zraver

take a gander at a late medievil horsemans ax. I bet he was using the reverse side with the spike or maul. The spike could punch plate and deliver a punture wound and the maul could cush it and the bones under neath. The bladed part even if it managed to penetrate would come in increasing contact with more and more armor the deep it tried to bite and get bogged down.

Triple C

Quite possible. One of the combatants, after being knocked off his horse, envicerated his opponent's mount with his axe and they started to go at it with their swords. You can probably find it in the local Barnes and Nobles--The Last Duel is the title. If the social historical stuff doesn't interest you, just go at the second last chapter. IIRC Frossart was a contemporary to the events, and he probably would be more accurate at his writing of this event than the 100 Years War.

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ORBIS NON SUFFICIT.

astralis

i was just thinking, that type of warfare requires some pretty impressive strength.

to do such blunt damage against an armored object requires one heavy (not necessarily sharp) weapon, and you either have to cut all the way through or free your weapon fast before you become vulnerable to a counter-attack. that's even worse than the swing to begin with, because you don't have momentum working for you...

IIRC that type of warfare didn't last for too long, relatively speaking. it took a while for armor to become strong enough to resist stab attacks effectively, and after a while the development of an effective pike/musket combo really made that warfare obsolete.

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Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.

-Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

zraver

yup, most sources say anceint through medievil battles went through 5-15 minute spurts and then a collective pause would envelop the combatants.

You don't nessecerily need heavy as much as focused weight. A weapon that is to heavy will end up using inertia against you. Hammers and axes really are not all that heavy.

Plate armor at least over the torso had been around in some form for thousands of years. The Hoplites wore a very tough bronze and Alexanders troops had a laminate nearly as good as modern anti-shank prison guard jackets and made on the same theory as modern bullet proof material.

Triple C

That's an interesting point you have brought up there. The way that I understood the evolution in weaponry and protection, it was the other way arround. The use of hauberk coats persisted for the better part of the Dark Ages because it sufficed to ward off most threats on the battlefield at the time.

The weapons that were needed to overcome maille defenses such as the mace and the two-handed battle axe had serious short comings as battlefield weapons which limited their presence in combat. The idea of crushing a knight under his armor with an axe or mace had its appeal, until you realize that a Frankish single-handed sword forged with Rhineland steel could easily severe limbs with one blow, and was much quicker in the hand thanks to superior ballance.

The lack of lethalty of arrows of all types from all sorts of bows had been established by a series of studies conducted by the Royal Amoury in England working with ballistics scientists from Vickers. The vaunted lowbow was only capable of penetrating maille to sufficient depths to inflict a mortal wound if it was shooting bodkin arrows forged with high grade steel. Those however were conspicuously absent from medieval battlefield archeological sites. Most other missile weapons could cause superficial and painful wounds, but were insufficient to kill.

The developement of plate armor was an reponse to the rise of the Swiss pike-infantry, who for the first time since the Roman Empire gave the footsoldier the lethality to halt shock cavalry attacks.

zraver

Are you sure? Froissart's painting of Crecy shows plate and he lived just after the battle and jsut before the rise of the Pike Square. Would not plate armor be inresponce to jousting and the shock cavalry tactics developed during the crusades and the threat from bows?

Also if I may, in the period jsut before the rise of the heavy cavalry the scourge of Europe was the Norsemen. They used axes (due to low cost) alot and did very evil things with them. Also IIRC didn't the Saxon Housecarls also use the ax? Mail persisted becuase its easy to make and worked well enough when combined with gambeson and shield. Europe's warfare was also missile poor at the time. It takes about 10 minutes to teach some one how to make the stuff, then all you need is time and some one to fit the pieces together. Winter fun in a pre-industrial society. Were I am murky is how complex the European mail was. I know the Perisans had a riveted double weave, and I know Europe used riveted mail, but I cant remember if they used a double weave or not.

Triple C

IIRC, the earliest record of the Swiss mercenary pike's showing on the battlefield actually dated back to the late 1200s according to my medieval studies lecturor Dr. Phillip Daileader, who also stated that the use of plate armor was an reaction to that of the pike, and could have proved a successful one had the arquebus not been invented.

A quick wikipedia search says that my admittedly poor grasp on numbers is probably right this time: "Late in the thirteenth century, soldiers drawn from the cantons of Switzerland gained a military reputation throughout Europe. This reputation was earned as a result of their defense against the Austrian Habsburg overlords and during campaigns in Italy. "

I am not so sure about Froissart. John Keegan's The Face of Battle stated that archery could kill armored men only at 'point-blank' range, using the artillerist's definition of the word. This seems to collaborate with what I have read from other sources. Froissart's writing are tremendously entertaining, but he lost my credulity when he described the valiant charge of the Blind King of Bavaria.

While I have read the said experiments on a medieval reenactor's web forum, I am loath to depend on them as my supporting evidence. So I will use Keegan's account of the part of the battle in which the contingent of armored French men-at-arms was engaged:

Keegan extrapolated that the rout of the French cavalry was not the result of the arrow fire in itself, but the stakes that was erected behind the first rank of the archers that was hidden from view by the bodies of the archers, who retreated suddenly behind the cover of what was essentially a make-shift pallisade, panicking the horses. As the cavalry wheeled arround and fell back, the archers squeazed off more shots at the rear of the French horse, which was not armored, and caused a stampede through the advancing French infantry.

