The Art of War in the Middle Ages a.d. 378-1515

CHAPTER II.. The Early Middle Ages (a.d. 476-1066).

THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES (A.D. 476-1066).

Paucity of Data for the period.--The Franks in the sixth century.--Battle of Tours.--Armies of Charles the Great.-- The Franks become horsemen.--The Northman and the Magyar.-- Rise of Feudalism.--The Anglo-Saxons and their wars.--The Danes and the Fyrd.--Military importance of the Thegnhood.-- The House-Carles.--Battle of Hastings.--Battle of Durazzo 15-27

CHAPTER III.. The Byzantines and Their Enemies (a.d. 582-1071).

THE BYZANTINES AND THEIR ENEMIES (A.D. 582-1071).

§ 1. Character of Byzantine Strategy.

Excellence of the Byzantine Army.--Scientific study of the art of war.--Leo’s ‘Tactica.’--Wars with the Frank.--With the Turk.--With the Slav.--With the Saracen.--Border warfare of Christendom and Islam.--Defence of the Anatolic Themes.-- Cavalry as a defensive force.--Professional and unchivalrous character of Byzantine officers 28-38

§ 2. Arms, Organization, and Tactics of the Byzantines.

Reorganization of the Army of the Eastern Empire by Maurice.-- Its composition.--Armament of the Horseman, A.D. 600-1000.-- Armament of the Infantry.--Military Train and Engineers.-- The Officers.--Cavalry tactics.--Leo’s ideal line of battle.--Military Machines and their importance 38-48

CHAPTER IV.. The Supremacy of Feudal Cavalry (a.d. 1066-1346).

THE SUPREMACY OF FEUDAL CAVALRY (A.D. 1066-1346).

Unscientific nature of feudal warfare.--Consequences of headlong charges.--Tactical arrangements.--Their primitive nature.--Non-existence of strategy.--Weakness of Infantry.--Attempts to introduce discipline.--Rise of Mercenaries.--Supreme importance of fortified places.-- Ascendency of the defensive.--The Mediæval siege.-- Improvement of the Arts of Attack and Defence of fortified places.--General character of Campaigns.--The Crusades 49-61

CHAPTER V.. The Swiss (a.d. 1315-1515).

THE SWISS (A.D. 1315-1515).

§ 1. Their Character, Arms, and Organization.

The Swiss and the Ancient Romans.--Excellence of system more important than excellence of generals.--The column of pikemen.--The halberdier.--Rapidity of the movements of the Swiss.--Defensive armour.--Character of Swiss armies 62-69

§ 2. Tactics and Strategy.

The ‘Captains’ of the Confederates.--The Echelon of three columns.--The ‘Wedge’ and the ‘Hedgehog’ formations 70-73

§ 3. Development of Swiss Military Supremacy.

Battle of Morgarten.--Battle of Laupen.--Battle of Sempach.-- Battle of Arbedo.--Moral ascendency of the Swiss.--Battle of Granson.--Battle of Morat.--Wars of the last years of the fifteenth century 73-87

§ 4. Causes of the Decline of Swiss Ascendency.

The tactics of the Swiss become stereotyped.--The Landsknechts and their rivalry with the Swiss.--The Spanish Infantry and the short sword.--Battle of Ravenna.--Fortified Positions.--Battle of Bicocca.--Increased use of Artillery.--Battle of Marignano.--Decay of discipline in the Swiss Armies and its consequences 87-95

CHAPTER VI.. The English and Their Enemies (a.d. 1272-1485).

THE ENGLISH AND THEIR ENEMIES (A.D. 1272-1485).

The Long-bow and its origin, Welsh rather than Norman.--Its rivalry with the Cross-bow.--Edward I and the Battle of Falkirk.--The bow and the pike.--Battle of Bannockburn and its lessons.--The French Knighthood and the English Archery.--Battle of Cressy.--Battle of Poictiers.--Du Guesclin and the English reverses.--Battle of Agincourt.-- The French wars, 1415-1453.--Battle of Formigny.--Wars of the Roses.--King Edward IV and his generalship.--Barnet and Tewkesbury.--Towton and Ferrybridge 96-123

CHAPTER VII.. Conclusion.

CONCLUSION.

Zisca and the Hussites.--The Waggon-fortress and the tactics depending on it.--Ascendency and decline of the Hussites.-- Battle of Lipan.--The Ottomans.--Organization and equipment of the Janissaries.--The Timariot cavalry.--The other nations of Europe.--Concluding remarks 124-134

INTRODUCTION.

The Art of War has been very simply defined as ‘the art which enables any commander to worst the forces opposed to him.’ It is therefore conversant with an enormous variety of subjects: Strategy and Tactics are but two of the more important of its branches. Besides dealing with discipline, organization, and armament, it is bound to investigate every means which can be adapted to increase the physical or moral efficiency of an army. The author who opened his work with a dissertation on ‘the age which is preferable in a generalissimo,’ or ‘the average height which the infantry soldier should attain,’ was dealing with the Art of War, no less than he who confined himself to purely tactical speculations.

