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Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac
First of all hello there and thank you for taking a look at my thread. I hope you find helpful and interesting answers here.

Who am I?

I am an Honours Class History student in Liverpool Hope University, planning to start my Master’s at the end of this year. In February I become a room & tour guide in Speke Hall (originally a Tudor manor house which later became a Victorian mansion, with a brief career in-between as a cattle shed). Generally I enjoy teaching and sharing information, and I figure this is a much more constructive venue to do that than responding to Youtube debates.

What is this about?

Medieval History. Anything from the Viking Age to the Teutonic Knights to Marjorie Kemp and what a strange person she was. Any aspects of medieval history that interest you; or any aspects that confuse you and you would like to understand better. Whether food, medicine, technology, daily life, the reasons behind the Crusades. Ask away and I will give the best answer I can.

A particular focus of mine is medieval arms and armour. I study medieval swordsmanship from historical manuscripts such as the Talhoffer Fechtbuch – which also contains mad-scientist ideas such as tanks (armoured war wagons with cannons), mobile land-mines with blades, and 15th century diving suits (which are fully functional, if inconvenient). I do not have a HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts) group in my area, but I am familiar with some of the fighting texts and much of the research into the performance of medieval arms and armour.

A difference between this and the military history thread is I expect a different focus. This will be part military history, part martial arts, and part social/political/cultural history.

Anything else to know in advance?

Medieval history is mostly guesswork, so answers will revolve around not only what we know but also how we know and what evidence there is to support that conclusion. A lot of answers will have a simple version and more nuanced and detailed version.

I like busting misconceptions. A huge amount of what people think they know about the medieval world turns out to be completely wrong. Actually that is true for almost any area of history, but the medieval world is the area I feel most qualified to answer in detail.

University does not like me keeping a sword on campus, so if answering your question means testing things out with my practise sword then you may have to wait until the weekend for a full answer.

Let the questions begin!

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karl fungus
May 6, 2011

Baeume sind auch Freunde
How many of the common fantasy "medieval" weapons were actually used in the Middle Ages? I suppose a better way of phrasing the question is, what were armies typically armed with? Did people really just grab whatever they had on hand?

I find it hard to believe that, say, flails or various forms of scythes were ever actually used in combat. Swords don't really seem like a mass-producible weapon, either.

THE LUMMOX
Nov 29, 2004
What's the hottest debate in the field right now?

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac
Karl Fungus:

Many common fantasy “medieval” weapons were used somewhere at some time. That somewhere might not have been a very large place, and that some time might not have been very long, although generally fantasy weapons have a loose tie to reality.

Except for double-headed axes. That is the one weapon off the top of my head I can say was never used in battle.

There was a huge difference between armies of 700 AD and armies of 1400 AD, although the most common weapon for either was a version of either a bow or a spear. The spear of 700 AD might be 7-8 foot long and used with a shield, while the spear of 1400 AD might be a pike (10-20 foot spear) or a halberd (combine a spear with an axe). The bow of 1400 AD might be crossbow. However, bow or spear is the broad theme.

Bows and spears were relatively inexpensive, might be used for hunting, and being able to attack without the enemy attacking you was a huge advantage. According to Konungs Skuggsja (a diverse text from around 1250) one spear was worth two swords in a shield wall.

Using a bow also allows an unskilled fighter to fight at less risk to himself.

Swords, axes and maces were used, although were typically not primary weapons. Exceptions did exist, such as the Dane Axe or Scottish Claymore, although these were not particularly common. The first weapon was always the one that could strike from further away, and then the secondary weapon is drawn once you get closer. These weapons also changed significantly over the medieval period.

Actual swords tended to be reserved for the wealthy, although cheaper options existed that resembled oversized knives – these could be the seax in early medieval Europe, a messer in later Germany, and later on cheaper swords for pikemen such as the Swiss Degen and German katzbalger become possible.

Most medieval armies were properly equipped for battle. Some places (England, Denmark) had militia laws requiring every man above a certain level of wealth to keep weapons and armour, others (France) tried to forbid the peasants from owning weapons but relied more on household troops. The German & Italian states varied too much for me to easily keep track of, although I think they tended towards armed.

Flails were mainly used in the Hussite Wars, although mainly saw use in East Germany during the 1400s. The advantage is most peasant farmers had used a flail to thresh grain, so he would know how to use a version adapted to combat. It seemed to be used about as much as the pike according to ordinances. For example, Duke Albrecht V ordered in 1421 that of every 20 men, there should be 3 handguns, 8 crossbows, 4 pikes & 4 war flails. It also tells us something about Duke Albrecht’s maths (3+8+4+4=19, not 20).

LUMMOX:

I have never really experienced hot debates in medieval history, at least not within scholarly circles. Instead there is just straightforward cases of either outdated information (such as with medieval sword use, the concept of the Dark Ages) or a disconnect between scholarly research and popular culture (attitudes towards the Crusades, views of medieval science, and so on). The closest answer I could give would be to give a list of common misconceptions about the medieval period.

On medieval combat, the chief debate I can think of is whether the longbow is really able to pierce plate armour or not (the answer: not reliably).

I hope those help!

zombieswithblenders
Nov 21, 2008
How common where castle sieges? Was that common practice? Or was that kind of stuff avoided?

Ferdinand the Bull
Jul 30, 2006
Probation
Can't post for 2 hours!
Was there any medeival technology shared between the Western European countries and other parts of the world, and if so, what?

What I want to know is if, say, Chinese weapons of the same period were known of within Europe.

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



Railtus posted:

I have never really experienced hot debates in medieval history, at least not within scholarly circles. Instead there is just straightforward cases of either outdated information (such as with medieval sword use, the concept of the Dark Ages) or a disconnect between scholarly research and popular culture (attitudes towards the Crusades, views of medieval science, and so on). The closest answer I could give would be to give a list of common misconceptions about the medieval period.

I thought there was significant debate about what clothes were actually worn, at least in the Viking age. I think the line of reasoning was "We know what they were buried in, so we know what they wore" vs "We know what they were buried in, it doesn't follow that the clothing they used while alive was similar" and that the debate was quite heated.

I think part of it came from the way that Viking burial ships have ornamental shields (and so on) on them that wouldn't be practical to actually use, due to size, weight, construction, and so on.

