# The best mediaeval weapons for women



## Brian G Turner (Jan 15, 2017)

Some interesting and thought-provoking comments in this video:


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## Toby Frost (Jan 16, 2017)

Thanks Brian. That's very interesting. I probably would have gone for the crossbow and a ******* sword type weapon too. I guess a lot would depend on the type of armour used, too: needing the raw physical strength to smash through heavy armour could change a lot. I gather that the traditional weapon for women in Japan was the naginata, a sort of short polearm, because of its extra reach compared to a sword. But then, very little armour was worn there compared to Europe. In such a situation, a razor-sharp sword would be very handy. 

I suppose for a smaller person, techniques that close the distance between fighters and do a lot of damage with minimal effort would be good, which would require good training and confidence. Likewise knowing how to knock opponents down, lock/break joints and so on would be more useful than just battering an opponent into the ground.


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## MWagner (Feb 1, 2017)

Nice video. I do find it curious that all of these analysis of weapons women are capable of wielding in medieval-like worlds always talk about the physical considerations, but never address the (in my opinion much more serious) social considerations. How and why does this society allow women to devote themselves to the kind of training most of these weapons require, at an age when they're sexually fertile? In the absence of reliable birth control, and with the imperative in agrarian societies to produce more labourers for the king/lord/emperor's fields (and for noble families to produce heirs), I struggle to think of a plausible cultural reason for women warriors to be anything but extraordinarily rare anomalies. Maybe some kind of order of celibate warrior-priestesses?


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## Vaz (Feb 1, 2017)

Daggers! Daggers for everybody!


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## Toby Frost (Feb 1, 2017)

To be honest, I think those are questions for the author, many of which will involve some variation on "readily available magic" and "matriarchy", with varying extents of hand waving. The problem to me is that the unrealistic (but sometimes vaguely credible) high-magic worlds influenced by Dungeons and Dragons have been replaced by "realistic" worlds (ie more pain, cold and poo) that leave out huge chunks of the medieval mentality and are scarcely more realistic in historical terms. Whatever the answer is, it won't look a lot like real medieval society, but after all, surely fantasy should be fantastical.


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## thaddeus6th (Feb 1, 2017)

Saw that a little while ago. The same chap has some nice videos on how good or bad Whiterun or Kaer Morhen or Skyhold would be for defence in realistic terms. Quite interesting stuff.

Toby, I think internal consistency is all that matters. Anything from high fantasy to grim and gritty realism is fine so long as the rules make sense and are consistently applied. Otherwise you wander into "Why didn't the eagles just carry Frodo to Mordor?" territory.


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## Null_Zone (Feb 2, 2017)

Toby Frost said:


> To be honest, I think those are questions for the author, many of which will involve some variation on "readily available magic" and "matriarchy", with varying extents of hand waving. The problem to me is that the unrealistic (but sometimes vaguely credible) high-magic worlds influenced by Dungeons and Dragons have been *replaced by "realistic" worlds (ie more pain, cold and poo) that leave out huge chunks of the medieval mentality and are scarcely more realistic in historical terms*. Whatever the answer is, it won't look a lot like real medieval society, but after all, surely fantasy should be fantastical.



That is a big turn off for me in modern fantasy. 

Everyone simply knows that they have terrible lives that the situation is wrong and that things should be better, but from a 21st Century perspective.
Social and economic injustice through a corrupt patriachal society that can be overcome by a plucky (and hard hitting) femanist that Germaine Greer would consider a bit overboard doesn't fit into a faux medieval world. Or the natural order of peasant labour with a distant landlord is just crying out for some farm lad to come up with Marx's theories on labour and a nice bit of modern farming techniques.


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## J Riff (Feb 4, 2017)

Without quality iron, a jagged rock tied to a stick is hard to beat, and the women always had lots of rocks around, for grinding food and whatnot. Any quality weapons would be given to the swarm of louts known as the army, wouldn't they? Slingshots are underrated.


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## Montero (Feb 6, 2017)

On the subject of female labour, fertility and training - women were a lot more than baby machines, also, due to hard physical work and poor diet, many women were not nearly as fertile as modern women, having intermittent periods and early miscarriages/late periods.
Now returning to "a lot more than baby machines". Try reading "The Working Lives of Women in the 17th Century" by Alice Clark. This looks at the Guild records of women's professions. In the "craft classes" a woman's skill was often her dowry. She might have the same skill as her husband, or one that complemented it, or a separate business - but she was an important part of the family finances - plus she ran the household. Child raising was shared as with a workshop, the husband, or husband and wife, could be working in there, the kids were in there too learning the basic skills of the trade. So the woman had years of training before marriage.
Another important point made in the book was the _quality_ of your troops. In the Elizabethan period it was noted how yeomen - effectively smallholders - were big, healthy, robust and made much, much better soldiers than a basic peasant. So a law was passed to prevent the building of new houses unless they had 8 acres of land for the support of the family living there. That 8 acres was used intensively for vegetable growing, chickens, linen growing - plus they would be stabling cows, pigs - and be getting forage on common land. The household would be relatively prosperous - very hard working, but they'd have plenty of veg, some eggs, milk, meat, cheese - and be selling linen thread or cloth. There were complaints at that period from farmers that they couldn't get enough labour all year round, because the yeoman would only labour for someone else at ploughing time and harvest time when the wages were much higher than the rest of the year. That gave the household some actual cash as well.
So the idea that women were only valued for pushing out multiple babies as labour or cannon fodder just doesn't hold water.

Since women did go through a lot of training on all the craft tasks, I don't see why they shouldn't also train for war.

And finally, also from Alice Clark's book - the swordsmith to the King of France in the 1620s (from memory) took over the job from HER father.

Our view of the medieval period socio-economics is distorted by the Industrial Revolution where the socio-economic status of women dropped - a mixture of factory work with fixed shifts being less helpful for child raising than working on a craft at home - plus the gentrification during the Georgian period that turned formerly busy farmwives into ladies of leisure as their husbands became gentleman farmers. The odd thing about that, is that in the aristocracy of the seventeenth century and earlier, the role of the wife was to run the house and the estates, while the husband went away to court to do the politics and try and get favour for the family. The aristocratic wife was actually supposed to be a shrewd manager and businesswoman. This is covered in Alice Clerk's book, including examples from either end of the spectrum, one where a noble lord received some sympathy/expressed exasperation because his wife was no good at running the estates and another where a different noble lord off at court  would once a year ask his wife how his debt stood - and year by year she was reducing it. He wasn't involved at all in her estate running and money making.

Alice Clerk also highlighted the downside of children for labourers. There were women farm labourers as well as men - as in digging the fields, harvesting and so on. If two farm labourers married, their income dropped as she couldn't work as long or as hard when pregnant or breast feeding. Many of them fell into poverty and became vagabonds, sometimes the husband would up and leave. So that is an example where child birth reduced the number of labourers available, at least in the short term, and children of vagabonds were not going to get lots of food and grow up to be big and strong.


