So recently I was reading an online article on medieval Sheilds, armour, and weapons. It was a good article, but I can't remember much about it. :P

On the article, it mentioned "pavisers"- French spear-troops armed with pavises (all be it slightly smaller ones then crossbowmen used) and spears or other polearms. The article says this was to help block English arrow fire. (We're talking 14th and early 15th century, 100 years war here)

Since reading that, I've done a bit of research- and apart from finding that these troops were also sometimes used by hungry and Poland, everything else online has been "total war" units, or wargaming miniatures. I've come out completely blank.

So, I have a few questions regarding these "illusive" troops.

-what would their use have been on the battlefield? Defending "wall", an aggressive infantry unit, just normal infantry? it depends? (Probably the latter :D )
-did they see widespread use? Were they used much at all?
-what King of equipment would they have used? Shorter spears, halberds, bills, pikes, etc, etc,?

If anyone could point me in the direction of any sources that would be great, to.

Hi James. Sorry I can't really help with this question. All I can tell you is that pavisiers were also used in Scottish armies of the mid to late 15th century. The equipment required of these troops is mentioned in the following legislation.

1456 
"each man whose goods extend to 20 merks be furnished at least with jack, with sleeves to the hand or else a pair of splints, a sellat or a pricking hat, a sword and a buckler, a bow and a sheaf, and if he can not shoot that he shall have an axe and a targe either of leather or of board with two hands on the back." 

1471 
"Also that each yeoman who cannot handle a bow should have a good axe and a targe of leather to resist the shot of England, which is of no cost but the value of a hide." 

1481 
"Item, that every axeman who has neither spear nor bow shall have a wooden or leather targe according to the fashion of the example that shall be sent to each sheriff."

Now don't be fooled by the word targe. At this point in time the word targe was a synonym for shield, and so could be used to refer to any kind of shield, including pavises.

So it seems that Scottish pavisiers of the second half of the 15th century would be armed with; jack, helmet, sword, pavise, and axe. Now this axe was probably a pollaxe. I would also love to know how these troops were used. If I was to guess I'd say that their role was probably to form a defensive wall in front of the archers.

Here is an image of a man armed with a pavise and a pollaxe. I think it's late 15th century, either Italian or Spanish.

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Navarrese documents of the late XIVth century name a kind of soldier named pillart or pillard, which together with the crossbowmen, formed all the foot soldiers (sometimes an odd English longbowman is in the lists). Probably the word is also used in French documents, so it can be a start.

What is certain is that in the whole XVth century Iberia pavises in several shapes, sizes and woods were widely used. Sadly, the exact differences between them are unknown to us, but sometimes 4-5 names can be found in the same document, showing that a variety of pavises used at the same time.

In "El victorial", the tales and adventurea of Pero Niño, from the early XVth century, you can read at least an account of Castilian crossbowmen and pavisisiers fighting longbowmen in the coasts and islands of England.

And there are several images of spear and pavise armed troops.

In the "Biblia de Alba" and the knightly tale of "El caballero Zifar" both from the early- middle XVth century, are several drawings. This image is from the later.

(Writing from a mobile sucks)

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"Pillart" appears as a soldier category to be recruited in a Navarrese document of 1378 (and many others).
Reading the documents I cannot find descriptions about their equipment. I had read somewhere that they could be spear and shield armed infantry, but reading again the sources I'm inclined to think that perhaps they were light cavalry, and thus, with no relation to this thread...

Splints seems most likely to be an arm defense of some type, potentially what gets called jack chains or a similar form of limited plate armour. Note that it's an alternative to having sufficient sleeves on the jack.

Scottish Kings of the 15th century made numerous legislations requiring men to own bows and to practice archery every Sunday. However I'm not sure how effective this effort was as most Scottish infantry continued to fight as spearmen.

Splints can mean different things at different times and in different places, but given the context of late 15th Scotland, I'd agree with T. Kew. A pair of splints was probably what we would call jack-chains.

This is just my opinion, but I believe that the axe in this case was a pollaxe, and the targe was a pavise.

The pavise originates from Italy - the name itself is a reference to the town of Pavia, though the specific association may be apocryphal. The earliest reference I have come across is a mention in Florentine regulations from around 1260 - the pavesarii are to accompany and protect archers and crossbowmen. During travel, the pavesarii are to remain near the baggage train to be able to quickly retrieve their pavises if needed for battle. This matches the well known actions of the Genoese mercenaries at Crecy in 1346 (though here the impatient French king ordered the Genoese into battle without their pavises).

