1. The Billmen
Source: bucks-retinue.org.uk
In medieval Europe, the Vikings and Anglo-Saxons often used in battles numerous detachments of bilmen - foot soldiers, whose main weapon was a combat sickle (halberd). Derived from a simple peasant sickle for harvesting. The combat sickle was an effective edged weapon with a combined tip of a needle-shaped spear point and a curved blade, similar to a battle ax, with a sharp butt. During battles, it was effective against well-armored cavalry. With the advent firearms detachments of bilmen (halberdiers) lost their importance, becoming part of beautiful parades and ceremonies.
2. Armored boyars
Source: wikimedia.org
The category of service people in Eastern Europe in the period of the X-XVI centuries. This military class was distributed in Kievan Rus, Muscovy, Bulgaria, Wallachia, Moldavian principalities, in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Armored boyars come from "armored servants" who served on horseback in heavy ("armored") weapons. Unlike the servants, who were released from other duties only in wartime, the armored boyars did not bear the duties of the peasants at all. Socially, armored boyars occupied an intermediate stage between peasants and nobles. They owned land with peasants, but their civil capacity was limited. After the accession of Eastern Belarus to Russian Empire, the armored boyars became close in their position to the Ukrainian Cossacks.
3. Templars
Source: kdbarto.org
This was the name given to professional warrior-monks - members of the "order of the mendicant knights of the Temple of Solomon." It existed for almost two centuries (1114-1312), having arisen after the First Crusade of the Catholic army in Palestine. The Order often performed the functions military protection states created by the crusaders in the East, although the main purpose of its establishment was the protection of pilgrims visiting the "Holy Land". The Knights Templars were famous for their military training, mastery of weapons, clear organization of their units and fearlessness bordering on madness. However, along with these positive qualities, the Templars became known to the world as tight-fisted usurers, drunkards and debauchees, who took their many secrets and legends with them into the depths of centuries.
4. Crossbowmen
Source: deviantart.net
In the Middle Ages, instead of a combat bow, many armies began to use mechanical bows - crossbows. The crossbow, as a rule, surpassed the usual bow in terms of shooting accuracy and lethal force, but, with rare exceptions, it lost a lot in terms of rate of fire. This weapon received real recognition only in Europe from the 14th century, when numerous detachments of crossbowmen became an indispensable accessory of knightly armies. The decisive role in raising the popularity of crossbows was played by the fact that from the 14th century their bowstring began to be pulled with a collar. Thus, the restrictions imposed on the tensile force physical abilities arrow, were removed, and the light crossbow became heavy. Its advantage in penetrating power over the bow became overwhelming - bolts (shortened arrows of crossbows) began to pierce even solid armor.
Chapter from the book of the Belgian historian Verbruggen " Military art West in the Middle Ages" (J.F. Verbruggen. The Art of Warfare in Western Europe During the Middle Ages). The book was first published in 1954.
Thanks to the work of Delbrück and Lot, we can get an idea of the size of medieval armies. They were small, as they existed in relatively small states. These were professional armies, made up of people coming from the same class; the number of such people was accordingly limited. On the other hand, the economy was underdeveloped, the cities were just emerging or were still small. First of all, the limited financial resources of the princes did not allow them to field large professional armies, consisting of mercenaries or their vassals. Raising such an army would take a long time, supplies would be a severe problem, there would be insufficient transport to carry supplies, and agriculture would not be sufficiently developed to provide big armies.
For military history the problem of the size of armies is key. It is rather unusual for an outnumbered army to defeat a superior enemy: therefore, it is necessary to find out who had a large army. Medieval sources constantly report the victories of inferior armies, while speaking about the help of God or at least a patron saint. God's help is constantly mentioned in connection with the Crusades, as are references to the Maccabees. St. Bernard of Clairvaux surpasses all. Agitating to join the Order of the Temple, he wrote about the Templars: "They want to win by the power of God ... And they have already experienced it, so that one single one threw a thousand, and two put 10,000 enemies to flight."