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Avalanche
Feb 2, 2007
How much 'skill' and 'training' did it take to become proficient in using a longbow and using a sword (lets say a broadsword)? I've heard that with some of these weapons, it required a lifetime of training to really know what you're doing. With others, you could essentially pick the thing up and go.

Were your traditional 'knights' actually skilled warriors? Or just aristocratic dudes with a lot of money that picked up weapons, gave themselves a title, and charged into the fray?

How common was it for military commanders to fight alongside their infantry in battle? Were there ever any cases of some famous commander leading a charge up front? Or did all the rich, wealthy 'leaders' just sit back in the rear and watch the murder unfold?

Svarotslav
May 22, 2005

Railtus posted:

Except for double-headed axes. That is the one weapon off the top of my head I can say was never used in battle.

not really your area/period of expertise, but there's examples of the eastern roman empire using them from about 900ad - 1200ad .. I believe they were known as tzikourion; am aware of some mosaics which allegedly show them in 905.

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac
Zombieswithblender:

Castle sieges were the most common way to conduct medieval warfare, although assaulting the walls was a last resort. Actually it was battles that were avoided if possible, unless you were confident of victory, because a battle that goes badly meant losing your army, which was difficult to recover. Instead, you tried to avoid exposing your army to risk.

Raiding or indirect warfare was popular. The English during the Hundred Years War used raids called chevauchees against the French, where soldiers would sweep in burning villages and sweep out. The idea was to reduce productivity of the land and a bizarre PR-campaign. A feudal lord had a responsibility to protect his population, and a chevauchee proved the lord was failing that. In practise, the PR campaign tended to cause disorganisation, but also earned a lot of hatred.

Good examples are the raids by Edward the Black Prince in his 1355 campaign laying waste to the lands of Armagnac, which caused the count to lose a lot of support. He launched them again in 1356, 1373, and 1380. The interesting thing is there did not seem to be much of a solid goal to those campaigns other than loot and pillage.

Again it was used by William the Conqueror during the Harrying of the North. Essentially rather than fight the rebels he would slaughter civilians, burn crops and destroy livestock, and just let people starve over the winter. That said, William did get criticised in a lot of chronicles for the extent of this. Orderic Vitalis says “I have often praised William in this book, but I can say nothing good about this slaughter. God punish him.”

Al-Kutami, an Umayyad (Moorish) poet wrote down “Our business is to make raids on the enemy, on our neighbour and on our own brother. In the event we find none to raid but a brother.”

If we look at Frederick I’s invasions of Italy, there was the Siege of Crema (1159-1160), the Siege of Milan (1161-1162) and the Siege of Alessandria (1174-1175). There were battles in between, such as the Battle of Tusculum. However, where a battle could be won or lost in a day, each those three sieges crossed the boundary from one year to another. Months would be spent besieging a castle or a city, possibly sapping/undermining, possibly bombardment, rather than sending troops forward.

Ferdinand:

Europe probably did get gunpowder from China in 1242, introduced to it by the Mongols. In fact a term for gunpowder was “Chinese snow”. Paper was introduced through Islamic Spain to Europe in the 1200s as well. The most important imported technology in Europe was Arabic Numerals, the numbers we use today. Before that they used the I, II, III, IV system of the Romans.

Most inventions, however, were not imported from Asia. The compass appears slightly later in Europe than the compass in China (1186 Europe, circa 1040 China) but before the compass spread to the Middle East (1232), and independent invention seems more likely than the compass spreading from China to Europe without crossing the space in-between.

Alphadog:

Doing a brief read-around I have not found that debate, although it sounds interesting. I have not come across it in my research, however.

As far as I knew, the clothes Vikings or Norse peoples wore were described by other sources and artwork as well, although that would be biased towards the upper classes and people who generally appeared in tapestries. There are lots of references to tunics, I think Dorsey Armstrong describes a humorous anecdote about a thing a man keeps beneath his tunic, to put in a hole he has put the thing in many times before (referring to a key). Trousers get described in the sagas, such as Fljotsdaela saga, where the trousers of Ketill Prioanderson are described as having no feet, but straps under the heels like stirrups.

Does this mention mean trousers were supposed to have feet?

So overall I would be surprised if there was such a heated debate on the subject, just because there are other sources such as tapestries or the sagas that can tell us what they wore during the Viking Age. However, if you do come across anything on that debate, please send it to me because I would love to learn more about historiographical issues.

Avalanche:

If you want a good archer, start with the grandfather.

Or so the saying goes, most often applies to longbowmen. Most English longbowmen had distinctive skeletons, such as those found on the Mary Rose. Twisted spines, grossly enlarged left arms, bone spurs on the wrists, shoulders and fingers. This is because the draw weights are so high (100-120 lbs seems to be the average, although with some in the 150-180 lb range).

Quite a few laws required archery practise in England. Edward III in 1363 decreed weekly archery practise on Sundays, supervised by village priests. In 1477 Edward IV banned a cricket-type game because it interfered with archery practise, and Henry VIII passed statutes on archery in 1515. I have heard it even goes back to the 1252 Assizes of Arms but have not been able to confirm that.

No weapon ever truly required a lifetime of training, although many are much more skill-based than others. A trend I notice is single-edged swords tended to be more common among the less-skilled troops, while the knights and elite professional warriors preferred double-edged swords (because you can use lots of cuts with a double-edged sword that are not obvious). My favourite weapons are things like the bill-hook, which is essentially a modified gardening tool. Nearly any farmer would be familiar with how to use it, which would cut down on training time considerably.

I am running low on time but will answer the rest of your questions when I get back.

Svarotslav:

Thanks for the heads up, I have a little more to say on that subject when I get back. Tzikourion seems to be a general term for axes. The archaeology on them seems to be kind of complicated, with single heads and spikes on the back that apparently can slot together into a double-headed construction. I will post images when I get back.

ASIC v Danny Bro
May 1, 2012

D&D: HASBARA SQUAD
CAPTAIN KILL


Just HEAPS of dead Palestinnos for brekkie, mate!
How the hell was metal smelted way back then?

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



Railtus posted:

Alphadog:

Doing a brief read-around I have not found that debate, although it sounds interesting. I have not come across it in my research, however.

