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Originally posted by Sonny
Have we narrowed down who the illustrious "48" are who are playable dynasties?:confused:
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Hm...
Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Scotland, England, Gwynedd, Deheubarth, Morgannwg, Ireland, France, Aragon, Castille, León, Navarre, Galicia, Barcelona?, Canossa+, the Este, Benevento, Apulia+, Salerno, Savoy, Zäringen?, Germany, Thüringen?, Kärnten, Steiermark, Nordmark, Meissen, Ostmark, Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, Croatia, Byzantine emp., Kiev, Novgorod, Chernigov, Murom, Smolensk, Pereyaslavl, Rostov, Smolensk, Polotsk, Georgia, Khaketi... that's 46... Then we should also have Brittany, Aquitaine, Toulouse and possibly some of the more powerful counts of the north, like Champagne and Flandern... Hm... I need an axe :D
 
curious

I'm a bit curious, who do you use as you're historical sources. I'm a bit familair with medieval history, but am interested in what you think of as worthwhile reading. I have a masters in history, but not in this time period (mostly classical period), and find myself lacking in the details and theories of this period. What would you recomend for political, philosophical, military reading for the timeframe of this game? What historian do think really covered the middel ages? Just curious, thanks for the leads.
 
You can always check out the stickied great books thread in the pre-1419 forum. For Medieval Languedoc/ Cathar France try Ladurie´s "Montaillou" (Swedish medieval historians would KILL for that kind of source material...) - nothing to do with war and such but great insights into how medieval people thought and felt.

BTW It´s funny how so many people still think the Medieval Era is the most accurately displayed in "Jabberwocky":rolleyes:

Cheers,
Vandelay
 
Re: curious

Originally posted by rje207
I'm a bit curious, who do you use as you're historical sources.
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Well, the problem with military history is that many regular historians (ones trained in source criticism/historical research) for the last 50 years or so have been very, very reluctant to present themselves as military historians. This is changing, but it still means that a lot of the literature is re-used and often heavily outdated. An excellent local(scandinavian) example is the grand Queen Margrete I exhibition that toured scandinavia a few years back: the text they used to discuss military matters in the (otherwise excellent) publication collection that was sold as part of the exhibition was from 1941, written by a swedish lieutenant (and sports fencer) named Nils Helsten who had NO historian's education at all(in addition to his viking-age fetish, this makes...interesting reading).

The Brits have had a better go but are often exceedingly Anglo-centric, and gentlemen like David Nicolle, author of _way_ too many Osprey books on just about all pre-modern military societies, is still a firm believer in the idea that all good things come from Asia, no matter what the facts are (I've always found it interesting to note that Ospreys premium writer on medieval warfare has a Ph.D. in Oriental Studies :D)

For a quick and easily accesible read, see:

http://www.deremilitari.org/

A good site that (mostly) accepts only serious publications.

The problem with a great many introductory books to medieval warfare is that they are so broad, and often so outdated, that they are all but useless. The study of combat and war in the middle ages is really taking off these days, but still works by old Fogeys like Turnbull are still circulating...

EF
 
Re: Re: curious

Originally posted by Endre Fodstad
Nils Helsten who had NO historian's education at all(in addition to his viking-age fetish, this makes...interesting reading).
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That is not completely true. Actually *back then* Military History was part of the curriculum fro Officers, and if he ever where a General Staff assistant (probable if he was a great athlete) then he had even more.

Secondly, viking-age fetish might be an unscientific approach today, but *back then* it was legio in Scandinavia.

Just because we today have a different view of history (modernist/critical) doesn't mean that people who had a different view was A) historically ignorant/incompetent or B) necissarily wrong.