Based on the reports of some chroniclers who saw the outcome of the battle as the Judgment of God, they believed for a long time that the Flemish and Swiss defeated their strong enemies with inferior armies. These ideas appeal to the national pride of the winners, and therefore are readily accepted. From a critical point of view, the ratio of the number of fighters tends to be diametrically opposite: the infantry was more numerous than the knights, which was the reason for these significant victories. There was a revolution in the art of war - a revolution preceded by another, in the way the army was recruited, in its social structure. To the greatest extent, this was the result of the rise of a new class, which had an awareness of its own strength, capable of improving its situation.
It is generally accepted that medieval man did not attach importance to numbers, and that even commanders were rarely interested in accurate statistics. Fantastically huge numbers were accepted and repeated on their behalf in the chronicles. The case of the chronicler Riecher is typical: where he follows the Annals of Flodoard, Riecher arbitrarily changes the numbers, almost always upwards. However, there were clerics who gave accurate figures, which provide valuable information about the small number of cavalry. This was true of the First Crusade and the Kingdom of Jerusalem that followed. Heermann, based on a comparison of all sources, obtained the following results:
Completely - I have
War is the normal state of the Middle Ages, but the poor development of the economy, and therefore the small number of heavily armed combatants (full knightly weapons were very expensive) led to the fact that the wars were protracted and boiled down for the most part to the ruin of the enemy’s areas or to long sieges. Wars in general, as a rule, did not resolve those controversial issues due to which they began, and military force served as only one of the arguments in the negotiations.
Big battles were very rare. During the wars of Charlemagne with the Saxons, which lasted more than 30 years (772-804), there were only two battles, his campaigns in Italy (773 and 774) and on the Duke of Tassilon of Bavaria (778) cost no battles at all. The lack of developed communication technology led to the fact that the movements of troops were often chaotic, fronts in the modern sense did not exist, the space of military operations (detachments on a marching march, convoy, reconnaissance groups, gangs of marauders, more or less secretly accompanying the army, etc.) covered no more than 20 km in width. The commander was required to more or less successfully find a place for the battle and determine the time of its beginning. This was the end of his strategic and tactical possibilities. However, the desire to observe knightly honor, the desire to give the enemy equal opportunities with themselves had a lot of influence on the choice of time and place of the battle and its conditions. A fully armed knight does not have the right to retreat, having met with any number of enemies, therefore they went for reconnaissance without armor in order to be able to flee without damaging honor. It was considered very noble to agree with the enemy on the time and place of the battle, preferably on an open field, so that the conditions of the terrain would not give anyone an advantage, and only strength and courage would decide the outcome of the battle. The pretender to the Castilian throne, Henry (Enrique) of Trastamarsky, in 1367, in the fight against his rival, King Peter (Pedro,) the Cruel, deliberately sacrificed an advantageous position in the mountains, descended into the valley and lost the battle of Najere (Navaretta).
Conscious strategy and tactics did not exist in the Middle Ages. The writings on organization and tactics had little to do with reality. The authors either accurately retell Vegetius, or state something that has absolutely nothing to do with reality at all. In the “Treatise on War” compiled around 1260 by order of the King of Castile Alphonse X the Wise, without any irony, it is stated that the foot soldiers should have their legs tied before the battle so that they cannot flee from the battlefield; then they, however, will not be able to pursue the enemy, but this will only demonstrate contempt for him. The educator of the King of France Philip IV the Handsome, a student of Thomas Aquinas, a prominent church leader Egidio Colonna, in his treatise “On the Principles of Government” (end of the 13th century), addressed to his royal student, seriously describes the “round” and “triangular” formation of the legions. The construction in dense groups, characteristic of the Roman army, was revived again only in modern times. Barbarian detachments fought not in formation, but in gangs. Repeatedly mentioned in medieval sources, the formation of a “wedge”, also called “boar’s head”, “pig”, dates back to barbarian times and does not carry any tactical plan: the leader goes in front of the detachment, a little behind him - close associates, then - the rest of the soldiers. The appearance of heavy cavalry does not change the tactical principles in the least. The description of the wedge-shaped formation of knights riding so tightly that, as one poem said, “a glove thrown into the air could not fall to the ground” refers only to the marching formation.
