Got a Real-World Weapon or Armor Question? Mk. VII

[RationalGoblin]

Okay, one final question; were longbow-ish bows effective against horse archers? They have more range and a stronger user (aka, the needed arm strength to use a longbow) behind them, after all.

[Spiryt]

Okay, one final question; were longbow-ish bows effective against horse archers? They have more range and a stronger user (aka, the needed arm strength to use a longbow) behind them, after all.

Yes, if the arrow from longbowish bow hit the horse archer, hit would die just like everyone else.



Seriously though, that's rather confusing question.

If longbow, I assume feet archers would be effective against horse archers, would depend on tactics, terrain, leadership, skill and many other factors, like any other battle...

I'm not aware of any larger scale clashes between typical longbow echelons and and horse shooters.

Although I guess that english ones vs Prussian/Polish/German etc. horse crossbowmen would be possible during some wars in France, someone could do some search.

[Thane of Fife]

They have more range and a stronger user (aka, the needed arm strength to use a longbow) behind them, after all.

I believe, though someone may correct me if I'm wrong, that range would normally come down in favor of the horse archers, actually. Sources I've read normally say that a steppe nomad's composite bow could fire about twice as far as, say, an English longbow. It is possible that effective range in battle would be a different story, though.

[Yora]

As I understand it, the english longbow was not a weapon to be sused by a single individual, but to provide massed indirect fire. I may be mistaken, but I think mounted archers were mostly used in direct assaults and raids instead of field battles.

[Spiryt]

I believe, though someone may correct me if I'm wrong, that range would normally come down in favor of the horse archers, actually. Sources I've read normally say that a steppe nomad's composite bow could fire about twice as far as, say, an English longbow. It is possible that effective range in battle would be a different story, though.

Eh, that depends on the exact bow, we're talking about, as there were many nomads with many bows trough the history.

Generally, shorter, efficient reflexives would be able to achieve much greater velocities with light, 'flying' arrows.

However in case of actual martial arrows, difference won't be really great, to none, but that's a very broad subject.

And of course, no matter how much we can talk about mastery and high BaB horse is a platform where you can't use your legs in drawing and the rest, is unstable, always a bit unpredictable, and generally not part optimal for shooting.

That would mean, that in theory, foot archer would in theory be able to not so much out range horse one, but shoot in way more accurate and predictable way on distances sensible in battle.

Again, that's broad, but definitely in theoretical "exchange" between foot and horse archers I doubt that horse one would do very good, if only for horses, that would be in most cases unarmored, so wounded killed, and causing chaos with arrows flying around.

But that's a moot point, probably, as I don't recall such occurrences, probably because they obviously weren't happening too often.

[Incanur]

Foot archers typically used somewhat heavier bows than horse archers. Because of both this, the great stability of firmly planted feet, and greater density, I suspect infantry archers would have the advantage against cavalry archers at the tactical level.

[Galloglaich]

Yeah, it would be fun, but we may indeed be digressing too much.

"It would not be an exaggeration to describe the Kingdom of Sicily during the reign of Roger II as the most important realm of Europe and the Mediterranean, politically and intellectually as well as economically. "

I'm not necessarily disagreeing, but you tend to read this type of statement about most of the interesting zones of Europe at any given time; which is one of the challenges of studying Medieval history. Like I said it's often very challenging to construct

From this page:
http://www.bestofsicily.com/history2.htm#middle_ages

So just for fun, for sense of (hopefully interesting and thread-relevant perspective) at the same time Norman Sicily was such an important economic and intellectual and military center of Europe, looking a few miles north circa 1100 AD.

Venice is a small trading town, a vassal to Byzantium situated in a cluster of swampy islands in the Northern Adriatic. In 1104 AD, Venice, which refers to itself by the grandiose title Serenissima Republica ("Serene Republic"), has just built their Arsenal, a huge complex of shipyards and armories claimed by some to be the largest factory in the world, with which the tiny Republic will equip it's navies to trade salt and silk and glass throughout the world and fear neither pirates nor foreign war-fleets.

