually skipping the other point I've repeatedly raised, that mercenaries were most often themselves raised directly from militias. The Venetians as case in point relied heavily on militia from Albania, Croatia, (the Dalmatian Coast) including the famous Schiavoni who comprised the bodyguard of the Doge of Venice. And further afield, German and Czech miltiia such as comprized the bulk of the Venetian financed Hungarian Black Army.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Army_of_Hungary

which brings me to the second part of my point. Yes Venice relied heavily on a permanent force of mercenaries, because Venice controlled half of the Balkans and the Eastern Mediterranean at various times. They were one (by todays standards) very small city with a heavily engaged manufacturing sector they could not afford to disrupt (since their wealth came from trade and manufacturing) including a 3,000 ship fleet, and they had to garrison hundreds of islands and fortifications from Italy all the way to the Black Sea. Genoa faced the same problem, incidentaly.

You seem to think Venice was limiting their activity to the Italian peninsula, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth - they had a huge Empire to maintain. For example note this map:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e1/Late_Medieval_Trade_Routes.jpg/800px-Late_Medieval_Trade_Routes.jpg

The Venetian trade routes are in blue and purple. Many of these bases you see the Venetians landing were permanent Venetian outposts. I'll list a few

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corfu#Venetian_rule

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Ragusa#Venetian_suzerainty_.281205.E2. 80.931358.29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canea#The_Venetian_era

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crete#Venetian_rule

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famagusta#Medieval_Famagusta.2C_1192-1571

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyprus#Middle_Ages

Most of the major Islands in the Eastern Mediterranean (like Crete and Cyprus) and a great deal of the land in what is now Greece, Croatia and Serbia were at one time or another under the control of Venice, and they (Venice) had military outposts and trade missions much further afield, as far as the Crimea and deep into the Black Sea, the Middle East and Persia. It was the same for Genoa. In short, they controlled the equivalent territory of a large Kingdom, so they obviously needed more military manpower than they could supply out of the militia of one town.



From an academia standpoint, I know of no better work on the subject. If you have something to recommend, or can dig something up, I would be most interested. It's possible that new information may state that the militia impact on Italian warfare was larger in the mid-15th century than previously thought, and that the militia was very capable. But, so far, I haven't been able to find anything to that effect, and Mallet's research is very thorough.

You keep trying to bring it back to this, but I am not focused on the Italian Condottieri, I have my hands full with the other research I'm doing right now. I do however have several sources on Swiss and Czech militia and the Landsknechts, including first-hand accounts and primary sources if you want me to recommend some of those I can. But for the time-being my interests lie north of the Alps.

G

Voyd211
2012-10-23, 09:51 AM
Besides the obvious course of action known as the bayonet, what would be a practical method of combining a melee weapon with a firearm? I have essentially the Book of Armaments, and most of the combination weapons shown were showpieces and probably wouldn't work as martial weapons.

Yora
2012-10-23, 10:06 AM
Many thrown weapons can also be used by keeping them in the hand. Otherwise I don't really see any practical applications.
Close combat weapons come in two types: bashing as stabbing. When it's about life and death, risking your ranged weapon getting damaged by hitting an attacker in the head is a worth risk. But since ranged combat is always preferable to hand to hand combat, I think it very doubtful that anyone would make a ranged weapon more difficult to hold and aim for the sake of making it a better club. The alternative is poking someone with the weapon, which is covered by the bayonet.

Spiryt
2012-10-23, 11:10 AM
Besides the obvious course of action known as the bayonet, what would be a practical method of combining a melee weapon with a firearm? I have essentially the Book of Armaments, and most of the combination weapons shown were showpieces and probably wouldn't work as martial weapons.

Renaissance arsenals and museums are full of gun-axes, shields with guns, guns with maces, morningstars with guns, sabres with guns and all other crazy stuff.

The question is obviosuly how practical those things were, and how widely used - the answer is probably "not very".

Most of them are rather ornate and all, being probably rich man toy that could very well be useful for self-defense in some unexpected situation.

http://www.myarmoury.com/feature_spot_combo.html



. But since ranged combat is always preferable to hand to hand combat, I think it very doubtful that anyone would make a ranged weapon more difficult to hold and aim for the sake of making it a better club.