As a military Historian examined from the National Defence College (only place that teach Military Historiy as an Academic Subject in Sweden.) I would like to site a very famous Swedish Historian : "It is not they that were stupid but we."
(Transl.note: Meaning that because elder historians had 'funny' views it doesn't follow that they are stupid, but that we are if we are unable to understand why they had such views)

/Greven
 
Originally posted by Havard
Hm...
Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Scotland, England, Gwynedd, Deheubarth, Morgannwg, Ireland, France, Aragon, Castille, León, Navarre, Galicia, Barcelona?, Canossa+, the Este, Benevento, Apulia+, Salerno, Savoy, Zäringen?, Germany, Thüringen?, Kärnten, Steiermark, Nordmark, Meissen, Ostmark, Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, Croatia, Byzantine emp., Kiev, Novgorod, Chernigov, Murom, Smolensk, Pereyaslavl, Rostov, Smolensk, Polotsk, Georgia, Khaketi... that's 46... Then we should also have Brittany, Aquitaine, Toulouse and possibly some of the more powerful counts of the north, like Champagne and Flandern... Hm... I need an axe :D
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So you're the one who took webrave's axe!:eek:
 
I dont know if its relevant, but in the pre-Interregnum empire (911-1250), the Germans separated wars into "public" war and "private" war.

Public war involved the Emperor/King, the Co-king (prince/heir) or royal reps who ran the government in the his absence. He'd call a Diet, demand contingents from the Imperial Princes, and set a date and place for them to assemble. The Dukes were liable for service in general, while the Margraves were only bound to serve in adjacent areas since their function was to guard the military frontiers.

Those who didnt appear could be fined to pay for troops in place of their contingent (like scutage). All princes were bound to accompany the King to Italy to be crowned Emperor; those that didnt go paid "Rome Money" with which the King could hire Brabantine Pikemen or other "professional" mercs.

Generally, the Emperor would call up those vassals closest to the area of operations. So if he was invading Poland or Denmark, he'd take the Duke of Saxony & the Margrave of Brandenburg. If Hungary, Duke of Bavaria & Margrave of Austria. For Italy, it was common to take the Dukes of Franconia & Swabia, (thus leaving the Saxons & Bavarians to guard the east) and any princes that also owned land in Italy (like the Dukes of Lotharingia). For a Burgundian campaign, Dukes of Swabia & Lorraine, and so on.

Private war was between princes/nobles, family or inter-house feuds, cities, clergy, etc., all "non-official" campaigns. The Emperors tried to curb these or at least stipulate they could only take place at certain times under certain conditions (like the Truce/Peace of God); those who feuded outside these bounds could be outlawed and/or deprived of their fiefs.
 
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One problem with medieval armies logistic is that we lack reliable documents, and for that I mean mainly pyment documents, that is the source that from the late XVI century allows military historians to say what was (aproximately) the size of an army at that point, how much was spent on food, ammunition, etc. For medieval armies instead we generally have only some fantastic numbers, armies hundreds of thousands soldiers are frequently mentioned, for instance Matthew of Edessa says that the Byzantine army at Manzikert was 1 million strong!! However, when documents are available, armies are shown to be much smaller.
Fortunately there are some exceptions, for instance England had already in the XIII century a well developed administration for war and many documents have survived. There is an interesting article by Cristopher Candy on the 1.300 scottish campaign of Edward I, it wasn´t a brilliant campaign, but there are many administrative documents that have survived. Interesting to note

1. The english army is composed of 4 different bodies, as other western medieval armies of the period are
a) Infantry levies. For this campaign Edward requested 16.000 to be recruited from the northern counties, muster rolls indicate that in fact there was a maximum of 9.200 actually serving in the army.Campaign was schedule to start in April, and for the whole previous winter supply dumps were stablished along the route that the army was going to take. However, the army was finally ready to depart only by June 24. The campaign lasted until August 27. Despite not a single major action, there were only 5.100 men remaining in service, so a terribly high rate of desertion, however hardly surprising for anyone familiar with military history of the period.

b) The Household, for the campaign a maximum of 728 men were registered in the musters, with numbers oscilating between 500 and 700.

c) To the feudal summon responded 366 squirres and 40 knights, all from the north of the country

d) mercenaries: not registered in documents.