As far as I knew, the clothes Vikings or Norse peoples wore were described by other sources and artwork as well, although that would be biased towards the upper classes and people who generally appeared in tapestries. There are lots of references to tunics, I think Dorsey Armstrong describes a humorous anecdote about a thing a man keeps beneath his tunic, to put in a hole he has put the thing in many times before (referring to a key). Trousers get described in the sagas, such as Fljotsdaela saga, where the trousers of Ketill Prioanderson are described as having no feet, but straps under the heels like stirrups.

Does this mention mean trousers were supposed to have feet?

So overall I would be surprised if there was such a heated debate on the subject, just because there are other sources such as tapestries or the sagas that can tell us what they wore during the Viking Age. However, if you do come across anything on that debate, please send it to me because I would love to learn more about historiographical issues.

Hey, cool! I remember reading about the stirruped pants. That was a common design feature of later-period hose, right?

I'm not a historian, but I was a viking age re-enactor for 8 years, and a lot of the guys were either history students or actual historians. I just listened to them talking a lot and tried to absorb things, and read a few books. So I don't think I could source or quote anything for you, sorry. I think it had a lot to do with other depictions "...biased towards the upper classes", and the idea that people may have been buried in their best clothes, so grave-finds aren't necessarily a good indicator of everyday wear. But I heard about it in probably 2004, and I haven't been very interested in the whole scene for 3 years or so now. So there's a good chance I'm just wrong.

I have a question about Viking and Celtic swords and knives. I know they were pattern-welded, probably due to the poor quality of iron ore available. Is it true that they could work designs into the patterns created by the process? I've seen modern smiths pull it off (sort of), but I've always wondered if they could do it back then.

Edit: Do you have any idea how accurate the Heimskringla is? I know it was written well after the events described, but do we know how embellished it was?

Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 14:57 on Jan 23, 2013

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac
Avalanche:

Part II, Knights.

Knights were extremely skilled warriors. Early on, they were death on horses. Later on, fighting on foot became more common, at which point knights became death on legs.

Most of our evidence is concentrated from 1300 and later. The main reason for this was because that was when the fighting classes became more literate. Before then, the people who knew how to fight were not the people who knew how to write books, which limited how much information survived today. However, what we do know seems to imply that it was in place beforehand.

First of all, we can look at the martial arts. If we look at the fight-manuals such as the I.33, the Talhoffer Fechtbuch, Flower of Battle and Nuremburg Handschrift, they all depict advanced and sophisticated martial arts even from the limited picture we have of them. Johannes Liechtenauer, an early fighting instructor from the mid-1300s, claimed that everything he taught had already existed for centuries. Actually his teachings included relatively recent weapon designs like the longsword, but I interpret it as saying that fighting techniques relying on the same principles existed before.

Second is athleticism. The Towton Graves indicate knights or men-at-arms had fairly distinctive skeletons too, such as separations in their shoulder blades that come from vigorous exercise beginning at early childhood. Highly developed arms similar to tennis players. We definitely know knights during the Wars of the Roses were extremely physically capable men.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-gcvq7Vk90&t=6s

For more on athleticism, the works of Marshal Boucicaut aka Jean Le Maingre, describes an exercise regimen and the feats a knight was expected to be able to do. Example feats:

Leaping onto horseback in full armour (no cranes required, you should be able to jump onto the horse unaided).
Turn somersaults whilst clad in a complete suit of mail (save for the helmet).
Vaulting over a horse.
Climb between two perpendicular walls standing 4-5 feet apart by mere pressure of his arms and legs, without resting on either ascent or descent.
Climb the underside of a ladder using just his arms, while in full armour.
Doing the same without armour, but only with one arm.

Watch gymnastics and imagine doing that stuff wearing 50-60 lbs of armour. From that evidence we know knights at the time (1300-1450 for those sources) trained extensively like athletes, presumably with the same willingness to endure discomfort as any athlete would have. Sources that directly tell us how skilled knights of the day were are harder to find (read: I can’t think of any :P ) but their athleticism tells me they took their training seriously.

We have less information on earlier times, however the Annales Lamberti of 1075 complained about the physical fitness of labouring peasants, implying that the warrior class were expected to be more fit.

If we know they took their training seriously and they had access to sophisticated martial arts, I would expect them to be highly skilled fighters.

Thirdly is the social system, which is why I think earlier knights were also just as highly trained. Feudalism and the institution of knighthood were structured to support an elite class of full-time warriors trained from childhood. In many ways the education of a knight mirrored that of a guild craftsman who was first an apprentice, then a journeyman, and finally a master. Except with a knight his trade was war.

A knight began his career between the ages of 6 & 8, when he was sent off to another nobleman’s court. He started off as a page, which was partly a glorified servant but received part-time military training. Often the servant work would toughen them up, such as pulling wooden horses on wheels so that older squires could practise jousting, so it would help build up strength.

At ages 13 or 14 he became a squire, apprenticed to a knight, if he has demonstrated an aptitude for being a warrior. This would act mostly as a support troop, managing a knight’s horses, bringing him fresh lances during battle. In many cases a squire would protect his master if the master was injured, or guard prisoners.

Normally, between ages 18 & 21 one would be knighted, ideally having either proven ones skill or shown valour in battle.

This system was in place from early on, so I doubt they would have such a detailed system of raising knights and not train them well. Additionally devices like the Pell or Quintain used for training also existed early on.

Occasionally people did get knighted for other reasons, such as Balian of Ibelin knighting 60 men in the defence of Jerusalem, or a Holy Roman Emperor (Sigusmund) knighting a peasant to stop a knight from abusing his rank in a legal dispute. However, the knight as a military figure as opposed to a social title was about as skilled a warrior as was likely to ever be.

Part III, Commanders.

Early on, commanders routinely fought alongside their troops. Perhaps not the infantry though. At Hastings, William the Conqueror was participating in attacks on the Saxon shield wall, enough that there was a suspicion he had died and he had to take off his helmet to show everyone he was alive and well.

Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick fought on foot at the Battle of Barnet to show his men that he had no intention of fleeing. Which did not work out well for him due to a friendly fire incident. I also think Warwick was described as "with great violence he beat and bore down all who stood before him."

Henry V fought near the front at Agincourt, I think his helmet got damaged, and before that he was known to have a scar from being shot in the face with an arrow.