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## Montero (Feb 6, 2017)

Going back to the video at the start of this - now been able to watch it as didn't want to make noise earlier - interrupt what OH was doing. Anyway, pretty much agree with the video presenter, with a couple of minor caveats and comments. This is speaking as someone who has done epee fencing, and seventeenth century English Civil war battle re-enactment. So, the video recommends the long sword for personal defence and a pole arm for battlefield. Not bad.
So personal defence you get to move around a lot more than on the battlefield. On the battlefield you are hopefully shoulder to shoulder with your comrades. Both of these help make it work with the weapons recommended.

Now there is a pretty important point to remember both with the longsword and a pole arm - once you are past the point of your opponent's weapon then if you are on the inside of their weapon you have the advantage. You are starting to get the leverage to push their weapon out of line and open a path all the way to the body. Anything long is not necessarily that manoeuvrable. I have many times been able to grab a pole arm that was being pointed at me, near the business end, and haul it to one side, against a taller chunkier opponent, because I had the leverage. Once you are inside the sharp dangerous bit, their weapon is a lot less useful and you can thunder up to whop them one with something shorter.
Not ever played with a long sword, but doing epee I have many times seen a short person beat a tall long armed person because they are more manoeuvrable - and they practice like hell on the footwork to be really fast over the ground so they can get inside their opponent's point. . There are advanced epee moves to get the point back in, but overall, the question raised in the video is more complicated than just a longer weapon. Any combat has an element of rock, paper, scissors, with no ultimate answer

The other thing to remember about the medieval period and through into the twentieth century - most women had quite a bit of physical work in their daily lives. Heaving around baskets of wet sheets, hand wringing clothes. My grandma was only five feet tall but her hands were really large, with thick bones and big knuckles - and a killer grip. All from decades of hand wringing laundry. 
What ticks me off about films is giving a heavy weapon to a person with no muscle (which is sort of what the video was saying).  In Hollywood this tends to be women (there are muscular women in Hollywood) but many actresses tend not to have really chunky muscles, where as action hero actors have thumping great muscles. And wandering further sideways on this - having hung out around swimmers, there is a very characteristic truly chunky shoulders look about competitive swimmers both male and female - and Hollywood totally misses that too.


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## MWagner (Feb 6, 2017)

Montero said:


> What ticks me off about films is giving a heavy weapon to a person with no muscle (which is sort of what the video was saying).  In Hollywood this tends to be women (there are muscular women in Hollywood) but many actresses tend not to have really chunky muscles, where as action hero actors have thumping great muscles. And wandering further sideways on this - having hung out around swimmers, there is a very characteristic truly chunky shoulders look about competitive swimmers both male and female - and Hollywood totally misses that too.



Hollywood notions of strength and body type are almost always off-base. Male actors have the kind of inflated muscles that only come from isolating muscle groups in gyms. One of the worst movies for this was Gladiotor, with it's WWF-style puffed out steroid monsters battling in the arena. Real gladiators needed to be quick, and have decent endurance. They would have been strong but lithe. Same with many other warrior roles, where carrying around a lot of mass can be a serious handicap. Roman legions often won long battles when their larger Germanic foes tired. I used to work moving furniture, and most furniture movers are small guys, which enables them to work all day. Big guys would get absolutely gassed after only a short time carrying boxes and desks up and down stairs.


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## The Big Peat (Feb 6, 2017)

Toby Frost said:


> Thanks Brian. That's very interesting. I probably would have gone for the crossbow and a ******* sword type weapon too. I guess a lot would depend on the type of armour used, too: *needing the raw physical strength to smash through heavy armour could change a lot.* I gather that the traditional weapon for women in Japan was the naginata, a sort of short polearm, because of its extra reach compared to a sword. But then, very little armour was worn there compared to Europe. In such a situation, a razor-sharp sword would be very handy.
> 
> I suppose for a smaller person, techniques that close the distance between fighters and do a lot of damage with minimal effort would be good, which would require good training and confidence. Likewise knowing how to knock opponents down, lock/break joints and so on would be more useful than just battering an opponent into the ground.



There's always the good old fashioned trip them up then dogpile them on the floor and stick something sharp through the gaps of the armour of course; smashing through heavy armour was rarely anyone's favoured answer.


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## Dave (Feb 6, 2017)

I thought Poison would be the weapon of choice.


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## RX-79G (Feb 7, 2017)

Scorn.


Overall, weapons for smaller, less strong people are either going to be the unexpected - hidden daggers, poison, etc - or a pole arm. Japan seems to be one of the few countries that have an identifiable "women's" military arm, and I doubt there was any sexism in it. The naginata was the preferred military arm for nearly everyone who wasn't on horseback or using a bow. It was essentially a sword on a stick, so it gave user reach while allowing slashing and stabbing attacks and being lighter than some sort of long mace or other impact weapon. 

Swords have always been more weapons for mounted soldiers in Asia and Europe - you give up reach for easier one handed use and storage. Short swords/big knives are good for confined spaces.

Bows are certainly a good possibility, but strength is an issue. When I used to compete in classic archery, the women were all using a lower draw weight that caused more skill to aim (trajectory) and didn't penetrate as much. 

A classic crossbow is not an easy or fast weapon to reload, and it isn't easy to carry. I'd be willing to bet they were more in use by armies and navies en masse, rather than those using a personal choice of weapon.


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## David McKay (Feb 7, 2017)

Null_Zone said:


> That is a big turn off for me in modern fantasy.
> 
> Everyone simply knows that they have terrible lives that the situation is wrong and that things should be better, but from a 21st Century perspective.
> Social and economic injustice through a corrupt patriarchal society that can be overcome by a plucky (and hard hitting) feminist that Germaine Greer would consider a bit overboard doesn't fit into a faux medieval world. Or the natural order of peasant labour with a distant landlord is just crying out for some farm lad to come up with Marx's theories on labour and a nice bit of modern farming techniques.



Listen. Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.


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## David McKay (Feb 7, 2017)

Modern thinking is that gladiators may have been a little on the tubby side. The intention in the fight was not to kill but to incapacitate without maiming. After all maiming someone would effectively take them out of play for the next bout and sing is most of these people were slaves you're destroying somebody's property. The worst place to get caught would've been in the belly because there was absolutely no medical treatment for a pierced organ. Consequently if you had a lot of belly fat your chances of stopping the blade from piercing/slicing your intestine Ines were improved. Similar to the modern day wrestler, gladiators were trained to put on a good show while minimizing serious injury.


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## Montero (Feb 7, 2017)

@MWagner on body size and muscles.
Funnily enough, I was coming back to comment on fencers. If you see a top flight fencing competition - as in the kind of people with a chance for the World Championship squad - most of them are about 5 feet 7 inches up to just under 6 feet, with a lot around the 5ft 9inch/10 inch point and well proportioned. Not all, but a lot more that kind of size and build than in the general population. Other body shapes and sizes can do well, but there is definitely a advantage for the size range I mentioned.
With modern fencing, where everything is about speed and flexibility, and the weapons are relatively light (even so your arm and hand can get tired, believe me - and as for your legs.....) big chunky, short, square weight lifting muscles limit your flexibility and speed and make your reach shorter as the tight shoulder muscles slow you down. Fencers muscles are more streamlined looking rather than the squared off gym muscles.