Conclusions:
1) Forces were usually recruited only in the areas close to the theater of war
2) Recruting and supply preparations were undertaken mainly in winter
3) Infantry levies could be recruited in good numbers, but they melted away very quickly too,
4) The Household was the nucleus of the army, and they provided leaders for all units
5) Campaign season was usually reduced to summer, specially for the cavalry grazing was very important, otherwise great expenses had to be done to supply the horses


So, medieval warfare was not primitive, but limited, by the King resources and the underdeveloped administration of the days.



b)
 
Originally posted by Greven
:D That WAS the EDUCATION of those days.

/Greven
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Well, it was Post-Delbruck and post-Clausewitz so military historians had a bit more to work with than Helsten choose to do- and he should have known better: the German fechtbuch (at least Lichtenauer and Talhoffer) manuals are, for example, mentioned in Hjalmar Falks "Altnordische Waffenkunde" from 1914(which Helsten _should_ have read - the work was the premium scandinavian work on viking and medieval weaponry in his time), and the fechtbuchs certainly demonstrate the high standard of the medieval martial art. Falk certainly was a part of the viking glorification process, but his more reflected view allowed him to provide a work that has any relevance today, whereas Helsten's is completely worthless(as a source on viking age/medieval combat). In addition, Kulturhistorisk Leksikon for Nordisk Middelalder's first complete edition was in 1956, and a great deal of the articles therein predate Helsten's. They're still a lot better and more critical to sources than his is, as they're written by people who have had a regular historian's education as opposed to the rote learning he got (I've personally attended the contemporary norwegian military staff college's lectures on military history in 2000, and they are still not what you'd call up to date. In fact, they are sometimes positively archaic).

1941's historical views were old-fashioned in our eyes, but my point is that Helsten was uninformed even in his own time, something that makes the constant reprints of his views even more unforgivable.

EF
 
Sure. I never said that Helsten was a good historian. In fact i concure that he was a hopelessly worthless historian. What I though did not concede to was that because he was a bad historian then he immediately was no historian. I think that very many of the historicistic historians of that age and especially when we come to those studying (if they ever where really:)) the Middle Ages and the periods earlier was a too influenced by their own time and its political situation and the mythology built around their own nationalistic outlook.

/Greven
 
what about the crusades?

Those campaigns were pretty far from their crownlands. Even if they didnt need to worry as much about desertion i'm sure supplies must have been a problem! But they seem to have handled it at least somewhat effectively for the crusaders to have been able to really fight any battles at all.
 
In fact, supplies were a problem in the crusades, and crusading armies were very much dependant on Byzantine administration to get them, or later on Italian navies.However there are some general rules in pre industrial war about supplies.

1) Armies could be fed on the ground when moving, consuming local supplies, providing they moved to another location whenever they exhausted local supplies. That involved looting and pillage, and authorities tried to avoid it when moving armies within their frontiers as Edward I did creating depots on the route the army was planned to follow. Of course no such concerns existed when invading enemy territory, that was why first priority of any state at war was to invade the enemy to make it pay for the maintenance of the army.

2) Supply problems increased when sieging enemy fortresses, in that case the army remained in a location for a long period, exhausting local ressources, and it has to be supplied externally, for instance in the first crusade the crusaders sufered most when besieging Antiochia.
 
Originally posted by Aryaman
In fact, supplies were a problem in the crusades, and crusading armies were very much dependant on Byzantine administration to get them, or later on Italian navies.However there are some general rules in pre industrial war about supplies.

1) Armies could be fed on the ground when moving, consuming local supplies, providing they moved to another location whenever they exhausted local supplies. That involved looting and pillage, and authorities tried to avoid it when moving armies within their frontiers as Edward I did creating depots on the route the army was planned to follow. Of course no such concerns existed when invading enemy territory, that was why first priority of any state at war was to invade the enemy to make it pay for the maintenance of the army.

2) Supply problems increased when sieging enemy fortresses, in that case the army remained in a location for a long period, exhausting local ressources, and it has to be supplied externally, for instance in the first crusade the crusaders sufered most when besieging Antiochia.
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Excellent post. I can´t agree more. Supplies dictated the strategy of the war in many cases. As late as the 30 years war the movement of armies had less to do with where strategic targets were located and more with fresh supplies could be found.
 
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