Later 14th century Florentine documents indicate that pavesarii and crossbowmen were mustered in roughly equal numbers, and crossbowmen were higher paid. So it seems that at least originally the pavisier was only a low-ranking soldier, not well-armed or equiped, just a body serving to shield the more important yet vulnerable missile troops.

The first documented uses of pavises in France and England occur within a decade or two after Crecy - its possible that the battle marks their introduction into Western Europe.

Here are some more Scottish legislations worth looking at.

1430
"Item, each yeoman that is of £20 in goods shall have a good doublat of fence or a habergeon, an iron hat with a bow, sheaf, sword, buckler and knife. And all others of £10 in goods have a bow, sheaf, sword and buckler. And the yeoman that is no archer, and cannot draw a bow, shall have a good sure hat for his head and a doublat of fence with sword and buckler, and a good axe, or else a pointed staff."

1491
"each gentleman who has £10 worth of land or more is adequately furnished and armed with a basinet, sallet, metal hat, gorget or pisane, whole leg harness, sword, spear and dagger; and gentlemen who have a small amount of land or unlanded shall be armed as far as possible according to the view and discretion of the sheriffs, bailies and such persons as our sovereign lord will depute and commission for this; and honest yeomen with sufficient power who choose to be men of arms shall be sufficiently furnished according to the discretion of the said sheriffs or commissioners; and all other yeomen of the realm between sixteen and sixty shall have sufficient bows and sheaves, sword, buckler, knife, spear or good axe instead of the bow"

These two legislations state that an axeman was to be armed with axe, sword and buckler, and a knife. The only way this makes sense is if a pollaxe is what was the type of axe intended.

Altogether these legislations show us that the targe (pavise) was not a popular item, nor was it used for very long. Targes only appear in legislation between 1456 and 1481. 25 years isn't a particularly long time. I think that the Scottish experimented with the idea of pavisiers, but probably didn't find them to be very effective. Also, the fact that examples of these targes had to be sent out to every sheriff, 25 years after their introduction, tells us that they weren't particularly popular, otherwise these examples wouldn't have been necessary.

It's possible, though not necessarily ideal, to use a smallish shield in conjunction with a pike. Various historical soldiers did this. See this thread, for example.

I also find other references about axes and shields in scottish military of 14-15th centuries. This is from Heath's Armies of Middle Ages vol. 1. p. 103.:

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The heater shield is also found in effigies of highlander chiefs and seens to have been very popular among scots. Notice that local taste for axes was already present by that time; that shouldn't be surprising: Robert de Bruce had a of fine axes and used one of them to kill a young english knight in single (at horseback). The type of axe mentioned in the manuscript:
https://scontent.fgig4-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/18922193_1211426098968455_6755630500653154073_n.jpg?oh=30f9a136993e91d217e1b25d52976f7c&oe=59E8AC53

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Iagoba Ferreira wrote:

What is certain is that in the whole XVth century Iberia pavises in several shapes, sizes and woods were widely used. Sadly, the exact differences between them are unknown to us, but sometimes 4-5 names can be found in the same document, showing that a variety of pavises used at the same time. In "El victorial", the tales and adventurea of Pero Niño, from the early XVth century, you can read at least an account of Castilian men and pavisisiers fighting longbowmen in the coasts and islands of England. And there are several images of spear and pavise armed troops. In the "Biblia de Alba" and the knightly tale of "El caballero Zifar" both from the early- middle XVth century, are several drawings. This image is from the later.

Spanish pavises (or paveses) tend to be shorter and suited for skirmishing and méele , perhaps that's why the french and the dutch in 16th century called them "targes". This article says that such troops were particularly popular amoung galicians, although they could be seen in all peninsula; as Prof. Paulo Jorge Simões Agostinho states in his book, spanish kingdoms all shared the same types weapons no matter from where they came: a type of light javelin from Navarre was common in the entire peninsula, and things like that.

Article: http://ejercitodeflandes.blogspot.com.br/2013...esado.html

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Benjamin H. Abbott wrote:

It's possible, though not necessarily ideal, to use a smallish shield in conjunction with a pike. Various al soldiers did this. See this thread, for example.

In the first post you mentioned that sources talk about "pavises" in scottish pikemen's equipment at Flodden. They do really talk about that type of shield or is what you assumed from its context?

