# Depth of infantry line



## Aldarion (Jan 23, 2020)

How deep does the infantry line have to be in order to resist a charge of 15th century knights (cca 1450 - 1480)? 10th century Byzantine infantry deployed typically 7 ranks deep (2 or 3 rows of spearmen, 3 rows of bowmen, and then 1 or 2 rows of spearmen on the inside), but _kataphraktoi_ used on the Eastern front at the time were very different from 15th century Western European heavy cavalry.


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## The Big Peat (Jan 23, 2020)

No set depth, but quick searching found this GCSE textbook claiming 6 deep at Falkirk and this website I found linked to on De Re Militarii claims 8 deep for Courtrai. So I'd go 6 to 8 without considering bowmen.

Not 15th century admittedly, but I really doubt it changes much - although longer pikes do allow deeper formations.

Edit: Mercenaries in Medieval and Renaissance Europe says the Swiss Pikemen had 10 x 10 formations

Slightly later in time period - "Under the Dutch system, the central pike block drew up in ranks between five and ten men deep, while the flanking shot drew up in ranks of between eight and twelve men."


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## Venusian Broon (Jan 24, 2020)

If you were using pikes, then I'd tentatively suggest that if you had at least three lines and a determination to stay your ground then that should be enough, given that on most representations of pike formations the fourth line seems to more or less held vertically and not really used in the defence. (Although I've read from some sources that the vertical pikes behind the front three could interrupt arrows that were aimed for the back ranks. I assume just a few arrows, not all - it hardly looks like an arrow shield! But I don't know if that was the case really.)

Basically horses won't willingly charge into an unwavering line of pikes. Because they aren't stupid. I think you have to teach them to be that stupid. They will charge into a disorganised melee of terrified men though, I assume. 

The reason pikemen formations had deeper formations with a lot more ranks would be, I think, on one hand so that people could come up and replace losses, but mainly for when the formation went on the offensive and therefore it became a shoving match. The greater your mass the more likely you were to push your opponent back. 

But then I think a determined, heavily armoured infantry unit with, say, linked shields, enough sharp objects to poke with or throw and a few ranks, say, could probably dissuade even something as heavily armed as late medieval knight from battering through. A basic peasant armed with pitchfork, a sackcloth and a nervous scream - no. 

From a brief look at other internet sources it seems that by your time period a successful charge against professional infantry would have been unlikely as they would have mostly failed, which seems right from understanding from my forays into this sort of history...

This from Wikipedia (Charge (warfare) - Wikipedia) (my bolding)

"However, from the dawn of the Hundred Years' War onward, the use of professional pikemen and longbowmen with high morale and functional tactics meant that a knight would have to be cautious in a cavalry charge. Men wielding either pike or halberdin formation, with high morale, could stave off all but the best cavalry charges, whilst English longbowmen could unleash a torrent of arrows capable of wreaking havoc, though not necessarily a massacre, upon the heads of heavy infantry and cavalry in unsuitable terrain. *It became increasingly common for knights to dismount and fight as elite heavy infantry**, although some continued to stay mounted throughout combat. The use of cavalry for *flanking manoeuvres* *became more useful*, although some interpretations of the knightly ideal often led to reckless, undisciplined charges.

Cavalry could still charge dense heavy infantry formations head-on if the cavalrymen had a combination of certain traits. They had a high chance of success if they were in a formation, collectively disciplined, highly skilled, and equipped with the best arms and armour, as well as mounted upon horses trained to endure the physical and mental stresses of such charges. However, the majority of cavalry personnel lacked at least one of these traits, particularly discipline, formations, and horses trained for head-on charges. Thus, the use of the head-on cavalry charge declined, although Polish Hussars,  French Cuirassuers, and Spanish and Portuguese conquistadores were still capable of succeeding in such charges, often due to their possession of the previously mentioned combination of the traits required for success in such endeavours."

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*In the numerous wars between Scotland and England, the Scottish developed the _schiltron _to counter the English calvary charge. The English knights were unable to do much about these so instead the English started countering this tactic by just dismounting their knights and using them to cut through the pikes as men-at-arms. Oh and also longbowmen, of course.