John of Bedford led a charge by the English men-at-arms at Verneuil, after the French/Lombard/Milanese cavalry had scattered his longbowmen.

At the Battle of Lewis it was a nobleman leading the charge.

Overall, I think it would be more noteworthy to find a commander who didn’t take part in the charges. It started happening more towards the 1500s, but it was far more traditional for a king or duke at the head of the army to be kicking rear end and taking names.

Svarotslav:

I looked into Tzikourion, and it seems to be a general word for axe. The Tactica of Leo (900 AD) says the cavalry should have a double-edged axe, although then says one edge should be long spear-like point. Others had a long protrusion like a hammer face on the back. Apparently there is mention of some axes being like the bipennis (which was a double-headed axe, strictly ceremonial, and later used as a symbol of both fascism and feminism). What I was thinking of when I mentioned double-headed axes was the larger fantasy-style axes, which would just be a huge extra weight on an already heavy weapon. I imagine with a much smaller axe it would be plausible, although I would much prefer a spike or a hammer on the back so my weapon could be multi-purpose.

The image I wanted to post would stretch the board, but it shows the curved back-spike of one head fitting snugly over the axe-side of another, and vice versa.

All the archaeological finds I can see are single-headed, although with a point or hammer or something on the back. What I did find that was interesting was two axeheads together could be placed on top of each other and fit together to form a double-headed axe shape.

However, I learned something from that, so thanks for letting me know!

ASIC:

Early on they used a type of furnace called a bloomery which was essentially a glorified chimney with air forced through by bellows. This initially produced a mix of iron and slag called sponge iron, then it was shingled which means drawing out under a hammer, which probably involved gratuitous beatings.

Eventually these got larger and larger, which is just as well because you would only get 1 kg of iron at a time.

Eventually they moved onto the blast furnace that could produce fully molten steels, as well as crucibles. This was economical in that it could provide larger amounts of iron/steel at once, and it also was less work because it could produce more homogenous steels. The early bloom steels required pounding, folding and welding to be high quality steel – similar to Japanese tamahagane. Or you could carburise the surface to harden the iron.

Alpha Dog:

I think later hose were more sock-like in design, with full feet. Often hose were combined with breeches, so the breeches would be the pants and the hose would be essentially glorified socks.

My main concern when judging Viking Age clothing was warmth. If it is practical, warm and comfortable, it makes sense for Vikings to use. Grave goods were probably fancy, but trousers and tunics are a pretty safe bet.

They could definitely work designs in. Pattern-welding was sometimes layered on top of a soft iron core, which would say it was decorative rather than functional. How detailed these designs got I am unsure, but they could definitely use it just for decoration.

Heimskringla seems to be more accurate the further forward in time it goes. The first few sagas are believed to have been essentially made up, but more credible the nearer to the 13th century the sagas get. For me, it is still valuable as a resource of the time, because even exaggerations tell you what people felt a need to exaggerate, which is an important aspect of my dissertation. However, I am just parroting the established consensus rather than conducting an analysis of my own.

Railtus fucked around with this message at 15:55 on Jan 23, 2013

Nelson Mandingo
Mar 27, 2005



Was there a diet that Knights were suggested to eat? I would have thought that exercise regimes were a more modern invention.

What was a superweapon or game changer of the medieval era?

Was there ever the idea of a vacation or tourism amongst commoners? Was tourism more for the rich?

What did people do for entertainment that we might not know about?

Nelson Mandingo fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Jan 23, 2013

Sweevo
Nov 8, 2007

i sometimes throw cables away

i mean straight into the bin without spending 10+ years in the box of might-come-in-handy-someday first

im a fucking monster

What sort of battle tactics were in common use? Medieval battles are always portrayed as two large groups just running towards each other, which is clearly inaccurate.

Godholio
Aug 28, 2002

Does a bear split in the woods near Zheleznogorsk?

Nelson Mandingo posted:

What was a superweapon or game changer of the medieval era?

Not to hijack his thread, but I'll chip in with an answer and a question. :)

There's a concept called "technological determination" that looms over military history. For example, it's pretty common knowledge that muskets and pistols revolutionized warfare in the Early Modern Era, replacing basically all other weapons and leading to the line-and-volley tactics of the American Revolution, etc. Except that's not true at all. Guns were one part of a larger trend that began centuries before they were widely used. Technological determination is basically attributing massive change to a technology that didn't cause it. The longbow revolutionizing warfare is another example...it didn't really happen the way people think. If the longbow couldn't pierce plate armor reliably, there was no way it could stop the French in their tracks...so what did?

The answer to that question is the same as the answer to yours: training. In broad terms, battles were fought by using the infantry and archers to pin the enemy infantry in place, then scare the everloving gently caress out of them with a charge of heavy cavalry. For centuries this worked. Pikes could certainly kill horses and unseat knights, but untrained levies lacked the discipline and training to tighten up and try to actually withstand the charge. When the cavalry hit home, they tended to do so against the enemy's backs as they ran which had obviously devastating effects and emphasized the dominance of cavalry over infantry. But when infantry actually began standing their ground, the started winning. One example is the Battle of Crecy (the mud is not a complete answer), but there are several others in the years that followed.

Depending on where you stand in the active debate over the Military Revolution, the expansion of training may be credited to William of Orange and Gustavus Adolphus. Things like marching in step, smaller and more maneuverable formations, standardized uniforms, equipment, and weapons (including muskets and pistols) became common place. These well-trained armies led to a resurgence in siege warfare as open battles became unpredictable and dangerous. Gunpowder artillery made medieval castles obsolete and the trace italiene design emerged (often called a star-fort, but that's only part of the change). The manpower needed to encircle one of these large fortresses was immense, so armies grew. The unbelievable cost of these armies led to a completely new international banking system, and the difficulty in managing them required more complicated and professional government administration. Defenders realize that by having another army (relief army) attack the rear of besiegers they could end the siege and win; so besieging armies basically double to have their lines facing both directions (we're talking tens of thousands of men spread over a 10-20 mile line); the supporting changes continue. The modern nation state and banking (with modern loans, etc) arise.

The whole military revolution debate is fascinating as hell, but in the most reductionist sense it all comes back to training.

My question for the OP: with your focus on the medieval, do you plan on learning Latin or period French or anything?

