War is the normal state of the Middle Ages, but the weak 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 destruction of enemy areas or to long sieges. Wars in general, as a rule, they did not give a solution to those controversial issues because of 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 .Major battles were considered as "God's judgment", and therefore the defeat was understood as a condemnation of the wrong and led to the end of the war. The lack of a developed communication technology led to the fact that troop movements 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.) n.) covered a width of no more than 20 km. 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 capabilities. However, the desire to maintain 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 teacher 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” addressed to his royal student (late 13th century), seriously describes the “round” and “triangular” construction of the legions. Typical for the Roman army construction in dense groups was revived again only in modern times. Barbarian detachments fought not in formation, but in gangs. The formation of a “wedge”, repeatedly mentioned in medieval sources, also called “boar's head”, “pig”, dates back to barbarian times and does not carry any tactical plan: the leader goes ahead of the detachment, a little behind him - close associates, then - the rest of the warriors. 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, French and English detachments converged and elected 30 people from their midst, whose fight, which took place according to tough 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 questioned, although it itself persisted until the beginning of the 17th century. If you believe the text of the 12th century, the last Anglo-Saxon king of England Harold on the eve of the battle of Hastings (1066) refused his opponent the Duke of Normandy Guillaume the Illegitimate (soon to become King of England William the Conqueror) in a decisive duel, saying that the fate of the country cannot be made dependent on the chances of a fight between 2 people. In ХУв. 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 it’s enough for us.” Then the French commander Jean de Buey banned one of his subordinates to participate in a duel before the battle, adding that the combatant “desires to inflict damage on the enemy, namely, to take away his honor, in order to ascribe to himself empty glory, which costs 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 riders as far as it could exist. The right to start a battle was a privilege first attested in Germany in 1075, where was assigned to a certain family, and in the Holy Land during the era of the Crusades in 1119, under which the chronicler mentions a special detachment of St. Peter, who had such a right.
The knight's army is a collection of individuals, where everyone gave 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 looking back at 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. During 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 aforementioned 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. Even in spiritual knights orders, whose members had to follow monastic discipline, one of the few military prohibitions was the prohibition at the beginning of the battle to gallop horses without orders.
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 latest figures should not be unconditionally trusted, because the authors were prone to exaggeration. 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 there was a small number knightly fiefs 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 Crecy, the British had 4 thousand knights, 10 thousand archers AND 18 thousand infantrymen, the French had about 10 thousand knights, but the infantry is most likely smaller 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" class (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 crossbow went on throughout the Middle Ages (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.
The archers fought on foot, their horses were a vehicle. Horse archers, borrowed from the East in the era Crusades, in Europe did not take root. 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 to this battle, considers the weapon used in this - the hook - as "unworthy" and says that it can only be used by supporters of evil , adherents of the devil, for it violates the hierarchy and allows the commoner to drop - down! - a noble horseman. The main function of 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. In the battle of Legnano in 1176 between the army of the emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, on the one hand, and the Italian knights and the militia of the northern Italian cities, on the other, the Milanese infantrymen, after the flight of their riders, held the attack of the German knights until the fugitives regrouped, again attacked the German knights 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. explained by the above-mentioned transition from knightly wars to nation-state wars. A centralized state needed significant armed forces, not excessively expensive and more or less controlled. 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 fighter of modern special forces - 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, the 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 a "ban"; in exceptional cases, an arrier ban was convened, including vassals (arrier vassals). In some places, especially in England, the principle of general militia was preserved, by virtue of which every free man, however ignoble, was required, in accordance with his income, to have certain weapons and to go to war at the call 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 liens were supposed to serve the overlord on campaigns only a certain number of days a year, and if the 80 time of hostilities expired, then the overlord had to support the vassal and pay for his military services. Here the germ of mercenarism was already concluded, although the fighting vassal , unlike the later mercenary, bound by a contract, he might not have agreed to such an extension of service. In the 12th century, mercenary units formed by their commanders appeared. 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. where the reward is clearly specified. 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 the noble and the 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 said that they would fight in the name of glory). The best warrior of the losing English side (selecting the most valiant separately among the winners and the vanquished was typical for tournaments) was declared the commoner Crokar ( this, perhaps, is not even a name, but a nickname), a former domestic servant, and the king of France offered him the nobility and a noble bride if he left 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 submission to the commander was assumed by the very fact of receipt to 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" (French homme d "armes - "armed man", plural gens d armes - "armed people"). Ban and arrier-ban were not formally canceled, but they lost all meaning. In In 1448, Dauphin Louis first tried to organize in his inheritance something like a recruiting system, and after becoming King Louis XI of France in 1461, he extended this principle to the whole country. At first, their obligatory weapons were bows and arrows, then it became more diverse - pikes, halberds, firearms. Recruits retained the name "free arrows" due to their original weapons and due to the fact that the state exempted their families from paying taxes. Thus, it was not possible to create them, and in 1480 the king dismissed them.
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, the branches of the armed forces - horsemen, arrows - turned out to be such not organizationally, but according to the functional principle of division during the campaign. 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 riflemen equipped with transport horses, 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, page, servant, 3 archers, crossbowman, arquebusier and pikeman. It should be noted, however, that "spear" was not military unit in the modern sense, and the heavily armed horseman was not his commander, like 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
Chapter from the book of the Belgian historian Verbruggen "The Art of Warfare in Western Europe During 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 become a severe problem, there would be insufficient transport to bring supplies, and Agriculture was not developed enough to provide large 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:
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Medieval battles slowly evolved from clumsy skirmishes of warlike gangs to real battles using maneuvers and tactics. Part of the reason for this evolution was the emergence of different types of troops, owning different weapons and, accordingly, different skills and advantages. The first armies of the Middle Ages were simply crowds of foot soldiers. With the development of cavalry, knights appeared in the armies. Foot soldiers still remained in the army in large numbers to destroy weakened enemies and do the hard work during the siege. In open battles, foot soldiers were at great risk from all sides, unlike knights, who usually fought one on one. But this applies only to the early feudal infantry, which consisted mainly of servants and untrained peasants. Archers were also very useful in sieges, but they also risked being trampled on the battlefield. By the end of the 15th century, the commanders managed to somewhat discipline the knights and get the army to work as a single team. In the English army, archers were reluctantly, but still respected, especially those who wielded longbows, as they showed their value in many decisive battles. Discipline also improved as more knights fought for money rather than glory. The Italian mercenaries became known for carrying out lengthy military campaigns without notable bloodshed. By that time, soldiers of all ranks had become too precious an asset to waste unwisely. The feudal armies, hungry for glory, were gradually replaced by mercenary armies who wanted to survive in order to be able to spend the money they earned.