Since the battle is "God's judgment" between 2 overlords, it was they who, ideally, should have fought in front of the formation, and the outcome of the duel decided the matter. In reality, fights, often proclaimed, almost never took place. Fights between warriors were not uncommon. Sometimes the battle itself was replaced by something like a tournament: in 1351, near the city of Ploermel in Brittany, the French and English detachments who came together elected 30 people from their midst, whose fight, which took place according to toughened tournament rules, was supposed to replace the battle; the battle was called the “Battle of the Thirty.” With the transition from knightly wars to state wars, the value of such a tradition is being questioned, although it itself persisted until the beginning of the 17th century. Helm the Conqueror) in the decisive duel, saying that the fate of the country cannot be made dependent on the chances of a fight between 2 people. the French leader rejected the proposal of the English commander-in-chief to allocate 12 people from each army so that their fight would solve the issue of supremacy, saying: “We have come to drive you out of here, and that’s enough for us.” worth little, but in fact neglects the service of the king and the public good (been public).
The battle began with an attack by heavily armed horsemen, during which the marching formation fell apart, turning into a disorderly chain of cavalry, galloping at a not very fast gait; the battle ended with the same attack. The rarely used reserve was used to send to the most dangerous battlefields, where the enemy pressed especially hard, and almost never - for a surprise attack from the flanks or, even more so, for an ambush, because all this was considered a military trick unworthy of a knight.
Controlling the battle was practically impossible. Knightly armor included a deaf helmet, a slot in which (or in its visor) gave a very small view, its design did not allow turning the head, so the knight saw only the one in front of him, and the battle turned into a series of fights. A deaf helmet made it impossible to hear commands, cavalry vaulting, i.e. the training of horses and riders to keep the formation during an attack arose only in modern times. In addition, it is more than difficult to manage a barbarian warrior, in a fighting ecstasy, or a knight fighting for personal glory. The only command that Roland gives in "The Song of Roland" is "Lord, barons, slow down!".
Each sought to be the first to fight the enemy, not paying attention to the fact that, exposing himself, as befits a knight, to increased danger, he weakened the chain of horsemen as far as it could exist. giving such a right.
The knight's army is a collection of individuals, where everyone took a personal oath of allegiance to the commander, and not a structure welded together by discipline. The goal of the knight is an individual fight for the sake of honor and glory and for ransom, and not the victory of his army. The knight fights without regard to his comrades and commander. At the battle of Poitiers (1356), two French commanders argued about the right to start a battle and rushed to the attack without waiting for the royal order, without agreement with others and interfering with each other. The British counter-attack led to their retreat, and they faced the continuing advance of their troops, which caused confusion and panic, which turned into a swift flight, including those who did not even join the battle. Sometimes the victors were so carried away by robbing the enemy convoy that they let the enemy leave or regroup and attack again, often successfully. Attempts to impose at least some kind of discipline were unproductive and consisted only of punishments for individual violations. At the time of the First Crusade, its leaders ordered to cut off the noses and ears of those who would engage in robbery until the end of the battle; before the mentioned battle of Bouvina, Philip Augustus ordered the gallows to be erected for those who would grab prey from the enemy convoy before the end of the battle. order.
The battle ended with a flight, which marked the defeat of the enemy; long pursuit was very rare, and the symbol of victory was spending the night at the battlefield. As a rule, there were few killed. Heavy weapons protected the knight well, and the purpose of the fight was, as noted, to capture the enemy, and not to kill him. Only two knights died in the Battle of Buvin, but either 130 or 300 noble prisoners were captured.
In the bloody battle of Crecy (1346), about 2000 knights and about 30 thousand infantry fell from the side of the French who lost this battle. However, the last figures should not be unconditionally trusted, because the authors were prone to exaggerations. One of the chroniclers claimed that the British put up 1 million 200 thousand people in the battle of Hastings (in reality, this is slightly less than the population of England at that time), another stated that in the battle of Grunwald (1410), the combined Polish-Lithuanian army numbered 5 million 100 thousand people, and only 630 thousand fell in this battle on both sides. In fact, medieval armies were very small because the number of knightly fiefs was small due to the low productivity of agriculture. About 5 thousand people participated in the battle of Hastings from the Norman side, including about 2 thousand knights, Harold's army was smaller. In the Battle of Buvin, the French had about 1300 knights, the same number of lightly armed horsemen and 4-6 thousand infantrymen on the side of the French. In the Battle of Crécy, the British had 4,000 knights, 10,000 archers AND 18,000 infantry, the French had about 10,000 knights, but the infantry, most likely, is less than the British, and therefore the above figures of French losses look doubtful.