Edit: Good call by the OP, training and organization.

Godholio fucked around with this message at 19:51 on Jan 23, 2013

ed balls balls man
Apr 17, 2006
What does Honours Class mean in UK terms?

edit: Also love your answers already, I did a module on the first crusade at university and this brings back some nice memories, but is there any chance you could quote the question you are answering in your response just to make things easier for fat slobs like me?

ed balls balls man fucked around with this message at 17:20 on Jan 23, 2013

Moridin920
Nov 15, 2007

by FactsAreUseless

Railtus posted:

The image I wanted to post would stretch the board, but it shows the curved back-spike of one head fitting snugly over the axe-side of another, and vice versa.

Use the [timg] tag, it'll adjust the image to a thumbnail that expands to fit the board or to its full resolution depending on where you click on the thumbnail.

Interesting stuff, I didn't know knights were expected to be able to do stuff like that.

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac
Nelson:

Specific diets for knights do not seem to be well known. The MS_3227a (Nuremburg Handschrift, or Codex Dobringer) seems to have food recipes despite being largely a martial arts manual, although that could be general, not just knightly. It also has magic spells in there. Some organisations like the Knights Templar or Hospitaller would sometimes be required to eat like monks, essentially living off bread and vegetables, yet it never seemed to impact their fighting prowess.

No superweapon truly existed, although game changers would be the advancement of cannons in the 1400s. Older castles were designed with higher walls and often a square shape to maximise the space enclosed within its walls. These forts were vulnerable to cannons. Later forts would then be built resistant to cannons, but the castles that had dominated in previous centuries stopped dominating.

Another game-changer was the adoption of munitions armour. These are cheap sets of plate armour for foot soldiers that do not require fitting to the individual soldier. Not as good as a knight might wear, but it will still stop a sword or a spear or an arrow reliably, and that resembles the general pattern – instead of investing massive resources into one man (the knight) you can get a more cost-effective use of resources by having cheaper infantry with mass-produced equipment.

There was an idea for tourism, normally under the guise of pilgrimage. The Canterbury Tales was actually fairly realistic in describing pilgrimage as a semi-social event. Margery Kemp went on a lot of pilgrimages, while her fellow pilgrims kept trying to ditch her. Anyway, things like pilgrimages were great excuses for vacation. If you could afford it.

One thing people did for entertainment was carve the medieval equivalent of noughts-and-crosses on the back church benches. Pews were not standard, but those that did exist had some interesting carvings on the back. :D Hunting and hawking were considered recreation for the nobility, and hunting was important as training for war (if you want practise fighting for your life, engage a boar in hand-to-hoof combat). Dancing was extremely common. I’ll try to think of others.

Sweevo:

A go-to guide for medieval tactics and strategy was De Re Militari.

Early tactics seemed to involve the shield wall, to give as much mutual protection as possible. The idea was to break their shield wall while keeping your formation in good order. One way this was done was through tools like the Dane Axe – a mail-clad Saxon huscarl could hack down on the unshielded side (there is a rumour they used their long axes left-handed on purpose) and disrupt the formation, causing enough of a break for your own shield-wall to capitalise.

An important tactic was combined arms. The English in the Hundred Years War combined dismounted knights using pollaxes with archers, the idea being that the archers can shoot directly at the approaching Frenchmen and then step back behind the cover of the knights once the French get closer. Later on you see fully armoured knights or doppelsoldners mixed in with the pikemen, to hack down anyone who gets past the pikes or to exploit breaches in formations.

Field fortifications were important. Again, the English in the Hundred Years War would use fields of sharpened stakes to prevent cavalry charges, which worked early on (Azincourt & Crecy) and failed elsewhere (Verneuil & Patay). This was also used in Laager or Wagonburgs in the Hussite wars, which was literally creating a fort by making wagons in a circle and using the wagons as shooting platforms. A few had planking and cannons installed specifically to assist this purpose.

Pike formations became popular later on, pioneered by the Swiss (although largely with the help of ambush and ferocity) which later inspired the German Landsknecht and Spanish Tercio. The Scottish also used early pikemen. It was noted the best place to charge a pike square was on the rear corners. A circle or schilltrom could be formed, but if the pikemen defend all sides at once, they make an excellent target to shoot at.

Those are off the top of my head. Obvious stuff like flanking, cavalry charges and so on were also important.

Godhio:

That is a really good description of the transition from medieval to renaissance warfare. I like it. I would say training and organisation.

I do not know any historical languages; to be honest I think I would really struggle to learn them. If I get a good chance I will, but I think it might be difficult.

Ed:

Honours Class means I’m in my 3rd year of a 3 year Bachelor’s Degree. It sounds better than 3rd year student so I go with that. :D

I will try to start using quotes. I cannot guarantee I will always remember, and these forums are different to the ones I usually use, but I will do my best. Reading through the forum rules there seems to be no rule against double/triple/quad-posting (am I correct?), so I could give each reply its own post with a quote. Would that help?

Railtus fucked around with this message at 20:14 on Jan 23, 2013

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac

Moridin920 posted:

Use the [timg] tag, it'll adjust the image to a thumbnail that expands to fit the board or to its full resolution depending on where you click on the thumbnail.

Interesting stuff, I didn't know knights were expected to be able to do stuff like that.

Thanks!





Bip Roberts
Mar 29, 2005
You mention raiding villages? Were wholesale atrocities on the opposing serfs commonplace earlier in the 100 years war like what happened later in the 30 years war. I assume having a roving army in your countryside is at the very least bad for the food supply of the average peasant but did it also result in every male of age being strung up in a tree? To what extent was medieval war "total"?

JoeCool
Aug 15, 2009
What was the deal with self flagellation during the black plague?

Trump
Jul 16, 2003

Cute
Awesome thread. I've been wanting to get into the middle ages a bit, is there any general overview works you would recommend to get started?

Railtus posted:

I will try to start using quotes. I cannot guarantee I will always remember, and these forums are different to the ones I usually use, but I will do my best. Reading through the forum rules there seems to be no rule against double/triple/quad-posting (am I correct?), so I could give each reply its own post with a quote. Would that help?

