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William P
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 Posted: Tue 06 Mar, 2012 9:54 pm Post subject: |
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| Matthew Amt wrote: | | William P wrote: | | but you guys have showcased that many things printed in popular books and tv shows and internet articles as simply being untrue. and i wondered if that concept of knights using ranged weapons on the battlefield, was true or false, even if it was uncommon, thats still knights using ranged weapons, on foot or on horse. |
Gotcha. You're questioning your assumptions, and that's a good thing! Best way to do it is to go back to original sources, accounts of knights in battles, and see if there is anything which doesn't match the popular scenario.
| Quote: | | i guess i just have this idea in my head of charge, pull back to regroup, when regrouped, everyone pulls out a bow/ crossbow (those who dont have one, sit there doing nothing, to keep formation), loose a bolt or two, put away the bow, THEN charge. |
So all you need is a more or less reliable account or depiction (or more than one, preferably!) of something like this happening in a medieval battle. Otherwise we're just making up "shoulda coulda woulda" theories. In this case, while I agree that many of the modern *reasons* for knights not using missile weapons may be modern rationalizations, and that it's never safe to say "never", I just have a feeling that any significant evidence in support of the theory would have appeared by now, if it existed.
My motto: Good research questions the answers more often than it answers the questions! (Usually said with an evil grin!)
Matthew |
matt, joining this sie, plus joining my reenactment group, the NVG makes up a very large part of why ive all but stopped buying books on warriors from your regular bookshops, that and the fact im running out of money, (honours thesis= no job + reenacting = no money ) and i havent the money to buy the stuff from the bookshop abbeys, which, as far as i know is one of the only books in sydney that actually has a dedicated section on the byzantines.
one book i bought recently by christopher gravett on the evolution of the english knight from 1200-1600 is a decent book but makes some flawed statements about armour verses arrows.
and my whole thing about how knights COULD use bows was definately a speculative description of tactics. that im not expecting there to be evidence of.
as we all know, just because it could be made to work doesnt mean it was done.
jean--- the fact that, as you said other heavy cavalry of noble station used bows either on foot or horseback very regularly might i add. Is the reason i made the thread in the first place,
im thinking, surely those guys did it and they still functioned as heavy armoured (and with barded horses at times) lancers sometimes at the same time, so why not european knights.
especially when nobles trained as squires to use the bow and/or crossbow, plus the use of the javelin, surely it makes sense that they'd try and employ it in war. and im asking whether there is evidence they actively used them, either on foot or horseback.
the answer i seem to be getting is largely, no, that about 90% of the time they were acting as heavy infantry or cavalry
i was primarily looking at the 'western' countries i.e Britain/ Ireland, Scandinavia, holy roman empire, austria, Italy, France, Switzerland etc.
since in eastern europe and russia, as well as in spain, we have clear evidence of noble cavalry, making use of bows and javelins.
but if i can think of any reason why not. the knights of 'western europe' didnt encounter horse archers on their home turf. that the geography maybe just didnt facilitate horse archery all that well.
that and the fact there was that general eagerness for two groups of knights to get stuck into each other, and be the first one into the fight, which doesnt exactly facilitate a sustained, long range archery exchange.
plus we have the fact mounted knights were lancers right from the get-go.
although sassanid cataphracts used both bows and lances.
but i get the feeling the WHOLE thread is confounded by the fact of what defines a 'knight' especially since the qualifications of knight, you guys have said, apparently changed over time.
so the question arises, when is a knight not a knight?
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Lafayette C Curtis
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| Posted: Wed 07 Mar, 2012 4:02 am Post subject: |
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The Crusades had many notorious episodes where men-at-arms were forced to march or fight on foot after their horses had been killed or disabled by Turkish or Saracen arrows, and in a few of these occasions the knights grabbed a nearby crossbow and shot back at the opposing archers. Not very effectively, perhaps, but it was done. Besides, if I'm not mistaken, during the Siege of Acre in the Third Crusade, the primary accounts mention a couple of examples of people of knightly rank fighting with bows or crossbows--once again, certainly not the norm, but it was done.