Cavalry tactics
The cavalry was usually divided into three groups, which were sent into battle one after the other. The first group broke through the enemy line or caused him great damage so that the second or third wave could still break through. When the enemy fled, a real massacre and capture of prisoners began. Initially, the knights acted at their own discretion, often violating the plans of the command. The knights were mainly interested in fame and honor, so they even argued for the right to go to the first detachment of the first group. Overall victory in battle was a secondary goal for them. Battle after battle, the knights rushed forward only when they saw the enemy, thereby destroying any tactical plans of the commander. The commanders, on occasion, dismounted the knights in order to somehow maintain control over them. This was widely practiced in small armies who did not hope to hold out against a series of cavalry raids. Foot knights raised morale and significantly strengthened the infantry. The infantry used special military fortifications or terrain features to protect themselves from cavalry raids. An example of the undisciplined behavior of the knights was the Battle of Crécy in 1346. The French army vastly outnumbered the English (40,000 versus 10,000), and had a large number of mounted knights. The English divided into three groups of archers with longbows, protected by wooden fortifications dug into the ground. Between these three groups were two groups of dismounted knights. The third group of foot knights was in reserve. The French king sent mercenary Genoese crossbowmen to fire on the English knights on foot while he tried to divide his mounted knights into three groups. However, the crossbows soon became wet and ineffective. The French knights ignored their king's attempts to build an army and, upon seeing the enemy, put themselves into a trance with cries of "Kill! Kill!". Dissatisfied with the inefficiency of the crossbowmen, the French king yielded to the onslaught of his knights and let them into battle, and they, rushing forward, immediately trampled their crossbowmen. Although the battle lasted all day, the foot English knights and archers (who still managed to keep the bowstrings dry) still defeated the French cavalry, who fought like a crowd of savages. By the end of the Middle Ages, heavy cavalry was no more important on the battlefield than archers or infantry. By this time, military leaders had already realized the futility of raids on well-organized and fortified infantry. The rules have changed. For the defense of the cavalry of the army, dug pointed sticks, dug ditches and rolling logs were increasingly used. Cavalry attacks against properly formed groups of spearmen and archers ended in the defeat of the cavalry. The knights were forced to fight on foot or wait for the right moment. Devastating cavalry attacks were possible, but only when the enemy was running away, disorganized, or leaving their fortifications to attack.
Shooter tactics
For most of this era, arrows were represented by archers using one type of bow. First it was a shortbow, then a crossbow and a longbow. Archers had the advantage of being able to kill and injure enemies without engaging in hand-to-hand combat. The value of such troops was generally recognized in ancient times, but they were forgotten at the beginning of the Middle Ages. In the early Middle Ages, knights outnumbered archers, and their code of honor required one-on-one hand-to-hand combat with a worthy enemy. Killing with arrows from a distance was unworthy of the ruling class, so military leaders initially made no effort to improve bows and improve their skills in using them. However, it gradually became apparent that archers are very effective and are often indispensable, both in siege and in battle. More and more armies included archers in their ranks. The decisive victory of William the First at Hastings in 1066 may have been won by archers, although traditionally the knights received most of the glory. The Anglo-Saxons occupied the hillside and planted their shields so tightly that the Norman knights could not penetrate their defenses. The battle went on all day. The Anglo-Saxons came out from behind their shield wall, partly to attack the Norman archers. And when the Anglo-Saxons came out, they were easily killed. For a while it looked like the Normans were about to be defeated, but the Norman archers won the battle. One shot mortally wounded Harold, King of the Anglo-Saxons, and shortly thereafter the battle was over. Foot archers fought in large groups of several hundred or even thousands of people. At a distance of about a hundred meters from the enemy, crossbows and longbows could already cause significant damage. At this distance, the archers fired at individual targets. Such damage simply drove enemies crazy, especially if they had nothing to answer with. In an ideal situation, the archers were able to break the enemy formation by shooting at it for a while. The enemy could defend against the cavalry with wooden fortifications, but it was impossible to defend against all the arrows and darts. If the enemy left the defenses and launched an attack on the archers, friendly cavalry took over, which had to have time to save the archers. If the enemies simply sat in their positions, they nevertheless gradually weakened to the point where the cavalry could destroy them in the fortifications. The possession of the bow and the education of archers were encouraged in England, since the Anguilla troops were most often in the minority in wars on the continent. When the British learned to use large groups of archers, they began to win victories, even in spite of the numerical superiority of the enemy. Using longbows, the British developed a barrage system. Instead of accurately shooting at individual enemies, the archers fired long distances into the thick of the enemy army. Making up to six shots per minute, three thousand archers could fire 18 thousand shots at the enemy formation. The result of such a shelling was amazing, as both people and horses died. The French knights who participated in the Hundred Years' War told that the sky at times turned black from arrows and nothing was heard except the loud whistle of these flying projectiles. Crossbowmen became widespread in the armies on the continent, especially in the militias and professional troops employed by the cities. Even with minimal training, the crossbowman became an effective soldier. By the 14th century, the first primitive hand firearms began to appear on the battlefield. When it was possible to use them, they were even more effective than bows. The main difficulty in using archers was to protect them when they fired. To be effective, they had to be fairly close to the enemy. English archers took long poles with them to the battlefield, which they hammered into the ground with hammers from where they were going to shoot. These poles provided them with some protection from enemy cavalry. They relied on their firepower to deal with enemy archers on their own. However, they started to have problems if they were attacked by enemy infantry. Crossbowmen carried a large passive shield with them. From these shields it was possible to build walls, because of which it was convenient to shoot. By the end of the medieval period, archers were fighting in teams allied with spearmen. Pikes prevented foot and mounted enemies from attacking the archers while the archers shot down the enemies. These mixed formations have learned to maneuver and even attack. The enemy cavalry retreated before well-organized groups of spearmen and archers. If the enemy did not have their own groups of spears and shooters, the battle was most likely lost.
Infantry tactics
At the beginning of the Middle Ages, infantry tactics were simple to the point of stupidity - they approached the enemy and began to chop. The Franks would throw axes at the enemy before the clash to cause confusion. Warriors relied mainly on their strength and fury. The increase in the role of the knights led to a temporary decline in the infantry, mainly because then there were still no well-disciplined and trained infantry. The infantrymen in the armies of the early Middle Ages were mostly peasants who were neither trained nor properly armed. The Saxons and Vikings used a defensive formation called the Shield Wall. The warriors stood close together and held their shields so as to form a barrier. This allowed them to protect themselves from archers and cavalry, which were lacking in their armies. The resurgence of the infantry took place in countries where there were no resources to create or use heavy cavalry armies, such as in hilly countries such as Scotland and Switzerland, and in developing cities. Out of necessity, these two groups learned to form effective armies with little or no cavalry. THEY learned that horses would not attack if there was a stockade or pointed poles driven into the ground in front of them. A trained troop of spearmen could stop an outnumbered troop of cavalry from wealthier countries or lords. The Schiltron formation is a circular spear formation used by the Scots in warfare in the late 13th century (demonstrated in the Lionheart painting). They realized that the shiltron was a very effective defensive formation. Robert the Bruce called the English knights to battle only in swampy terrain, which did not allow the effective use of heavy cavalry. The Swiss became famous for their skill in using pikes and spears. They revived the traditions of the Greek phalanxes and achieved great skill with long pikes. They built spearmen in squares. The outer ranks kept their pikes almost horizontal, tilting them slightly downward. This was an effective defense against cavalry. The back ranks used long, pointed poles to repel attacks from enemy infantry. The Swiss trained to such an extent that they could form such a system very quickly and mix without disturbing the structure. In this way they made a powerful means of attack out of a defensive formation. The answer to the masses of spearmen was artillery, which swept the line. The Spaniards were the first to learn how to use artillery effectively. The Spaniards also learned to fight effectively against spearmen using swords and small shields. They were warriors in light armor who could quickly slip through the thick of peaks and effectively wield their short swords in the crowd. Their shields were small and light. At the end of the Middle Ages, the Spaniards were also the first to experiment with combining spearmen, swordsmen and archers in one formation. It was a very effective army that could withstand any weapon in any terrain, both in attack and defense. At the end of the Middle Ages, the Spanish army was the most effective in Europe.