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## Aldarion (Jan 25, 2020)

Thanks! So basically it comes to a combination of equipment + discipline on both sides, but feudal heavy cavalry was much harder to get properly disciplined, and so infantry prevailed? What about disciplined cavalry, such as Matthias Corvinus' Black Army, versus disciplined infantry?



Venusian Broon said:


> If you were using pikes, then I'd tentatively suggest that if you had at least three lines and a determination to stay your ground then that should be enough, given that on most representations of pike formations the fourth line seems to more or less held vertically and not really used in the defence. (Although I've read from some sources that the vertical pikes behind the front three could interrupt arrows that were aimed for the back ranks. I assume just a few arrows, not all - it hardly looks like an arrow shield! But I don't know if that was the case really.)



But what about the value of men behind those three lines? In Byzantine military manuals it is implied/stated that heavy cavalry can break spears of opposing infantry, so it may come down to having physical mass to stop the cavalry charge. Meaning that _men_ behind first three lines may still matter, even if their spears do not.



Venusian Broon said:


> Basically horses won't willingly charge into an unwavering line of pikes. Because they aren't stupid. I think you have to teach them to be that stupid. They will charge into a disorganised melee of terrified men though, I assume.



I have found both arguments, but personally I believe they will. I know of cases when horses charged into solid objects, large masses of people, or both; and these were racing horses, not trained cavalry horses. Example. There is also the fact that Byzantine military manuals - with few of which I am intimately familiar - either suggest or outright state that, yes, horses will indeed charge into infantry lines. And Byzantine infantrymen were not pushovers, they would stand their ground - yet you see progressively deeper infantry lines as Caliphate cavalry gets heavier. So while wild or light cavalry horses may not charge into pikes, heavy cavalry horses - bred and trained for the purpose - probably will.



Venusian Broon said:


> The reason pikemen formations had deeper formations with a lot more ranks would be, I think, on one hand so that people could come up and replace losses, but mainly for when the formation went on the offensive and therefore it became a shoving match. The greater your mass the more likely you were to push your opponent back.



That may be one of reasons, but Byzantine manuals specifically specify increasing infantry / spearmen depth in order to resist charge of progressively heavier cavalry. But that is 10th century, so it does not really help with 15th century warfare. Hence my asking.

Your Wikipedia link suggests, as I already stated, that it came down to discipline first and foremost, and problem was that feudal cavalry was sh*t at that particular thing. But there were few disciplined heavy cavalry armies in 15th century - Hungarian Black Army and French _Compagnies d'Ordonnance_. So you definitely could see disciplined cavalry charging disciplined infantry - but I have not found sufficient sources myself to reach any final conclusion.


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## Venusian Broon (Jan 25, 2020)

Aldarion said:


> Thanks! So basically it comes to a combination of equipment + discipline on both sides, but feudal heavy cavalry was much harder to get properly disciplined, and so infantry prevailed? What about disciplined cavalry, such as Matthias Corvinus' Black Army, versus disciplined infantry?



Yes I think it comes down to all those things that are hard to pinpoint down: morale, experience, discipline on that day etc. Given the right equipment and training I am sure either side, calvary or infantry could break each other. My tentative guess is that, on balance, it usually went to the infantry. Why? Simply because they are cheaper: to train, to arm, to gain experience, and there were a lot more of them. But as the wikipedia article states there were cavalry units famous for charging - one assumes that took a lot of training and experience to pull off though. So yes I am sure there are instances of elite cavalry charging and breaking elite pike/heavy infantry face to face.




Aldarion said:


> But what about the value of men behind those three lines? In Byzantine military manuals it is implied/stated that heavy cavalry can break spears of opposing infantry, so it may come down to having physical mass to stop the cavalry charge. Meaning that _men_ behind first three lines may still matter, even if their spears do not.



On the defensive against cavalry I can think of one good reason for more than three ranks. What a cavalryman does not want is to lose his momentum in the charge and find himself at a stop in enemy lines. So a determined scrum of men in depth would dissuade nervous cavalry from just rushing in. A cavalry soldier has an advantage over an individual foot soldier with his weapon...but if you've come to rest completely surrounded by enemy, you are very likely going to to pulled down and then you're toast. A unit with just three ranks, would be easier for aggressive cavalary to just crash through to the other side and escape, I would think.