What I personally suspect is that the use of missile weapons against human targets was frowned upon not because it was dishonourable to the knight, but somewhat insulting to the target. You know, if you were a nobleman or a gentleman who been shooting at deer and boars since your youths, it's possible that in your adulthood you might feel a bit reluctant to shoot people because it'd be tantamount to equating them with the animals you hunt. There's a little bit of support to this idea in the fact that knights and similar men-at-arms were a great deal less reluctant to use missile weapons against heathens, but that's about it. Nothing else to show that it's anything more than my own fanciful idea with very little basis in fact...
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A. Elema
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| Posted: Thu 08 Mar, 2012 2:28 pm Post subject: |
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The idea that knights should not use bows probably comes from the twelfth-century sources.
The Second Lateran Council of 1139 mentions it in Canon 29.
| Quote: | | We prohibit the deadly art of crossbowmen and bowmen, detestable to God, to be practiced against Christians and non-heretics (catholicos), on pain of anathema. |
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It wasn't a particularly successful injunction, but in the thirteenth century, Guillaume Le Breton's poem praising Phillip Augustus claimed that the king had complied with it.
| Quote: | | Among our Frenchmen, it was a wholly unknown in those days that there should be a ballista or a crossbow, nor would the king allow any man whom he knew to use such weapons in the whole army. |
The claim likely isn't true, however. The English complained to Innocent III that Phillip himself shot three English knights with a crossbow at the siege of Messina in 1191.
I also spotted a comment on the bow in the song of deeds Girart de Vienne, written around 1180. Young Girart and his brothers Hernaut and Renier are about to ambush a caravan of Saracens.
| Quote: | And Hernaut says: "Let all of them approach,
For by the Saint that pilgrims seek in Rome,
I will strike down the first one to draw close,
Straight through the chest, with my bow's steel-tipped bolt!"
Girart says to Renier: "I hope he won't!
If we, like common boys, use archers' bows,
We shall be held in lowest reproach;
But if we slay with fists or with a pole,
Our courage and our strength would be well shown;
A curse on him that shoots first at his foe;
He is a coward, who dares not fight up close!" |
(Translation by Michael A. Newth)
It looks as if bows were a political hot button in twelfth- and early thirteenth-century France, but perhaps not necessarily in other times and places.
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Elling Polden
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| Posted: Thu 08 Mar, 2012 4:25 pm Post subject: |
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As far as I have gathered, the use of bows/crossbows where more of a hot potato in early/high medevial Italy, where mercenary crossbowmen from the southern Italian regions and Sicilly would sometimes serve Sicillian saracen masters. Thus, it was in the direct interest of the papal state to probibit this practice.
"this [fight] looks curious, almost like a game. See, they are looking around them before they fall, to find a dry spot to fall on, or they are falling on their shields. Can you see blood on their cloths and weapons? No. This must be trickery."
-Reidar Sendeman, from King Sverre's Saga, 1201
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David Jenkins
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| Posted: Fri 09 Mar, 2012 2:25 am Post subject: |
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Just another observation, shooting someone dosen't get you a ransom.
Practicalities aside I suspect attitudes varied a lot over time, place, who you were fighting and how nasty things got.
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Dan Howard
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| Posted: Fri 09 Mar, 2012 4:29 am Post subject: |
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Agreed with Elling. At the time of the 2nd Lateran Council, Roger Guiscard was leading a Sicilian Moslem army up towards the Papal States from southern Italy. This is why the Pope tried his injunction - it gave his troops an unfair advantage against Guiscard who would have faced excommunication if his troops shot at a Christian soldier, while the Pope's troops could shoot anyone they wanted because the Sicilians were not Christian. It had nothing to do with crossbows being dishonourable or any other such nonsense.
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A. Elema
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| Posted: Fri 09 Mar, 2012 12:18 pm Post subject: |
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| Dan Howard wrote: | | It had nothing to do with crossbows being dishonourable or any other such nonsense. |
Girart of Vienne would seem to suggest that the view was held by at least some people, some of the time. Matthew Strickland has also noted that bowmen in captured garrisons in twelfth-century England tended to be executed when other infantry were not. Being a bowman was just a bit dodgy in the English and French world at the time.