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. AT social relations 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 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 with them their many secrets and legends 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.
A. Marey
This work briefly highlights the main points in the development of the army in the Middle Ages in Western Europe: changing the principles of its recruitment, organizational structure, the basic principles of tactics and strategy, social status.
1. Dark Ages (V-IX centuries)
The collapse of the army of the Western Roman Empire is traditionally associated with two battles: the battle of Adrianople in 378, and the battle of Frigidus in 394. Of course, it cannot be argued that after these two defeats the Roman army ceased to exist, but it must be admitted that in the 5th century the process of barbarization of the Roman army acquired unprecedented proportions. The fading Roman Empire withstood another, the last battle for itself, in which, however, in the ranks of the Roman army there were already mainly detachments of barbarians. We are talking about the battle on the Catalaunian fields, in which the combined army of Romans and barbarians under the command of the “last Roman” Aetius stopped the advance of the Huns, led by their previously invincible leader, Attila.
A detailed description of this battle has come down to us in the account of Jordanes. Of greatest interest to us is Jordan's description of the battle formations of the Roman troops: the army of Aetius had a center and two wings, and on the flanks Aetius placed the most experienced and proven troops, leaving the weakest allies in the center. Jordanes motivates this decision of Aetius by taking care that these allies do not leave him during the battle.
Shortly after this battle, the Western Roman Empire, unable to withstand the military, social and economic cataclysms, collapsed. From this moment on, the period of the history of the barbarian kingdoms begins in Western Europe, and in the East the history of the Eastern Roman Empire continues, which received the name of Byzantium from the historians of modern times.
Western Europe: From the Barbarian Kingdoms to the Carolingian Empire.
In the V-VI centuries. in the territory Western Europe a number of barbarian kingdoms are formed: in Italy - the kingdom of the Ostrogoths, ruled by Theodoric, on the Iberian Peninsula - the kingdom of the Visigoths, and in the territory of Roman Gaul - the kingdom of the Franks.
At that time, complete chaos reigned in the military sphere, since three forces were simultaneously present in the same space: on the one hand, the forces of the barbarian kings, which were still poorly organized armed formations, consisting of almost all the free men of the tribe; on the other hand, the remnants of the Roman legions, led by the Roman governors of the provinces (a classic example of this kind is the Roman contingent in Northern Gaul, led by the governor of this province, Syagrius, and defeated in 487 by the Franks under the leadership of Clovis); finally, on the third side, there were private detachments of secular and ecclesiastical magnates, consisting of armed slaves (antrustions), or of warriors who received land and gold from the magnate for service (buccellarii).
Under these conditions, a new type of army began to form, which included the three components mentioned above. A classic example of a European army VI-VII centuries. can be considered an army of the Franks. Initially, the army was recruited from all the free men of the tribe who were able to handle weapons. For their service, they received from the king land allotments from the newly conquered lands. Every year in the spring, the army gathered in the capital of the kingdom for a general military review - the “March fields”. At this meeting, the leader, and then the king, announced new decrees, announced campaigns and their dates, and checked the quality of the weapons of their soldiers. The Franks fought on foot, using horses only to get to the battlefield. The battle formations of the Frankish infantry "...copied the shape of the ancient phalanx, gradually increasing the depth of its construction ...". Their armament consisted of short spears, battle axes (francisca), long double-edged swords (spata) and scramasaxes (a short sword with a long handle and with a single-edged leaf-shaped blade 6.5 cm wide and 45-80 cm long). Weapons (especially swords) were usually richly decorated, and appearance weapons often testified to the nobility of its owner.
However, in the eighth century Significant changes are taking place in the structure of the Frankish army, which entailed changes in other armies in Europe. In 718, the Arabs, who had previously captured the Iberian Peninsula and conquered the kingdom of the Visigoths, crossed the Pyrenees and invaded Gaul. The actual ruler of the Frankish kingdom at that time, Major Karl Martell, was forced to find ways to stop them. He faced two problems at once: firstly, the land reserve of the royal fiscal was depleted, and there was nowhere else to take land to reward warriors, and secondly, as several battles showed, the Frankish infantry was unable to effectively resist the Arab cavalry. To solve them, he carried out the secularization of church lands, thus obtaining a sufficient land fund to reward his soldiers, and announced that from now on, not the militia of all free Franks was going to war, but only people who were able to purchase a complete set of horseman weapons: a war horse , spear, shield, sword and armor, which included leggings, armor and a helmet. Such a set, according to Ripuarskaya Pravda, was very, very expensive: its full cost was equal to the cost of 45 cows. Very, very few could afford to spend such an amount on weapons, and people who could not afford such expenses were obliged to equip one warrior from five households. In addition, the poor were called to serve, armed with bows, axes and spears. Karl Martell distributed allotments to horsemen for service, but not in full ownership, as it was before, but only for a lifetime, which created an incentive for the nobility to serve further. This reform of Charles Martel was called beneficial(benefits - i.e. beneficence - the so-called piece of land given for service). At the Battle of Poitiers (10/25/732), a new army of the Franks under the leadership of Charles Martel stopped the Arabs.
Many historians consider this battle a turning point in the military history of the Middle Ages, arguing that from that moment the infantry lost its crucial, passing it to the heavy cavalry. However, this is not entirely true, both militarily and socially. Although it is from this moment that the separation of the layer of horsemen begins, not only as an elite combat unit, but also as a social elite - the future of medieval chivalry - but still it must be borne in mind that this was a long process, and for quite a long time the cavalry played only a supporting role with the infantry, which took on the main blow of the enemy and exhausted him. The change in the situation in favor of the cavalry, both in Western Europe and in Byzantium, was facilitated by the fact that in the 7th century. Europeans borrowed from the nomadic people of the Avars a previously unknown stirrup, which the Avars, in turn, brought from China.