Aldarion said:


> I have found both arguments, but personally I believe they will. I know of cases when horses charged into solid objects, large masses of people, or both; and these were racing horses, not trained cavalry horses. Example. There is also the fact that Byzantine military manuals - with few of which I am intimately familiar - either suggest or outright state that, yes, horses will indeed charge into infantry lines. And Byzantine infantrymen were not pushovers, they would stand their ground - yet you see progressively deeper infantry lines as Caliphate cavalry gets heavier. So while wild or light cavalry horses may not charge into pikes, heavy cavalry horses - bred and trained for the purpose - probably will.



I would (again tentatively!) suggest that while cavalry horse were indeed trained to charge into masses of enemy, it would still be a very bad idea to take on a pike unit face on. And if you put a gun next to my head, I say that the pike unit, in such circumstances will win nine times out of ten. But flanking a pike unit, so avoiding all the pointy bits - that would be good.

Very simply (too simply!) after the peak of the Roman Empire, I believe Western European battle tactics shifted towards mobility and cavarly. Phalanxes and legions needed expensive training and were a lot of manpower. The states left over shifted to smaller armies, and many (but not all!) of the enemies coming in, utlised horse armies. To counter this armies like the Bzyantines had to respond and change also. There was a definite tilt to heavy cavalry and that became the elite aristocratic unit to have - helped very much by the Normans!

Now I'm not saying that infantry at that time were bad, just that advances in calvary tactics and technology, horse breeding, changes in societies expectations (a knight charges gallantly against the enemy on his horse of course!), and aggressive use of heavy cavalry (by said Normans for example) made them the pre-eminent unit. You would have your elite infantry units - as I am sure you are aware, the Varangian guard for the Byzantines, but I would (again tentatively!) suggest that a lot of the other infantry would be of lower quality and quite a lot of 'filler' - levies etc.



Aldarion said:


> That may be one of reasons, but Byzantine manuals specifically specify increasing infantry / spearmen depth in order to resist charge of progressively heavier cavalry. But that is 10th century, so it does not really help with 15th century warfare. Hence my asking.



By the time you get to the 15th century I believe you are getting the end result of two trends.

Firstly, because of the predominance of heavy cavalry in the early period, others rediscovered the utility of heavy pike infantry. Scotland did it with the schiltron as I've stated ~1300, but there we are really talking about the famous Swiss pike formations and the German Landsknecht. These then led to the Spanish Tercio's, the Swedish innovations later on etc. This, as I've argued, balanced the effect of heavy cavalry and would usually dictate the actual use of horses most of the time. By the late 15th century the infantry will have been getting very good at it. 

Secondly the battles are getting smaller. Even the most prosperous of European states can't afford to have huge armies - logistics was rearing its ugly head. So armies became more 'quality not quantity'. Those low quality levi spearmen tended to dissappear. (Unless, of course, it was an 'asymmetrical war', say Kings putting down peasant uprisings etc.) So effectively you were left with the 'cream of the crop'. The hardened and experienced warriors/mercenaries who could afford all the kit were the ones on the field most of the time. 



Aldarion said:


> Your Wikipedia link suggests, as I already stated, that it came down to discipline first and foremost, and problem was that feudal cavalry was sh*t at that particular thing. But there were few disciplined heavy cavalry armies in 15th century - Hungarian Black Army and French _Compagnies d'Ordonnance_. So you definitely could see disciplined cavalry charging disciplined infantry - but I have not found sufficient sources myself to reach any final conclusion.



My guess is that, because a knight in western European was also a member of societies elite, they were less likely to be cohesive as a unit. To be an effective shock trooper on horseback takes training and following orders. Would all these lordlings get on well with each other? Or were they more concerned with jousting and going starry-eyed about one-on-one combat? Hence my guess at the effectiveness of orders of knights such as the Hospitallers and Templars who submitted their egos to their organisations - at least in the tactical sense.

I'd suggest that because heavy cavalry was not as effective as it used to be, what we are seeing was these armies 'rediscovering' the tactics of Alexander the great. Hammer and anvil. Use the infantry to pin the enemy then use the cavalry to flank and charge into a weak point. Cause a rout then run down all the fleeing soldiers. I note that the Hungarian Black Army you talk about was famous for its cavalry but still had a lot of infantry at its core.