@D McKay - I can believe that about gladiators because I've known quite a few successful chubby fencers. Generally not competition winners it has to be said, but people who could make it a long way up through the competition. Fencing is short intense bouts of movement, with some endurance in between. 

Here is a link to a film of two fencers at the 1984 Olympics - Boisse and Bormann.  You can see what I mean by the bursts of activity.




I saw them both live in a competition in about 1992 and Boisse had gained a bit of chub - but was still incredibly fast.


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## RX-79G (Feb 7, 2017)

Are rapiers and other light swords used in the style of sport fencing "medieval weapons"?


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## Montero (Feb 7, 2017)

They came into the discussion to illustrate
1. My point about the points of weapons and getting past them.
2. Various points about the differences between different types of musculature.
3. How individual combat can be bursts of activity.

I don't know a lot about medieval swords - but I would highlight the poignard to you - which was bigger than a dagger, though shorter than a modern epee. 
Poignard - Wikipedia and Poignard Dagger - 401726 from Medieval Archery

There is mention of 20 inch blades in the second reference. Modern epees are 90cm/35 inches. The second link is talking about how poignards were used for combat in situations where you weren't allowed to be carrying a sword, as well as a second weapon to be used with a sword. Medieval  swords were variable in length and the epee seems to fall into the middle ish of their length range. It is of course far lighter than a medieval _sword_, being purely a point weapon.


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## RX-79G (Feb 7, 2017)

Montero said:


> They came into the discussion to illustrate
> 1. My point about the points of weapons and getting past them.
> 2. Various points about the differences between different types of musculature.
> 3. How individual combat can be bursts of activity.
> ...


I just don't know if it is instructive to talk about the musculature and physical requirements for the use of weapons that medieval people either didn't or couldn't make. The rapier was a large leap forward, allowing skill and speed to overcome heavier, slower swords while maintaining defensive distance. Medieval people didn't have that option, and would have had to deal with the greater mass of their weapons.

The famous sword fight at the end of _Rob Roy_ illustrates this difference nicely.

Also, I'm not sure if it is entirely correct to say the rapier and similar were purely point weapons. There was some debate among swordsman of the time about how many edges the swords should have - suggesting that slashing attacks were also used.


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## Montero (Feb 7, 2017)

I didn't say that a rapier was a purely point weapon, just an epee.
The poignard had far less mass than medieval swords and that too was used for fighting - and I don't see why a fast enough person couldn't leap in and out while someone with a heavy sword was taking a swing - because you open yourself up to a point attack when you take your larger sword out of line to make a cut. Highly risky but do-able, particularly if you aimed for the sword arm. You couldn't parry with a poignard's blade - not enough mass and it would probably be broken - but it was designed for catching the blade of a much heavier sword at the join between blade and cross-piece.

In terms of musculature well, I still think that speed and flexibility as important as strength. Doing a You Tube search for duelling with longswords (without armour) gives the following








This does have the bursts of fast footwork in between slower portions as per modern fencing - different footwork, same pattern of energy usage. The guys taking part in this do not then helpfully take off some of their clothes  but as well as one can judge with the baggy tops, and far tighter hose, they have similar musculature to fencers. The blade movements do also show fluidity and flexibility in arm movements. 
In the original video at the start of the thread, the longsword was being suggested as a weapon of personal defence rather than battlefield, so these two YouTube videos do seem applicable.
It is also noteworthy how relatively tight and controlled the sword movements are - you don't want to wind up and do big slashes because of the momentum which would off balance you. A key part of fencing is to keep your balance and not over-reach, I am seeing the same principle in the longsword videos.


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## RX-79G (Feb 7, 2017)

Montero said:


> In terms of musculature well, I still think that speed and flexibility as important as strength.


I think you are making a complex argument that misses the fact that medieval weapons were a certain size and shape for very good reasons, and the most effective of them required muscle on top of speed to use effectively. If stilettos or other short, light weapons were a match for swords, then there wouldn't have been swords. The long, heavy sword went away because of the advent of long, light swords. Before that happened, having upper body strength was what made you sword fast and controllable. All the technique in the world isn't going to make up for a weapon that is like juggling a bowling ball.

I imagine that the rapier and similar light swords came from the fact that advances in armor had turned long sword technique entirely to thrusts, and that metallurgy developed to the point that a high carbon, springy blade became possible in thin cross sections. Once the long bow made heavy armor obsolete, the thrust technique had supplanted previous methods.

The problem with thrusting weapons is that they rely on a certain balance of penetration shape to mass to get the job done. A medieval short sword might be as maneuverable, but the blade isn't going to penetrate as well as something with a narrower profile - on top of the reach problem.


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## Abernovo (Feb 8, 2017)

And, with respect RX, I think you miss a few vital points. Not everyone wore armour, certainly not full armour, as it was the reserve of the richer members of society. Of those that did, it could vary immensely. Armour was also generally only worn in pitched battle and for show purpose; it was not worn every day, yet a fight could erupt anywhere.

Also, no fight is equal, and having a big sword is no guarantee of knowing how to use it. When it comes to grapple and scuffle, close quarters stuff, which most fights really are, having a weapon which is flexible in use, and not too cumbersome, can be a life-saver. Any gap in protection can be exploited.

And, yes, I've fought with foil, épée, cudgel and staff (probably two of the more common weapons throughout the ages), as well as competed in archery, and used more modern tools. I also know of at least one woman on these forums who trains with mediaeval weaponry, but she can involve herself in this conversation if she wants.


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## RX-79G (Feb 8, 2017)

Abernovo said:


> And, with respect RX, I think you miss a few vital points. Not everyone wore armour, certainly not full armour, as it was the reserve of the richer members of society. Of those that did, it could vary immensely. Armour was also generally only worn in pitched battle and for show purpose; it was not worn every day, yet a fight could erupt anywhere.
> 
> Also, no fight is equal, and having a big sword is no guarantee of knowing how to use it. When it comes to grapple and scuffle, close quarters stuff, which most fights really are, having a weapon which is flexible in use, and not too cumbersome, can be a life-saver. Any gap in protection can be exploited.
> 
> And, yes, I've fought with foil, épée, cudgel and staff (probably two of the more common weapons throughout the ages), as well as competed in archery, and used more modern tools. I also know of at least one woman on these forums who trains with mediaeval weaponry, but she can involve herself in this conversation if she wants.


I think you misunderstood my posts. I was not saying what kind of weapon someone might choose in any particular era to fight armor, but what kinds of weapons were _common and available_ in different eras due to the driving concerns like armor or metallurgy. Given what was available, the choice of edged weapons was pretty much big heavy sword, light short sword or some sort of polearm. For someone of limited strength and size, all three have their disadvantages, but the first one is out and the second is good for many things - but not a battlefield.

If I were writing this kind of fiction, my smaller characters would likely use polearms, bows and hidden weapons.


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## Dave (Feb 8, 2017)

Outside of a fantasy novel, how would a woman get herself trained on these weapons, and where would she find the time to do so? 

