Interesting facts you know about medieval warfare?

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mymee

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Here's mine, scroll down to "The Hidden Secrets of Stairwells." Pretty interesting right, too bad the D'shar don't understand this concept :razz:.

What are some interesting facts you know?

Also, where the :oops: is Ansen!?!?
 
One fact I noticed and found was interesting was that men who were full-time archers in the army started to get bone spurs from longtime use.
"... Considerable practice was required to produce the swift and effective combat shooting required. Skeletons of longbow archers are recognisably deformed, with enlarged left arms and often bone spurs on left wrists, left shoulders and right fingers..."
Not to mention that when archers stuck their arrows into the ground for easier access it increased the chance for infection for the person hit.
 
That the Falchion sword evolved as an anti-armour weapon. The first anti-armour weapons were just great big axes but these were to unwieldy to use in massed melee combat, so the Falchion was developed to have the agility of a sword and the cleaving power of an axe intended to shear right through plate armour.
 
mymee said:
Here's mine, scroll down to "The Hidden Secrets of Stairwells." Pretty interesting right, too bad the D'shar don't understand this concept :razz:.

What are some interesting facts you know?

Also, where the :oops: is Ansen!?!?

He's in 3.5 your just not looking hard enough. He is wearing different clothes as well.
 
I can feel my history nerd level rising, I've known all of these facts.  :neutral:

Well, I do have a question.  Did you mean medieval Europe, Russia/Asia, Japan?  Or one specific one?

Cause I need to narrow down my field here.  XD
 
CrymsonChaos said:
I can feel my history nerd level rising, I've known all of these facts.  :neutral:

Well, I do have a question.  Did you mean medieval Europe, Russia/Asia, Japan?  Or one specific one?

Cause I need to narrow down my field here.  XD

Medieval Everywhere!
 
About bath, that may be right, except for the Vikings. They used to clean themselves daily and take a bath every Saturday – which is way more than an average Central European. Nowadays the word for “Saturday” in Norwegian is still “Wash-day” (lørdag) because that habit.

Romans, too, were very fond of personal hygiene. For example, most people would go to a barber shop every day to shave, because less hair = cleaner. They also cut their hair short (and made fun of the Greek) because of that thought.

(Note: I have long hair myself)
 
Always a pleasure to have you here, Noosers  :wink:

Vikings were medieval. Romans were mentioned for the warfare part of the thread. Some extra knowledge can always be useful for someone. :smile:
 
heavy armor was actually quite effective in protecting from arrows,yes the arrows did penetrate the armor but the armor itself blunted the arrow so little to no harm was sustained. it was quite a sight seeing one of these heavily armored knights still fighting with arrows sticking out of him like a porcupine. not to mention it was quite frightening seeing this as the enemy. you actually had to aim at the weaker spots in the armor to get a definite hit/kill.

crossbows were created more for the ease of use for peasants then the armies themselves. main reason was because the bow required years of practice to be any good with,so there wasnt enough stopping power behind a normal shot. not to mention everything else you have to account in for with archery. crossbows allowed for almost anyone to pick one up and fire it half way decently for a kill. though pulling back the string to load another quarrel/bolt required alot of strength. thats what the metal frame in the front was used for,it allowed you to stick it into the ground. then allowed you to use your feet to ground it to reload it. it was trained with must like the bow,but it had a lower skill cap then the bow.

heavy armors were actually VERY hard and cumbersome to move and fight in. it required both high strength and high endurance. not to mention falling in one of these made it near impossible to get up no matter how strong you were. this was why everyone wasnt running around in a set of full plate,not to mention how expensive it was on top of that.

also the armored skirt allowed you to run much easier compared to others.



 
Rpground said:
heavy armors were actually VERY hard and cumbersome to move and fight in. it required both high strength and high endurance. not to mention falling in one of these made it near impossible to get up no matter how strong you were. this was why everyone wasnt running around in a set of full plate,not to mention how expensive it was on top of that.

On top of that, any old horse couldn't exactly be expected to carry a fully armoured man into battle. Combine the cost of training and feeding a warhorse and you get some idea why it was generally the wealthy got to ride around while others got rode over.

Heavy cavalry was developed in the middle east as a response to nomadic raiders. Basically some dudes were given the right to tax an area in return for protecting it, which they did by equipping themselves with heavy armor and big ass horses. It created bit of a stalemate in warfare between the nomads and civilizations, as the former couldn't defeat heavy cavalry, while the latter couldn't chase the nomads very far due to their horses requiring special feed and being unable to live off the land.

Europeans came up with a similar system several hundreds of years later, as a response to all kinds of folks raiding western europe. This mode of taxation and protection spread pretty fast and lead to the knights we all know and love.

I never studied any particular period of warfare, but do know a little bit about a whole bunch of different things.
 
I think you can put Romans in the medieval period...if just barely. I wanna say they essentially mark the Roman empire getting all tore up the beginning of the medieval period. I think you can even safely argue that the Byzantine Empire is basically what was left of the Roman Empire transitioning into the new era.
 
Fulkram said:
I think you can put Romans in the medieval period...if just barely. I wanna say they essentially mark the Roman empire getting all tore up the beginning of the medieval period. I think you can even safely argue that the Byzantine Empire is basically what was left of the Roman Empire transitioning into the new era.

They still considered themselves "Roman" and wasn't coined the Byzantine Empire till much later. The Roman Empire died in 1453 with the fall of Constantinople.

Heard this one from my professor, Leading up to the battle of Agincourt the archers were stricken with diarrhea. So when it came to the day of the battle field they wore no pants. So they would release their arrow and then release diarrhea, then release arrow and release diarrhea, and repeats for a long time. Leads me to believe that the Archers were great troops in a force and had great discipline. I know I would be in the back of the woods with a huge pile of leaves.


 
the fact is that knights used to **** in their armour because it was hard to put it on and take it off and needed help from squires and servants.
 
Gambino said:
the fact is that knights used to **** in their armour because it was hard to put it on and take it off and needed help from squires and servants.

That...reduces the glamour related to knights I've harbored quite a bit :p
 
Full plate was not used until the end of the dark ages, and then it was scarce as it was very expensive.

Yes, even Kings used to die from the weight of there armors when the fell from the horses in shallow creeks.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_I,_Holy_Roman_Emperor (cant give a full link)
one of the more famous King died like that, also a bunch more of them did too.

Many of the nations from the eastern Europe used to coat there weapons with feces so the bacteria in them would kill even lightly wounded people.

Knights followed a strict code of conduct in battle, at battle of Agincourt the British didn't follow any, as it was forbidden to hack and slaughter knight who fell from the horses or where lightly wounded. This was just among the Cristian European.

@ Pericles_plato
When you are facing people who want to kill you, your priorities shift in a sec. :smile:
 
Rpground said:
heavy armors were actually VERY hard and cumbersome to move and fight in. it required both high strength and high endurance. not to mention falling in one of these made it near impossible to get up no matter how strong you were. this was why everyone wasnt running around in a set of full plate,not to mention how expensive it was on top of that.

From what I've heard a medieval soldier armoured from head to toe would still be carrying less weight than a modern infantry man, and the medieval soldier would have his burden better distributed. It varies of course by what type of armour he is wearing, but especially later full plate armours could be fairly light, and made in such a way as to allow very much freedom of movement.

All in all, the equipment was lighter than we usually think, but of course swinging a sword that weighs not much more than a kilogram gets tiring more quickly than we expect also.
 
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