Certainly a well-timed cavalry charge could be the decisive point of a battle, but discipline was crucial. How many battles have been lost by one sides flanking cavalry winning, chasing the defeated units off the field, only to return to discover the rest of their army has been soundly crushed!


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## svalbard (Jan 25, 2020)

I think the problem with a line or "phalanx" of pikemen was that they were vulnerable on the flanks. The best way to disrupt a line of pikeman was to charge in from the flanks either on horse or an infantry charge. Good infantry formations operated best when their flanks were covered by cavalry.

The depth of the line was also important especially when two lines of pikemen faced each other and the 'push of pike' occurred. Basically a shoving match where the side with the more men, better discipline and importantly longer pikes normally won. A fairly horrendous event by the sounds of it.


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## The Big Peat (Jan 25, 2020)

Venusian Broon said:


> Secondly the battles are getting smaller. Even the most prosperous of European states can't afford to have huge armies - logistics was rearing its ugly head. So armies became more 'quality not quantity'. Those low quality levi spearmen tended to dissappear. (Unless, of course, it was an 'asymmetrical war', say Kings putting down peasant uprisings etc.) So effectively you were left with the 'cream of the crop'. The hardened and experienced warriors/mercenaries who could afford all the kit were the ones on the field most of the time.
> ides flanking cavalry winning, chasing the defeated units off the field, only to return to discover the rest of their army has been soundly crushed!



This I am very dubious about. The general trend of the medieval period is the creation of bigger more centralised states and unless I've missed something, battles are getting bigger. Using wiki estimates as I'm lazy -

Hastings had 17,000. Falkirk had 21,000. Bannockburn had around 25,000. Crecy had around 37,000. Agincourt... well, very hard to call. But armies get bigger throughout the period for England when fighting a foreign power, and maybe level off after the Black Death. Some other examples - Courtrai in 1302 has 16k-18k. Novara in 1513 has around 40k - picked because both are French invasions of mainly urban areas. This may not be universal, and I may be wrong, but in general, I think armies get bigger.


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## svalbard (Jan 25, 2020)

Armies do indeed get bigger as the Medieval period progresses. Some as you say is down to the growth of larger nation states, more again to improved technology, a growth in professionalism and improved logistical support.

There is also a somewhat different approach to warfare. Take Henry II as an example. He did everything in his power to avoid battle, skirmishes and sieges yes but outright battle no. Too many vagaries to stake everything in an all out clash. This was quite common across the late 12th and up to the mid 13th century. You do have some notable battles but nothing compared to the late 13th century onwards. Something changed. 

The complete opposite of Henry was Edward III who actively sought and staked everything on a one off battle Crecy. The Black Prince did something similar at Poitiers and Henry V at Agincourt.


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## Venusian Broon (Jan 25, 2020)

The Big Peat said:


> This I am very dubious about. The general trend of the medieval period is the creation of bigger more centralised states and unless I've missed something, battles are getting bigger. Using wiki estimates as I'm lazy -
> 
> Hastings had 17,000. Falkirk had 21,000. Bannockburn had around 25,000. Crecy had around 37,000. Agincourt... well, very hard to call. But armies get bigger throughout the period for England when fighting a foreign power, and maybe level off after the Black Death. Some other examples - Courtrai in 1302 has 16k-18k. Novara in 1513 has around 40k - picked because both are French invasions of mainly urban areas. This may not be universal, and I may be wrong, but in general, I think armies get bigger.



Cheeky! Leaving out Agincourt. Hard to call! English army of ~6000?   Yes the French probably had 25,000. But even that's really not much for a state. Falkirk/Bannockburn are bad examples cause Scotland is a small state so I wouldn't extrapolate using them. Although interestingly it seems throughout the period from the wars of independence to 1500, the English 'expeditionary forces' overseas probably only mustered 15,000 at most, which I think says something more about medieval logistic chains - a big factor. Obviously in civil wars, such as the wars of the roses you could obtain more men and sustain them.