The Venetian navy, destined within 100 years to conquer their own patrons the Byzantine Empire itself (during the 4th Crusade) has already established a key military innovation by 1100 AD. While the war-galleys of every other Power in the Mediterranean (Christian or Muslim) are rowed by slaves or convicts, the Venetians use paid (and armed) sailors instead. This means that each ship has in the neighborhood of 300 fighting men instead of 100 men and 200 chained slaves who cannot fight. This gave Venice a huge advantage in the ship-to-ship close combat so common with galleys. Venetian galleys built in the Arsenal are also made with more sophisticated designs and construction techniques than, arguably, anywhere else in the world at this time.

With the help of their navy and their incredibly sophisticated diplomatic and intelligence network, the small town of Venice (with a population never more than a few hundred thousand even at it's peak) gradually spread her dominance throughout the "Middle Sea" for the next 400 years, conquering most of the Balkans, Greece, and almost all the major islands of the Eastern Med, they have Embassies in the courts of every major State in Europe and the Middle East. In the Middle Ages Venice would go on to become one of the greatest powers of Europe and prove to be virtually the only effective opposition to the expansion of the mighty Ottoman Empire in the Mediterranean.

Further north, the old Celtic-Roman city of Mediolanum has re-invented itself as the Lombard town of Milan. Their principle industry is armor, of which in the 11th -12th Century meant mail, including doubled mail and very rare tempered mail which was made almost nowhere else at this time. Milanese armor would be worn by the best equipped armies of Europe during the Crusades and for the next 500 years. Unlike other armor-producing towns, Milan lacks a system of guilds, and they are noted for their efficiency including the early use of water mills. During the Middle Ages the armor production of this little town would soon outstrip that of the entire nations of France and England combined. Milan was also to become one of the principle leaders of the Lombard League in the 12th Century which would lead to the full independence of the Northern Italian cities through the Middle Ages, leading directly to the Renaissance.

Nearby Bologna, as I already mentioned, founded the oldest University in Europe, the Studio in 1088 AD. By 1100 AD the Bolognese Scholar Irnerius has translated the legal writings of Emperor Justinian and is re-introducing the concepts of Roman Law which will spread throughout the towns of Lombardy and later, throughout Europe (for better or worse). The City built it's first walls at this time (1100 AD), and has become a center of learning with a notable liberal bent. In the 13th Century they would establish the famous Legge del Paradiso ("Paradise Law"), which abolished feudal serfdom and freed the slaves, using public money. (boosting the nearby rural economy and liberating many potential artisans to work in the workshops of Bologna). Nor was the impact of the University purely political or intellectual; later during the Renaissance Bologna would become one of the World's greatest centers of Martial Arts.

Genoa, another small town with grandiose dreams, little more than a fishing village in the 10th Century, is one of the first cities in Europe to be granted citizenship rights by a feudal Lord and established itself as a Republic since 1005 AD. Having fought off Arab pirates throughout the first half of the 11th Century, they are now aggressive participants in the 1st Crusade, and have by 1100 AD already gained control of Sardania (after defeat of an Arab fleet of 150 ships in 1015 AD) are well established in Sicily, and have in alliance with Pisa conducted large scale raids against the Fatimid Caliphate in North Africa, briefly capturing the city of Mahdia in 1087.

A small force of 12 Genoan Galleys provided much of the naval support for the 1st Crusade and they have greatly benefited from the looting of the Levant, establishing a strong foothold there. The Norman Lord Bohemond I has already granted Genoa a headquarters in Antioch including a Church and 30 houses, and Baldwin I has also given them the entire income of the city of Acre as a concession, as well as 1/3 of the land in Acre, Arsuf and Cessaria. Genoese Merchants are also now controlling much of the Western trade from Byzantium and Armenia, and have even been granted free trading rights in Egypt and Syria. A small force of Genoese militia established a reputation as the finest Crossbowmen in Europe during the siege of Jerusalem in 1099 AD, making Genoan mercenaries among the highest paid marksmen throughout the Middle Ages.

So perhaps, the dynamism of these towns (and I haven't even discussed Florence, Pisa, Amalfi, Brescia etc. etc.) is somewhat evident even as early as 1100 AD.