I don't want to be a party-pooper but if you are all really so worried about historical accuracy, then women were far too busy having endless children, cooking and cleaning. Why would a man ever teach her to use these weapons? Why would a woman want to fight a man in combat when she could get another man to do it for her?

The fact is that women murderers mainly used poison. That is one reason for the idea of witches.


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## thaddeus6th (Feb 8, 2017)

There are always exceptions. Sichelgaita commanded troops on the battlefield alongside her husband, Robert Guiscard, in the 11th. During the Diadochi era (4th century BC), Cratesipolis, Olympias, and Adea all lead armies at one point or another (Cratesipolis doing so for a prolonged period). Xerxes' favourite ship captain was a woman.


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## Montero (Feb 8, 2017)

Dave - read my post #9 on this thread regarding the lives of women. They were not having endless children, cooking and cleaning to the exclusion of everything else. Yes, of course they had kids, cooked and cleaned, but they "found" time to be trained in a whole range of crafts because those crafts were an important source of income. I don't have any direct medieval source on the fighting skills of women, but if you lived in a dodgy area where you are more likely to be attacked, then there is value in women having some fighting skills. I think it would more likely be at the level of going to self-defence classes these days - learning how to get in a good whop and run while screaming for help - but you live in a dodgy place, you learn how to fight.
As to why would a man ever teach her how to use weapons - well I can think of three scenarios
1. Because the father/brother/husband wants his daughter/sister/wife to be safe when she is out and about working.
2. Because a woman taught her.
3. Because she watched the men at practice and taught herself.

And as to the time spent cooking and cleaning - well, most cooking in the medieval period was chop it up and lob it in the cauldron. Women would have had dairy skills - butter, cheese - and made bread, but the daily diet was generally pottage (stuff cooked up in a pot) or porridge (if you were a bit better off and could afford oats), lunch - bread and cheese, supper- pottage. Some variations with smoked meat, bacon - but you are unlikely to have had a lot - so it went in the pot.
So to list out some "women's work"
Dairy work - churning butter is bloody hard work and builds muscles.
Heaving buckets around - lots of bringing water from the well, milk from the cow - that builds muscles. You have to haul a bucket up from a well you build muscle.
Cleaning - yes they cleaned but they were much smaller houses, with few possessions so not a lot to do.
Laundry - done by hand and less frequently than these days (good muscle builder that one)
Carding, Spinning and weaving - lots of that - where your clothes came from or for sale. (Carding is particularly good for building muscle)
Growing veg - digging, hoeing, weeding, cropping (muscles)
Chopping firewood. (muscles and skill with an edged weapon)

And even back then there was a lot of specialisation - the housewife would have collected up the tallow from any meat they had, but rushlights were often made by a visiting peripatetic rushlight maker as it was a tricky job. (See Tales from the Green Valley).

And women did fight.  There are accounts from the English Civil War period, particularly of sieges, of women fighting on the castle walls in sieges - and Lady Derby was noted as a successful siege commander. I recall hearing an account of a Napoleonic Era woman soldier, who after the war made a living telling her story and showing her army pension book as proof. I tried googling for Napoleonic Era women soldiers and got this account of women soldiers from Wikiepedia
Women in warfare and the military in the 19th century - Wikipedia
And it looks like some of them were well known to be women.


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## Montero (Feb 8, 2017)

Further to previous - it occurs to me Dave that you are over-estimating the weapons skills of most men in the medieval period. From what you have said I was getting a mental picture of men practising weapons for hours a day while their women folk cooked, cleaned, minded children, gave birth etc. At the craftsperson, farmer, smallholder, peasant level both men and women were working hard all day - at their crafts, farms and so on. Laws had to be passed to make men practice the long bow on Sundays - you don't go to the effort of writing laws if people are joyfully spending their free time and energy on turning themselves into skilled archers all ready for your next war.
So most people, men and women, would not be expert with weapons like swords. May well have a good punch, or be fast with a billhook or a broom handle, but purpose made weapons like swords, not so much. 
If something is of importance and value to people, they (mostly) do it. If it isn't they (mostly) don't - particularly if they are bouncing along the poverty line and one bad harvest could wipe them out. So both men and women in the medieval period at the farming, craft etc level had tasks that made them fit and muscular, so if they saw a need for fighting, they were able to do it, but probably would lack expertise - unless of course there were retired soldiers in the village who could teach them how.


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## MWagner (Feb 8, 2017)

Montero said:


> So most people, men and women, would not be expert with weapons like swords. May well have a good punch, or be fast with a billhook or a broom handle, but purpose made weapons like swords, not so much.



Yes, but that's one of the rationales for making women warriors extremely rare in fictional worlds that function largely like our middle ages: very few people were skilled warriors, and almost all of those were wealthy men because of the intense life-long training it required. In spite of all our populist books and movies about stout commoners giving effete nobles a good thrashing, a trained and equipped men-at-arms or knight in feudal times would have as much trouble with a typical spear-wielding farmer as a professional football player today would have against the average guys playing on the local pitch with their mates. And for the same reason - intense dedicated training from a young age.


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## Dave (Feb 8, 2017)

MWagner said:


> ...a trained and equipped men-at-arms or knight in feudal times would have as much trouble with a typical spear-wielding farmer as a professional football player today would have against the average guys playing on the local pitch with their mates. And for the same reason - intense dedicated training from a young age.


@Montero This is the point I'm making, and for women even more so. I understand that women weren't necessarily weak (I used cooking and cleaning as shorthand for all the various domestic tasks - most would also work as agricultural labourers as required by the season too, and also have authority over the whole household if they were the farmers wife) but as already discussed in this thread, just being muscular is not sufficient, the weapons being discussed here are niche weapons that require great training and skill to use. I also agree that the context of the locality is certainly important. A north-east coastal village, subject to raids, being a little more dangerous than one in Surrey. 


thaddeus6th said:


> There are always exceptions.


Agreed.


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## RX-79G (Feb 8, 2017)

Women weren't weak, but neither were men. Both sexes were likely to be tougher than their modern equivalents, but that doesn't mean that weapons designed to make use of a medieval man's musculature wouldn't be too much for a medieval woman. You can't acquire skill in something that takes more gross strength than you have available.


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## Brian G Turner (Feb 8, 2017)

RX-79G said:


> Are rapiers and other light swords used in the style of sport fencing "medieval weapons"?



The aim of the nobility was generally _not _to kill other nobility, so the sword itself wasn't (generally) designed to pierce plate armour. And by the end of the mediaeval period (actually, starting from roughly the middle) plate armour became increasingly redundant and used more for show - ie, tournaments - because of advances in gunpowder. This meant the nobility started to withdraw from the battlefield and left fighting to professional armies/mercenary groups.

The rapier seems a post-mediaeval weapon to me, much more suited to urban classes/lifestyles/environments far from the battlefield. While there's a lot of historical focus on the actions of the upper classes and their (actually infrequent) battles, there is far more creative room to work with the lower classes. 

This is especially the case for women, who were the most restricted the higher their social class - yet the lowest class women could easily be present at the various "disreputable" fencing schools that appeared all over Europe.