The French infantry, advancing in echelon at a slower pace and in a state of disorganization, was then subjected to barrage of archery fire. Yet "The Archers failed nevertheless to halt the French advance". What they have accomplished was "channelling" the French heavy infantry, who hit the English lines and sucessfully forced their armored counterpart to fall back "a spear's length". However, the arrow fire and the terrain's channellizing effect had "so tightly bunched that they could not use their weapons to widen the breach they had made". The charge died at the point of the English lance and, as it became evident that the French forward momentum was lost, the archers dropped their bows, drew whatever impact weapon they had, converged on the French flanks, and decisively won the battle.

The sequence of the events were confirmed by the chroniclers. Had the archery been capable of punching through armor dependably--and thousands of arrows were fired--the French would not have been able to make it to the English lines.

Ironduke

Maybe somebody should make a movie about ninjas fighting knights.

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The Buck Stops Here

Triple C

Some sources would claim that the Norsemen's most important asset was the mobility of their long boats. They could strike, loot and burn a town to the ground before it could be relieved by stronger forces, and laugh at the law enforcement from a distance.

I am equally murky about mail, but Erik D Schmid who has solid credentials in mail armor research (Curator of Wallace Collection endorses him) said that once you have mastered the metallurgy, it was faster and cheaper to make plate armor rather then mail. He was also convinced that well-made mail armor would be able to absorb dart fire and take the sting out of the bite. Good mail had to be made of softer iron, which is counter-intuitive but it sort of acts like the collapsable egine compartment of a modern car. This requires considerable skill.

The Romans clad their footsluggers in laminate plate, centurions in mail, and force commanders in bronze. That would be rather odd practice to give your officers less protection than enlisted men to save resources. It usually goes the other way arround.

The problem with two-handed Axe is that it required the use of both hands, and the soldier had to forgo both mount and shield. They could kill mail-clad lads easy, but they would be vulnerable to missiles. That was what got them in Hastings, when the Huscarls were put under constant harrassing fire and a contingent was finally provoked into making an ill-considered charge.

Dunno about how the Crusaders worked in the wars with the Turks. Allegedly, the Turks found their arrows incapable of killing the crusaders, some of whom were described by their chroniclers as "stuck like porcupines" and fought with no appreciable detrement in their ferocity. The Crusaders were equally irked by their enemies ability to inflict numerous painful flesh wounds at stand-off range. If I ever got arround reading Joinville's Chronicle of the XIII Crusade, I will sure tell you what he said about the issue. He was an odd fella for his times, being a literate fighting man.

Triple C

I don't see why not. After all we have had a movie about Spartans fighting Persian mutants and Rhino riding grenadiers.

astralis

triple C,

the way i see it is that there was a decisive transition from the stab attacks used in roman period, to slash attacks in early medieval period, to finally blunt attacks (which then gradually gave way to gunpowder fires). the example of the frankish single-handed sword somewhat fits in with this: one doesn't sever limbs with a stab attack, one creates a gaping hole.

stab attacks were used excellently by the legions: efficient, didn't open the body to counter-attack, and had the most punch. but stab attacks require lots of training and discipline, and worst yet against growing levels of armor and stirrup cavalry the lethality went down.

slash attacks were then used as armies transferred to cavalry. for example, byzantine cavalry, a type of "medium" half-armored cavalry, relied on a combination of sword and horse archery. existing infantry at the time either configured to anti-cavalry or did not have the discipline to create stab armies.

as time went on and better armor was developed, first one-handed and later two-handed swords were needed (zweihanders) to create the blunt attack needed. the development of pikemen made these weapons even more massive in size, so that they could first attack pike shafts and then the pikemen themselves (doppelsnolders).

in any case, the quality of steel needed for slicing through the heavy armor of the period certainly precluded most infantry from having that. so blunt blows were needed. however, as i've said, this period didn't last for too long: the inclusion of musketeers into pikemen ranks made even the massively armored doppelsnolders wary of charging into pikemen.

Triple C

Cutting simply wouldn't 'cut it' after High Middle Age. After this peiord lethality and handling had became totally moot when one is in the business of fighting heavily armored cavalry. The one and only goal was to punch through armor, and the only way to do it was to apply massive force concentrated at the smallest possible surface area. Hence pike, hammer, arquebus.

astralis

i think we're on the same track. only quibble i have is that the massive force was used to cause trauma (knock-out, broken bones, internal bleeding) as opposed to punching through armor, which grew progressively harder as armor became thicker and harder.

zraver

The horse was equally important to the mongols. But long boat or horse are not going to kill me, ax or bow will.

[quote]I am equally murky about mail, but Erik D Schmid who has solid credentials in mail armor research (Curator of Wallace Collection endorses him) said that once you have mastered the metallurgy, it was faster and cheaper to make plate armor rather then mail. He was also convinced that well-made mail armor would be able to absorb dart fire and take the sting out of the bite. Good mail had to be made of softer iron, which is counter-intuitive but it sort of acts like the collapsable egine compartment of a modern car. This requires considerable skill.[/quot]

The metallurgy being important.

officers had to ward off missiles- sheet metal is good for that unless the enemy had bodkin type points. Centurions needed mobility. rank and file needed heavy armor to ward off enemy blows an stabs. 3 different tactical needs, 3 diferent answers.

the 'real" two handed ax is a pole arm, I was talking about norse long axes.

I'd have to dig out the primary source document, but literacy was indeed not common. I have a report from a Moslem doctor on Frankish medicine-

Triple C

It was alleged that laminate plate was also quicker and cheaper for the factories to forge. Axes, yeah, probably would get through mail armor. A sword was a faster weapon to handle though, and a solid hit could probably render a man hors de combat for the duration, armor or no armor. I sometimes wonder that was probably what made chivalry practicable.

Amusing stuff that was! I have read the same document. Those doctors probably killed more patients than what would have been if they just stopped to practice.