Manuscript miniatures seems to have quite a few depictions of spearmen carrying large shields in the 14th-15th centuries

http://manuscriptminiatures.com/4925/15120/

http://manuscriptminiatures.com/4925/14666/

http://manuscriptminiatures.com/4304/22524/

http://manuscriptminiatures.com/search/?tags=%22pavise%22

Also, I also would resist the idea of pavises being used in scottish schiltrons. I mean, shields were used in schiltrons; if they weren't, there would be no "schiltron" at all. Let's see some quotes I found (in Wikipedia, but they came from good authors, so let's be tollerant at first):

"The front ranks knelt with their spear butts fixed in the earth; the rear ranks leveled their lances over their comrades heads; the thick-set grove of twelve foot spears was far too dense for the cavalry to penetrate."
Source: Oman, Charles (1924). The Art of War in the Middle Ages. vol.2. London: Greenhill. p. 80.

They had axes at their sides and lances in their hands.They advanced like a thick-set hedge and such a phalanx could not easily be broken."
Source: Brown, Chris (2008). Bannockburn 1314. Stroud: press. p. 78.

They were all on foot; picked men they were, enthusiastic, armed with keen axes, and other weapons, and with their shields closely locked in front of them, they formed an impenetrable phalanx ..."
Source: ibid. p. 90

From what we know about schiltrons:
1) They had shields and use them in their formations
2) Defensive formations used stances that couldn't be achieved with large shields

You actually told me that we shouldn't consider "targe" as a reference for the latter highland targe, so I was thinking: what shields scotsmen used that could fit the role? My answer in the heater shaped ones: they were used longer in Scotland than any other places (16th century highlander chiefs still used with them), could and certainly were called "targes" and, were small and practical enough to be attached to the arm while holding a pike (more or less likely the burgundian pikemen did).

Then, you would probably say: "the legislation say the shields were intended to resist the shot of the english". I don't see why that exactly would meant such a great shield as the pavise: heater shields could do the job, and they were the only reference for scottish shields we had by that time. Remember that those shields DIDN'T changed longbowmen effectiveness against schiltrons and other infantry, so the can only conclude that the shields weren't that effective (that matches heater shields perfectly).

Oddly enough, I eventually came across another topic, and you was in the discussion:
http://myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=23240

Quote:

All I have to support claim this is that Patten mentions the Scots unsuccessfully using these targets as protection against shot. This also makes sense when we consider the 15th century legislation which state that a man who could not use a bow, should equip himself with an axe and a targe (which matches Patten's description), to resist the shot of the English. This man sounds like he might have been a pavisier/sapper used to carry a large shield, and construct field fortifications.

I'm not inclined to believe that those legislations aren't meant to sappers, but your source definitely say such shields weren't sucessfull in protecting scots against longbowmen, what might prove my earlier point. And, I don't believe that pavises weren't effective against missiles: every regular crossbowmen in Portugal used them, early landsknecht crossbowmen used pavises as well and genoese arbalests were using them before everyone else. Many people even believes that Crecy would be a whole different affair if genoese could actually use their crossbows while protecting themselves behind their large pavises.

Hi again Pedro.

You are right. It is possible that the figures on the Carlisle charter could be showing us "irregular" troops. This raises another question though, why would Robert the Bruce be using irregular troops to operate his siege equipment, and to scale the ladders? Wouldn't the more professional troops be given these tasks? Perhaps this image is not to be trusted. It comes from an English source after all. Maybe portraying the Scots so poorly equipped was just English propaganda?

Even if the Carlisle charter is to be taken as evidence for what irregular troops were like in the early 14th century, I don't think that this applies to the axe and targe men mentioned in 15th century legislation. You can see in the above quotes that axe and targe men were required to also have; helmets, jacks, swords, and bucklers. These men were just as well equipped as any other type of infantry at the time, and so I think they should be thought of as "regular" troops. If fact in the 1456 legislation, it specifically states that no poor or under-equipped men should show up for military service.

Yes trying to fight with a two handed axe and a large shield would be highly impractical, but that isn't at all what I meant. Many pavises were designed so that they could stand up on their own. These pavises didn't need to be held in hand or strapped to the back. My current thinking is that these men might have set up their targes/pavises to form a defensive wall to shelter other troop types from the initial volleys of English arrows, but if the enemy reached the Scottish lines then these men would fight with their two handed axes.



Edited to make one small additional point.