It's also possible that it was not exactly dishonourable for a knight to use a bow, but it was distinctly dishonourable for someone to show up at a muster armed only with a bow, when by right he was supposed to have shown up with more expensive equipment appropriate to a higher status.
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Joshua Connolly
Location: Massachusetts, USA Joined: 28 Sep 2006
Posts: 49
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| Posted: Fri 09 Mar, 2012 12:29 pm Post subject: |
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Well, I'm not sure if we can describe these people as 'knights', but according to later 15th century muster lists in France it was acceptable for poorer nobles to answer the muster as longbowmen instead of pole-armers or men at arms. Sometimes they'd answer as arquebusiers.
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Kurt Scholz
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| Posted: Fri 09 Mar, 2012 2:02 pm Post subject: |
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Just my thoughts on honour. Knights seem to have put much emphasis on knowing their enemy and being known to their enemy. If you use a long range weapon the whole fun gets spoiled. On the other hand if you fight some no-name commoner it would be of little concern how he dies. Spinning this further non-noble sergeants (=heavy cavalry called "knights" incorrectly) could be the primary users of crossbows. The nobles know how to handle these weapons but rather appear as commanders of ranged weapon corps than as noble ranged weapon units. If the enemy is not properly Christian you can kill them by any means without using face, so other than crossbows I'd expect early Molotov cocktails with naphta.
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William P
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| Posted: Sat 10 Mar, 2012 6:47 am Post subject: |
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| Kurt Scholz wrote: | | Just my thoughts on honour. Knights seem to have put much emphasis on knowing their enemy and being known to their enemy. If you use a long range weapon the whole fun gets spoiled. On the other hand if you fight some no-name commoner it would be of little concern how he dies. Spinning this further non-noble sergeants (=heavy cavalry called "knights" incorrectly) could be the primary users of crossbows. The nobles know how to handle these weapons but rather appear as commanders of ranged weapon corps than as noble ranged weapon units. If the enemy is not properly Christian you can kill them by any means without using face, so other than crossbows I'd expect early Molotov cocktails with naphta. |
that falls down of course when you consider the mounted archery duels of 12th century japan between individual samurai
there was still that rush to be the ffirst to decl;are his name. and pick out a good opponent. and they wenrnt neccesarily shy about getting into close combat either.
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Matthew Amt
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| Posted: Sat 10 Mar, 2012 7:31 am Post subject: |
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| William P wrote: | | that falls down of course when you consider the mounted archery duels of 12th century japan between individual samurai |
Completely different system of idealism!! (Not to mention tactics.) Several people have already pointed out that ideas of chivalry and honor varied by time and place. *You* were the one who first asked about *knights* using ranged weapons on a battlefield, eh?
Oh, a point on the edicts against use of crossbows against Christians--those refer to the use of crossbows in general, don't they? I mean, they aren't forbidding *nobles* in particular to use crossbows in certain situations, it's a ban that includes commoners, right? So I don't see how they can be much of a factor in the discussion of a noble's ideas of honor and chivalry. We're not actually trying to say that the whole concept of medieval noble honor and chivalry is a later invention, are we? Just checking--you guys have more research available than I do!
Matthew
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Kurt Scholz
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| Posted: Sat 10 Mar, 2012 9:33 am Post subject: |
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| William P wrote: | | Kurt Scholz wrote: | | Just my thoughts on honour. Knights seem to have put much emphasis on knowing their enemy and being known to their enemy. If you use a long range weapon the whole fun gets spoiled. On the other hand if you fight some no-name commoner it would be of little concern how he dies. Spinning this further non-noble sergeants (=heavy cavalry called "knights" incorrectly) could be the primary users of crossbows. The nobles know how to handle these weapons but rather appear as commanders of ranged weapon corps than as noble ranged weapon units. If the enemy is not properly Christian you can kill them by any means without using face, so other than crossbows I'd expect early Molotov cocktails with naphta. |
that falls down of course when you consider the mounted archery duels of 12th century japan between individual samurai
there was still that rush to be the ffirst to decl;are his name. and pick out a good opponent. and they wenrnt neccesarily shy about getting into close combat either. |
Samurai are not Medieval European knights. It doesn't matter if they decide to throw cherry blossoms at each other.
