LafayetteCCurtis wrote:Um...where did you get that definition of "warrior class?" And I don't quite see your point here. For one thing, the Roman army in the Second Punic War was a citizen militia only in theory. In practice, most of its men served continuously for years on end and provided the Romans with what was essentially a standing army in all but name.
True, but their tactics weren't above what Greek armies could do, and remarkably below what for example Cesar's legions could do (or Hannibal's units too). Once we are at it, let's compare Celts and Romans. Celts were regarded even by Romans as superior individual warriors, but Romans used to win battles. Celtic warrior class could be superior, but their army wasn't.
My point here is that individual prowess doesn't directly translate into great army. Even if you train your people as units, it still may not translate easily into good fighting force during a pitched battle. Napoleon made a comparison of French soldiers with Mamelukes (iirc), where he guessed that French could have an advantage from several thousands up, but on a smaller scale Mamelukes (or whoever it was) were better fighting force.
At least some people in this thread made a point, that if knights were good at individual fighting they "surely" made great armies. I read your post similarly.
That's only true for the landed knights. The gentry was made up of more than just these knights--it also included people like landless squires, and many of these people had no trade other than war. What do you think the scutage is? Technically it was a fine, but its de facto application was as a military tax used to hire the less fortunate but more bellicose men-at-arms to fight in lieu of their richer and less martially-inclined cousins.
So we have a warrior class, where two-thirds isn't military inclined? Fine by me. This picture of medieval nobility is maybe less superheroic, but much more human.
I'm thoroughly amazed. Stunned. Shocked by the totally baseless assertion that medieval men-at-arms had no training! Maybe they didn't get trained in military academies like our modern soldiers do, but I don't know how to describe their years as pages and squires other than as prolonged and thoroughly immersive periods of martial training. And while not all medieval armies had the time or resources to drill their men in formation fighting,
That's it. We obviously agree here. Not my fault.
many clearly did. You need only read Bernard Bachrach's article on medieval cavalry warfare here:
http://www.deremilitari.org/resources/a ... hrach3.htm to see some examples of medieval armies that
did employ extensive and intensive formation drills to prepare their men for battle.
I see this article in obviously different way that you do. I read, that mounted troops were generally inferior to well trained infantry, that recruits didn't know how to ride and had to be started on wooden horses (sic!). Kinda surprising, I have to admit.
You pointed to the example of Crecy. All right--the French there did show strikingly undisciplined behavior. But for every example like that, I can point at least one example of medieval knights and men-at-arms behaving in a thoroughly disciplined and professional manner. We don't even need to move to a different battle to find an instance of this disciplined behavior. At least one-fourths of the English host was made up of knights and men-at-arms who were essentially similar to the French men-at-arms on the opposing side. And these men-at-arms held their formation and waited for the disorganized French attack to arrive before turning back and annihilating these attacks in piecemeal fashion. Dare you say that the English men-at-arms weren't disciplined?
You don't need discipline to stay in the fortress and wait for an attack. English men-at-arms were effectively in a very similar situation there. But at the same time I suspect that their level of discipline was much above French, so don't get me wrong here.
I've demolished the "no training" idea up there.
Oh, my! It hurt so bad.
And what did these men do when not actively campaigning? Some of them, being feudal alndlords, would have returned to their land-holdings, but this doesn't mean that they would have stopped training and drilling--they still did both, only at a much smaller scale involving their families and perhaps the lords of neighboring manors, and they also had things like tournaments where they could apply their martial skills outside the context of an open war.
If they trained year round why a customary preparation period before a judical duel? In recent article here I read, that one duel was exceptional, because the participants received only two weeks of preparation time, and at least one of them could be a robber-knight, so he had a day-to-day motive to stay in fighting shape.
Others would be mercenaries, and these people would simply have sought employment in other wars since there was scarcely a year when Europe was entirely free of armed conflicts of one kind or another. Even lords who possessed relatively large standing armies--such as the King of France with his Ordonnance companies in the second half of the 15th century--often sent substantial parts of their forces to aid their allies or relatives for no other reason than to keep the soldiers in practice.
It's all great, and I agree with it. I just can't understand how come you post a link _fully_ supporting my position here, and claim that it demolishes something. It is written there that even Frank cavalry was at best mediocre fighting force, even if they trained regularly. But did they? You see, if they did train like that on a regular basis and if proper execution of such maneuvers were commonplace, there would be nothing to write home about. I got the impression, that spectators were uncommonly impressed by the discipline showed by the horsemen who were under no threat at all.
Mongols could do stuff like that in real battle. That takes discipline...
Not all knights were expert tacticians and fighters anymore than all samurai or all mughals were etc.
, but please, there is a context to it.