The Carolingian army took its finished form under Charlemagne. The army was still convened for the spring review, however, postponed from March to May, when there is a lot of grass that served as food for the horses. The entire size of the army, according to historians, did not exceed ten thousand soldiers, and more than 5-6 thousand soldiers never went on campaigns, since already such an army “... was stretched along with the convoy for a distance of a day’s march of 3 miles” . In the border area and major cities there were scars - permanent detachments created from professional warriors, similar scars accompanied the emperor and counts. The grandson of Charlemagne, Emperor Charles the Bald, issued an edict in 847, obliging every free person to elect a lord and not change him. This consolidated the vassal-seigneurial system of relations already established in society, and in the field of manning and commanding the army led to the fact that now each seigneur brought his detachment to the battlefield, recruited from his vassals, trained and equipped by him. The united army was formally commanded by the king, in fact, each seigneur himself could give orders to his people, which often led to complete confusion on the battlefield. Such a system reached its apogee later, in the era of developed feudalism.
2. Armies of the High Middle Ages (X-XIII centuries)
A) Western Europe in the X-XI centuries.
After the division of the Frankish Empire under the terms of the Verdun Treaty of 843, signed between the grandchildren of Charlemagne, the political development of the French lands was determined by two main factors: the constantly growing external threat from the Norman pirates and the decline in the importance of royal power, unable to organize the defense of the country, which directly entailed an increase in the influence of local authorities - counts and dukes and their separation from the central government. The transformation of counts and dukes into sovereign hereditary rulers resulted in the progressive feudal fragmentation of the French lands, an increase in the number of granted land holdings, proportional to the decrease in the area of \u200b\u200beach specific allotment, and the transformation of the beneficiary, complained for service, into hereditary landed property. In the conditions of the extreme weakening of royal power, the old custom of electing the king on the council of the nobility is resurrecting. Counts from the family of Robertins of Paris became kings, famous for their struggle with the Normans.
These political changes are closely related to the changes in military affairs of that era. The decrease in the importance of the common infantry and the coming to the fore of the heavily armed knightly cavalry led to a sharp social stratification of Frankish society; it was during this period that the idea of dividing society into three classes was finally formed and gained particular popularity: “prayers” (oratores), “warriors” (bellatores) and “workers” (laboratores). In turn, the progressive feudal fragmentation could not but affect the reduction in the size of the army, which now rarely exceeded two thousand people. A detachment of one and a half thousand people was already considered a large army: “Thus, nine hundred knights were recruited. And [Cid] recruited five hundred hidalgo foot squires, not counting the rest of the pupils of his house.<…>Sid ordered to leave his tents and went to settle in San Servan and around it in the hills; and every person who saw the camp that Sid set up said later that it was a large army ... ".
The battle tactics have also changed. Now the battle began with a well-coordinated blow with the spears of the heavy cavalry, which split the enemy's line. After this first attack, the battle broke up into single duels between knight and knight. In addition to the spear, the obligatory weapon of each knight is a long double-edged sword. The defensive equipment of the Frankish knight consisted of a long shield, a heavy shell and a helmet worn over a neck cover. The infantry, which played an auxiliary role in battle, was usually armed with clubs, axes, and short spears. Archers in the West Frankish lands were for the most part their own, while those in the East Frankish were hired. In Spain, instead of a shell, chain mail borrowed from the Moors with long sleeves and a chain mail hood was often used, over which a helmet was worn: a helmet and a chainmail hood, and half a skull…” .
Distinctive feature The armament of the Italian knighthood was its lightness - short stabbing swords, light flexible spears with narrow tips equipped with additional hooks, daggers were in use here. Of the protective weapons in Italy, light, usually scaly shells, small round shields and helmets that fit the head were used. These features of weapons also determined the differences in the tactics of the Italian knights from their French and German counterparts: the Italians traditionally acted in close contact with the infantry and archers, often performing not only the attacking function, traditional for knights, but also the infantry support function.
It is impossible not to say about the main opponents of the Western Franks in the period under review - the Normans (Vikings, Varangians). It was the Normans who were one of the most daring and knowledgeable sailors of medieval Europe. Unlike most continental countries, they used the fleet not only for the transport of goods and people, but for military operations on the water. The main type of the Norman ship was the drakkar (several such ships were found, the first of them was found in Oseberg in 1904 and exhibited in the museum in Oslo) - a sailing and rowing ship 20-23 m long, 4-5 m wide in the middle part. It is very stable due to a well-developed keel, thanks to a small draft it can approach the shore in shallow water and penetrate into rivers, thanks to the elasticity of the structure it is resistant to ocean waves.
The pirate raids of the Normans instilled such horror in the hearts of Europeans that at the end of the 10th century, a request to God for deliverance “from the fury of the Normans” (“De furore Normannorum libera nos, Domine”) was included in the church prayer for deliverance from disasters. In the land army of the Normans, the main role was played by the “mounted infantry”, i.e. infantry, making transitions on horseback, which gave them a significant gain in mobility. hallmark The weapons of the Normans were a helmet pointed upwards with a nosepiece, a tight-fitting shell and a long shield elongated downwards. The heavy infantry of the Normans was armed with heavy long spears, axes and the same long shields. Of the throwing weapons, the Normans preferred the sling.
If mainly squads of the Scandinavian nobility (the so-called “sea kings”) went on campaigns to Western Europe, then at home a distinctive feature of the Scandinavian social structure and military affairs was the preservation of the free peasantry (bonds) and the significant role of the peasant militia (especially in Norway ). The Norwegian king Hakon the Good (d. c. 960), according to the saga, streamlined the collection of the naval militia: the country was divided into ship districts as far from the sea “as salmon rises” and it was established how many ships each district should put up during the invasion to country. For notification, a system of signal lights was created, which made it possible to transmit a message throughout Norway in a week.
Another distinguishing feature of military affairs in the 10th-11th centuries is the flourishing of castle fortifications. In the French lands, the construction initiative belonged to local lords who sought to strengthen their power in their possessions, in the German regions, where royal power was still strong, the king was actively building fortifications during the period under review German lands built a whole series of fortified towns - burgs). However, it cannot be said that during this period there was a flourishing and take-off of the siege skills of Western European armies - siege weapons increase quantitatively, but practically do not change qualitatively. Cities were taken either by starvation or by digging under the walls. Frontal assaults were rare, as they were associated with heavy losses for the attackers and were crowned with success only in a small number of cases.
Summing up the results of the development of the army and military affairs in the countries of Western Europe during this period, one more important feature of this process can be noted: at the time in question, active borrowing into Western military art tactical and strategic techniques, details of armor or weapons from the military art of other peoples, most often - the peoples of the East. This process will take on a much greater scope in the next period of European history - the period crusades.
B) Western Europe in the XII-XIII centuries: the Crusades.
End of the 11th century in Western Europe was marked by the beginning of the Crusades, i.e. campaigns for the liberation of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. It is generally accepted that the crusades began in 1096, when the first campaign of Christian knights began in Palestine, which led to the conquest of Jerusalem, and ended in 1291 with the loss of the city of Acre, the last fortress of the crusaders in Palestine. The crusades had a huge impact on the entire history of Christian medieval Europe, but their influence was especially noticeable in the military sphere.