Even deep into the age of guns, ranged combat was still very often not considered 'superior' to melee - with proper ways, one could still inflict severe losses and rout with hand to hand combat.

Galloglaich
2012-10-23, 02:29 PM
There are lots of potential reasons to use mercenaries - you may not want to risk your own citizens, you may simply not be able to afford the economic cost of having a large portion of your work force gone for an extended period,

I think this bears repeating, it's the principle point. These towns were not that big, and the militia often included many of their most prominent citizens, their merchants in the cavalry and their skilled craftsmen in the infantry. If a town of 10,000 people deploys 2,000 militia and loses half of them to dysentery in a siege, they have just lost 10% of their economy, and probably the most productive 10%.


you may not have one or more specialty troops (cavalry, siege engineers, etc), or you may simply need more troops than you have.

I think it was kind of the opposite. They had a lot of speciality troops in the sense of siege engineers and the like, (though not as much cavalry) but what they lacked was cannon fodder, for the reasons you referred to above.

To underscore this, some facts: we have detailed records of the muster of a small army from the German city of Regensburg which went on campaign in 1431. The force consisted of 73 horsemen, 71 crossbowmen, 16 handgunners, and a mixed group of smiths, leatherworkers, a chaplain, pike-makers, tailors, cooks, and butchers, for 248 men in total.

This small force had a large number of supplies:

They brought 6 cannon, 300 lbs of cannonballs and 200 lbs of lead shot. Forty one wagons carried powder and lead, 6,000 crossbow bolts, 300 fire-bolts, 19 handguns, cowhides, tents, and horse fodder for six weeks. Supplies for the 248 men included ninety head of oxen, 900 lbs of cooked meat, 900 lbs of lard, 1200 pieces of cheese, 80 stock-fish, 56 lbs of uncut candles, vinegar, olive oil, pepper, saffron, ginger, 2 tuns and 73 “kilderkins” of Austrian wine, and 138 “kilderkins” of beer. The total cost of this campaign was 838 guilders. The source for this is the Osprey book German Medieval Armies, page 10.

This small, very well supplied force then merged with two other larger forces consisting of peasant levies and mercenaries, to the tune of about 1,000 more troops, mostly armed with polearms and lighter crossbows. This is a good example of how a hard core of militia, which had plenty well-trained, well-equipped specialists, a lot of times was fleshed out with more warm bodies.

Of course the opposite did also sometimes happen where the towns provided the 'cannon fodder' and the mercenaries or nobility supplied the specialists, particularly cavalry. These types of scenarios usually happened when the town was the lesser partner in a given alliance. But for the towns themselves, to the extent that they were in control of a given campaign, it was much more in their interests to try to get the most out of their expertise and special equipment, while reducing the risk to their population and therefore economy as possible.

G

fusilier
2012-10-23, 04:53 PM
I pointed out, with facts, that his theory that "armor and crossbows" made war too complex for militias was patently ridiculous. I think this was broad enough of a hole in his argument (the principle one that you quoted) that I didn't need to elaborate further, but I can if you want.

And I've repeatedly pointed out -- it didn't make war "too complex" for the militias, but it gave the Condottieri an advantage. That advantage was one that came from spending more time training tactics with mixed arms.




If they got fined, one assumes there was a reason...

Yes, but the statistics showed that they weren't missing 90% of their men. The most egregious offenders were down only about 25%, and they were considered to be exceptional. For the most part the contracts were being honored.




No- you are missing the point. Experience can be trumped by technology, training and esprit de corps, as the militia of the Flemish, the Germans, the Swiss and the Czechs repeatedly proved. And as did the Venetians and the Italians of the Lombard League and many others.

So only militia could have access to training? That's my point. The Condottiere spent a lot of time training -- they could afford to do so, because increasingly their contracts employed them during peacetime.




In some cases yes it does, but quite often experimentation with different tactics comes from training, which happens with militias as often or more often than with mercenaries.

Ah, this is where we are in fundamental disagreements of the facts. But, you have admitted you are not familiar with the Italian campaigns of the time. Mercenaries started to receive more and more training, as their contracts kept them enrolled even in peacetime. That was a major change in the system.