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## RX-79G (Feb 8, 2017)

Brian G Turner said:


> The aim of the nobility was generally _not _to kill other nobility, so the sword itself wasn't (generally) designed to pierce plate armour. And by the end of the mediaeval period (actually, starting from roughly the middle) plate armour became increasingly redundant and used more for show - ie, tournaments - because of advances in gunpowder. This meant the nobility started to withdraw from the battlefield and left fighting to professional armies/mercenary groups.
> 
> The rapier seems a post-mediaeval weapon to me, much more suited to urban classes/lifestyles/environments far from the battlefield. While there's a lot of historical focus on the actions of the upper classes and their (actually infrequent) battles, there is far more room to work with the lower classes.
> 
> This is especially the case for women, who were the most restricted the higher their social class - yet the lowest class women could easily be present at the various "disreputable" fencing schools that appeared all over Europe.


What I was getting at is that the discussion of fencing has little to do with medieval weapons, since rapiers were post-medieval.

The part about armor was to discuss how thrusting weapons first came into use since hacking with longswords became increasingly pointless against armor, causing the emergence of half-sword technique. But the lightweight thrusters like the rapier are post-armor. In other words, armor caused sword use in Europe to focus on thrusting technique, and when armor went away due to longbows (and later guns), this paved the way for light thrusting swords like the rapier. Maybe the rapier would have developed otherwise, but it didn't in Japan where armor never stopped being useful and a tougher blade was necessary.

Every medieval weapon doesn't have to be capable of defeating a full suit of armor, but they need to have some ability to deal with plate and mail, as well as having the ability to counter the long reach weapons of the battlefield. Otherwise, a straight razor is as capable of assassination as a broadsword, but that doesn't help when your back is against the wall.


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## Montero (Feb 8, 2017)

RX-79G said:


> Women weren't weak, but neither were men. Both sexes were likely to be tougher than their modern equivalents, but that doesn't mean that weapons designed to make use of a medieval man's musculature wouldn't be too much for a medieval woman. You can't acquire skill in something that takes more gross strength than you have available.



Of course you can't acquire skill in a weapon too heavy for you to handle.  However I think you are considerably overestimating the difference in strength between men and women. There is of course a wide range of strengths in both genders, but also considerable overlap of the stronger women and weaker men. Picking a weapon from the lower weight end of the "male" weapons seems plausible to me. And further up the thread there was mention of a woman on this forum who does fight with medieval weapons.

@Dave glad you agree that medieval women could be fit and muscular and also about location. Regarding skill and niche - yes, someone who can train many hours a day should be better than someone who can't. But I can say from fencing, that a relative beginner can be quite hard for an "intermediate" to beat - been there, done that on both sides. The reason being that the beginner has learnt basic parries well and is really, really cautious about doing anything at all. They are entirely on the defensive and you just can't get an opening. (Its why competition bouts are timed - with some pairs of fighters you could be waiting for hours for one of them to finally win.) So yes, the beginner would be creamed by someone who is "advanced" but not necessarily by someone who has a year or two of training, but isn't yet advanced. So you'd be better of with the longsword and a bit of practice than nothing at all. 

I'd say a polearm would be easier to become reasonably competent with than a longsword - but a few beginners moves with a longsword would be a lot better than nothing.

It just occurred to me to google You Tube and women fighting with longswords. There were quite a few results. Here is one of a competition in 2013. Women fighting with longswords.






I think that settles the argument on whether women have enough strength to fight with a longsword. 

(I think there is a whole socieeconomic argument on whether the lower classes could afford a longsword - a pole arm would be cheaper, your wood chopping axe strapped to a longer pole cheaper still)


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## RX-79G (Feb 8, 2017)

Montero said:


> Of course you can't acquire skill in a weapon too heavy for you to handle.  However I think you are considerably overestimating the difference in strength between men and women. There is of course a wide range of strengths in both genders, but also considerable overlap of the stronger women and weaker men. Picking a weapon from the lower weight end of the "male" weapons seems plausible to me. And further up the thread there was mention of a woman on this forum who does fight with medieval weapons.


And I think that the weapons chosen for smaller males are likely to not be large swords, but polearms. 

As far as strength goes, I am a smallish person weighing 145 pounds. I have been close to or dated female body builders and gymnasts, some of which were bigger people, and even at those extremes my strength was still fairly obvious. I would expect that hearty men and women from any age to still have an obvious difference for their size, and men are generally larger than women on top of being stronger at the same size. It would be nice to be able to say that men and women are equal in every way, but it simply isn't realistic to claim that women are mostly as strong (in the upper body especially and with the same diet and exercise).


Montero said:


> I think that settles the argument on whether women have enough strength to fight with a longsword.


I don't think it settles anything. It isn't a question of whether someone is strong enough to lift a 4 pound sword, but whether a person of limited strength can maneuver such a weapon as quickly and precisely as someone who has much more upper body strength. Showing videos of women fencing women doesn't really speak to the problem that any female warrior is going to be battling almost 100% men.


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## Montero (Feb 8, 2017)

Sorry, earlier you were saying women weren't strong enough to handle a sword. Not just "lift a 4 lb sword" but fight with it. I've shown they can. 
Regarding fighting a man - well what you need is enough strength to handle to 4lb weapon well. Any surplus strength above that is wasted. And as was remarked earlier in the thread, muscle bulk is extra weight to carry around, and as I said you need flexibility as well as strength and too much muscle can limit that.
A lot about precision and speed comes from listening to what you are taught and having self-discipline. Bluntly when it comes to weapons training a lot more men than women have an attack of the Errol Flynn and thrash around showing off their strength rather than learning properly. Thrashing around tends to lead to being off balance and leaving big holes in your defence. 
If you had a competition to rank every single longsword user in the world then I would think it is more likely that a man would be the victor but not guaranteed - and I also think there would be women well up the rankings. The basis of a sword that it is a tool. A well used tool is a force multiplier. In boxing it would be highly unlikely for a smaller woman to beat a man, but having a sword starts to level things up.
I am also picturing a far wider world than just professional warriors - self-defence, "weekend warriors" and the like.
And if you know you are slower/weaker than your opponent, then you use your brain. You work out ways to get in the first hit and floor him, because you might not get a second hit.


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## RX-79G (Feb 8, 2017)

Montero said:


> Sorry, earlier you were saying women weren't strong enough to handle a sword. Not just "lift a 4 lb sword" but fight with it. I've shown they can.


A 4 year old can "handle" a sword. Please quote where I said a women can't lift a sword.



Montero said:


> *Regarding fighting a man - well what you need is enough strength to handle to 4lb weapon well. Any surplus strength above that is wasted.* And as was remarked earlier in the thread, muscle bulk is extra weight to carry around, and as I said you need flexibility as well as strength and too much muscle can limit that.
> A lot about precision and speed comes from listening to what you are taught and having self-discipline. Bluntly when it comes to weapons training a lot more men than women have an attack of the Errol Flynn and thrash around showing off their strength rather than learning properly. Thrashing around tends to lead to being off balance and leaving big holes in your defence.