You can qoute multiple posts by scrolling down in the reply window and then clicking on the "qoute" button. It really makes reading these kind threads easier :)

Earwicker
Jan 6, 2003

I have read in a few places that clean water for drinking was relatively rare for most people in medieval Europe and so everyone constantly drank beer or other alcoholic beverages instead. Is this true or a misconception and if it's true how anyone get anything done and why didn't people constantly die from dehydration and alcohol poisoning?

THE LUMMOX
Nov 29, 2004

Earwicker posted:

I have read in a few places that clean water for drinking was relatively rare for most people in medieval Europe and so everyone constantly drank beer or other alcoholic beverages instead. Is this true or a misconception and if it's true how anyone get anything done and why didn't people constantly die from dehydration and alcohol poisoning?

Gonna jump in on this one although it's by no means a definitive answer.

Something I learned from Ken Burns' awesome Prohibition doc as well as A History of the World In 6 Glassses is that the ABV% was really low. Like beer was 1-3% and wine was watered down. Then the industrial revolution happened and suddenly you had cheap 30% ABV distilled alcohols but people didn't change their drinking habits to reflect this. So whereas having a beer at breakfast was normal and basically of no consequence (and in fact an important calorie supplement) suddenly they were drinking whiskey and everything got hosed up.

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



Railtus posted:

Heimskringla seems to be more accurate the further forward in time it goes. The first few sagas are believed to have been essentially made up, but more credible the nearer to the 13th century the sagas get. For me, it is still valuable as a resource of the time, because even exaggerations tell you what people felt a need to exaggerate, which is an important aspect of my dissertation. However, I am just parroting the established consensus rather than conducting an analysis of my own.

Thanks again!

I love that set of sagas, the language is at times quite naive, which gives the whole thing a bit of a surreal tone. That might be the translation though.

Could you give some examples of exaggeration in medieval accounts of things? It'd be cool to hear what was considered important enough to start fibbing about.

Earwicker posted:

I have read in a few places that clean water for drinking was relatively rare for most people in medieval Europe and so everyone constantly drank beer or other alcoholic beverages instead. Is this true or a misconception and if it's true how anyone get anything done and why didn't people constantly die from dehydration and alcohol poisoning?

As far as I know, what they were talking about was "small beer" - beer with very very low amounts of alcohol. You can make small beer at home pretty easily, and it comes out to around 0.5% alcohol (you can do this by accident when you gently caress up your homebrew process). You'd have to drink 10 pints to get as much alcohol as a single pint of normal beer.

The safeness probably had much more to do with the fact that the brewing process involves boiling the malt and water than with "alcohol kills germs".

Again, I could be completely wrong, since I'm in no way a historian.

Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 07:14 on Jan 24, 2013

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac

Trump posted:

Awesome thread. I've been wanting to get into the middle ages a bit, is there any general overview works you would recommend to get started?


You can qoute multiple posts by scrolling down in the reply window and then clicking on the "qoute" button. It really makes reading these kind threads easier :)

Thanks! That helps a great deal.

Dusseldorf posted:

You mention raiding villages? Were wholesale atrocities on the opposing serfs commonplace earlier in the 100 years war like what happened later in the 30 years war. I assume having a roving army in your countryside is at the very least bad for the food supply of the average peasant but did it also result in every male of age being strung up in a tree? To what extent was medieval war "total"?

Not to the same extent, although still pretty bad. Chevauchees were essentially acts of terrorism, PR campaigns designed to undermine the French king by proving he could not protect the French people. Of course Edward the Black Prince needed survivors for his point to be proven to, so the slaughter was not generally that severe.

I think slaughtering the population was typically not the done thing, although it did happen on occasions the city was taken by storm (such as the capture of Jerusalem in the First Crusade). However, medieval war was sufficiently harsh on ordinary folks that militia became very popular later on.

So I guess low-level atrocities were more the thing?

JoeCool posted:

What was the deal with self flagellation during the black plague?

An imaginatively named cult called the Flagellants took one form of penance – mortification of the flesh – and got carried away. The idea is that there are many ways you can repent for sins, prayers of contrition, good works, pilgrimage, although a few monks would occasionally beat themselves. Because nothing says sorry like self-harm.

They were a heretic cult during the 13th & 14th centuries, cast out from the church for their practises. The essential belief that made them grow to the extent they did was that by repenting for their sins they could receive some kind of protection from the Great Death or the pestilence. That the church cast these guys out implies some measure of disapproval, so I don’t think their position was the mainstream of the church.

Earwicker posted:

I have read in a few places that clean water for drinking was relatively rare for most people in medieval Europe and so everyone constantly drank beer or other alcoholic beverages instead. Is this true or a misconception and if it's true how anyone get anything done and why didn't people constantly die from dehydration and alcohol poisoning?

Absolutely. LUMMOX gave a good answer. Essentially regular alcohol could be quite watered down, so you get more water from the beer than you need to digest it.

An interesting thing is if you look at the medieval peasant diet, it was very low on calories and high in vegetables. Now pair that with the fact that heavy drinkers get an ale gut because of how calorific most alcoholic beverages were. One problem was used to solve the other.

However, with alcohol being a staple, I wonder if Foetal Alcohol Syndrome was particularly common back then.


AlphaDog posted:

Thanks again!

I love that set of sagas, the language is at times quite naive, which gives the whole thing a bit of a surreal tone. That might be the translation though.

Could you give some examples of exaggeration in medieval accounts of things? It'd be cool to hear what was considered important enough to start fibbing about.


As far as I know, what they were talking about was "small beer" - beer with very very low amounts of alcohol. You can make small beer at home pretty easily, and it comes out to around 0.5% alcohol (you can do this by accident when you gently caress up your homebrew process). You'd have to drink 10 pints to get as much alcohol as a single pint of normal beer.

The safeness probably had much more to do with the fact that the brewing process involves boiling the malt and water than with "alcohol kills germs".

Again, I could be completely wrong, since I'm in no way a historian.

I struggle to think of any off the top of my head, but it is an angle I am using for debating the reliability of William of Tyre’s Historia and accounts of how the Crusader kingdoms treated their Jewish and Muslim population. I have heard it be suggested William of Tyre’s work might be propaganda meant to glorify King Baldwin. However, if it is propaganda, then any suggestion of Baldwin showing kindness towards Jews & Muslims – whether true or false – would be a sign that such kindness was considered admirable according to the people of the time.