The descriptions of the battles spoke most of the knights, although, as can be seen from the calculations, other combatants participated in them. However, until the end of the Middle Ages, it was the heavily armed horsemen that formed the basis of the army, it was they who determined the nature of the battle, and only the knighthood was considered a "fighting" estate (bellatores). Among the fighters were also lightly armed horsemen of ignoble origin, servants of knights or ignoble fetters (in France they were called sergeants). It was believed that war was an occupation of exclusively noble people, therefore the opportunity to engage in battle with a commoner was rejected with contempt. When the fief sergeants of the abbey of Saint-Denis began the Battle of Bouvines, their opponents - the Flemish knights - considered this an insult and mercilessly killed horses and riders. Heavy weapons, as noted, were expensive, so fighting non-knights, who did not have sufficient income, were easily vulnerable in battle. Their main weapon was a weapon that struck from afar - a bow and (from the 12th century) a crossbow. The use of such weapons was contrary to the traditions of martial arts and was not used by knights. In 1139, the bow and crossbow were generally banned by the Church in battles between Christians - another example of the combination of Christian and knightly ethics. However, by the end of the 13th c. this weapon became widely used, especially by the British, who initially used it in the wars in Wales and Scotland, where the hilly or mountainous terrain did not leave room for large horse battles. The dispute between the combat qualities of the bow and the crossbow went on throughout the Middle Ages (the bow was faster, the crossbow was long-range) and did not come to a resolution. In any case, in the battles of Crecy and Agincourt (1415), the English archers proved their superiority over the French crossbowmen, and it was the powerful flow of English arrows that made the attacks of the French knights choke in both battles and made it possible for the British to successfully counterattack.
Archers fought on foot, their horses were vehicles. Horse archers, borrowed from the East in the era of the Crusades, did not take root in Europe. Infantrymen, i.e. foot soldiers armed with non-small weapons made up the bulk of the army until the advent of heavy cavalry in the 8th century.
The foot soldiers were the servants of the knights, they helped them get on the horse if they were knocked down to the ground, they guarded the camp and the convoy. One of the forms of participation of the infantry was that the infantrymen pulled the knights off the horses with pointed hooks and killed or captured them. For the first time, this was recorded in 1126 in Palestine, but soon appeared in Europe. The chronicler who tells about the battle of Buvin, a witness of this battle, considers the tool used in this - the hook - as "unworthy" and says that it can only be used by supporters of evil, adherents of the devil, because it violates the hierarchy and allows the common man to drop - down! - a noble horseman. The main function of the foot soldiers was to create bristling with spears, tightly closed, from the ranks of a relatively wide formation, sometimes in the form of a square, behind which or inside which the retreating knights could hide from prosecution. The masses of their horsemen held off the attack of the German knights until the fugitives regrouped, attacked the German knights again and defeated them. Until the XIV century. yet the infantry performed only defensive functions.