I really don't know where you're coming from on this. Strength is advantageous anytime you are moving something with mass quickly and changing directions often. Practitioners of iaido not only become very strong, but they use swords that are an appropriate size and mass for the individual. There isn't some minimum level of strength that is sufficient, greater strength is required for finer control. Anyone who has spent time with dancers will understand just how strong they must be to move their bodies so precisely, and the same principle applies to large, tip heavy swords.

None of which suggests that a stronger person is automatically more skilled, but that the stronger person will be able to display more skill when wielding a heavier sword. And 3 to 4 pound swords ARE heavy compared to anything but the largest claymores. I have a katana that I've done a little tameshigiri, and muscle is definitely important, even with a 2 pound, tip heavy sword. 

Can a woman "handle" a longsword? Sure, but the mass and inertia of a long sword is going to be seriously disadvantageous for a woman when she is fighting a similarly experienced man who can make his sword start, stop, accelerate and change direction faster than his lighter built opponent. I don't see how that is even up for debate. A baseball isn't so heavy that a woman can't throw one, but the fastest men and women have a 35 mph/33% difference in their ability to accelerate the ball. I don't see how you can claim that the ability to thrust a sword falls under some other kind of physics.

At the lighter mass of a fencing saber, things start evening out and lighter built people do indeed have more than enough power to control the blade tip as quickly as a larger person. Olympic target shooting is another sport where the equipment weight is low enough that upper body strength isn't advantageous, and women's scores are actually higher. But those situations are simply different than using the heaviest class of swords.


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## J Riff (Feb 9, 2017)

I'm glad I don't believe in most history. ) Now back to the jagged rock lashed to a stick...


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## Montero (Feb 9, 2017)

@RX - I was using the word "handle" as pick up and use effectively, not just pick up.

Thank you for explaining that you do have a considerable background in martial arts and your detailed explanation of your position - that does support your argument more than your previous posts which did not have that information. 
Now where I am coming from is this - up thread the statement was made "4lb longsword". Starting from assuming that all longswords are 4lb I have made what I think is a valid statement for that weight of sword - you need enough muscle to handle that weight. Yes if you have a lot more muscle you could go with a 5lb or 6lb sword. And yes as you say if you have a sword made for your height and weight that is a lot more effective. However, a lot of the discussion in the thread has been picking up a basic standard weapon and learning it enough for there to be some point to bothering in the first place. What you describe in your background is effectively being a highly skilled man at arms.
Two people of similar skill fighting - well if one has more strength maybe that one will win. But why assume that all women are smaller, lighter and weaker than the man?
I am not entirely convinced by your baseball argument as the movements are not necessarily the same.
And finally being observant and having guile are also important - it is not just the speed at which you move, it is the speed with which you spot and opening and start to move.


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## RX-79G (Feb 9, 2017)

Montero said:


> @RX - I was using the word "handle" as pick up and use effectively, not just pick up.
> 
> Thank you for explaining that you do have a considerable background in martial arts and your detailed explanation of your position - that does support your argument more than your previous posts which did not have that information.
> Now where I am coming from is this - up thread the statement was made "4lb longsword". Starting from assuming that all longswords are 4lb I have made what I think is a valid statement for that weight of sword - you need enough muscle to handle that weight. Yes if you have a lot more muscle you could go with a 5lb or 6lb sword. And yes as you say if you have a sword made for your height and weight that is a lot more effective. However, a lot of the discussion in the thread has been picking up a basic standard weapon and learning it enough for there to be some point to bothering in the first place. What you describe in your background is effectively being a highly skilled man at arms.
> ...


The main line I'm trying to draw is that there wasn't necessarily an appropriate weight longsword made for smaller medieval people. People who carried swords were likely to be the better fed classes. It was a weapon intended for people who could train to use it, while polearms were weapons that were more widely useful for more body sizes. They were effective regardless of body size and were effective against cavalry or those with swords. And, many farming implements were nut so different in use.

It is certainly possible that a smaller person could appeal to a swordsmith to make something a bit lighter than standard, but steel quality is going to be a concern (the best swords in Europe were made of Indian steel well past the end of the middle ages), so I don't know how light a long sword could practically be made without being fragile. The point being - someone would have to invent something like the rapier long before the invention of the rapier if the goal was arming someone who is not a largish and fit male. That's up to the author.

It is also up to the author if they want to write their female character as being of unusual size (due to odd genes, odd jobs or foreign parentage), or being unusually skilled where they could use normally less effective weapons with such competence that makes up for their better armed opponents (ninja princess).


I am not a huge martial arts guy - just a dabbler. But I have swung a real sword in as controlled a fashion as possible to know that it is not just technique. Forearm, wrist and hand strength definitely matter when you are trying to get the sword moving fast, at the right cutting angle and then stop it just past the target.


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## Montero (Feb 9, 2017)

Dave - you are making valid points, and there is interesting detail on sword handling, but you are not entirely answering the points I have made.  Also, at no point have I said it is "just technique". To summarise what I have said I think technique and strength are both important, and that I think you are over-estimating the importance of strength and also the impact of differences in strength. Provided someone has enough strength to handle a given weight of weapon - the 4lb longsword in this discussion - then additional muscle for handling that particular weight of weapon is not that much of an advantage for the reasons I gave earlier. Having heavier swords are also not necessarily an advantage *outside* of an arena, where you'd get breaks between the fights. On the road, you have to carry the extra weight, on a battlefield you may have to keep fighting for many hours and despite additional upper body strength that extra weight in your weapon that seemed such a good idea because you have extra body strength, will tell on your stamina.

Now, broadening the discussion again. Polearms. I'm a bit unconvinced by them as a weapon outside of line of battle. Yes, a whole row of spearmen or women, each guarding the other's flank, not a bad weapon in a mass - which is how the video at the start was describing its use. (Not as a personal defence weapon.) But as I said earlier, even in a mass it has a weakness - it can be grabbed and pushed aside. A sword is tapered with sharp edges - grab that in your bare hand and you'd regret it and it can be pulled back out of your hand. Grab a spear on the wooden pole behind the sharp bit on the end and you have a lever on the person at the other end, you don't cut your hand and it is hard for them to pull it back out. If they are flanked either side by more spearmen, then while you are mucking around holding onto the end of the spear, presumably their mates would be sticking their spears into you - unless of course you are flanked by your mates who have grabbed hold of their spears. And so it goes.

I've also been thinking about writing fight scenes and I think the first question ask is what are you trying to achieve. Is it a duel to the death or the survival of your character? So are you trying to kill the opponent, or slow them down enough so you can escape? Are you trying to be mean enough that you'd do damage as you went down and both of you know that - so they know that you can be beaten, they know that they will be injured by you - so are you worth robbing or is it better to rob someone else. And so on.

Moving onto more general weapons for women and Riff's mention of a rock on a stick. The discussion on here about a) strength, and b) rocks and sticks made me think of the story of David and Goliath. So Goliath is big and strong and beats trained champions who are not as strong. Along comes David who brings a rock to a sword fight. Knocks out Goliath and then uses Goliath's own sword to cut off his head. That is the point I was making earlier about guile. Also, David didn't even have to carry the whacking great sword to the battle in the first place.