Would you agree that if this were the case, then mercenaries would be better trained than militia?


The only way you could have this feeling is if you didn't read all my other posts, let alone follow all the links and so on. I don't necessarily blame you, they were long and we don't agree on just about any of this so you probably didn't want to read it. But you are once again completely missing the point as a result.

I did read your posts -- what I don't see is how they applied to Italian condottiere of the 15th century.


I mentioned personal weapon training as one aspect of understanding of Medieval Warfare that Mallett obviously didn't understand, (and contrary to your assertion, the effectiveness and weight and so on of armor and crossbows and guns and swords does matter on a larger scale because these things do percolate up - and these are things - the weight of armor- that you and Mallett mentioned) and which has changed dramatically since his era. But it's only one of several things that have in terms of our understanding. I already pointed out at length the major tactical and operational innovations of the militias during the Medieval period, which you seem to have glossed over or ignored.

First, you haven't read Mallet and you are making major assumptions. Crossbowmen could be hired out of the militias, and he flatly states that this was the major source for them. But the difference is the system that they entered.

Second, I've glossed over those developments, because they form the starting point for the condottiere, not a competing system. Sforza tactics involved highly detailed, complicated battle plans with various forces supporting each other in close ways that required lots of practice. Braccesco tactics involved less pre planning but detailed manipulation of forces during battle - rotating troops in and out in small numbers, and also very close coordination between different kinds of troops. Both systems required a high degree of training to be effective. Well timed ambushes and encircling maneuvers led to more prisoners being taken during Italian warfare in the 15th century.

Those tactics are named for famous Condottiere and not urban militias for very good reasons. These are the innovations that Italian mercenaries started to introduce -- innovations that were not matched by the militias, at least not in Italy, including Venice and Genoa.


But regarding armor, maybe Mallett thought it was too much for militias because he thought it weighed a lot more than it did.

I find this to be unlikely, but it is possible. Other authors working at the same time, those who had done even a little research, seem to have had a good idea of the actual weight of armor. Bradford's translation of "The Siege of Malta", from 1965, includes notes that get the weight of armor right, and tries to dissuade the myth that armor was excessively heavy (although he does mention that heat must have been an issue). This research took time to percolate up into popular works, but Mallett was by no means working in the framework of popular works. However, he doesn't mention numbers, and it's possible that he used some outdated ideas about armor.

A proper, complete suit of plate armor would be heavier than a complete suit of chain mail -- correct? Does wearing plate armor (for long periods of time), require more physical conditioning?

Mallett's approach is very systematic. My suspicion is that militia cavalry couldn't afford as many suits of plate armor as mercenary cavlary -- this puts pressure on the system.


As I've pointed out repeatedly, militias pioneered many if not most of the principle military tactical innovations of the late Medieval period, including but not limited to, halberd squares (the Swiss) pike squares (the Swiss) firearms (the Czechs) gun wagons (the Czechs) field howitzers (the Czechs) and the most sophisticated tactics of integrating crossbows with heavy infantry, which you alluded to (via Mallett) several times upthread, were pioneered by the Genoese, the Flemish, the Swiss, and the Czechs. Militias.

That the militias introduced technologies into warfare isn't debated. See above, however, for the complex tactics that developed within the Condottiere. That's where the militias couldn't compete (not well anyway). However, as stated upthread, those complex tactics didn't scale up -- and once you could start putting large number of forces on the field militia effectiveness could become paramount. However, the Italian urban militias could only field very large numbers when they combined together, and that was rare after the 13th century.

The Condottiere style of warfare, refined during the 15th century, ran into problems at the end as large invasions of Italy once again took place. However, they left their mark on the development of warfare and tactics, and Cordoba's use of combined arms at Cerignola can be seen as a further development of Condottiere tactics, modernized, as it were, to the new scale of warfare.


As for cavalry, I've pointed out several times that militias tended to make good infantry, often the best available - whereas the best cavalry comes from the Feudal Aristocracy. It's always been that way, going back to Alexander.

In northern and central Italy, the feudal aristocracy wasn't as strong, so their availability to provide good cavalry was rather diminished. Nevertheless I would still argue that Condottiere cavalry were better, in certain time periods. But we are basically digressing at this point.