On June 11, 1302, the first battle in the Middle Ages took place, where the main role was played by the attacking infantry. The foot militia of the Flemish cities - 13 thousand people won the Battle of Courtrai against 5-7 thousand French knights, swiftly attacking them when they crossed the stream and climbed onto the clay bank - i.e. in violation of all the rules of knightly combat. However, the Flemings' two-time attempt to repeat such a success - in 1328 at Kassel and in 1382 at Roosebek - was unsuccessful, and the knights defeated the foot soldiers. The spread of infantry in the XIV-XV centuries. is explained by the above-mentioned transition from knightly wars to national-state wars. The centralized state needed significant armed forces, not overly expensive and more or less manageable. The infantry demanded less expense than the cavalry, the common people were more accustomed to submission than the nobles, less obsessed with the thirst for glory. The foot army could huddle in tight ranks, it was easier to control the mass of people in it, and this gave an advantage over better armed, but uncontrollable cavalry, Knightly combat (not tournament) weapons were, contrary to popular belief, not so heavy (12-16 kg; for comparison: the full calculation of a modern special forces soldier is 24 kg) so that it was impossible to fight on foot. For the first time the knights fought dismounted in the battle of the English with the Scots at Northallerton in 1.138; the English knights repulsed the attack of their northern neighbors, but did not go on the counteroffensive. At the Battle of Crécy English king Edward III forced his knights to dismount and distributed them among the archers. This measure had not so much tactical as psychological significance. The infantrymen were afraid to let the enemy cavalry close to them, because, having collided with it, they could neither defend nor run; the defeated knights relied on the speed of their horses, that is, the noble ones left commoners to their fate. By placing the knights between the footmen, Edward III strengthened the moral factor: it was believed that a sense of honor would not allow the knights to escape and they would help the foot soldiers to the end; the nobles supported the courage of the common people, sharing with them all the dangers. Thus, the English king for the first time demonstrated the unity of the army, not divided into privileged and unprivileged, but united by the single task of victory and the single will of the monarch.
The army consisted of detachments brought by the direct vassals of the monarch-such an army was called "ban"; in exceptional cases, the arier ban was convened, which included vassals (archer-vassals). The principle of universal militia was maintained, due to which each free, even distant, was supposed, in accordance with its income, to have certain weapons and to have a certain weapon and to have a certain weapon At the appeal of the king. But in reality, such a militia was practically not used, and participation in it was replaced by contributions to the treasury. From the 8th c. the basis of the army was vassals, but already at the end of the 11th - beginning of the 12th century. mercenaries appear. In accordance with the vassal agreement, the vassals were supposed to serve the overlord on campaigns only a certain number of days a year, and if the 80th time of hostilities the period expired, then the overlord had to support the vassal and pay for his military services. Here, the embryo of mercenarism was already concluded, although the warring vassal, unlike the later mercenary bound by contract, might not agree to such an extension of service. In the 12th century, hiring appeared nye detachments formed by their commanders. The creation of a military force directly subordinate to the sovereign caused dissatisfaction with influential social groups, and, for example, the English Magna Carta (1215) forbade mercenarism, but in general such opposition was unsuccessful. Early (XII-XIII centuries) mercenarism was not considered shameful if the mercenary was a person of noble birth. It was quite within the norms of knightly honor, moreover, it was considered quite honorable such a situation in which a poor knight, in search of glory and food, entered the service of a large seigneur. Payment was considered as a gift from the master to his ally, although since 1108 we have known mercenary agreements, where the reward is clearly stipulated. The trade of a mercenary becomes condemned only in the late Middle Ages, when the number of ignoble among the mercenaries increases, when in general the border between noble and ignoble in the troops is erased. People who lived exclusively in war were condemned, because it was believed that their morals were very different from truly knightly ones. The Battle of the Thirty was a clash of mercenary detachments, but it was carried out according to all knightly rules (the leaders of the detachments declared that they would fight in the name of glory). The best warrior of the losing English side (the election of the most valiant separately among the winners and the vanquished was typical for tournaments) was declared the commoner Crocard (this may not even be a name, but a nickname), a former household servant, and the king of France offered him nobility and noble bride, if he leaves the service of England.
The spread of mercenaries in the late Middle Ages is explained by their independence from the feudal structure. As for non-knightly morals, this is generally characteristic of the transition from knightly wars to national state wars, from feudal civil strife to civil conflicts, for a period of changing values and priorities. However, only a professional regular army could become a reliable military support of the monarchs, which did not provide for an agreement of equals, like a vassal union, or a mercenary contract (in Italy, mercenaries were called condottieri, from it. condotta “agreement”) and subordination to the commander was assumed by the very fact of entering the service. For the first time such an army arose in France after, in 1439, the General States established a permanent tax intended for the maintenance of such an army. This TROOP, created in 1445, was a heavily armed cavalry, mainly from the nobility, but it was no longer knightly army. The soldiers of this army were called "gendarmes" (fr. homme d "armes - "armed man", plural gens d armes - "armed people"). Formally, the ban and the arrier-ban were not canceled, but they lost all meaning. XI, extended this principle to the whole country. One person was called up for 80 families from non-noble groups of the population, primarily peasants. Their obligatory weapons were first bows and arrows, then it became more diverse - pikes, halberds, firearms. Recruits retained the name "free arrows" due to the original weapons and due to the fact that the state exempted their families from paying taxes. 480 the king dismissed them.Real armies of recruits arose only in the New Age.