You can find out more if you trace the Ringerpferd and the Reiters. Less wealthy nobles from Germany used them successfully for warfare and had a much reduced risk to lose a fortune in horse and armour. As far as we know the pistol was the weapon that most suited this kind of combat, but I highly suspect that this already early 16th century term was connected to mounted crossbowmen just like the Hakkapeliitta (that appear in Europe after the Swedish military reforms that replaced all crossbow forces with pike and shot). The problem is that knight is a legal term without implications for the degree of armament while heavy cavalry doesn't mean all knights in a European context. So knights can have very light armour and not be considered heavy cavalry by French standards for example.
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Dan Howard
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| Posted: Sat 10 Mar, 2012 1:17 pm Post subject: |
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The terms "heavy" and "light" have nothing to do with armament either. They are related to how the unit is deployed. If the cavalry is deployed for shock tactics where they charge in close ranks at a formation then they are "heavy cavalry". If a bunch of naked men stand in close ranks such as in a phalanx or shield wall then they are "heavy infantry". If they are deployed in more open formations for skirmishing etc then they are "light" units.
Agreed about the terms Ringerpferd and Reiters. It is possible that they originated from mounted crossbowmen. Tactics wouldn't change much when switching from a crossbow to a pistol.
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William P
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| Posted: Sat 10 Mar, 2012 7:37 pm Post subject: |
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| Kurt Scholz wrote: | | William P wrote: | | Kurt Scholz wrote: | | Just my thoughts on honour. Knights seem to have put much emphasis on knowing their enemy and being known to their enemy. If you use a long range weapon the whole fun gets spoiled. On the other hand if you fight some no-name commoner it would be of little concern how he dies. Spinning this further non-noble sergeants (=heavy cavalry called "knights" incorrectly) could be the primary users of crossbows. The nobles know how to handle these weapons but rather appear as commanders of ranged weapon corps than as noble ranged weapon units. If the enemy is not properly Christian you can kill them by any means without using face, so other than crossbows I'd expect early Molotov cocktails with naphta. |
that falls down of course when you consider the mounted archery duels of 12th century japan between individual samurai
there was still that rush to be the ffirst to decl;are his name. and pick out a good opponent. and they wenrnt neccesarily shy about getting into close combat either. |
Samurai are not Medieval European knights. It doesn't matter if they decide to throw cherry blossoms at each other.
You can find out more if you trace the Ringerpferd and the Reiters. Less wealthy nobles from Germany used them successfully for warfare and had a much reduced risk to lose a fortune in horse and armour. As far as we know the pistol was the weapon that most suited this kind of combat, but I highly suspect that this already early 16th century term was connected to mounted crossbowmen just like the Hakkapeliitta (that appear in Europe after the Swedish military reforms that replaced all crossbow forces with pike and shot). The problem is that knight is a legal term without implications for the degree of armament while heavy cavalry doesn't mean all knights in a European context. So knights can have very light armour and not be considered heavy cavalry by French standards for example. |
my point is that these guys showed that having a affinity for archery doesnt preclude those ideas of knowing who your enemy was before engaging. they just did it at a greater distance. or did it wehen they finally got to close quarters.
although depending on the circumstance the samurai would close and , as was the case of one duel, the combatants, settling a matter of honour, shot three arrows at each other , and honour being settled they both withdrew from the field, although of course this wasnt a battle scenario, and was more akin to a judicial duel.
but they wernt scared of closing for close combat
and to add to wha dan said.. the swiss pike formations, prior to the widespread use of handguns.. used crossbows in their formations
and dans definately right that crossbow is a decent aapproximator to a cavalrymans gun, primarily the wheellock pistols, they share the fact that they can be loaded well in advance of actually being fired and carried around in a loaded state.
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Kurt Scholz
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| Posted: Sun 11 Mar, 2012 3:05 am Post subject: |
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OK, point taken that archery can be done with a known enemy. But we simply have no source about a similar code in European warfare. As far as we know a codex-fighter was a close combat fighter.