If they weren't, why did you yourself say that Venice used the militia first, and usually brought in the mercenaries after the war 'bogged down' as you put it (i.e. in most cases, became a siege)?

The condottiere system developed over time. For most of the fourteenth century the city-states would initially rely upon their militia, and then hire mercenaries as they felt necessary. However, beginning in the second half of the fourteenth century, mercenary contracts started to get longer, and were increasingly renewed. So by the fifteenth century mercenaries were usually in the permanent pay of those states. In the mid 1300s most contracts were 2-3 months, sometimes six months. By the 1440s most Venetian contracts were for two years, plus one year (Italian contracts had an optional period, but by this time it was pro-forma to assume the employer would activate the option). So they had a large mercenary force on hand to initiate campaigns -- and they wanted to get their money's worth.


And you are continually skipping the other point I've repeatedly raised, that mercenaries were most often themselves raised directly from militias. The Venetians as case in point relied heavily on militia from Albania, Croatia, (the Dalmatian Coast) including the famous Schiavoni who comprised the bodyguard of the Doge of Venice. And further afield, German and Czech miltiia such as comprized the bulk of the Venetian financed Hungarian Black Army.

I've been ignoring it, because I'm tired of repeating myself:

They received their tactical training as mercenaries -- that's what set them apart from the militia.

Militia serving as mercenaries for years on end, potentially for various employers, cease being militia in my mind. I've presented the evidence of the long term contracts that they signed with regards to this. While some mercenaries drifted in and out of the system, training with a well accomplished Condottiere would put them apart from other militia.


which brings me to the second part of my point. Yes Venice relied heavily on a permanent force of mercenaries, because Venice controlled half of the Balkans and the Eastern Mediterranean at various times. They were one (by todays standards) very small city with a heavily engaged manufacturing sector they could not afford to disrupt (since their wealth came from trade and manufacturing) including a 3,000 ship fleet, and they had to garrison hundreds of islands and fortifications from Italy all the way to the Black Sea. Genoa faced the same problem, incidentaly.

You seem to think Venice was limiting their activity to the Italian peninsula, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth - they had a huge Empire to maintain. For example note this map:

My focus in on Italy. So it's Venice's actions in Italy that bear on the subject. That's why I've ignored their overseas activities, except when they bear directly on Italian warfare. Venice's militia was probably in better shape, partly because they had a large overseas empire to maintain. The use of mercenaries was common in their major wars in Italy in the 15th century.



You keep trying to bring it back to this, but I am not focused on the Italian Condottieri, I have my hands full with the other research I'm doing right now. I do however have several sources on Swiss and Czech militia and the Landsknechts, including first-hand accounts and primary sources if you want me to recommend some of those I can. But for the time-being my interests lie north of the Alps.

G

My focus is Italy. And I fear that you are being too dismissive of the Italian system, and what information I present, because it doesn't fit with the Northern European narrative.

Conners
2012-10-23, 06:47 PM
How effective are bones for stopping/turning blades? There was a documentary where they noted dented skulls, and that the dents seemed to be from sword-cuts.

gkathellar
2012-10-23, 07:58 PM
Samurai versus viking, the kanabo smashed the viking shield.

I've seen demonstrations of how this is pretty much nonsense, as one can expect from Deadliest Warrior. A respectably made wooden shield is not plywood, it will not shatter easily.


Besides the obvious course of action known as the bayonet, what would be a practical method of combining a melee weapon with a firearm? I have essentially the Book of Armaments, and most of the combination weapons shown were showpieces and probably wouldn't work as martial weapons.

There's not really a whole lot. Melee weapons and ranged weapons tend to have different needs and are designed to endure different stresses. An unstrung bow might serve as a respectable cudgel, and of course the stock of a gun is strong and can endure a lot of impact force, but even in those cases, damage to the weapon remains a possibility.

A bayonet is convenient specifically because you're not introducing much stress that a rifle doesn't undergo already, and because a direct thrusting motion directs most of the stress back into the wielder. That advantage isn't encountered much elsewhere.