In modern times, the modern division of the army into formations, units and subunits was also carried out - detachments of soldiers of equal numbers, led by officers, and into branches of service. In the Middle Ages, military branches - cavalrymen, arrows - turned out to be such not according to organizational, but according to the functional, for the duration of the campaign, the principle of division. among mercenaries. The composition of these initial "spears" is unknown, but it can be assumed that it did not differ much from the composition of the later "copies" created in the standing troops. The French "gendarmes" were divided into companies, or "companies", of approximately 60 people each, and those into 10 "spears" of 6 people each. The "spear" included: 1 heavily armed horseman, 1 lightly armed, 3 arrows equipped with transport horses, a page. Sometimes, instead of one of the shooters, a servant. In 1471, the Duke of Burgundy Charles the Bold, like his overlord and main opponent, King Louis XI of France, but less successfully than that, attempted to create a permanent army. It was very small, only 1000 people, divided the axis into 4 "squadrons", "squadron" into 4 "chambers", "chamber" into 6 "copies" of 10 people; in addition, each “squadron” had one additional “spear” of its commander. The “spear” included: 1 heavily armed horseman, 1 lightly armed horseman, page, servant, 3 archers, crossbowman, arquebusier and pikeman. It should be noted, however, that the “spear” was not a military unit in the modern sense, and a heavily armed horseman was not its commander, similar to a modern officer . Nomme d arme is the main fighter, and the remaining members of the "spear" are auxiliary.
Separate parts in the late Middle Ages were only gun servants. Until the New Age, the importance of artillery was not too great. The first mention of the use of cannons dates back to the beginning of the 14th century: cannons served as siege weapons during the siege of Gibraltar by the Castilians in 1308.
There is evidence that at the battle of Crécy the British used 6 cannons for a volley, which caused panic among the French. If this is true, then the impact was purely psychological, nothing is reported about the dead. it became widespread, however, despite its relative range - 230-250 steps versus 110-135 for a crossbow, it was used mainly by the besieged in the defense of fortresses, because this weapon was inferior to the crossbow in rate of fire and ease of handling.
The effect of the use of firearms was not so much tactical or strategic as socio-cultural: as already noted, in order to hit the enemy, neither courage, nor strength, nor nobility was required, but only certain professional skills. Losses from the use of artillery were small: in Orleans, besieged for more than six months, in 1428-1429. there were no more than 50 people killed and wounded by cannonballs out of 5-6 thousand, the garrison and about 30 thousand of the population of the city. The situation changed only at the turn of the 15-16 centuries. with the advent of field artillery. As for handguns, they completely replaced the cold ones - the pike, the bayonet. sword, saber - only in the twentieth century.
D.E.Kharitonovich "War in the Middle Ages" // MAN AND WAR: War as a phenomenon of culture
1. The Billmen
Source: bucks-retinue.org.uk
In medieval Europe, the Vikings and Anglo-Saxons often used in battles numerous detachments of bilmen - foot soldiers, whose main weapon was a combat sickle (halberd). Derived from a simple peasant sickle for harvesting. The combat sickle was an effective edged weapon with a combined tip of a needle-shaped spear point and a curved blade, similar to a battle ax, with a sharp butt. During battles, it was effective against well-armored cavalry. With the advent of firearms, the units of bilmen (halberdiers) lost their significance, becoming part of beautiful parades and ceremonies.
