I have a hard time believing a group of charging knights all stopped so their horses could kick the enemy. I think a knight would prefer his horse to remain a stable platform with all that armor on.
I have a hard time believing a group of charging knights all stopped so their horses could kick the enemy. I think a knight would prefer his horse to remain a stable platform with all that armor on.
Ok, did I say the knight stopped up to fight the infantry with his horse. He would of course rely on his lance and close melee weapons.
No, I said should he happen to be surrounded the horse itself was not a bad weapon. It could defend itself to some extent.
Of course a heavy horse with armour on it would have hard time doing what those Spanish horses do, and then be able to run, if it at all could do it. But the point is that that particular method was a finetuned drill, borne out of centuries of cavalry combat. Certainly a backkick was possible from a Destrier, and the size of it compared to the generally small size of non-nobles of the time would make it not only fightening but deadly.
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BTW, Danish Crusades are true to history.
You may not care about war, but war cares about you!
You may not care about war, but war cares about you!
Quote Originally posted by Kraxis:
Ok, did I say the knight stopped up to fight the infantry with his horse. He would of course rely on his lance and close melee weapons.
No, I said should he happen to be surrounded the horse itself was not a bad weapon. It could defend itself to some extent.
Of course a heavy horse with armour on it would have hard time doing what those Spanish horses do, and then be able to run, if it at all could do it. But the point is that that particular method was a finetuned drill, borne out of centuries of cavalry combat. Certainly a backkick was possible from a Destrier, and the size of it compared to the generally small size of non-nobles of the time would make it not only fightening but deadly.
[/QUOTE]
We talk and talk, but again, no one seems to be able to present an historical example of a victorious frontal charge by knights on a determined unscathed static formation of spearmen with protected flanks... Every example I've seen of a victorious frontal charge by knights shows a tired, harassed, disorganised, broken or flanked infantry unit.
Cheers,
Antonio
amrcg,
That's because no one believes eyewitnesses. Medieval journals and diaries are apparently suspect and only Keegan's description of NAPOLEONIC warfare is valid when talking of cavalry. Medieval accounts are either fantasy or propaganda according to most modern military historians. These, of course, are the same historians who told us the knight had no skill or understanding of swordsmanship. Hehe, fencing was an art but the martial skills of a knight consisted of bashing and then bashing again.
Fencing is an aristocratic joke. Related to true medieval sword fighting exactly like masterbation is to intercourse. If you examine a true medieval manual, even as an amateur, you quickly realize that what you are looking at is not wild swinging but an entire system devoted to killing or incapicitating an opponent in the least possible moves. If you look at their weapons you would realize they couldn't fence if they wanted to. Death and incapacity was the goal. This has been accepted. The idea that our European ancestors didn't just swing and poke indiscrimantely but had a form of martial arts every bit as good and in some situations better than East Asia is no longer in dispute. This entire history is based on manuals and contemperary accounts.
That horsemen charged and decimated infantry in the Middle Ages is also based on the same sources. "A scythe through chaff" is a common metaphor. But, because historians have found that certain writers had certain patrons, this evidence should be discarded and a 20th century historian's interpretation of a 19th century campaign should, now and forever, be the definative study of cavalry from 200 B.C to 2002 B.C..
The reason I haven't posted examples of cavalry beating well-ordered infantry is threefold: 1.) I did. Do a search for Kircholm. 2.) There are endless eyewitness testimonies to the charge but, by definition, they are biased and invalid to a modern historian. It becomes a losing battle. Napoleonic texts are bible and reliable but medieval texts are lies and exaggeration. 3.) I did post links but no one seems to have actually looked at them.
http://www.deremilitari.org/
A good place to start. "He lived it, he saw it and he chose to give it to posterity. But it can't possibly be true." Historian "blank".
Quote Originally posted by tomppb:
BUT intially the knight's charge was not futile or ineffective. Its psychological impact was often more than enough to set the militia infantry running at which time the cavalry could easily cut down the individual soldiers. And since the infantry formation was broken up the knight did not have to worry about spearing one infantryman only to have his horse collide into 4 others causing the ruination of them all.
[/QUOTE]
Yes! and that was the point I was trying to make right at the start of this thread and then managed to do better on its sisted thread 'Charge - The great cavalry debate.'
To my mind the issue should not be why MTW cavalry can't ride over infantry but Why MTW infantry hardly ever panic when charged by cavalry.