How effective are bones for stopping/turning blades? There was a documentary where they noted dented skulls, and that the dents seemed to be from sword-cuts.

Bone is pretty strong! Chopping straight through it requires tremendous force and material hardness. The denser it gets, the stronger it gets, and it tends to be less vulnerable to getting sliced through than it is to impact forces. That said, taking a hit with a blade on your skull or other bone is going to be very painful and probably result in severe injury.

Galloglaich
2012-10-23, 08:01 PM
I already cited 3 year contracts way upthread, though those were not the most common type. Even if they were, three years is hardly a lifetime. It's like a typical military tour today and one tour in the army doesn't make you a hardened professional soldier (I did a tour and I sure ain't one).

I think this boils down to my taking a view of things from beyond Italy, (as well as in Italy), while you are looking at a microcosm of really only within Italy and only a certain period. I'm looking at a macrocosm. In fact the reason I'm fairly familiar with the Italian campaigns in spite of never focusing on it is because I had to learn about all the other regions surrounding Central Europe in order to make any sense of Central Europe. Everything in the Medieval world was highly interconnected, militarily, economically, and culturally, especially in places like Italy which had so much international commerce (and so many powerful foreign enemies)

I'm familiar with the Sforza method and a few of the others as well, including some of the foreigners like Hawkwood, but as you pointed out these didn't necessarily 'scale up' past the semi-formal type of warfare the condottieri were developing ... not without good reason I might add, to somewhat reduce their own casualties and the overall destruction of war. What did scale up was the militias of the Swiss, Flemish, Czechs ... and the Venetians.

With regard to the Venetians, you simply can't talk about the role of their armies in Italy without paying any attention to their enormous commitment outside of Italy. Hell 80% of their military was outside of the Italian peninsula most of the time and most of the time all Venice cared about was some major power like the Ottoman Empire and when they were focused in their own back yard it was usually aimed at the other big Italian maritime empire, Genoa.

Mercenaries didn't just appear out of thin air. And militias didn't sit on their hands until some major battle came, they tended to fight all the time. By your narrative militias were just static and only got combat experience when they fought as mercenaries - and if they did fight as mercenaries, they ceased to be militia. This is all nonesense. Look how many wars the Swiss got into in any 100 year period between the 14th and 17th Centuries

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battles_of_the_Old_Swiss_Confederacy

You just can't view all this in a vacuum. Just as mercenary infantry often came from militias, mercenary cavalry usually came from Aristocrats, both from within Italy and beyond, in Spain, Savoy, Provence, Germany, and Dalmatia to name a few typical sources.

You might want to look into where Venice recruited most of their mercenaries - they were a combination of Croatian feudal cavalry and Dalmatian urban militias

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalmatia#Middle_Ages

...who came from a meaner place than Italy where they had to contend with the Ottomans, the Hungarians, the Serbians and so on. So they had plenty of experience both as militias and as mercenaries.

The Condottieri are interesting, and there is no doubt that they contributed to the development of warfare in Italy and well beyond it, but it's ridiculous to contend that they had a monopoly on skill, expertise, innovation or battle effectiveness. My own area of research is on the militias, from Central and Northern Europe but also throughout Europe, and I know enough about them to be pretty confident that they were no push-overs in combat and could in fact contend with the best the Condittieri could throw at them. I think I've shown more than enough evidence of their importance in period warfare on every level. Beyond that we may just have to agree to disagree since we seem to have started talking past each other.

G

Galloglaich
2012-10-23, 08:10 PM
How effective are bones for stopping/turning blades? There was a documentary where they noted dented skulls, and that the dents seemed to be from sword-cuts.

Swords will cut right through bone if you can cut properly. The reality of Medieval Warfare is much, much, much more brutal than in Video games, movies, or RPG's. Why? I have no idea since we have all of the above set in modern or sci fi or apocalyptic eras which are plenty gory.

These are from Kutna Hora in Czech Republic, 14th Century
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-W1cPsIhI_HM/Tas4N8y2EVI/AAAAAAAAAII/IEZKFRTXU9A/s1600/DSCF2359.JPG

These are from Wisby in Sweden (Gotland), also 14th Century
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/peter.fairweather/docs/Visby2(2).jpg

Note a humerus (thigh bone) severed, they found a few bodies in that site which had both legs cut through by the same cut- also severed top of a skull.