2. Armored boyars
Source: wikimedia.org
The category of service people in Eastern Europe in the period of the X-XVI centuries. This military estate was common in Kievan Rus, Muscovy, Bulgaria, Wallachia, the Moldavian principalities, and in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Armored boyars come from "armored servants" who served on horseback in heavy ("armored") weapons. Unlike the servants, who were released from other duties only in wartime, the armored boyars did not bear the duties of the peasants at all. Socially, armored boyars occupied an intermediate stage between peasants and nobles. They owned land with peasants, but their civil capacity was limited. After the accession of Eastern Belarus to the Russian Empire, the armored boyars became close in their position to the Ukrainian Cossacks.
3. Templars
Source: kdbarto.org
This was the name given to professional warrior-monks - members of the "order of the mendicant knights of the Temple of Solomon." It existed for almost two centuries (1114-1312), having arisen after the First Crusade of the Catholic army in Palestine. The order often performed the functions of military protection of the states created by the crusaders in the East, although the main purpose of its establishment was the protection of pilgrims visiting the "Holy Land". The Knights Templars were famous for their military training, mastery of weapons, clear organization of their units and fearlessness bordering on madness. However, along with these positive qualities, the Templars became known to the world as tight-fisted usurers, drunkards and debauchees, who took their many secrets and legends with them into the depths of centuries.
4. Crossbowmen
Source: deviantart.net
In the Middle Ages, instead of a combat bow, many armies began to use mechanical bows - crossbows. The crossbow, as a rule, surpassed the usual bow in terms of shooting accuracy and lethal force, but, with rare exceptions, it lost a lot in terms of rate of fire. This weapon received real recognition only in Europe from the 14th century, when numerous detachments of crossbowmen became an indispensable accessory of knightly armies. The decisive role in raising the popularity of crossbows was played by the fact that from the 14th century their bowstring began to be pulled with a collar. Thus, the restrictions imposed on the force of tension by the physical capabilities of the shooter were removed, and the light crossbow became heavy. Its advantage in penetrating power over the bow became overwhelming - bolts (shortened arrows of crossbows) began to pierce even solid armor.
Until now, there are many errors and speculations around the issue of the structure and number of medieval European armies. The purpose of this publication is to bring some order to this issue.
During the period of the classical Middle Ages, the main organizational unit in the army was the knightly "Spear". It was a combat unit, born of the feudal structure, which was organized by the lowest level of the feudal hierarchy - the knight as a personal combat unit. Since in the Middle Ages the main fighting force of the army was the knights, it was around the knight that his combat detachment was lined up. The number of spears was limited by the financial capabilities of the knight, which, as a rule, were rather small and more or less equalized, since the distribution of feudal fiefs proceeded precisely on the basis of the knight’s ability to assemble a combat detachment that meets certain basic requirements
This detachment, which in everyday life was called - Spear in the XIII-beginning of the XIV century. consisted of the following soldiers in France:
1. knight,
2. squire (a person of noble birth who served as a knight before his own knighting),
3. cutie (auxiliary equestrian warrior in armor who does not have knighthood),
4. 4 to 6 archers or crossbowmen,
5. 2 to 4 foot soldiers.
In fact, the spear included 3 mounted warriors in armor, several archers mounted on horses and several foot soldiers.
In Germany, the number of the Spear was somewhat smaller, so in 1373 the Spear could be 3-4 riders:
1. knight,
2. squire,
3. 1-2 archers,
4. 2-3 foot warrior servants
In total, from 4 to 7 warriors, of which 3-4 are mounted.
The spear thus consisted of 8-12 warriors, 10 on average. That is, when we talk about the number of knights in the army, we must multiply the number of knights by 10 to get its estimated strength.
The spear was commanded by a knight (a knight-bachelier in France, a knight-bachelor in England), the distinction of a simple knight was a flag with a forked end. Several Spears (under King Philippe-Augustus of France at the beginning of the 13th century from 4 to 6) were united in a detachment of more than high level- Banner. The banner was commanded by a knight-banneret (his distinction was a square flag-banner). A banneret knight differed from a simple knight in that he could have his own knightly vassals.
Several Banners were united in a regiment, which, as a rule, was led by titled aristocrats who had vassals.