I think thats where the problem lies. Infantry being attacked by cavalry ought to panic more often especailly if caught unprepared and on the move whereas at the moment its actually possible to launch a successful counter-charge with infantry against charging cavalry.
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Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Quote Originally posted by Kraxis:
Of course he would get a kick, but even an average knight would have practiced with the lance. He might even have defeated a few other knights in Tournaments. Now if he didn't get injuries from striking the enemy there, at comparably higher speeds (both horses running, perhaps not charging), why should we expect him to get any in a fight where the speed of closure is lower? He might of course get injuries, all soldiers can get injuries from bad luck and such. But the knight expected to hit the enemy and be able to fight on with the same arm using a sword/mace/flail/whatever.
[/QUOTE]
This was one reason why I was curious to hear from re-enactors who ought to be able to vouch for the recoil impact of hitting a galloping target with a lance.
The only real difference I can imagine between the tourament and the battlefield is that in the tournment the lances were blunted or capped and so the normal result was a deflection hit kocking the opponent off their horse.
In the case of battlefield combat against infantry however the assumption is that the lance was un-capped and lethal. This a hit was not intended to be deflected by to penetrate. Thus the recoil effect would not be a short sharp kick in the shoulder but far more powerful and sustained as the lance point would remain in the victim[s] and have to carry their bodies with it.
I have no idea how different that would be for the knight or what steps they took to prepare or avoid it.
All I do know is that Napoleonic lancers were warned against allowing their lances to penetrate beyond the blade and to withdraw the head very quickly after impact which is one reason why victims are reported to have multiple lance wounds rather than one killing blow.
Quote
But lets think back at the time of impact:
The spearman standing there holding his 7 foot spear, braced in the ground.
The lance strikes him squarely in the chest (lucky knight) impaling him, but even if he dies at once he will most likely have a short weak spasm in his arms (and most other parts of the body), so he clenches his spear harder (as you correctly wrote).
The lance transfers to the body a great amount of force sending him backwards at a speed a bit slower than the lance. Because he clenches the spear he brings it up from its former great anti-knight position, to a position that is perhaps even a not so anti-knight vertical.
The horse is running on, while the spearman is thrown back into the next man, who might get knocked out from the sudden compression of his lungs, at the very least he too will get pushed back and his spear will also go vertical if he continues to hold on to it. But this time the horse is closer and the spearpoint has a chance actually hitting the head or throat of the horse, unfortunately for him this is a much smaller target than the chest and chances are that he will fall to one side a bit (the formation would not have been perfect, the men would try to look over the should of the others making it a little bit rhomboid) making the spearpoint pass the horse. Naturally it would hit in some cases, even the first man would hit sometimes...
The third man would perhaps be able to stand up, but he too would feel the compression of his chest quite violently. He would have been able to see the knight close and hit and would as many people do in scary situation inhale sharply. The 'Oof'he lets out would save his life with a few broken ribs but I'm not sure a man in such a situation would clech his spear harder. I was once at a concert up front, and suddenly people from behind began rushing forward. The compression made me lose sight for a few splitseconds, and I noticed at once that I had dropped my shirt (I never found it again, would probably not want it again). I'm guessing the third man would experience the same.
I could ofcourse be wrong.
[/QUOTE]
Well! we could all be wrong as we are merely playing with logic here but your scenario is as logically plausible as mine. And your right in theory both horse and rider might survive the impact to be rolled into the ground although the net result is the same either way.
Also don't forget that the knight would have another whole file of spearmen opposing him not just one due to the comparative width of frontage. So regardless of whether the man he hit kept his spearpoint down there was still another one aimed at his horses chest.
[EDIT] Forgot in my hurry that the horse would just be stumbling over the fallen men and the endresult would be much the same.
It is a big perhaps if it could be standing after passing over the fallen men, it could happen but I doubt it. I just think it would not be fatal for the horse and knight all the time.[/B][/QUOTE]
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Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Quote Originally posted by AgentBif:
But the point is, mounted knights in the western tradition were generally the primary attack force. A full-on frontal charge of a massive wall of heavy cavalry was usually the main attack, and not infrequently it was the opening move. This was not a rare thing, it was the modus operandi, the SOP, the way things were done.
[/QUOTE]
Well you are obviously better read than I am. So far the battles I have looked at all began with an attempt to soften up the enemy infantry with missile fire before the cavalry were committed. And the final massed cavalry assault seems almost to have been the final resort when that attempt failed.
I can't help wondering also what the official story of the battle would be if after the missile fire had completely demoralised the infatry the knights did charge and ride them down.