Firstly, in the East, Christian knights encountered an enemy previously unknown to them: the lightly armed Turkish cavalry calmly evaded the attack of the armored knightly armada and showered Europeans with arrows from bows from a safe distance, and the Turkish infantry, who used crossbows still unknown to Europeans in battle, the cores of which pierced knightly armor, produced significant damage in the ranks of the Christian cavalry. Moreover, the Turks, who were inferior to the knights in single combat, outnumbered the Christians and attacked all at once, and not one by one. Much more mobile, since their movements were not constrained by armor, they circled around the knights, striking from different directions, and quite often succeeded. It was obvious that it was necessary to somehow adapt to the new methods of warfare. The evolution of the Christian army in the East, its structure, weapons, and, therefore, the tactics of warfare followed two main paths.
On the one hand, the role of infantry and archers in military operations is increasing (the bow, of course, was known in Europe long before the Crusades, but with such mass application Europeans encountered this weapon for the first time in Palestine), the crossbow is borrowed. The massive use of archers and infantry by the Turks makes such an impression that the English king Henry II even carries out a military reform in England, replacing military service many feudal lords by tax collection (the so-called "shield money") and creating a military militia from all free people who are obliged to appear in the army at the first call of the king. Many knights, trying to catch up with the Turks in mobility, borrow light weapons from them: chain mail, a light helmet, a round cavalry shield, a light spear and a curved sword. Naturally, the knights armed in this way were no longer self-sufficient, and were forced to act in active cooperation with the infantry and rifle units.
On the other hand, the armament of the vast majority of knights is evolving towards weighting: the size and thickness of the spear increases so that it becomes impossible to control it with a free hand - now, in order to strike, it had to be rested against the recess of the shoulder pad, the weight of the sword increases. A helmet-pot appears in the armor, covering the entire head and leaving only a narrow slit for the eyes, the shell becomes noticeably heavier, and even more than before, it hinders the movements of the knight. Horse with with great difficulty could carry such a rider, which led to the fact that, on the one hand, the Turk with his light weapons could not cause any harm to the iron-clad knight, and on the other hand, the knight loaded with armor could not catch up with the Turk. With this type of weaponry, the famous knightly spear strike was impossible - each individual knight, firstly, took up too much space, and secondly, was too clumsy - and, thus, the battle immediately broke up into many fights in which each the knight chose his opponent and sought to grapple with him. This direction in the development of weapons became the main one for European military affairs throughout the 13th century.
Secondly, the crusades had a strong influence on increasing the group solidarity of the European chivalry, which suddenly realized itself as a single army of Christ. This awareness manifested itself in several main forms, among which we can mention the formation and wide distribution of military monastic orders and the emergence of tournaments.
Military monastic orders were organizations of the monastic type, which had their own charter and residence. The orders were headed by Grand Masters. Members of the orders took monastic vows, but at the same time they lived in the world and, moreover, fought. The order of the Knights Templar arose first in 1118, at about the same time the order of the Johnites or Hospitallers appeared, in Spain in 1158 the Order of Calatrava appeared, and in 1170 the Order of Santiago de Compostela, in 1199 the Teutonic Order of the Sword was founded. The main tasks of the orders in the Holy Land were the protection of pilgrims, the protection of most of the Christian fortresses, and the war against Muslims. In fact, the orders became the first regular professional armies of Christian Europe.
So, summing up the development of military affairs in Europe in the 12th-13th centuries, several main trends can be noted: an increase in the role of infantry and rifle formations and, at the same time, the closure of the knightly class, which was expressed, on the one hand, in the further weighting armor, which turned a single knight into a fighting fortress, both in terms of formidability and mobility, and on the other hand, in the self-organization of chivalry into military-monastic orders, in the appearance of a developed system of coats of arms, the meaning of which was clear only to the initiated, etc. This growing controversy eventually led to several major defeats inflicted on the knights by commoners (for example, at Courtrai in 1302, at Morgarten in 1315) and to a further decline in the military role of chivalry.
3. Europe in the XIV-XV centuries: autumn of the Middle Ages.
The value of the XIV-XV centuries. for European military history comparable, perhaps, only with the VIII-X centuries. Then we watched the birth of chivalry, now - its decline. This was due to several factors, the most significant of which are the following: firstly, during this period in most European states, single centralized monarchies were formed, replacing feudal fragmentation, which, in turn, entailed a gradual but inexorable transformation vassals into subjects, secondly, ordinary people returning from the crusades understood that chivalry was not as invincible as it seemed, they understood that a lot could be achieved by coordinated actions of the infantry, and, finally, thirdly, it was during this the period includes firearms and, above all, artillery, from which even the best knightly armor was no longer saved.
All these and some other factors were fully manifested during the longest military conflict in the history of Europe, which took place between England and France. We are talking about the Hundred Years War of 1337-1453. The war began because of the claims of the English king Edward III to the French throne.
Literally in the very first years of the war, France suffered a series of serious defeats: in the naval battle of Sluys (1346), the entire French fleet was killed, and already on land, in the Battle of Crecy (1346), the French chivalry, faced with English archers, suffered a terrible defeat. In fact, in this battle, the French were defeated by their own belief in the invincibility of the knightly cavalry and the inability of the infantry to effectively resist it. When the field for battle was chosen, the English commander placed his archers and dismounted knights on the hill. The dismounted knights could not move, but they stood, covering their archers with a steel wall. The French, on the contrary, threw their knights into the attack on the hill right from the march, not allowing them to rest or line up. This led to very sad consequences for them - the arrows of the English archers could not penetrate the knight's armor itself, but they found a path in horse armor or in the helmet visor. As a result, only about a third of the French knights reached the top of the hill, wounded and exhausted. There they were met by rested English knights with swords and battle axes. The destruction was complete.
Ten years later, at the Battle of Poitiers (1356), the French suffered another defeat. This time the victory of the British was striking in its results - the king of France, John II the Good, himself was captured by them. In the midst of the battle, the vassals of the French king, seeing that military luck had betrayed them, preferred to withdraw their troops from the battlefield, leaving the king to fight almost completely alone - only his son remained with him. This defeat once again showed that the feudal army had outlived its usefulness, and could not more adequately resist the recruited militia from ordinary people.
The situation worsened with the beginning of the active use of firearms, first as a siege weapon, and then as field artillery. The critical situation that developed in France both in politics and in the field of military affairs by the beginning of the 15th century forced King Charles VII to carry out a military reform that radically changed the face of the French, and then the European army. According to the royal ordinance issued in 1445, a regular military contingent was created in France. He was recruited from the nobility and was a heavily armed cavalry. This cavalry was divided into detachments or companies, which consisted of "spears". The “spear” usually included 6 people: one cavalryman armed with a spear and five auxiliary horse soldiers. In addition to this cavalry, which bore the name "ban" (i.e. "banner") and recruited from the direct vassals of the king, the contingent also included artillery units, archery units and infantry. In case of emergency, the king could convene an arjerban, i.e. a militia of vassals of their vassals.