Which makes me think of the slingshot as a weapon for a woman. Never used one, am aware that you have to whirl it around a few times, so it would be something to use on someone charging at you before they arrive.

Rocks on sticks - if you want to kill someone with one weapon, then a jagged rock on a stick is better than a stick. But you have to get the darn thing fastened on the stick in the first place. Or you could kill the opponent by stages -  slingshot or knocking them out with the stick and bashing in the head with a bigger rock and so on.
Also thinking about bolas - rocks on strings - tie their legs together, then run in and kill them or knock them out.


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## Montero (Feb 9, 2017)

Further to previous (too late to edit) that should be addressed to RX not Dave - my bad.


And edited to add a link - got curious and took five minutes I shouldn't have done  to look up David's Slingshot.






Only watched the first couple of minutes, but that was and is an impressive thing especially given its simplicity. Must watch more of the film to find out how you aimed it. That could be something that you practised as part of your daily life. Walking along a road, try and hit a tree further along, retrieve stone when you reach the tree, try and hit another target further along and so on. And most medieval women would know how to braid cords, so they could easily make one.


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## MWagner (Feb 9, 2017)

I don't think it's a simple matter of basic strength. No doubt most medieval peasants were quite strong (presuming they were prosperous enough that they had a healthy diet). But hand-to-hand combat involves very specific muscle groups, and specialized development and training of those muscles. A Japanese peasant may be strong from hauling water and pots of rice around all day. Doesn't mean he can apply that strength to wield a sword the way a samurai can, a samurai who has been rigorously developing specialized muscles and movements since childhood. 

Or look at slingers. They could be highly effective weapons in the hands of experts. But experts didn't grow on trees. The men of the Balearic Isles trained relentlessly to employ slings as weapons, and became highly-paid mercenaries around the Mediterranean. Why wouldn't the Carthaginians, Romans, and Greeks just train their own peasants to use slings effectively? Because it's bloody hard, and takes the dedication of years and years - the kind of dedication that only comes from a narrow background or training.


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## RX-79G (Feb 9, 2017)

Montero said:


> Dave - you are making valid points, and there is interesting detail on sword handling, but you are not entirely answering the points I have made.  Also, at no point have I said it is "just technique". To summarise what I have said I think technique and strength are both important, and that I think you are over-estimating the importance of strength and also the impact of differences in strength. Provided someone has enough strength to handle a given weight of weapon - the 4lb longsword in this discussion - then additional muscle for handling that particular weight of weapon is not that much of an advantage for the reasons I gave earlier. Having heavier swords are also not necessarily an advantage *outside* of an arena, where you'd get breaks between the fights. On the road, you have to carry the extra weight, on a battlefield you may have to keep fighting for many hours and despite additional upper body strength that extra weight in your weapon that seemed such a good idea because you have extra body strength, will tell on your stamina.
> 
> Now, broadening the discussion again. Polearms. I'm a bit unconvinced by them as a weapon outside of line of battle. Yes, a whole row of spearmen or women, each guarding the other's flank, not a bad weapon in a mass - which is how the video at the start was describing its use. (Not as a personal defence weapon.) But as I said earlier, even in a mass it has a weakness - it can be grabbed and pushed aside. A sword is tapered with sharp edges - grab that in your bare hand and you'd regret it and it can be pulled back out of your hand. Grab a spear on the wooden pole behind the sharp bit on the end and you have a lever on the person at the other end, you don't cut your hand and it is hard for them to pull it back out. If they are flanked either side by more spearmen, then while you are mucking around holding onto the end of the spear, presumably their mates would be sticking their spears into you - unless of course you are flanked by your mates who have grabbed hold of their spears. And so it goes.
> 
> ...



"Half sword" techniques involved grabbing the blade of your own sword, leading me to believe that being able to grab a polearm isn't much different. What a polearm does offer is a handle that can be easily held up close to the blade or much further away. It also offers tremendous leverage if your hands are placed far apart. Anyone who has used a garden implement will quickly understand the advantages.

As far as your points about swords go, I'm not following what distinctions you're making about "handling". 4 pound long swords are heavy. They are pushing the practical limit for controllable mass on a short handled weapon, and they went away. Swords continued to be useful battlefield weapons even after the civil war, not no one ever issued something as unwieldy again. Such a sword was a weapon for very strong people, not just anyone.


David brought down Goliath by shooting him at a distance. I doubt Goliath's buddies saw it as anything but a violation of the understood rules of the time. David would not have gotten away with this twice.


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## Montero (Feb 9, 2017)

Slingers - it is a nice, cheap, simple weapon you can practice as you go about your daily work. Shepherds use them to chase off wolves. You can use them to kill rabbits and other small game. I think that ordinary people could become reasonably good - not necessarily up to the level of the massed Balearic slingers, but good.
Having now watched the video of the recreation, the killing of Goliath was very, very difficult - agreed.

But as I keep saying, it doesn't always have to be top use of a given weapon. Someone defending themselves out on the road - it might well be enough to drive off whoever is attacking them or injure them - not kill them. So being able to slingshot stones at them from say 10 or 20 feet as the bandit comes leaping out the bushes, so they get a fast moving stone in the mouth, or ricocheting bruisingly off their rib cage - its offputting. Driving off wolves - stones smacking into their ribs, bouncing off the ground around them - that drives them back. And in terms of defending yourself on the road - no rules of war there.

Polearms - as I have said, I have successfully grabbed the business end and deflected it. Maybe the other person wasn't that great at using it - but whatever the reason, I have beaten polearms barehanded on several occasions. It wasn't a "stage play" re-enactment - it was a real attack (as real as you are allowed to get) and a real defence. Leverage goes two ways - I had leverage against the person at the other end of the weapon. Presumably I had a better spaced grip than they did.
And the trouble with shortening your grip on a polearm is that you have a length of pole waggling around behind you. OK if you are on your own, really hacks off the people in the rank behind you if you are part of a squad. Again, been there, seen that, heard the swearing.

Longsword - you are saying "short handled weapon" the video Brian posted was recommending it for women as it could be used two handed. So not quite sure if we are talking the same weapon here. Hhm, now thinking about the video of women using longswords I posted which had them successfully using them one handed. So this is getting a bit confusing.


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## Brian G Turner (Feb 9, 2017)

RX-79G said:


> 4 pound long swords are heavy.



Certainly, so far as swords go - aren't normal arming swords around 1.2 - 1.5 lbs?

IMO there's no problem in terms of strength for a mediaeval woman using a sword - she would likely be stronger than most modern Western men due to a lifetime of hard manual work. 

The difficulty is getting the training - in mediaeval times it's very limited to upper class men. IMO that's by far the biggest barrier for anybody outside of that social group.


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## RX-79G (Feb 9, 2017)

Montero said:


> Longsword - you are saying "short handled weapon" the video Brian posted was recommending it for women as it could be used two handed. So not quite sure if we are talking the same weapon here. Thinking about the video of women using longswords I posted had them successfully using them one handed.