The complicated nature of the subject being taken into consideration, it is evident that a complete sketch, of the social and political history of any period would be necessary to account fully for the state of the ‘Art of War’ at the time. That art has existed, in a rudimentary form, ever since the day on which two bodies of men first met in anger to settle a dispute by the arbitrament of force. At some epochs, however, military and social history have been far more closely bound up than at others. In the present century wars are but episodes in a people’s existence: there have, however, been times when the whole national organization was founded on the supposition of a normal state of strife. In such cases the history of the race and of its ‘art of war’ are one and the same. To detail the constitution of Sparta, or of Ancient Germany, is to give little more than a list of military institutions. Conversely, to speak of the characteristics of their military science involves the mention of many of their political institutions.

At no time was this interpenetration more complete than in the age which forms the central part of our period. Feudalism, in its origin and development, had a military as well as a social side, and its decline is by no means unaffected by military considerations. There is a point of view from which its history could be described as ‘the rise, supremacy, and decline of heavy cavalry as the chief power in war.’ To a certain extent the tracing out of this thesis will form the subject of our researches. It is here that we find the thread which links the history of the military art in the middle ages into a connected whole. Between Adrianople, the first, and Marignano, the last, of the triumphs of the mediæval horseman, lie the chapters in the scientific history of war which we are about to investigate.

THE TRANSITION FROM ROMAN TO MEDIÆVAL FORMS IN WAR.

A.D. 378-582.

Between the middle of the fourth and the end of the sixth century lies a period of transition in military history, an epoch of transformations as strange and as complete as those contemporary changes which turned into a new channel the course of political history and civilisation in Europe. In war, as in all else, the institutions of the ancient world are seen to pass away, and a new order of things develops itself.

Numerous and striking as are the symptoms of that period of transition, none is more characteristic than the gradual disuse of the honoured name of ‘Legion,’ the title intimately bound up with all the ages of Roman greatness. Surviving in a very limited acceptance in the time of Justinian, it had fifty years later become obsolete. It represented a form of military efficiency which had now completely vanished. That wonderful combination of strength and flexibility, so solid and yet so agile and easy to handle, had ceased to correspond to the needs of the time. The day of the sword and pilum had given place to that of the lance and bow. The typical Roman soldier was no longer the iron legionary, who, with shield fitted close to his left shoulder and sword-hilt sunk low, cut his way through the thickest hedge of pikes, and stood firm before the wildest onset of Celt or German. The organization of Augustus and Trajan was swept away by Constantine, and the legions which for three hundred years had preserved their identity, their proud titles of honour, and their ésprit de corps, knew themselves no longer.

Constantine, when he cut down the numbers of the military unit to a quarter of its former strength, and created many scores of new corps, was acting from motives of political and not military expediency. The armament and general character of the troops survived their organization, and the infantry, the ‘robur peditum,’ still remained the most important and numerous part of the army. At the same time, however, a tendency to strengthen the cavalry made itself felt, and the proportion of that arm to the whole number of the military establishment continued steadily to increase throughout the fourth century. Constantine himself, by depriving the legion of its complementary ‘turmae,’ and uniting the horsemen into larger independent bodies, bore witness to their growing importance. It would seem that the Empire--having finally abandoned the offensive in war, and having resolved to confine itself to the protection of its own provinces--found that there was an increasing need for troops who could transfer themselves with rapidity from one menaced point on the frontier to another. The Germans could easily distance the legion, burdened by the care of its military machines and impedimenta. Hence cavalry in larger numbers was required to intercept their raids.

But it would appear that another reason for the increase of the horsemen was even more powerful. The ascendancy of the Roman infantry over its enemies was no longer so marked as in earlier ages, and it therefore required to be more strongly supported by cavalry than had been previously necessary. The Franks, Burgundians, and Allemanni of the days of Constantine were no longer the half-armed savages of the first century, who, ‘without helm or mail, with weak shields of wicker-work, and armed only with the javelin,’ tried to face the embattled front of the cohort. They had now the iron-bound buckler, the pike, and the short stabbing sword (’scramasax’), as well as the long cutting sword (’spatha’), and the deadly ‘francisca’ or battle-axe, which, whether thrown or wielded, would penetrate Roman armour and split the Roman shield. As weapons for hand to hand combat these so far surpassed the old ‘framea,’ that the imperial infantry found it no light matter to defeat a German tribe. At the same time, the morale of the Roman army was no longer what it had once been: the corps were no longer homogeneous, and the insufficient supply of recruits was eked out by enlisting slaves and barbarians in the legions themselves, and not only among the auxiliary cohorts. Though seldom wanting in courage, the troops of the fourth century had lost the self-reliance and cohesion of the old Roman infantry, and required far more careful handling on the part of the general. Few facts show this more forcibly than the proposal of the tactician Urbicius to furnish the legionaries with a large supply of portable beams and stakes, to be carried by pack-mules attached to each cohort. These were to be planted on the flanks and in the front of the legion, when there was a probability of its being attacked by hostile cavalry: behind them the Romans were to await the enemy’s onset, without any attempt to assume the offensive. This proposition marks a great decay in the efficiency of the imperial foot-soldier: the troops of a previous generation would have scorned such a device, accustomed as they were to drive back with ease the assaults of the Parthian and Sarmatian ‘cataphracti.’

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