According to changes in the structure of the army, the algorithm of military operations also changed: now, when two warring troops met, shelling began first of all, accompanied by digging fortifications for their guns and shelters from enemy nuclei: “Count Charolais set up camp along the river, surrounding him with wagons and artillery…”; “The king's people began to dig a trench and build a rampart out of earth and wood. Behind her they put powerful artillery<…>Many of ours dug trenches near their houses…” . Patrols were sent out in all directions from the camp, sometimes reaching fifty spears, that is, three hundred people in number. In battle, the warring parties sought to get to each other's artillery positions in order to capture guns. In general, we can note that the classic war of the New Age began, the review of which is already beyond the scope of this work.
Annotated bibliography
I. Publications of sources (in Russian).
As well as for the previous article in this edition, the selection of sources for this work was complicated by several circumstances. Firstly, it is extremely difficult to find at least one source on the history of the Middle Ages, which would not touch on the topic of war; secondly, in contrast to antiquity, in the Middle Ages there were practically no works devoted specifically to military affairs, or the history of any particular war (the exception is the Byzantine tradition, within which the “Wars” of Procopius of Caesarea were created, as well as works on tactics and strategy of pseudo-Mauritius, Kekavmen and others); finally, thirdly, the situation with sources on the history of the Middle Ages, translated into Russian, leaves much to be desired. All this together leads to the fact that below is only a small selection of sources that we can recommend for reading on the topic of the article. The characteristics of the sources are given only from the point of view of military history. For more details see: Lyublinskaya A.D. Source study of the history of the Middle Ages. - L., 1955; Bibikov M.V. Historical Literature of Byzantium. - St. Petersburg, 1998. - (Byzantine library).
1. Agathius of Mirine. On the reign of Justinian / Per. M.V. Levchenko. - M., 1996. The work of the successor of Procopius of Caesarea is devoted to the description of the wars of the commander Narses against the Goths, Vandals, Franks and Persians and contains rich information about the Byzantine military art of the second half of the 6th century. However, Agathius was not a military man and his presentation of military events sometimes suffers from inaccuracy.
2. Anna Komnena. Alexiad / Per. from Greek Ya.N. Lyubarsky. - St. Petersburg, 1996. - (Byzantine library). Despite the rhetorical style and the author's own lack of any experience in military affairs, this work remains an important source on the military history of Byzantium in the era of the Komnenos.
3. Widukind of Corvey. The deeds of the Saxons. - M., 1975. The spring was created in the 10th century by a monk of the Novokorveysky monastery. Information of a predominantly political nature is given, wars are described briefly (in the style Veni,vidi,vici), however, there are descriptions of weapons and military clothing of the Saxons, there is information about the principle of manning the Saxon army, about the presence of a navy, cavalry and siege weapons among the Saxons.
4. Villardouin, Geoffrey de. Conquest of Constantinople / Transl., Art., Comment. M.A. Zaborova. - M., 1993. - (Monuments of historical thought). Memoirs of one of the leaders of the IV Crusade. Contains data on the organization, number and armament of the crusader army.
5. Greek polyorketics. Flavius Vegetius Renat / Foreword. A.V. Mishulin; comments A.A. Novikov. - St. Petersburg, 1996. - (Antique library). For a detailed commentary on this source, see above in the bibliography to the article on the ancient army. One can only add that the work of Vegetius was the most authoritative treatise on the structure of the army for medieval thinkers - in the ideal legion of Vegetius they saw an ideal model for building a medieval knightly army.
6. Digests of Justinian. Book XLIX. Titus XVI. About military affairs / Per. I.I. Yakovkina // Monuments of Roman law: Laws of the XII tables. Guyanese Institutions. Digests of Justinian. - M., 1997. - S.591-598. For a commentary on this source, see the bibliography for the article on the ancient army. It can be added that the military law "Digest" not only retained its relevance by the time of Justinian, but was also perceived and used later by many European legislators of the Middle Ages (for example, the king of Castile and Leon Alfonso X the Wise) in drawing up their laws.
7. Jordan. On the origin and deeds of the Getae. “Getica” / Transl., intro. Art., comment. E.Ch. Skrzhinskaya. - St. Petersburg, 1997. - (Byzantine library). – S. 98-102. From this work, we can only recommend Jordan's description of the famous battle in the Catalaunian fields, which became a role model for many medieval chroniclers in describing battles.
8. Clary, Robert de. Conquest of Constantinople / Transl., Art., Comment. M.A. Zaborova. - M., 1986. - (Monuments of historical thought). The author is one of the simple knights who were in the army of the crusaders who stormed Constantinople in 1204, which explains some of the incompleteness and subjectivity of the source's information. Nevertheless, the text of the chronicle contains information about the number of knightly detachments, the cost of hiring ships to transport troops, and the structure of the knightly army.
9. Commin, Philippe de. Memoirs / Trans., Art., Note. Yu.P. Malinin. - M., 1986. - (Monuments of historical thought). The author, a professional military man and diplomat, first served under the Duke of Burgundy Charles the Bold, then went over to the side of King Louis XI and became his adviser on the war with Burgundy. His work contains a lot of information necessary for the study of the French army, Ser. - 2nd floor. XV century, its structures, weapons, tactics and strategies.
10.Konstantin Porphyrogenitus. On the management of the empire / Per. G.G. Timpani. - M., 1991. - (The oldest sources on the history of Eastern Europe). The writing of the Byzantine emperor in 913-959. Contains numerous information on Byzantine diplomacy, military organization, relations with neighboring peoples, as well as on military equipment(description of Greek fire).
11.Kulakovsky Yu.A. Byzantine camp at the end of the 10th century // Byzantine civilization in the coverage of Russian scientists, 1894-1927. - M., 1999. - S.189-216. Annotated publication of a very carefully written little Byzantine treatise from the 10th century. "De castrametatione" ("On the setting up of camp"). Equipped with diagrams of the Byzantine camp. First published: Byzantine Vremennik. - T.10. - M., 1903. - S.63-90.
12.Mauritius. Tactics and Strategy: The Primary Source Op. about the military art imp. Leo the Philosopher and N. Machiavelli / Per. from lat. Tsybyshev; foreword ON THE. Geisman. - SPb., 1903. The fundamental Byzantine essay on the strategy of the turn of the 5th-6th centuries. Its attribution to Emperor Mauritius (582-602) is disputed by modern scholars. Of particular interest are the first in the European military literature the mention of stirrups, as well as information on the military affairs of the ancient Slavs. There is a more accessible abridged edition: Pseudo-Mauritius. Stategekon / Per. Tsybyshev, ed. R.V. Svetlova // The Art of War: An Anthology of Military Thought. - St. Petersburg, 2000. - T.1. - P.285-378.
13.Peter from Doesburg. Chronicle of the Prussian Land / Ed. prepared IN AND. Matuzova. - M., 1997. An essay telling about the wars of the Teutonic Order in Prussia from the point of view of the crusaders. An extremely valuable source on spiritual knightly orders, superbly translated and commented.