How many of the victorious knights basking in their glory would actually remember the insignificant detail that the crossbowmen had demoralised the enemy before they attacked?
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Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Quote Originally posted by Boleslaw Wrymouth:
I did post links but no one seems to have actually looked at them.
http://www.deremilitari.org/
A good place to start. "He lived it, he saw it and he chose to give it to posterity. But it can't possibly be true." Historian "blank".[/QUOTE]
Sorry BW I did go to your website and have a look but your URL just gives me the Home Page and I had no idea what it was you wanted me to read (and there's a lot of stuff on that site).
In the end I gave up trying to find the references you were thinking of.
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Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Didz
Fortis balore et armis
this is the longest thread I have ever witnessed in my entire life...........
Have looked there for info..lots of interesting articles but not much about cavalry versus infantry.
http://www.deremilitari.org/humphries.pdf
A bit info about knights and foot
http://www.deremilitari.org/marshall.pdf
Really only cavalry versus cavalry
http://www.deremilitari.org/mcglynn.htm
"Articles by Matthew Bennet, Jim Bradhury and John Gillingham reveal the 'vitally important' role of infantry by such telling examples as when the spears of Henry II's foot-soldiers saw off the French cavalry at Gisors in 1188 ('not the kind of thing that is supposed to happen in medieval warfare before the battle of Courtai in 1302') and the series of battles in England and Normandy between 1066 and 1141 which display the tactical combination of cavalry, dismounted knights, archers and infantry"
There might be more...
As I see it the primary reason for this ongoing discussion is the lack of knowledge/understanding of medieval warfare. Lots of nice theories, silly ideas and statements with no references to back them up: Blindfolded horses charging directly into frightened midget 4 1/2 foot tall soldiers might be the worst
Kircholm is not the greatest example to prove what cavalry could do 200-500 years before kircholm. See earlier in this thread for my comments on Kircholm and other battles during that period.
Im no expert but I have tried to provide references to books and websites when I have made my case and so have others. Ofc there is room for discussing sources and historians but it still looks more like general statements than concrete examples.
But no matter what, we have several historical examples to draw some (perhaps limited) conclusions on:
At Bouvines(1214) we see the german infantry, moving forward after defeating the french infantry, being defeated by cavalry. In the end we hear about a smaller infantry force making a last stand, standing in a square, apparently not defeated easily.
The Flemish infantry defeated french knights at Courtrai(1302), after fighting with french infantry first. Same type of infantry both have wins and losses against the French in the next couple of years (Arques 1303 and Mons-en-Pévèle 1304) the sources talks about the french knights reluctance of attacking the flemish infantry after Courtrai, especially if the infantry is prepared to recieve the cavalry charge (standing in square and/or using terrain/wagons as flank/rear protection). But the knights had success when attacking unprepared/attacking infantry.
Cavalry attacking the flanks or rear of an infantry formation was deadly but frontal attacks were deadly too if the infantry was not prepared..but was does prepared mean?
We are not just talking about the foot soldiers looking at the cavalry charging and thinking "ok Im prepared" We are talking about the whole infantry formation/unit going form standard marching order or close combat order to an even more dense order.
The normal combat close formation would be about 3 feet frontage per front soldier( we see that in ancient times too) and 6-7 feet depth. If forming a defensive formation against cavalry we are looking at about 1 1/2 foot frontage with depth reduced too. A formation not designed for speed and maneuver but for defense. The space between sub-units might be closed too so there is no room for any cavalry.
All that takes time and with limited command and control might not be easy if the formation was moving forward and as its not very mobile the flanks has to be protected by something (terrain or cavalry)
We do see that sometimes the infantry formed a square-like formation so there were no unprotected flanks: the scots with schiltrons and the flemish with the crown formation.
We do know from military manuals in the 16th and 17th century that cavalry trained for attacking pike formations. Maybe they didnt train for it that much earlier in the Middleages but we do know that knights attacked and won and sometimes they attacked and lost even before the pike came into use.
CBR
Quote Originally posted by CBR:
If forming a defensive formation against cavalry we are looking at about 1 1/2 foot frontage with depth reduced too. A formation not designed for speed and maneuver but for defense. The space between sub-units might be closed too so there is no room for any cavalry.[/QUOTE]
Ahh... well, that could make a difference. What if Spears and Pikes had a new formation besides the three they have now, like ranged units have Skirmish. A formation that is basically not mobile but smaller and gets the benefits they have now and a few benefits against other infantry as well... Obviously it would be very vulnerable to archery, just like Wedge.