I was talking about compared to the battles & campaigns of classical Rome, when the empire was at it's height.  (And compared to other civilisations, in the 15th Century, these figures seem, to me, all on the small side.) So the numbers fighting fell to a nadir after the fall of Rome, probably somewhere in the early medieval period but then I agree they are getting bigger through the period, just not dramatically.

That is partly a result of states getting better organised and wealthier, but also the military technology. Longbows needed a long time to master to become effective, but when the crossbow was introduced it may have had disadvantages, but it was effective and crucially did not require a lot of training. Same process occured when gunpowder arrived and efficient hand weapons could make semi-trained people lethal. 

I would argue that the biggest step up came with industrialisation, so that you could churn out all weapons to arm your now available pool of quick to train conscripts. Whenever that was.


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## etaylor (Jan 25, 2020)

Everything in medieval warfare boils down to five things. 

Equipment
Discipline
Information (intelligence)
Strategy & Tactics
Culture

And never underestimate the importance of that final condition. The first four are fairly self explanatory, but the clash of culture on the battlefield throughout history has led to devastating losses and astounding victories.

A few examples would be the prevailing victories of mounted archers like the Huns, Mongols, and Persians against predominantly infantry based forces like the Romans, Germanic tribes, etc. The victories of English longbowmen over French cavalry. The list goes on. 

And this difference of culture didn't have to come from worlds away. The Polish Hussars dealt the Swedish Pike & Shot formations absolutely astounding defeats under circumstances that should have seen the Swedes easily defeat their opponents according to conventional Western wisdom. And these were cultures that were close to each other, sharing the Baltic Sea.

Sweden had a world renowned military - professionally armed, professionally drilled, with capable commanders and combat experience. Conventional wisdom at the time said that defeating a cavalry charge was easily completed by employing a Pike and Shot formation. 

Poland had a long cultural history of being stuck between cultures fielding predominantly infantry forces (German states), and those fielding predominantly cavalry (Tatars, Mongols, Cossacks, etc). So they needed to adapt to both circumstances. 

The result was the Hussar, a moderately armored, fast moving cavalry force armed with pistols or carbines for ranged fire, lances longer than an infantry pike (which was widely considered impossible by Western cavalries, but accomplished by the Polish by hollowing out the Lance to reduce the weight, thereby allowing a longer Lance to be used without it becoming unwieldy), and sabers for close ranged combat. 

The matchup resulted in direct Hussar cavalry charges of Swedish Pike and Shot ranks, something Western cavalries considered to be suicidal. The Hussars utterly decimated their opponents, unleashing a volley by small arms fire to disrupt formation, followed by a charge with lances that outreached the Swedish pikes, mowing down the first and second lines of the formation and spreading utter chaos, followed by melee engagement of the now paniced and fleeing muskets.


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## The Big Peat (Jan 25, 2020)

Venusian Broon said:


> Cheeky! Leaving out Agincourt. Hard to call! English army of ~6000?   Yes the French probably had 25,000. But even that's really not much for a state. Falkirk/Bannockburn are bad examples cause Scotland is a small state so I wouldn't extrapolate using them. Although interestingly it seems throughout the period from the wars of independence to 1500, the English 'expeditionary forces' overseas probably only mustered 15,000 at most, which I think says something more about medieval logistic chains - a big factor. Obviously in civil wars, such as the wars of the roses you could obtain more men and sustain them.
> 
> I was talking about compared to the battles & campaigns of classical Rome, when the empire was at it's height.  (And compared to other civilisations, in the 15th Century, these figures seem, to me, all on the small side.) So the numbers fighting fell to a nadir after the fall of Rome, probably somewhere in the early medieval period but then I agree they are getting bigger through the period, just not dramatically.
> 
> ...



The estimates on Agincourt vary so wildly I didn't want to use it. Couldn't even come up with a halfway sensible average. Admittedly, plenty of varying estimates on the others, but Agincourt might be the worst...

If you're comparing them to Rome, or after, then yes, there's generally less men - I thought you meant in terms of the medieval period progressing. Although even hear it's a bit up and down. I don't think an English/British civil war produced a bigger battle than Towton. Teutobergerwald isn't bigger than Grunwald. And the whys of each particular case are hugely complicated but... if I'm honest, if I'm looking for a big army, I'm looking for population base and a willingness to use it. There's a reason why there's sometimes considered a link between the rise of medieval European infantry and the rise in non-aristocratic communities (mainly cities). It's not that hard to get the weapons and armour. Food's a pain but can be dealt with if enough food is grown. It's trained men that are the big difficulty.