14. Song of the Nibelungs: epic / Per. Yu. Korneeva; intro. Art., comment. AND I. Gurevich. - St. Petersburg, 2000. The famous old German epic. From here you can learn both information about weapons, and about the strategy of the medieval army (in particular, regarding the use of intelligence).
15. Song of Roland: according to the Oxford text / Per. B.I. Yarkho. - M. - L.: "Academia", 1934. From this text one can take information about the armament of the knights, about the tactics of battle (arranging ambushes, etc.), as well as about the structure of the army. No need to pay attention to the number of troops indicated in the "Songs ...".
16.Song of Side: Old Spanish heroic epic / Per. B.I. Yarkho, Yu.B. Korneeva; ed. prepared A.A. Smirnov. - M.-L., 1959. - (Lit. monuments). The text of the source dates back to the middle of the 12th century and contains valuable information about the military art of the 11th-12th centuries, about the methods of conducting a siege, about the number of troops (unlike the Song of Roland, this monument provides reliable information on this subject, confirmed by data from other sources), about the weapons and equipment of the knights.
17.Procopius of Caesarea. War with the Goths: In 2 volumes / Per. S.P. Kondratiev. - M., 1996. - T.1-2.
18.Procopius of Caesarea. War with the Persians. War with vandals. Secret History / Trans., Art., Comment. A.A. Chekalova. - St. Petersburg, 1998. - (Byzantine library). Procopius of Caesarea is a professional historian of the time of Emperor Justinian, who created the cycle of historical works “History of Wars”, dedicated to the wars of the Byzantine Empire under this emperor. This cycle includes the above-mentioned works “War with the Goths”, “War with the Persians” and “War with the Vandals”. A characteristic feature of these works is Procopius' deep knowledge of the subject being described - he long years was the personal secretary of the largest commander Justinian, Belisarius, and accompanied him on campaigns, and therefore had a direct opportunity to observe the course of hostilities. Particularly successful are Procopius' descriptions of the sieges of cities (both from the point of view of the besieger and from the point of view of the besieged). The author's information about the size and structure of the Byzantine army is confirmed by other sources, and therefore can be considered reliable.
19.Procopius of Caesarea. About buildings / Per. S.P. Kondratiev // He. War with the Goths: In 2 volumes - M., 1996. - V.2. - P.138-288. This work by Procopius contains rich information about the construction policy of Emperor Justinian, in particular, about the military construction of that era. The principles of Byzantine fortification are covered in detail, almost all the fortresses built under Justinian are named.
20.Richer of Reims. History / Transl., comment., Art. A.V. Tarasova. - M., 1997. From this work you can get information about the armament of the troops and the methods of warfare in the X-XI centuries, about the use of intelligence in military operations. In turn, information about the structure of the Frankish army from Rycher cannot be called trustworthy - Rycher clearly borrowed the division of the army into legions and cohorts from Roman authors, and more specifically, from his beloved Sallust.
21. The saga of Sverrier / Ed. prepared M.I. Steblin-Kamensky and others - M., 1988. - (Lit. monuments). History of internecine wars in Norway in the XII-XIII centuries. Continues the “Circle of the Earth” by Snorri Sturluson (see below), contains detailed information on military affairs, which, even after the end of the Viking Age, continued to be very different in Norway from the rest of Western Europe.
22. Saxon mirror / Resp. ed. V.M. Koretsky. - M., 1985.
23. Salic Truth / Per. N.P. Gratsiansky. - M., 1950. These two monuments of the written customary law of the German peoples are included in the list of sources as typical representatives of the "barbaric Pravda". From them, as a rule, it is impossible to draw real information about military affairs, but on the other hand, they contain information about the cost of armor and weapons, which creates an idea of the social position of a warrior in German barbarian society.
24.Snorri Sturluson. Circle of the Earth / Ed. prepared AND I. Gurevich and others - M., 1980. - (Lit. monuments). The classic collection of sagas about “rulers who were in the Nordic Countries and spoke Danish”, created in Iceland in the 1st half. 13th century The presentation has been brought from ancient times to 1177. In relation to military history, it contains information about the military affairs of the Vikings, about their campaigns of conquest, military tricks and weapons, about the mechanism for recruiting the Norman army.
25. Tips and stories of Kekavmen. The work of the Byzantine commander of the XI century. / Prep. text, introduction, translation, comments. G.G. Timpani. - M., 1972. - (Monuments of the medieval history of the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe). The source was written in the 1070s. It contains advice on the leadership of the army (about a quarter of the volume), as well as everyday instructions that give an idea of the Byzantine military aristocracy and, moreover, is often illustrated with examples from the field of military affairs. One of the main sources on Byzantine military history. The only manuscript is kept in the Manuscript Department of the State Historical Museum in Moscow.
II. Literature.
Below is the literature on the history of the medieval army, recommended for reading. We have selected only general works, which is explained by two main factors: the extraordinary abundance of works devoted to particular issues of the military art of medieval Europe, published in the West, on the one hand, and the low accessibility for the domestic reader of works on national military histories of Western European countries, on the other. Almost all of the works presented below have a good bibliography, allowing the reader to easily carry out further literature searches.
26.Winkler P. fon. Weapons: A guide to the history, description and depiction of hand weapons from ancient times to early XIX century. - M., 1992. A good reference book on medieval weapons, a well-chosen illustrative series, accompanied by a professional commentary.
27.Gurevich A.Ya. Viking expeditions. - M., 1966. - (Popular science series of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR). Although this book was not written by a military historian, it contains a lot of information about military affairs and the military organization of the Vikings, as well as photographs of ships and weapons. The author is one of the largest domestic Scandinavians.
28.Delbruck G. History of military art within political history: In 4 volumes - St. Petersburg, 1994-1996. - V.2-3. For this edition, see the annotation to it given in the previous article.
29.Dupuy R.E., Dupuy T.N. World War History: Harper's Encyclopedia of Military History. - St. Petersburg; M., 1997. - Books 1-2. This publication can be used only to obtain the initial minimum information on the subject of interest. The information collected here concerns, first of all, the tactics of medieval armies on the example of famous battles. The publication contains battle diagrams and other illustrative material.
30. History of the Crusades / Ed. D. Riley-Smith. - M., 1998. The publication is a translation into Russian of one of the best works on the history of the Crusades, prepared at Oxford University. Separately, it is necessary to note the chapters devoted to the military monastic orders, in which not only the military art of the orders is analyzed in detail, but also their internal organization, place in society and politics. It should also be said that the book separately touches upon the issues of supply and transportation of armies during the Crusades, which were previously studied quite a bit. A distinctive feature of the book is the rich illustrative material.
31.Cardini F. Origins of medieval chivalry. - Sretensk, 2000. In this work, it seems possible to recommend for reading the second and third parts, dedicated to the formation of the ideology of medieval Christian chivalry and the military art of Europeans (mainly the Franks, Byzantines and their allies) of the VI-IX centuries, because the author's point of view on the prehistory of chivalry and, in particular, his military art, set out in the first part of the book, is highly controversial and ambiguous. Unfortunately, it should also be noted that the Russian translation of this book removes all historiographical material, scientific controversy and references to sources, which, of course, deprives many of the author's statements of a fair amount of evidence.