Another example is the myth of Prima Nocta, or Droit du Seigneur – rumour was that a lord essentially had first dibs on the virginity of a woman on his land when she got married. The rumour is false; every contemporary source that mentions anything of that nature is accusing an enemy of it and using it as an example of how evil and corrupt they are. What tells us is 1: everybody thought it was evil, and 2: nobody thought it was acceptable. Between those two things, we can be very confident it was neither a law nor a custom in western Europe (also, that law is not on any of the books, and no woman was ever identified as having suffered it or even commenting on the practise).

EDIT: Apparently there was one reference in Zurich to lords interpreting a bride-pride or marriage fee to mean this, but this was also in the context of the church condemning them for abusing their position of power to sexually harrass their subjects.

In Ancient Greece they used to use wine to disinfect water (in my Classics A-level I remember one person was notable for only adding the minimum of wine to his water for it to be safe to drink), so I lean towards the alcohol kills germs theory just because it worked for pre-medieval peoples. However, boiling + alcohol is certainly more thorough.

Railtus fucked around with this message at 13:09 on Jan 24, 2013

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



I knew that Prima Nocta was probably not practiced at all, or at least that it was very rare or isolated to a small group of people during a small window of time. I never thought of it in terms of being a propaganda tool, but it really, really makes sense as one.

Aggressive pricing
Feb 25, 2008
Cool thread, I was wondering if you could expand on something:



Railtus posted:


At ages 13 or 14 he became a squire, apprenticed to a knight, if he has demonstrated an aptitude for being a warrior. This would act mostly as a support troop, managing a knight’s horses, bringing him fresh lances during battle. In many cases a squire would protect his master if the master was injured, or guard prisoners.



How did the squires manage that in the middle of battle? I guess either the knights left the front to resupply or squires ran stuff into them?

Godholio
Aug 28, 2002

Does a bear split in the woods near Zheleznogorsk?

Aggressive pricing posted:

Cool thread, I was wondering if you could expand on something:



How did the squires manage that in the middle of battle? I guess either the knights left the front to resupply or squires ran stuff into them?

Cavalry attacks weren't constant fights...they would charge, do the most damage possible as quickly as possible, then turn back and reform at a rally point.

Chamale
Jul 11, 2010

I'm helping!



How did health affect the effectiveness of troops in medieval times? I imagine most soldiers were much weaker than they could have been due to malnutrition, sleep deprivation, dysentery, and various other conditions.

What was the medieval equivalent of Noughts and Crosses you mentioned? I'd love to hear more about medieval games that are no longer played today.

Earwicker
Jan 6, 2003

Am I correct in assuming that if a person from the Middle Ages were to somehow fall into a time machine and show up in 2013, that anyone who met them would probably pass out due to their hideous stench?

Chamale
Jul 11, 2010

I'm helping!



Earwicker posted:

Am I correct in assuming that if a person from the Middle Ages were to somehow fall into a time machine and show up in 2013, that anyone who met them would probably pass out due to their hideous stench?

Conversely, if a person from 2013 somehow ended up in the Middle Ages would they most likely get burned as a witch, die of smallpox, become a beggar, or use their futuristic knowledge to get rich?

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

Godholio posted:

Cavalry attacks weren't constant fights...they would charge, do the most damage possible as quickly as possible, then turn back and reform at a rally point.

In fact, the ability of cavalry to reform after an initial successful charge was really what separated truly effective cavalry forces from less effective ones.

Later on, but same principle - the British generals hated their own cavalry and much preferred the King's German Legion, because the Germans would stop and reform and could be used against other units. Once the British cavalry broke anything, they tried to hunt it to the ends of the earth, which usually led to the horses getting blown and them getting all hosed to pieces.

Godholio
Aug 28, 2002

Does a bear split in the woods near Zheleznogorsk?

KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:

which usually led to the horses getting blown and them getting all hosed to pieces.

One missing word can really change the meaning of a statement. :lol:

Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac

Aggressive pricing posted:

Cool thread, I was wondering if you could expand on something:



How did the squires manage that in the middle of battle? I guess either the knights left the front to resupply or squires ran stuff into them?

A little of both.

At Hastings the knights rode up and down the hill with fresh spears, which must have been exhausting work. In 1066 they were still using spears rather than longer specialised lances, so often they would just throw the spear and ride down for fresh spears, although they would couch (tuck the spear under their arm) as well.

For more general lance charges, if the enemy formation is still intact after impact you generally do not want to stick around in a prolonged scrum of fighting - too much risk of being surrounded & mobbed. Also a risk of your horse being killed, since particularly in the earlier years horses were often less armoured than their riders. A mounted knight will make short work of individual infantry (ie: a broken formation), but drawing his sword against a solid shield wall is playing to his weaknesses. If they resist the charge, it is better to ride off a short distance and your squire will ride forward with a new lance for you, so you can be back into the fighting quickly.

A point I should make here is that war lances were never designed to break on impact. Only tournament or sporting lances broke on impact. The entire design of the lance was to maximise the amount of force the lance could deliver from the horse's charge, and designing the lance to break would be counterproductive to that.

A good example of lance design is provided by the ever-enthusiastic Mike Loades - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NblAIujdzeU&t=2s - starting around 2:20

If knights used their lances on foot, such as at the Battle of Arbedo (1422), using the lances was very similar to a pike formation. If you lost your lance, and the enemy had not got close enough for you to draw a sword or a dagger (by the way, daggers were VERY important), then you could step back and let the man behind you take your position. Go to the back of the formation, and again your squire should hopefully have a new lance waiting for you.

This is mostly speculation, but that is how I would do it.

Chamale posted:

How did health affect the effectiveness of troops in medieval times? I imagine most soldiers were much weaker than they could have been due to malnutrition, sleep deprivation, dysentery, and various other conditions.

What was the medieval equivalent of Noughts and Crosses you mentioned? I'd love to hear more about medieval games that are no longer played today.

Health was a major factor in medieval troops. More soldiers died from disease than combat, which makes sense considering that the preferred method of war was to attack supplies or rely on siege rather than direct battle. However, the English at the Battle of Azincourt were suffering from illness and still won.