By the way... good links, very enjoyable.
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BTW, Danish Crusades are true to history.
You may not care about war, but war cares about you!
You may not care about war, but war cares about you!
Quote Originally posted by Kraxis:
Ahh... well, that could make a difference. What if Spears and Pikes had a new formation besides the three they have now, like ranged units have Skirmish. A formation that is basically not mobile but smaller and gets the benefits they have now and a few benefits against other infantry as well... Obviously it would be very vulnerable to archery, just like Wedge.
By the way... good links, very enjoyable.
[/QUOTE]
yes it could be done in several ways I guess: either say the "hold formation" is very slow (half movement rates) or simply not mobile at all, or make a new formation type..called Shield Wall (ofc pikes dont have shields but its the same dense order)
CBR
Quote Originally posted by Didz:
So far the battles I have looked at all began with an attempt to soften up the enemy infantry with missile fire before the cavalry were committed. And the final massed cavalry assault seems almost to have been the final resort when that attempt failed.
[/QUOTE]
Incidentally, I did not intend to imply that the opening charge was the "modus operandi", rather, I was referring to the use of knights as the primary attack force.
Generally missile units were an auxiliary asset used to assist the cavalry charge or to aid in repelling one. There are some obvious examples of exceptions to this principle among the English.
And as far as "cavalry seemed to be the final resort", this is untenable as a general assesment of medieval warfare. Knights were not archers, knights were cavalry. The knights were the ones with the authority. The knights wanted above all to fight, and they almost always did everything they could to make sure they got to play.
Quote
I can't help wondering also what the official story of the battle would be if after the missile fire had completely demoralised the infatry the knights did charge and ride them down.
[/QUOTE]
Sure, it's quite plausible this sort of thing happened at times. But it was not uncommon for missile arms to expend their entire supply of arrows leaving hardly any impression at all. It was also not infrequent for a missile barrage by the defense to actually induce the charge.
bif
[This message has been edited by AgentBif (edited 11-01-2002).]
bif
-- There are 10 kinds of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. --
Quote Originally posted by AgentBif:
Sure, it's quite plausible this sort of thing happened at times. But it was not uncommon for missile arms to expend their entire supply of arrows leaving hardly any impression at all. It was also not infrequent for a missile barrage by the defense to actually induce the charge.
[/QUOTE]
Exactly, that was the point I was trying to make.
Ideally, the missile troops caused enough disruption and demoralisation amongst the defending infantry that they were unable to stand and face the Knights charge when it finally came and so the Knights rode them down.
Unfortunately, as we know this wasn't always the case and so far the pattern which leads to the knights downfall begins with their missile troops expending all their ammunition or being driven off by the opposing missile fire so that the knights were left with no choice but to charge an unshaken defencive line with predictable results.
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Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Didz
Fortis balore et armis
Quote Originally posted by Didz:
Unfortunately, as we know this wasn't always the case and so far the pattern which leads to the knights downfall begins with their missile troops expending all their ammunition or being driven off by the opposing missile fire so that the knights were left with no choice but to charge an unshaken defencive line with predictable results.
[/QUOTE]
No, the knights weren't a backup plan, they were THE plan (usually). The missile troops were there to make the knight's job easier (or were there because there simply weren't more knights available).
You sound like you're trying to spin it as if the knights were an auxiliary component of the army only to be trotted out if things started to go bad, and that's all backwards.
bif
[This message has been edited by AgentBif (edited 11-01-2002).]
bif
-- There are 10 kinds of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. --
Quote Originally posted by AgentBif:
No, the knights weren't a backup plan, they were THE plan (usually). The missile troops were there to make the knight's job easier (or were there because there simply weren't more knights available).
You sound like you're trying to spin it as if the knights were an auxiliary component of the army only to be trotted out if things started to go bad, and that's all backwards.
bif
[This message has been edited by AgentBif (edited 11-01-2002).][/QUOTE]
AgentBif you seem to be misinterpreting me, Didz and and others.
We are saying that aremoured cavalry "were the plan" in the Middle Ages". But for us, this plan was phased and the knights usually did not come first because that would be to risk extra casualties and risk defeat. The knights were the monster of the battle, but they were more effective when released at the right time, when the enemy formation and/or morale was more fragile and unable to stop the impetus of the horsemen. Gaps, thinner depth, formation disruption and low morale could be caused by auxiliaries like missile troops and/or other infantry. After that, the horsemen were most probably successful with no one strong enough to block their passage.
Antonio
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