Where the most important centers of intellectual life in Europe is hard to say, there are others of note in Flanders, Burgundy, Catalonia (esp. Barcelona), and Bohemia among others, as well as Sicily and Moorish Spain. It certainly was an interesting time.

G.

[Norsesmithy]

But that's a moot point, probably, as I don't recall such occurrences, probably because they obviously weren't happening too often.

I believe it was mentioned in the last 10 or so pages of the last thread that English/Welsh Longbowmen were popular mercenaries on the continent, and that, esp in northern Europe, they probably did face compound bow equipped horse archers.

I think as far as how they faired, I imagine it wasn't terribly different from how any infantry faired against horse archers. If they stood, the horsemen could only harass them, if they fled, they would get shot to pieces, and if they pursued, they would never catch them, and they might get shot to pieces if they let their formation get out of order.

This mention may be in a linked article about a Northern warrior order who mostly used horn prod crossbows of their own manufacture.

[Galloglaich]

I believe it was mentioned in the last 10 or so pages of the last thread that English/Welsh Longbowmen were popular mercenaries on the continent, and that, esp in northern Europe, they probably did face compound bow equipped horse archers.

I think as far as how they faired, I imagine it wasn't terribly different from how any infantry faired against horse archers. If they stood, the horsemen could only harass them, if they fled, they would get shot to pieces, and if they pursued, they would never catch them, and they might get shot to pieces if they let their formation get out of order.

This mention may be in a linked article about a Northern warrior order who mostly used horn prod crossbows of their own manufacture.

Yes I agree with this, there are several examples in the Baltic. One which springs to mind was during the siege of Vilnius in 1390, the English King Henry IV brought a small force of English Longbowmen with him on Crusade in the Baltic and they were used during that (unsuccessful) siege. This sort of thing happened more than once. It is highly likely that Henry IV's longbowmen faced Tartars (I.e. Mongols) from the Golden Horde during his Crusade, and he survived his adventure.

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

English king Henry IV spent a full year of 1390 supporting the unsuccessful siege of Vilnius by Teutonic Knights with his 300 fellow knights. During this campaign Henry Bolingbroke also bought captured Lithuanian princes and then apparently took them back to England. King Henry's second expedition to Lithuania in 1392 illustrates the financial benefits to the Order of these guest crusaders. His small army consisted of over 100 men, including longbow archers and six minstrels, at a total cost to the Lancastrian purse of £4,360.

Unfortunately that particular reference is unsourced but it probably comes from Teutonic Order records as many of those have survived intact and they go into a great deal of detail.

Longbows, particularly the very powerful "English Warbow" type, would have faired pretty well against horse-archers I think, for reasons already cited. There is a lot of argument as to which of the two weapons could outrange the other, my (by no means definitive) understanding is the heaviest recurves had something of an edge in range when using light arrows but the effective range against armored troops was equivalent, and the longbow arrows were apparently heavier and better for armor-piercing. The cavalry archers horses would also generally be vulnerable, more so than armored infantry.

Another area in which both weapons were used was in Naval Warfare. It's interesting to note that in battles between the Turks and the various Western Kingdoms, both longbows and Turkish recurve composite bows were used alongside (and sometimes in preference to) guns well into the 16th Century. Most of what we know in detail about Longbows today in fact comes from an English war-vessel, the Mary Rose which sank in 1545, when firearms were already very well established (in fact there were also Muskets and Gunshields found on the Mary Rose).

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

In fact some military histories claim that the Ottoman fleet was crippled by their loss of skilled archers at the battle of Lepanto in 1571 and this led to their gradual decline in Naval Power after that.

A good source about all this stuff is "The Great Warbow" which is unfortunately out of print.

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Warbow-H.../dp/0750931671

G.

[Matthew]

Not to forget the Itinerarium, which mentions at least one Welsh bowman as part of the English army during the third crusade.

[Horoar]

Just a quick question wondering what the reach on a halberd was like.

[Maclav]

Just a quick question wondering what the reach on a halberd was like.

Longer than a sword, shorter than a pike. Awkward at close range, but thats what a dagger is for.