Also mildly interesting tidbit. The French did start introducing longbow training during the Hundred Years War. It was abandoned as they started to realise the implications of having a peasantry that were actually armed and trained, and abandoned it. That's the main obstacle to a bow using populace...


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## Aldarion (Jan 25, 2020)

Venusian Broon said:


> Yes I think it comes down to all those things that are hard to pinpoint down: morale, experience, discipline on that day etc. Given the right equipment and training I am sure either side, calvary or infantry could break each other. My tentative guess is that, on balance, it usually went to the infantry. Why? Simply because they are cheaper: to train, to arm, to gain experience, and there were a lot more of them. But as the wikipedia article states there were cavalry units famous for charging - one assumes that took a lot of training and experience to pull off though. So yes I am sure there are instances of elite cavalry charging and breaking elite pike/heavy infantry face to face.



How would presence of ranged units affect the balance? I know that John Hunyadi and Matthias Corvinus often had their pikemen crouch so that crossbowmen could shoot over their heads, or at least that is how I found it explained. Likewise, heavy cavalry was often supported by mounted crossbowmen.



> On the defensive against cavalry I can think of one good reason for more than three ranks. What a cavalryman does not want is to lose his momentum in the charge and find himself at a stop in enemy lines. So a determined scrum of men in depth would dissuade nervous cavalry from just rushing in. A cavalry soldier has an advantage over an individual foot soldier with his weapon...but if you've come to rest completely surrounded by enemy, you are very likely going to to pulled down and then you're toast. A unit with just three ranks, would be easier for aggressive cavalary to just crash through to the other side and escape, I would think.



That is precisely what I thought. More than three lines of pikes may not help, but if cavalry does manage to crash through, deeper lines of infantry are better at stopping the charge.



> I would (again tentatively!) suggest that while cavalry horse were indeed trained to charge into masses of enemy, it would still be a very bad idea to take on a pike unit face on. And if you put a gun next to my head, I say that the pike unit, in such circumstances will win nine times out of ten. But flanking a pike unit, so avoiding all the pointy bits - that would be good.
> 
> Very simply (too simply!) after the peak of the Roman Empire, I believe Western European battle tactics shifted towards mobility and cavarly. Phalanxes and legions needed expensive training and were a lot of manpower. The states left over shifted to smaller armies, and many (but not all!) of the enemies coming in, utlised horse armies. To counter this armies like the Bzyantines had to respond and change also. There was a definite tilt to heavy cavalry and that became the elite aristocratic unit to have - helped very much by the Normans!
> 
> Now I'm not saying that infantry at that time were bad, just that advances in calvary tactics and technology, horse breeding, changes in societies expectations (a knight charges gallantly against the enemy on his horse of course!), and aggressive use of heavy cavalry (by said Normans for example) made them the pre-eminent unit. You would have your elite infantry units - as I am sure you are aware, the Varangian guard for the Byzantines, but I would (again tentatively!) suggest that a lot of the other infantry would be of lower quality and quite a lot of 'filler' - levies etc.



I had thought it might have been because people who could afford a horse would also be able to afford to actually train for war in cases where there was no centralized state support. And in those cases, increased mobility of mounted units was worth it. Question is, how often did such mounted units fight mounted, and how often did they fight on foot? Basically, why did _mounted combat_ become predominant way of fighting? Just requiring greater mobility does not explain it by itself - Basil II went and mounted his infantry on mules when he needed to quickly beat the stuffing out of a couple of border emirates, but they still fought as infantry in the end. And in 15th century, English would often have whole armies mounted for mobility, yet they fought on foot, while French would fight from horseback. Of course, it may simply be that cavalry easily terrified untrained levies, while against trained opponents it was better to dismount. Question there is whether untrained levies were really common? Frankish foot soldiers under Charles Martell were as professional as they come, and were in fact recruited in a manner similar to Byzantine thematic troops. And if they were not, what did allow cavalry to dominate, and what changed?