Swords have short handles compared to blade length, polearms have long handles compared to blade length. Even a "two handed" sword will have 2/3 of its length in blade, which requires a very different technique.

As far as you overcoming your polearm opponent bare handed - congrats! Do you think that would have worked with a Spartan or samurai? Polearms are frontline weapons, and people have been creating methods for their use for probably 10,000 years. They aren't romantic or popular for re-creators, so I wouldn't expect anyone to have a lot of expertise these days, but there are more than enough Japanese and Chinese martial arts films that depict their use to at least get an idea of actually dangerous it would be to step into their radius.


This article illustrates a lot of the reasoning I've been trying to present:
Naginata - Wikipedia

In many ways it is like a hockey stick, where the shaft length lends leverage and control that a short handled implement would not.


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## Brian G Turner (Feb 9, 2017)

Brian G Turner said:


> IMO there's no problem in terms of strength for a mediaeval woman using a sword - she would likely be stronger than most modern Western men due to a lifetime of hard manual work.



Apologies - I should have qualified by saying "low class women".


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## Montero (Feb 9, 2017)

The polearm I beat was a halberd - much shorter sharp bit than a naginata. And the other advantage I had was years of fencing training so I have a lot of practice in observing the path of a weapon and timing my response.
The discussion we are having here, starting from Brian's posted video, is the idea that a polearm would be a good idea for a woman  (and I was picturing a halberd not a naginata) and I was pointing out that they have a flaw, particularly if you are not that well trained in them. All through this thread some people have been saying that women wouldn't have the time for much specialised weapon training. And what you are saying RX is that a polearm is not that good an idea if you don't have time to get properly trained.
So a naginata style polearm might work for a woman with time to be trained.
If you don't have time to get trained, then the weapon you'd use the best, would be something closely related to your daily work, or that you could "fit-in" as you worked.

The longbow was not included as a good weapon for women, because it requires too much strength. However, there are hunting bows that were the pre-cursor of longbows which were used by women. There are images of medieval women using shorter hunting bows Medieval hunting - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. 
So I think I'd bring the bow back in as a weapon for women, just not a long bow. And most men used shorter (than longbows) for forest hunting because in woodland you didn't have long clear views.
So if you were battling, ranks of bowmen vs ranks of bowwomen - then the men would have greater range and power. But if you are positing defence on a road running through woodland, the advantage of the longbow is reduced because you are at a much closer range.


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## RX-79G (Feb 9, 2017)

Montero said:


> The polearm I beat was a halberd - much shorter sharp bit than a naginata. And the other advantage I had was years of fencing training so I have a lot of practice in observing the path of a weapon and timing my response.
> The discussion we are having here, starting from Brian's posted video, is the idea that a polearm would be a good idea for a woman  (and I was picturing a halberd not a naginata) and I was pointing out that they have a flaw, particularly if you are not that well trained in them. All through this thread some people have been saying that women wouldn't have the time for much specialised weapon training. And what you are saying RX is that a polearm is not that good an idea if you don't have time to get properly trained.
> So a naginata style polearm might work for a woman with time to be trained.


I don't see how any medieval weapon is effective without training, but I think a sword - particularly a heavy one - requires the most training given its low leverage.


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## Montero (Feb 10, 2017)

Fair enough.

Interesting thread this. Wonder how much will percolate on into the fantasy books we write . The balance of probabilities and usefulness, length of training and so on. Also the perils of words which mean different things to different people. 
For completeness, the halberd was multi-purpose and had a feature for hauling horsemen to the ground. Here is wiki on halberds and the like.
Halberd - Wikipedia
And having followed a link from there, I have learnt for the first time of a war scythe - looks quite a bit like a naginata and apparently could cut through helmets.
War scythe - Wikipedia - though that article lists the disadvantages as being weight.


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## Dave (Feb 10, 2017)

Montero said:


> Wonder how much will percolate on into the fantasy books we write .


Probably my last post here because you seem to be arguing round in circles. My own point, which I didn't appear to get across, was not that women were too weak, or too stupid, or never fought under any circumstances. My point was that social conventions and the sheer amount of work involved running a household, would mean that they were unlikely to get the training to be able to. Sure, you can quote exceptions, but the very fact that you can quote recorded exceptions is proof that those were very exceptional women. I just thought that for historical accuracy you might want to take that into account, however, on thinking more about this, no one wants to read a fantasy book about very ordinary people. So, carry on.


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## RX-79G (Feb 10, 2017)

Dave said:


> Probably my last post here because you seem to be arguing round in circles. My own point, which I didn't appear to get across, was not that women were too weak, or too stupid, or never fought under any circumstances. My point was that social conventions and the sheer amount of work involved running a household, would mean that they were unlikely to get the training to be able to. Sure, you can quote exceptions, but the very fact that you can quote recorded exceptions is proof that those were very exceptional women. I just thought that for historical accuracy you might want to take that into account, however, on thinking more about this, no one wants to read a fantasy book about very ordinary people. So, carry on.


Who would be the men in an medieval adventure story, for that matter? Why would Dave have time for quests if Darla does not?


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## thaddeus6th (Feb 10, 2017)

Montero, seem to recall a Lindy Beige video suggesting the idea of a scythe used in war was pretty unlikely, given it's structure. Something like a fancy spear, poleaxe or naginata would be so different from an actual scythe that the use of the name would be misleading.


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## Montero (Feb 10, 2017)

War scythe - they took the blade off the handle and turned it round by 90degrees so it is in line with the pole like the naginata - but yes, agree - unless you start your story with the peasants busily turning their scythes into war scythes (which they did) then it would be hard to understand.

@RX-79 - Thank you. Yes, exactly.

@Dave - in terms of historical accuracy, you appear to still be ignoring the myriad forms of work in which women engaged which was far more varied and extensive than running a household. This comes from guild records - it is not "exceptional women" there are numbers per type of job - read Alice Clark's book. As I also said, the social conventions of the period are seen through the distorting lens of the Victorian period and the industrial revolution. In terms of the examples I provided of women who fought - they are recorded by the society of the day - and in some cases rewarded by that society. Yes they were a minority, but they were not non-existent.
It wasn't that you were not getting your point across, it was that I was disagreeing with it - and still do. In terms of learning to fight, as I said earlier in the thread, I see no reason why women wouldn't have basic self-defence training in the same way they do today and the rougher the area the more value there is in them spending time learning how to fight. Not at the level of a professional man at arms, but at the level of driving off an attacker, slowing down an attacker and running like crazy. Hunting bows, good solid broom, belt knife, sling shots....

And reading Wikipedia about the myth of Amazons it seems there is a historical basis from a nomadic people where some of the women also learned to fight expertly so they could defend the herds while the men were off at war - with women warrior graves being uncovered by archaeologists.

And finally, if social conventions were 100% effective in limiting women's behaviour, how come there have been so many changes in their role? Owning property, voting, wearing trousers.....


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## Brian G Turner (Feb 11, 2017)

Montero said:


> Wonder how much will percolate on into the fantasy books we write .



Oh, all of it.


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