32.Litavrin G.G. Byzantine society and state in the X-XI centuries. - M., 1977. - S.236-259.
33.He is. How did the Byzantines live? - St. Petersburg, 1997. - (Byzantine library). - P.120-143. Essays on military affairs in Byzantium of the central period of its history (IX-XII centuries), written by one of the largest domestic Byzantinists (the second of these two books is popular science).
34.Melville M. History of the Knights Templar / Per. from fr. G.F. Tsybulko. - St. Petersburg, 1999. - (Clio). A solid study of the history of one of the most famous spiritual and chivalric orders.
35.Razin E.A. History of military art. - SPb., 1999. - V.2. - (Military Historical Library). The work was done quite thoroughly, and if you do not pay attention to the numerous Soviet stamps, then you can call it one of the most complete works on the military history of the Middle Ages in Russian. The book contains rich illustrative material, of which the schemes of the main battles of the Middle Ages are most interesting.
36.Flory J. The ideology of the sword: the prehistory of chivalry. - St. Petersburg, 1999. - (Clio). As the title implies, this work is devoted to the formation of the ideology of Christian chivalry and the formation of its social structure. One of the best works devoted to the ideology of chivalry, accompanied, moreover, by a fairly complete bibliography on the military history of the Middle Ages.
37.Yakovlev V.V. The history of fortresses: The evolution of long-term fortification. - St. Petersburg, 1995. - Ch. IV-XII. This edition is best handled with care - a professional study of fortifications of the 9th-17th centuries. accompanied by more than dubious historical commentary.
38.Beeler J. Warfare in the feudal Europe: 730 - 1200. - Ithaca (N.Y.), 1971. The work of a well-known English researcher examines the military affairs of Western Europe from the Carolingian era to the heyday of military feudalism. Separate chapters are devoted to the development and characteristics of military art in Norman Italy, southern France and Christian Spain. A distinctive feature of the work is the availability of the presentation of the material, which, however, does not affect its completeness.
39.Contamine Ph. La guerre au Moyen Age. – P., 1980; 1999. - (Nouvelle Clio: L'histoire et ses problems). For many years this work has been rightfully considered a classic in the study of the military history of the Middle Ages. The book highlights the development of the army and military art in the countries of Western Europe and in the states of the Latin East in the period of the 5th - to the 15th centuries. Special attention is paid to the evolution of weapons, the emergence and development of artillery, as well as the connection of war with various aspects of the life of medieval society. An excellent scientific and reference apparatus, the most important place in which is occupied by a list of sources and literature with a total volume of more than one hundred pages, gives reason to recommend this work to everyone who wants to get acquainted with the history of the military affairs of the Middle Ages.
40.Lot F. L'art militaire et les armées au Moyen Age en Europe et dans le Proche Orient: 2 vols. - P., 1946. A classic work on the history of military art, which has already gone through several editions and still has not lost its relevance. A special place in the book is given to the comparison of the military art of Christian armies and Muslims during the Crusades.
41. Medieval warfare: A history / Ed. by Maurice Keen. – Oxford, 1999. The book is divided into two main parts, the first of which chronological order the history of the military affairs of Europe and the Latin East is considered, starting from the Carolingians and ending with the Hundred Years War, and the second contains several chapters devoted to the consideration of individual issues: the art of the siege in the Middle Ages, the armament of medieval armies, mercenarism, the navy in the Middle Ages and the appearance of gunpowder artillery and regular armies. The book is richly illustrated with chronological tables and an excellent bibliographic index.
42.Menendez Pidal R. La España del Cid: 2 vols. – Madrid, 1929. An excellent work by a Spanish philologist dedicated to Spain in the period of the 11th – 13th centuries. The army is considered as an integral part of the Spanish medieval society, its structure, the foundations of its military art, its weapons are shown. Contrary to the name, the work is based not only on the material of the Song of Sid, but also on other sources.
43.Nicole D. Medieval warfare: Sourcebook: In 2 vols. – L., 1995-1996. – Vol.1-2. A generalizing summary work devoted to the military affairs of Medieval Europe, from the era of the Great Migration of Nations to the beginning of the Great Geographical Discoveries. The first volume describes military affairs within Europe, the second in question about the military activities of Europeans in other countries. The characteristic features of the work are, firstly, its clear structure, and secondly, the richest illustrative material (each volume has 200 illustrations per 320 pages of text), which makes the book almost indispensable for studying the military history of the Middle Ages.
44.Oman C.W.C. The art of war in the Middle Ages: A.D. 378 - 1515 / Rev. ed. by J.H. Beeler. – Ithaca (N.Y.), 1963. The fifth edition of one of the most popular military history books in Europe. Created in late XIX century, it still attracts readers with its accessibility and, in good sense words, popular presentation. The book focuses on the military side of the collapse of the Roman Empire, the Great Migration of Nations, separate chapters are devoted to the military development of Byzantium in the VI-XI centuries, Switzerland in 1315-1515 and England in the XIII-XV centuries. In conclusion, the author writes about the military affairs of states of Eastern Europe 15th century including the Ottoman Porte. The book is provided with chronological tables.
45.Prestwich M. Armies and warfare in the Middle Ages: The English experience. – New Haven; L., 1996. The book is interesting because the author separately focuses on the role of the infantry in the Middle Ages, considers in detail the problem of military communications, the problems of strategy (in particular, the use of intelligence in the Middle Ages). One of the main conclusions of the author is also interesting - he doubts the reality of the so-called “medieval military revolution”, which led to an increase in the role of cavalry in battle, and believes that the role of infantry in the medieval army was greatly underestimated by previous historians. The book is richly illustrated.
Jordan. On the origin and deeds of the Getae. Getica. - St. Petersburg, 1997. - S. 98-102.
Razin E.A. History of military art. - SPb., 1999. - V.2. - (Military Historical Library). – P.137.
Winkler P. fon. Weapons: a guide to the history, description and depiction of hand weapons from ancient times to the beginning of the 19th century. - M., 1992. - S. 73-74.
For more on Martell's reform, see the chapter on the strength and weakness of the Carolingian armies in: ContaminePh. La guerre au Moyen Age. – P., 1999.
Lex Ripuaria, XXXVI, 11 // MGH LL. – T.V. – P.231. Cit. on: Delbruck G. The history of military art within the framework of political history. - SPb., 1994. - V.2. - p.7.
For the question of the size of the Carolingian armies, see the relevant chapters in: Delbruck G. The history of military art ... - V.2. - St. Petersburg, 1994; ContaminePh. La guerre au Moyen Age. – P., 1999; Oman C.W.C. The art of war in the Middle Ages: A.D. 378 - 1515 / Rev. ed. by J.H. Beeler. – Ithaca (N.Y.), 1963.
For more information on the development of artillery, see the relevant chapters in: ContaminePh. La guerre au Moyen Age. – P., 1999; Medieval warfare: A history / Ed. by Maurice Keen. – Oxford, 1999.