> By the time you get to the 15th century I believe you are getting the end result of two trends.
> 
> Firstly, because of the predominance of heavy cavalry in the early period, others rediscovered the utility of heavy pike infantry. Scotland did it with the schiltron as I've stated ~1300, but there we are really talking about the famous Swiss pike formations and the German Landsknecht. These then led to the Spanish Tercio's, the Swedish innovations later on etc. This, as I've argued, balanced the effect of heavy cavalry and would usually dictate the actual use of horses most of the time. By the late 15th century the infantry will have been getting very good at it.
> 
> Secondly the battles are getting smaller. Even the most prosperous of European states can't afford to have huge armies - logistics was rearing its ugly head. So armies became more 'quality not quantity'. Those low quality levi spearmen tended to dissappear. (Unless, of course, it was an 'asymmetrical war', say Kings putting down peasant uprisings etc.) So effectively you were left with the 'cream of the crop'. The hardened and experienced warriors/mercenaries who could afford all the kit were the ones on the field most of the time.



Thanks. Though I think Matthias Corvinus and John Hunyadi went for combined-arms deployment where they combined pikemen, crossbowmen, and dismounted men-at-arms with pollaxes. Was that because of Hungarian specificities, or because Ottomans relied heavily on archery?



> My guess is that, because a knight in western European was also a member of societies elite, they were less likely to be cohesive as a unit. To be an effective shock trooper on horseback takes training and following orders. Would all these lordlings get on well with each other? Or were they more concerned with jousting and going starry-eyed about one-on-one combat? Hence my guess at the effectiveness of orders of knights such as the Hospitallers and Templars who submitted their egos to their organisations - at least in the tactical sense.
> 
> I'd suggest that because heavy cavalry was not as effective as it used to be, what we are seeing was these armies 'rediscovering' the tactics of Alexander the great. Hammer and anvil. Use the infantry to pin the enemy then use the cavalry to flank and charge into a weak point. Cause a rout then run down all the fleeing soldiers. I note that the Hungarian Black Army you talk about was famous for its cavalry but still had a lot of infantry at its core.
> 
> Certainly a well-timed cavalry charge could be the decisive point of a battle, but discipline was crucial. How many battles have been lost by one sides flanking cavalry winning, chasing the defeated units off the field, only to return to discover the rest of their army has been soundly crushed!



Agreed. I should note that from what I have read, a lot of knights were, in fact, professional soldiers. Most soldiers were at least part-professional, and actual nobility formed smaller part of heavy cavalry IIRC. Larger part was formed from professional knights who served as retainers to a landed lord. Of course, that still does not mean that they worked well on massed-combat scale. In fact, when you take a look at Ottoman wars, when it comes to smaller campaigns and armies, Christian commanders such as Krsto Frankapan could easily criss-cross whole of Bosnia without meeting serious resistance. But while his expedition of 6 000 managed to easily force their way to Jajce in 1525., Ottomans beat the stuffing out of Hungarian army at Mohacs in 1526.

And yes, Black Army still had a lot of infantry. In fact, their tactics - from what little I had been able to find - seem to resemble those of Byzantine infantry square, where infantry basically formed a mobile fortress to provide shelter to supplies as well as for cavalry. Once enemy charged into infantry, cavalry would exit the square in order to hit the enemy from the flanks.


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## The Big Peat (Jan 25, 2020)

Aldarion, it sounds like you've done your research and should be telling us the answers, not the other way around!

One small point on depth vs frontage for a unit - you've got to consider how easy a unit is beyond any other considerations (and I think the bulk of multiple ranks is very important). It is easier to be heard by 25 people if they're stood in a square than if they're in a straight line. If you want them to wheel, a frontage of 5 people wheels quicker than one of 25. That's a fairly extreme example but you get the picture. Obviously a long line matters when being flanked, but there's ways and means there.

As for why the switch to mounted shock warfare - I don't know. And I don't think anybody truly knows for definite. My best, half-remembered, guess is that it was simply a matter of what the dominant military cultures of western Europe liked. I'd go so far as to say that off the top of my head, I can't think of another time and place where mounted shock cavalry were the dominant arm of warfare other than western/central Europe, about 800-1300 (obviously knights were used a great deal after still, but 1300 marks the point at which it was obvious they weren't dominant). Most other horse-centric armies loved missile fire too much for the shock cavalry to be the dominant arm. It is probable I'm missing a couple, but not many.


