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I find this in a group of HEMA, when some people were saying such dutch sword-and-targe soldiers are product of spanish influence in the Netherlands, but I don't remember of any reference of them in battles or even as bodyguards. One was claiming that such soldiers were used under Nassau's wars against Spain, and although I actually have seen such style of helmet among modern dutch helmets, I don't know if they already existed by 16th century, so I would like to know your opinions.

Observation: Nassau was greatly influence by Machiavelli's work in warfare, where he defended the revival of sword-and-shield infantrymen the romans used. So it wouldn't be impossible if that was a real correlation. Check this image from late 16th century, for example:
https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/collection/RP-P-OB-9980

Another Observation: Due to Spanish influence, Portugal used rodeleros as well, they are greatly recorded in their wars in India and Thailand. For those who know portuguese, here is an article I translated:

Quote:

"Also here, after the extinction of the captains, naíques, espingardeiros (harquebusier or musketeer) and peões (ie. foot infantrymen) inherited from the pre-portuguese period, the military corps was extraordinarily increased in the time of the governor Fernão Teles de Meneses (1581). [...] Besides the captain and his close soldiers, were set places for 82 espingardeiros, 80 flecheiros (ie. archers or crossbowmen, probably the last one) and 83 rodeleiros (ie. portuguese for "rodeleros"), commanded by 5 naíques, resorting to local allied troops, in order to ease the shortages of men-at-arms. Source: p. 146 from: https://run.unl.pt/bitstream/10362/9389/1/tese_andreteixeira.pdf Some notes: 1. "Espingardeiro" was a generic term for any firearms employed soldier. It firstly meant a handgunner in 14-15th centuries, but also meant a harquebusier and probably musketeer as well. 2. Don't know that "naíque" means, but probably refers to some sort of officer in portuguese overseas' domains 3. "Flecheiros" would literally be translated as "arrow-er", but more specifically an archer or crossbowmen. Portuguese terminology is always confusing, since term like "besteiro", "archeiro" and "flecheiro" could equally means crossbowman, but "archeiro" and "flecheiro" meaning archer as well; english longbowman at Aljubarrota (1385) being refered as "archeiros ingleses", for the sake of example. Given to the ambigously usage, I prefered the term crossbowman because, since late medieval times, there are no known references to archers in Portugal, but only crossbowmen, since all the weapons of non-noble soldiers were usually kept in King's arsenals and the crossbow held great place in portuguese warfare. Although the crossbowmen were loosing space to the Espingardeiros in the end of 15th century (ie. handgunner of harquebusier), the text seens to indicate they never fade out to exist. If there is complainment about the use of native archers in the portuguse garrison, a reader must be aware that native troop were put under a different type of organization and typhology, so they wouldn't be recorded in the same place as the portuguese-born troops.

Since we are discussing this, I would also like to ask if it makes sense to say this: since sword-and-shield soldiers were firstly introduced by italians and then adopted by the aragonese, it's actually reliable to say that most of spanish rodeleros were actually aragonese? Or they became as much as popular in Castile as it was in Aragon?

Information I got in Ian Heath's book:
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Maurice of Nassau indeed fielded targetiers and pikers equipped with shields in the early 17th century. I posted some images from the 1625 English version of Adam Breen 1618 infantry manual. The dedicated targetiers in the 1625 manual look similar to the image you've got there.

As far as inspiration goes, I suspect it was a mixture of the longstanding Spanish (and general European) practice of using shields combined with belief in the efficacy of ancient Roman methods.

I suspect the influence is more classical, Machiavelli, or general European practice than Spain specifically. English military writers from the second half of the 16th century tended to have quite a bit of enthusiasm for targeteers, usually citing the ancient Romans. Robert Barret wrote that while nothing could withstand a push of pike on an open plain, "best for the myne or breach is the Target of prooffe, short sword, and Pistoll" and recommended that 2 or 3 infantry per hundred should be armed that way. Sword and target also remained relatively popular weapons for captains or other officers.

For the most part using targeteers or not seems to be presented as a matter of preference. Tactically they perform more or less the same role as halberds, bills, longswords, and other "short weapons": Backing up the pike square if it is disrupted, pursuing and executing routing enemies, entering into buildings, mingling among the shot to protect them in a melee, etc.

The Dutch Rondassiers are an intersting example of the difference between theory and practice.

"Rondassiers" could be found in units raised by the Dutch provinces before Maurice of Nassau, they appear in a number of musters from the 1570's and were never numerous, usually around 2-4 in a company with 3 being the most common number. They either took the place of the men with "greatswords" (slagszwaarden) or served alongside them.

Maurice and several other of the Dutch military reformers such as Johann von Nassau-Siegen were very interested in the used of Rondassiers and experimented not only with the common shot-proof steel target but also with the much larger shield seen in the image in the first post. These large square shields were not made to be shot proof and instead the Rondassier wore a modified version of the shot-proof armour used by cuirassiers.

If we look at the letters & documents that survive from the archives of Maurice and Johann one could easily believe that the Dutch were supposed to deploy Rondassiers in large numbers, particularly as a formal regulation for the drill used by the Rondassiers was published in 1618. But a look at the actual muster rolls show that the Rondassiers remained far and few between. The States General simply refused to introduce them in the numbers wanted by Maurice and the "heavy" Rondassier with square shield was probably never seen outside of Maurice's personal guard.

One probable reason for the refusal of the States General was the cost of the Rondassiers, the men were double-pay men and in all the musters I've seen they were invariably the best paid common soldiers. The equipment envisioned by Maurice was also expensive as shields, armour and pistols were all specialised and therefore expensive equipment.

That's useful to know. Commanders tended to want tons of expensive equipment when designing their ideal armies. Raimond de Fourquevaux, for example, specified some sort of armor for each and every soldier, if it were possible. In practice, this could be difficult to pull off. Similarly, commanders describing ideal armies tend to burden their soldiers with more weight than real soldiers usually wanted to bear.

Double pay is even older than Landsknecht - in Polish mercenary foot-soldier units formed from 1450s pavise men, who also acted as "decurions", received double the pay of a crossbowman. In 1490s pikemen were introduced (in small numbers, they formed single row in front of the formation just like pavise men) that also received the double pay.