The zweihander was used as early as the 14th century. The famous German mercs were merely most famous users of the big bad body-cleaver.
Nope, I was thinking of the Falchion.
Re: Medaeval War Tactics
The zweihander was used as early as the 14th century. The famous German mercs were merely most famous users of the big bad body-cleaver.
Nope, I was thinking of the Falchion.
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Re: Medaeval War Tactics
Two-handed swords have had many forms and sizes over the centuries you know, and go back to quite far Antiquity in some places (although they tended to get fogotten for a while at some point). The version the Doppelsöldners of the gaudily dressed Early Modern mercenary armies are famous for was AFAIK the largest ever actually used for combat, and a rather late developement (off the top of my head I'd guess second half of the 1400s at the earliest); it has been suggested it was developed partly to chop pike-shafts. Partly on the basis that they seem to have been largely withdrawn to bodyguard duties once people started adding metal reinforcements to their pikes to put a stop to such vandalism.
Knights those days, and not a few others, conversely favoured the "hand and half" longsword, as it was versatile, light and small enough to be carried as a sidearm and wielded one-handed from horseback, and the point could be thrust through the very few weaker points there were in period plate armour.
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Re: Medaeval War Tactics
Two-handed swords were used as early as the late 13th century, the famous Zweihänder only appeared towards the late 15th century however, as a response to pike warfare.Originally Posted by Hound of Ulster
The falchion was mainly popular during the early to high middle ages, but faded in popularity towards the end of the 14th century, when armour started to improve dramatically.
Ah, one of the oldest debate topics among military history nerds
I think it has been proved, through some research, can't cite any source unfortunately, that they were not likely to be capable of chopping off pike-shafts, they were rather designed to
a) shatter the pike-shafts (sweep them aside)
b) reach through the ranks and cut the pikeman (thus its great length)
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Re: Medaeval War Tactics
Tactics into medieval.
Its very hard to describe general tactics because into different parts of Europe people used different tacticsl. Just compare French tactic from beginning of XV century with with polish tactic from great polish teutonic war 1409-1411. I won't even mention Mongols because their tactic was really understood (with honorable mention of Lisowczycy unit) into XX century.
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Re: Medaeval War Tactics
Steppe-nomad fighting techniques tended to be a little murky for most people who didn't have the misfortune of living next to the troublesome buggers. Those who did, of course, by necessity tended to understand them quite well and came up with countermeasures in quite short order.
But yeah, there's the general problem that even if one brackets "Medieval" as between around the 11th to 15th centuries AD, and in the most common geographical definition of "Europe", there's still immense variations in tactics in both different times and places over it. Few people anywhere made war in the 15th century in the same manner as it had been made in the 11th; and the Bretons were different from the Normans, the Celtic Fringe from the Brits, the Scandinavians from the Germans, the Hungarians from the Austrians, the Russians from the Byzantines, the diverse Iberians from just about everyone else, the Venetians and Genoans from the Sicilians, all according to the vagaries of local geography, economy and sundry as well as the enemies they had to fight.
Last edited by Watchman; 12-04-2007 at 00:06.
"Let us remember that there are multiple theories of Intelligent Design. I and many others around the world are of the strong belief that the universe was created by a Flying Spaghetti Monster. --- Proof of the existence of the FSM, if needed, can be found in the recent uptick of global warming, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters. Apparently His Pastaness is to be worshipped in full pirate regalia. The decline in worldwide pirate population over the past 200 years directly corresponds with the increase in global temperature. Here is a graph to illustrate the point."
-Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster
Re: Medaeval War Tactics
please, generaly explain the tactics of the northern europeans (from England to france and HRE).
What did they do mostly with inf.?
What'd they do with archers moslty?
What'd they do with knights mostly?
What'd they do in battle? (just one head on fight? or depends on the general?) u know.. pitched battle.
who were the mainline inf? mainline archers? explain who generals preffered to recruit more, use more, sergeants or militia?
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Re: Medaeval War Tactics
No. It's still a huge topic. You know, no one in here can give you the exact answers, and few in the world probably knows. Besides, we are not your question answering army, there are the things called Google and Books, you know.
It's not easy being a man, you know. I had to get dressed today... And there are other pressures.
- Dylan Moran
The Play
Re: Medaeval War Tactics
Yeah, read a book. You can't expect clear and detailed explanations of the entirety of medieval military tactics in a forum post. What I can tell you in one sentence, however, is that the vast majority of fighting consisted of raiding done by cavalry or mounted infantry from small garrisons.
Last edited by Furious Mental; 12-05-2007 at 04:44.
Re: Medaeval War Tactics
I recommend the newsgroup soc.history.medieval. If they can't answer your question, then they'll be able to point you to books you can read in order to reach your own conclusion. A caveat is that they don't suffer fools, so they'll expect your questions to be highly focused and backed up by at least basic knowledge, and that you'll be able to understand the answers they give. Still, from my experience, if you fulfill these basic criteria, they're friendly enough, and immensely helpful.
Re: Medaeval War Tactics
i suggest you read the book, the art of warfare in western europe during the middle ages - by Richard Vaughan
very general
infantry was until early 14th century used as a backup for the knights... the battle was usually decided in clashes of knights... after that they became more and more important and capable of holding their own... contributing to this was the rise of the longbowmen, the scottish pikemen, the flemish pikemen and last bot not least the swiss.
archers usually skirmished infront of the mainline to pepper the enemy and then withdraw, to later fill the gaps in the battleformation. they were few and underused, but deadly nonetheless. though most knights regarded them, specially the crossbow as unholy weapons, so they didnt respect them.
cavalry was the main force of the medieval army in the west, they were the best trained which made up for their small numbers. they usually tried to break through enemy formation with charges from the centre and flanks to run through it and then charge again from the rear. the power of the knights lay in their dense formation not their individual force, if they broke ranks they could easily be encircled by the foot who usually outnumbered them.
the usual misconception that in medieval battles generals just charged and didnt care what happened is very wrong. the most usual thing to do is to split the army into 3, the vanguard, the main part and the rear guard, the rearguard was usually commanded by the general himself or an able companion. the rearguard was very important because it had to break the tide of battle or cover the retreat, so the most trusted and battlehardened men could be found there.
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