A more complicated version is called Nine Mens Morris. I cannot remember what the basic version is called. I am listening to Dorsey Armstrong, the Medieval World (the Great Courses are awesome), to find out what the game was (she was my source).

Earwicker posted:

Am I correct in assuming that if a person from the Middle Ages were to somehow fall into a time machine and show up in 2013, that anyone who met them would probably pass out due to their hideous stench?

Heck no.

Medieval people were no less clean than in any other period, and probably much more clean than people in the 19th century. Missing a bath was sometimes imposed as a penance for a sin, which tells us that bathing was standard. Most towns and even villages had public bath-houses (Etienne de Boileu wrote down some regulations for the Parisian guild of Bathhouse Keepers in 1270). As far as I am aware archaeological finds include wooden tubs or even barrels lined with padding on the inside, used for bathing.

Medical texts such as Physica by St Hildegarde of Bingen includes instructions on washing. Compendium Medicinae (1240) gave careful instructions on washing, and also discusses treatment for body odours, strongly suggesting medieval people were at least conscious of the subject.

Chamale posted:

Conversely, if a person from 2013 somehow ended up in the Middle Ages would they most likely get burned as a witch, die of smallpox, become a beggar, or use their futuristic knowledge to get rich?

My suspicion is the modern man would become a beggar. Look at the conveniences we are accustomed to? Our futuristic knowledge is mostly theoretical, I know gunpowder is a mix of charcoal, saltpetre and sulphur, but that does not mean I am in any way qualified to make it. I know adding carbon to iron produces steel, but that does not mean I could use it effectively. Maybe being literate would help? Although even that would need adapting. I think the best chance for a modern man would be the monastery.

Witch burnings were not that common in the medieval period. That was much more of a 1600s trend. In fact, until the 1300s, the church considered witchcraft a delusion and it was heresy to accuse someone of it.

Ron Don Volante
Dec 29, 2012

How accurate is the popular depiction of the Medieval era as the "Dark Ages"? If the Roman Empire hadn't fallen, do you think things would have been vastly different?

Arnold of Soissons
Mar 4, 2011

by XyloJW

Railtus posted:

Leaping onto horseback in full armour (no cranes required, you should be able to jump onto the horse unaided).
Turn somersaults whilst clad in a complete suit of mail (save for the helmet).
Vaulting over a horse.
Climb between two perpendicular walls standing 4-5 feet apart by mere pressure of his arms and legs, without resting on either ascent or descent.
Climb the underside of a ladder using just his arms, while in full armour.
Doing the same without armour, but only with one arm.

Watch gymnastics and imagine doing that stuff wearing 50-60 lbs of armour. From that evidence we know knights at the time (1300-1450 for those sources) trained extensively like athletes, presumably with the same willingness to endure discomfort as any athlete would have. Sources that directly tell us how skilled knights of the day were are harder to find (read: I can’t think of any :P ) but their athleticism tells me they took their training seriously.

Coming back to this: is there reason to believe that these were commonly attained goals )like the President's Fitness goals) and not theoretical No True Scotsman goals? In other words, is it reasonable to assume that the average knight could actually do these things, or were the merely laudable examples that he ought aspire to?

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



Chamale posted:

How did health affect the effectiveness of troops in medieval times? I imagine most soldiers were much weaker than they could have been due to malnutrition, sleep deprivation, dysentery, and various other conditions.

What was the medieval equivalent of Noughts and Crosses you mentioned? I'd love to hear more about medieval games that are no longer played today.

Medieval games? Hnefatafl! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tafl_games

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Railtus
Apr 8, 2011

daz nu bi unseren tagen
selch vreude niemer werden mac
der man ze den ziten pflac
Answers somewhat short because it is late, I am tired and have class in the morning.

Ron Don Volante posted:

How accurate is the popular depiction of the Medieval era as the "Dark Ages"? If the Roman Empire hadn't fallen, do you think things would have been vastly different?

The idea of the “Dark Ages” (a time of ignorance and superstition) is completely inaccurate, I would go so far as to say it turned 180 away from accurate and started running. The medieval period included the Carolingian Renaissance (Charlemagne’s drive for education), the establishment of universities, it was the time when persecution of alleged witches was forbidden by the church (Council of Frankfurt 794, Lombard Code 643, Canon Episcopi circa 900).

It was the copying of texts by Irish monks to thank for how much ancient history survives. Technology includes central heating through underfloor channels (8thC), mechanical clocks (13th/14thC), the blast furnace (1150), water-powered trip hammers (12thC) and the printing press (1440). Spectacles/eyeglasses were made in 1286. Admittedly most of this is elite culture, middle-class and up, but the point is the medieval world still had some amazing inventions.

That said; we did lose a lot with the fall of Rome. However, Rome was already in decline, the barbarians were growing stronger, and I think the circumstances that would allow the Roman Empire to survive in the west would have made Europe a very different place by themselves. Much of Rome’s military technology was copied from their neighbours. A different balance of power would be needed for the empire to survive.



Arnold of Soissons posted:

Coming back to this: is there reason to believe that these were commonly attained goals )like the President's Fitness goals) and not theoretical No True Scotsman goals? In other words, is it reasonable to assume that the average knight could actually do these things, or were the merely laudable examples that he ought aspire to?

Good question. I am not sure how many of these feats were common. Some of them, like leaping onto a horse in full armour, were presumably expected – I often read that for a knight to fail to do that after his knighting ceremony that would be a cause for great embarrassment. Others, like cartwheels in armour, are easy. Overall I suspect those exact feats were not uniformly expected (I doubt the training knights received was regulated enough for that), just that these feats were examples of how a knight or squire should train.

Geoffrey De Charney (14thC knight) did criticise overweight knights, so it is clear not all reached those standards.

I would assume the average knight could do quite a lot of those things, just from their bodies. The Towton Graves example mentioned earlier. Another sign is the armour; Dr Tobias Capwell points out that knightly plate armours were typically tailored to the individual warrior – if you look at the Wallace Collection these armours are overwhelmingly designed for men with deep chests, broad shoulders, narrow waists and well-proportioned thighs.

Later armours, the munitions armours of the 16thC and later, is when that trend disappears. Also munitions armours tend to be more drab and lower quality metal. This is not something I have studied in detail - and I really should - but it is a trend I have noticed in armours surviving in museums.

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