Another from Wisby
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/peter.fairweather/docs/Burial1(2).jpg

This is from Townton, in the UK, 15th Century

http://neveryetmelted.com/wp-images/Towton1.jpg

G

Conners
2012-10-23, 08:41 PM
Can it be assumed those cuts were made by one-handed swords?

Galloglaich
2012-10-23, 10:04 PM
Can it be assumed those cuts were made by one-handed swords?

At Wisby, probably yes since this was one of the most common types of edged weapon, we think, in that battle. At Kutna Hora, it would be a mix of things, arming swords, (two-handed) longswords, messers, bills, glaives. At Towton longswords are probably the most common sidearm, but there would also be bills, glaives, axes and so on, as well as plenty of spears and crushing weapons.

Probably at least some of the cutting injuries were from swords (I think 25% of the bodies they found at Wisby had cut marks on them, the rest were either from soft tissue damage or missiles) because swords were so ubiquitous, (and at Wisby so were shields which is why we think there were a lot of single-handed swords... and also why so many people seem to have been cut in the lower left leg). But other cutting weapons were also common so you can't really be certain.

Modern test-cutting does replicate this though with swords, I've seen plenty of people cut through pig skulls, pork shoulders, hams and so on at test-cutting events. If you have a good sword and know what you are doing it's not very hard. It's actually pretty disturbing how easy it is.


G

fusilier
2012-10-24, 03:36 AM
Me:

Civic militias weren't always the best forces around, but there were periods where they were.

Galloglaich:

City militias were usually extremely effective, they tended to be the best infantry in every era...

My response.

The Italian urban militias declined with the rise of the Condottiere system, while they didn't disappear completely, in some areas they were very limited often just supplying pioneers (and usually from the rural militia). Condottiere forces tended to be very cavalry oriented, but infantry companies became increasingly common.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Even in Italian states where the militia was well trained and strong, mercenaries were the primary fighting force. Obviously not for every moment in time, and not for every location in space.

However, I had gone on a bit farther than I probably should:

I suspect something similar happened in the German states, although probably at a later date.

I said this because I'm not unaware of the larger picture, and knew that German Landsknechts and Swiss mercenaries became popular in the late 15th and 16th centuries. But I did couch it in terms of uncertainty, as my detailed knowledge of how they operated was very limited. As I respected your knowledge of them, I later limited my objection only to what I consider myself to be very familiar with: Italian Condottiere.

G -- you were critical of my understanding of the broader picture of things. So allow me to be critical of the information you present.

For example:


Hell 80% of their military was outside of the Italian peninsula most of the time

Ok, do you have a source for that? Or a context? Is that before or after Venice starting expanding in mainland in Italy? And finally, what does that mean? How does that impact the larger system of warfare?

You seem to have lots of details, but there's no clear understanding of what they mean or how they fit into what's going on.

You've also misconstrued my arguments, typically through exaggeration:


The Condottieri are interesting, . . ., but it's ridiculous to contend that they had a monopoly on skill, expertise, innovation or battle effectiveness
I never said they did.


By your narrative militias were just static and only got combat experience when they fought as mercenaries
I never made that claim.


and if they did fight as mercenaries, they ceased to be militia
Certainly when they joined permanent mercenary companies. Otherwise, I questioned whether or not it was fair to call them militia, if they spent a long time serving as mercenaries.


This is all nonesense.
Maybe I have failed to articulate my positions well. But, I think for someone who professes ignorance on the subject, this is a very demeaning and rude thing to say. You also began, almost immediately, by attacking my source simply because it was from the 1970s, and I really didn't know how to respond to that (especially when you mentioned a theory that it considered obsolete). I have too much respect for this board, and, believe it or not, you, to continue with this. I'm done.

Spiryt
2012-10-24, 03:53 AM
http://www.freha.pl/index.php?act=attach&type=post&id=13592


http://www.freha.pl/index.php?act=attach&type=post&id=13591

Galloglaich
2012-10-24, 09:45 AM
Wow, those are really brutal! Better than the ones I posted. Where are they from?

G