What kind of info are you looking for?

[Norsesmithy]

Just a quick question wondering what the reach on a halberd was like.

Like most things in the preindustrial era, halberds were not of standardized length, and so it's going to vary.

A lot.

Smaller halberds aren't going to be much bigger than the impressive two handed swords used by the shock troops of the landesknects, and probably don't represent any significant advantage in reach, but larger halberds could be almost as long as a pike.

[Yora]

There are some videos on youtube of people sparing with naginatas. Not sure if they use the length that was used in warfare, but it might give you an idea. I imagine in a non-formation situation, the handling is quite similar.

Here's two people fighting with actual halberds, which seem rather long to my uneducated eyes. And they still get very close.

[Spiryt]

I don't think that naginata compares at all, it's more like shortish, slightly more "personal" glaive with slender but longish blade in all serious example I've seen.

Halberd in classic form is solid axe/cleaver with long spike and hook... outright different handling and qualities.

Arma video is obviously solid, and anything with pollexe will be good.

Polleaxes were generally shorter and generally different, but they give good comparison.

Here polleaxes start around 1 : 20 for example.

[Yora]

Not exactly a weapon question and certainly not real-world, but it goes into the terrioty of the flame thrower and maybe you guys here can make educated guesses. Also, let's keep this as much in good taste as possible, and if you think it's too inappropriate, let's keep it a that.

But assumed you are dealing with zombies that keep standing up, or another monster that is highly infectous, and you need to get rid of it. Would a flame thrower a liter of gasoline be able to take care of them? Would such a fire ignite the body, or just burn up the initial fuel and clothes and then go out?

[HenryHankovitch]

I'm not a crematorium engineer, but I feel fairly comfortable saying that a few liters or gallons of gasoline, burning in room-temperature atmosphere, will not consume the body to a significant degree. Enough to kill a living human, certainly, though it would take quite a while in terms of combat rounds. But if your zombies are walking corpses that can ignore things like gunshot wounds or severed limbs...not so much.

I can't speak for the gelled gasoline used in actual flamethrowers; and I don't know if you're referring to military designs or some sort of homemade flamethrower. Either way, I'm pretty sure that this tactic will just result in you fighting a zombie that is on fire.

If we're speaking (ghoulishly) of disposal methods rather than combat, I suspect that to truly render a corpse harmless would be to reduce it to ashes--requiring some kind of high-temperature crematorium or other very intense fire--or bury it in a place where it's not going to leach into the water table.

From an infections standpoint, particularly transmissible pathogens (smallpox or cholera, say) may be somewhat mitigated by partial burning. Of course, you then have the problem of the person handling the body en route to burning it. In both cases the most infectious phase of the disease has probably already passed, so of whatever airborne or waterborne pathogens would have come from the corpse, most are already loose in the enviroment. Your "magical" diseases like zombie-ism or Rage Virus may work differently, but at that point you're just waving your hands and saying "it's magic, it just works that way" anyway.

[fusilier]

I'm not a crematorium engineer, but I feel fairly comfortable saying that a few liters or gallons of gasoline, burning in room-temperature atmosphere, will not consume the body to a significant degree. . . .

There's a fairly bizarre set of circumstances that can cause a very small amount of fuel to result in almost complete human combustion. If the conditions are right, fuel (such as alcohol) can cause the human body itself to burn. It's wierd, but most of the claims of "spontaneous human combustion" can be explained by people drinking and smoking in bed. There was a case in France that the authorities treated as a murder, and discovered some interesting facts. A lady had been murdered and robbed in her home, and the robbers attempted to cover up the murder by starting a fire with a very tiny amount of fuel (chanel no. 5 I believe). This caused almost her entire body to burn up, reducing the bones to ash, but hardly set fire to anything else. They were able to replicate something similar using a hog cadaver.

I realize that's not exactly what you were referring to, and this process takes a considerable amount of time.

In order for this to happen, I think the fuel had to burn for long enough that it raised the core temperature of the body enough to set fire to fat. At the same time the fire itself couldn't be too destructive to body. There was some television show that I saw a few years back that contained this information.