I know the difference between light and heavy is not so much an issue of weight of equipment and I believe that the less armoured knights can be considered tactically light from a French gendarme's perspective.
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Benjamin H. Abbott
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| Posted: Sun 11 Mar, 2012 8:18 am Post subject: |
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While I've yet to find as much as I'd like on the subject, I understand that the French employed mounted crossbowmen and archers around the beginning of the sixteenth century who wore considerable armor and shot their crossbows or bows from the saddle. In Renaissance France at War, David Potter writes that there are accounts of these archers - often assumed to have simply be second-class men-at-arms - wielding their bows in the Italian wars. As Potter recounts, these archers typically came from the lower nobility.
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Jojo Zerach
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| Posted: Tue 20 Mar, 2012 4:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Jens Boerner wrote: | | Matthew Amt wrote: | | Well, part of the equation is that using a bow or crossbow simply isn't practical for a knight about to go into action on a typical battlefield. He's on horseback, for one thing, and armored, usually in a closed helm, and already juggling a shield and lance. Not really possible to do anything effective with a longbow at that point! |
What is a "typical battlefield"? I mean, from the 14th century on knights tend to fight on foot quite often, and there are also plenty of occurances where heavily armour riders used crossbows, in germany that kind of troups were called "stadtreiter" in the late middle ages.
It's also a matter of definition wether to call some of these "knights". They were armoured, riding a horse, they were often quite wealthy, some of them of noble birth...
I think it is also a matter of what time frame we're talking of.... |
If you look at English effigies from 1340-1400, you often see that their armour would be impractical for riding in. (even though they are shown with spurs.)
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Kel Rekuta
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| Posted: Tue 20 Mar, 2012 10:48 pm Post subject: |
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Fascinating opinon. Please expand on that. 
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Lafayette C Curtis
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| Posted: Wed 21 Mar, 2012 1:57 pm Post subject: |
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| Kurt Scholz wrote: | | You can find out more if you trace the Ringerpferd and the Reiters. Less wealthy nobles from Germany used them successfully for warfare and had a much reduced risk to lose a fortune in horse and armour. As far as we know the pistol was the weapon that most suited this kind of combat, |
I'm not sure the comparison is really that straightforward. Pistols were the weapon of shock cavalry comparable to earlier lancers; indeed, some of their earliest users were lancers looking for a powerful back-up weapon, and the deep formations utilised by 16th- and 17th-century pistol cavalry probably had closer ties to the deep wedges of late 15th-century German men-at-arms than to the skirmishers supporting these wedges. As such, the pistol wasn't really a "ranged" or "missile" weapon but rather a hand-to-hand combat weapon that just happened to do its damage by firing a projectile, and its use demanded as much courage (and the same kind) as what was needed to engage with the sword or lance. Ergo it's not really that relevant to our present discussion....
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Kurt Scholz
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| Posted: Wed 21 Mar, 2012 2:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Lafayette C Curtis wrote: | | Kurt Scholz wrote: | | You can find out more if you trace the Ringerpferd and the Reiters. Less wealthy nobles from Germany used them successfully for warfare and had a much reduced risk to lose a fortune in horse and armour. As far as we know the pistol was the weapon that most suited this kind of combat, |
I'm not sure the comparison is really that straightforward. Pistols were the weapon of shock cavalry comparable to earlier lancers; indeed, some of their earliest users were lancers looking for a powerful back-up weapon, and the deep formations utilised by 16th- and 17th-century pistol cavalry probably had closer ties to the deep wedges of late 15th-century German men-at-arms than to the skirmishers supporting these wedges. As such, the pistol wasn't really a "ranged" or "missile" weapon but rather a hand-to-hand combat weapon that just happened to do its damage by firing a projectile, and its use demanded as much courage (and the same kind) as what was needed to engage with the sword or lance. Ergo it's not really that relevant to our present discussion.... |
ranged weapons from horseback have short range of aimed hits and the deep formation was developed to deal with more shallow formations armed with lances.
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