There could be cases where the Banner Knight did not lead several Spears, but formed one large Spear. In this case, the Lance included additionally several knights-baschels who did not have their own vassals and their own Lance. The number of ordinary warriors also increased, after which the number of spears could be up to 25-30 people.
The structure of military monastic orders was different. They did not represent the classical feudal hierarchy. Therefore, the order structure was arranged as follows: the Order consisted of commanders, each of which included 12 knight brothers and one commander. Komturia was based in a separate castle and disposed of the resources of the surrounding lands and peasants on a feudal basis. Up to 100 auxiliary soldiers were assigned to the commander. Also, pilgrim knights, who, not being members of the order, voluntarily participated in its campaigns, could join the Komturia for a while.
In the XV century. The spear turned out to be the subject of regulation by European rulers in order to streamline the formation of the army. So under the French king Charles VII in 1445, the number of spears was established as follows:
1. knight,
2. squire,
3. reveler,
4. 2 mounted arrows,
5. foot warrior
Only 6 warriors. Of these, 5 horse.
A little later, the composition of the Spear was codified in the Duchy of Burgundy. By decree of 1471, the composition of the Spear was as follows:
1. knight,
2. squire
3. reveler
4. 3 mounted archers
5. crossbowman
6. cooler shooter
7. foot spearman
There are 9 warriors in total, 6 of them are mounted.
We now turn to the consideration of the question of the strength of the Middle Ages armies.
In the 15th century, the largest feudal lords provided the imperial German army: the Count Palatinate, the Duke of Saxony and the Margrave of Brandenburg from 40 to 50 Copies. Large cities - up to 30 copies (such an army was exhibited by Nuremberg - one of the largest and richest cities in Germany). In 1422, the German emperor Sigismund had an army in 1903 Spears. In 1431, for a campaign against the Hussites, 200 Spears were sent to the army of the Empire of Saxony, the Brandenburg Palatinate, Cologne, 28 German dukes together - 2055 Spears (an average of 73 Spears per duchy), the Teutonic and Livonian Orders - only 60 Spears (it should be borne in mind that this was shortly after the heavy blow inflicted on the Order at Tannenberg in 1410 therefore, the number of order troops turned out to be very small), and in total one of the largest armies was assembled late medieval consisting of 8300 copies, which, according to reports, was almost impossible to maintain and which was very difficult to command.
In England during the War of the Roses in 1475, 12 banneret knights, 18 knights, 80 squires, about 3-4 thousand archers and about 400 warriors (man-at-arms) took part in hostilities in the army of Edward IV in France, but in England the spear structure was practically not used, instead companies were created according to the branches of the military, which were commanded by knights and squires. The Duke of Buckingham during the War of the Roses had a personal army of 10 knights, 27 squires, the number of ordinary soldiers was about 2 thousand, and the Duke of Norfolk had a total of about 3 thousand soldiers. It should be noted that these were the largest armies of individual feudal lords of the English kingdom. So, when in 1585 the English royal army included 1000 knights, it must be said that it was a very large army in Europe.
In 1364, under Philip the Bold, the army of the Duchy of Burgundy consisted of only 1 banneret knight, 134 baschel knights, 105 squires. In 1417, Duke John the Fearless formed the largest army of his reign - 66 knights-bannerets, 11 knights-bacheliers, 5707 squires and revelers, 4102 horse and foot soldiers. The decrees of Duke Charles the Bold from 1471-1473 determined the structure of the army in 1250 copies of a unified composition. As a result, the differences between the knights of the banneret and the bachelier disappeared, and the number of spears became identical for all knights in the army of the duke.
In Russia in the 13th-14th centuries, the situation was very close to Western European, although the term Spear itself was never used. The princely squad, which consisted of senior and junior squads (the senior about 1/3 of the population, the junior about 2/3 of the population) actually duplicated the scheme of knights and squires. The number of squads was from a few dozen in small principalities, up to 1-2 thousand of the largest and richest principalities, which again corresponded to the armies of large European kingdoms. The cavalry detachment was joined by the militia of the cities and contingents of volunteers, the number of which approximately corresponded to the number of auxiliary troops in the knightly cavalry army.