[fusilier]

Some random trivia:

Venice's Arsenal, eventually became a kind of early form of a production line. In the 16th century it was claimed that they could crank out a complete galley in a day! The parts were standardized, and they kept forms of all the pieces, and would keep many spare pieces in stock (it also aided in repairs). Other nations did copy the Arsenal system, to a lesser or greater degree.

The University of Bologna:

I think this University was a "student-run" university. Professors that were late to class could be beaten by the head-student, and faced various fines/penalties for different infractions! If memory serves me correctly, Bologna specialized in Law.

At some point it was listed as a "Studium Generale" which means it was recognized by the Holy Roman Empire. This was the classification that most early universities sought. The university was not a physical place at this time. It was a collection of students and teachers, who typically rented rooms. This gave them mobility, and the ability to threaten to leave cities that didn't meet certain demands.

[Daemon]

I'd appreciate it if one of you could direct me to information about fighting with and wearing an axe. Or a description would work well to. The more types of axes included the better.

Also, were double bladed battle-axes use? Or is that mostly a fantasy based weapon?

My google-fu is pretty terrible and the searches I turned up were all related to that strange smelling stuff that many dudes like to put on their bodies.

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Hades]

This is probably the best resource I know of for axe fighting. The problem is that there aren't any real surviving resources, until you get to the poleaxe stuff, though that isn't really an "axe".

[AslanCross]

There's a fairly bizarre set of circumstances that can cause a very small amount of fuel to result in almost complete human combustion. If the conditions are right, fuel (such as alcohol) can cause the human body itself to burn. It's wierd, but most of the claims of "spontaneous human combustion" can be explained by people drinking and smoking in bed. There was a case in France that the authorities treated as a murder, and discovered some interesting facts. A lady had been murdered and robbed in her home, and the robbers attempted to cover up the murder by starting a fire with a very tiny amount of fuel (chanel no. 5 I believe). This caused almost her entire body to burn up, reducing the bones to ash, but hardly set fire to anything else. They were able to replicate something similar using a hog cadaver.

I realize that's not exactly what you were referring to, and this process takes a considerable amount of time.

In order for this to happen, I think the fuel had to burn for long enough that it raised the core temperature of the body enough to set fire to fat. At the same time the fire itself couldn't be too destructive to body. There was some television show that I saw a few years back that contained this information.

It's called the wick effect, and if I'm not mistaken it takes a very long time to produce.

It will probably work for a body with fresh adipose tissue, but in a zombie that's already undergone some level of decomposition, I'd think that the zombie would still keep going and be on fire, so I don't think it's a very...favorable situation, to say the least.

A fragmentation grenade would probably be far more effective.

[Daemon]

This is probably the best resource I know of for axe fighting. The problem is that there aren't any real surviving resources, until you get to the poleaxe stuff, though that isn't really an "axe".

Thanks for the link. I am kinda disappointed that this is the best material I've seen so far on axe fighting, but it's far better than my terrible attempts at figuring it out for mock battles. Thanks!

[Norsesmithy]

Not exactly a weapon question and certainly not real-world, but it goes into the terrioty of the flame thrower and maybe you guys here can make educated guesses. Also, let's keep this as much in good taste as possible, and if you think it's too inappropriate, let's keep it a that.

But assumed you are dealing with zombies that keep standing up, or another monster that is highly infectous, and you need to get rid of it. Would a flame thrower a liter of gasoline be able to take care of them? Would such a fire ignite the body, or just burn up the initial fuel and clothes and then go out?

If you are using proper coprecipitated aluminum salts of naphthenic, and palmitic acids or a more modern substitute equivalent, you could probably get a pretty good body roast out of a litre or less, but simple gasoline will not do a very good job.

And I don't think that you really need to burn the thing to ashes, you simply need to destroy the vector carried in the tissue, and that might mean 165 degrees Fahrenheit if it's a bacteria or fungus, and 300 degrees for a particularly durable virus, or 600 degrees if we are talking prions. Now if your vector is something exotic like a nanomachine, you can invent any target temperature you want.

[Psyx]

Thanks for the link. I am kinda disappointed that this is the best material I've seen so far on axe fighting,

Sadly; there is nothing really that has historically survived. None of the axe-fighting cultures wrote anything down about it, there's been no surviving 'sport forms' or off-shoots and stuff like that like there has been with fencing.

A fragmentation grenade would probably be far more effective.

Frag isn't powerful enough to shred a corpse. Maybe if you stood a zombie in front of a claymore it might work, but not a standard offensive frag grenade.
It'd also do a great job at essentially aerosolling body tissue: Great for infection.

[AslanCross]

Frag isn't powerful enough to shred a corpse. Maybe if you stood a zombie in front of a claymore it might work, but not a standard offensive frag grenade.
It'd also do a great job at essentially aerosolling body tissue: Great for infection.

Ew. What would you recommend, then?

Anyway, my brother and I picked up a hardwood bokken earlier today. Anyone know of any katas I can practice? The initial results I found on the net were pure text and highly technical.

[RationalGoblin]

How high quality of equipment (weapons and armor) did typical Dark Ages (900s or so) soldiers have? I know this question depends on the wealth and social status of the soldier, so add that in to the quality. (Aka, poor nobility, rich peasant, rich nobility, merchant class, etc)

[Psyx]

How high quality of equipment (weapons and armor) did typical Dark Ages (900s or so) soldiers have? I know this question depends on the wealth and social status of the soldier, so add that in to the quality. (Aka, poor nobility, rich peasant, rich nobility, merchant class, etc)

Depends on culture as well, of course.
If by 'soldiers' you mean the small number of 'professional' warriors that were kicking around, then the answer is 'very, very good'.

Mail was enormously time and resource intensive to make, so was very much a luxury. It represented a massive investment, really. Worth far more comparatively than modern body armour.

Likewise, anyone carrying a sword was also in a pretty fine fiscal position, assuming that it was a pattern welded blade. Once again: The work of a skilled craftsman, a lot of metal and time were involved.

And if there was a horse involved... well; those weren't cheap either. The feudal system funnelled money up to the fighting classes because their panoply was far from being within the fiscal limits of the lower classes.

Many cultures required the free men of the nation/tribe to be able to outfit themselves for war in times of need. Obviously, these militias were less tooled: A decent spear and/or axe, a well-made shield, and whatever scraps of armour could be afforded were what was typically available.

Ew. What would you recommend, then?

Being a long way away and requesting some napalm?

Most weapons don't reduce people to small lumps of meat, because it's rather ineffective. It it just takes a few bits of metal to render someone non-combative, then that's all that is used: It's lighter, cheaper and safer than reducing someone to a pile of ash and teeth-fillings.

White phosphor is VERY unpleasant and burns a treat, but WP munitions once again only need a target to be hit with a few fragments, rather than crispy-fried.

Point blank Claymore mines are capable of putting bodies up in trees and stripping the clothes of them, so would do the trick. Otherwise; if you have a foe that needs physically taking apart in order to kill 'em, then I guess it's time for some chopping! A boar spear might be good, too: It wouldn't destroy a zombie, but it'd stop it getting any closer!

I'm going have to go back to the old addage here:

Remove the head, destroy the brain.

[Britter]

Anyway, my brother and I picked up a hardwood bokken earlier today. Anyone know of any katas I can practice? The initial results I found on the net were pure text and highly technical.

Do yourself a favor and see what is availible around you in terms of sword instruction. With traditional Japanese sword arts, you are not going to be able to learn anything authentic and effective over the internet or by video. A good place to start would be to look for a local kendo club or school. The kendo curiculum has a set of 7 katana used against katana and 3 wakizashi used against katana kata which are very good and entertaining kata to practice. They will also give you a good solid set of foundational sword skills.

I can't speak towards instruction in Western Martial Arts, so I will leave that to experts in that field, but as regards Japanese Sword arts it is my opinion, formed by 13 years of training, that learning without a qualified instrutor is literaly impossible to do correctly.

[Yora]

Thanks for the answers regarding fire. I already suspected that lamp oil or something like that wouldn't work.