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## Aldarion (Jan 26, 2020)

The Big Peat said:


> Aldarion, it sounds like you've done your research and should be telling us the answers, not the other way around!



Trust me, the more you know, more questions you have. And my knowledge is primarily concentrated around Roman/Byzantine Empire and Croatian-Ottoman/Hungarian-Ottoman wars. Everything else, I know little more than what is present in school textbooks, I think. My knowledge about Anglo-Saxon military system comes from the time I was doing research for my article about military organization of Gondor, for example. Agincourt I only know anything about because I did some research on effectiveness of longbow vs plate armour after seeing that infamous scene in _Return of the King_.



The Big Peat said:


> One small point on depth vs frontage for a unit - you've got to consider how easy a unit is beyond any other considerations (and I think the bulk of multiple ranks is very important). It is easier to be heard by 25 people if they're stood in a square than if they're in a straight line. If you want them to wheel, a frontage of 5 people wheels quicker than one of 25. That's a fairly extreme example but you get the picture. Obviously a long line matters when being flanked, but there's ways and means there.



That is true, but from what I know it was not until gunpowder weapons and _tercios_ that truly deep units started appearing. Deepest units in pre-gunpowder era I am aware of are those of Macedon phalanx, at 16 ranks deep. Roman legion / centuria deployed in ranks 6 - 10 deep, depending on the period, Byzantine army also deployed in ranks 6 - 8 deep, Greek hoplite phalanx deployed in ranks 8 deep...



The Big Peat said:


> As for why the switch to mounted shock warfare - I don't know. And I don't think anybody truly knows for definite. My best, half-remembered, guess is that it was simply a matter of what the dominant military cultures of western Europe liked. I'd go so far as to say that off the top of my head, I can't think of another time and place where mounted shock cavalry were the dominant arm of warfare other than western/central Europe, about 800-1300 (obviously knights were used a great deal after still, but 1300 marks the point at which it was obvious they weren't dominant). Most other horse-centric armies loved missile fire too much for the shock cavalry to be the dominant arm. It is probable I'm missing a couple, but not many.



Actually, Byzantine Empire also deployed heavy cavalry - cataphracts - as its dominant offensive arm for a while, though infantry remained extremely important in defense. That being said, cataphracts have differences from feudal knights - I am not sure they ever truly utilized mounted shock combat akin to feudal knights until Komnenoi era. Mongols also had armoured melee horsemen, though I do not know much about their tactics.


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## The Big Peat (Jan 26, 2020)

Aldarion said:


> Trust me, the more you know, more questions you have. And my knowledge is primarily concentrated around Roman/Byzantine Empire and Croatian-Ottoman/Hungarian-Ottoman wars. Everything else, I know little more than what is present in school textbooks, I think. My knowledge about Anglo-Saxon military system comes from the time I was doing research for my article about military organization of Gondor, for example. Agincourt I only know anything about because I did some research on effectiveness of longbow vs plate armour after seeing that infamous scene in _Return of the King_.



Oh, there's always more questions. Always. I've got an MA in Military History and the main thing it taught me is a) how little I know and b) archival research involves actually working which is the worst.



> Actually, Byzantine Empire also deployed heavy cavalry - cataphracts - as its dominant offensive arm for a while, though infantry remained extremely important in defense. That being said, cataphracts have differences from feudal knights - I am not sure they ever truly utilized mounted shock combat akin to feudal knights until Komnenoi era. Mongols also had armoured melee horsemen, though I do not know much about their tactics.



It depends how you define it a little. The Mongols were very horse archer dependent... but does that make them the dominant arm? Or are the melee horsemen dominant because they deliver the killing blow? I should really read up more on them.


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## Aldarion (Jan 27, 2020)

The Big Peat said:


> It depends how you define it a little. The Mongols were very horse archer dependent... but does that make them the dominant arm? Or are the melee horsemen dominant because they deliver the killing blow? I should really read up more on them.



I would say that the dominant arm is the one that tactics are built around. In Byzantine example, cataphracts were never large percentage of the army... but infantry acted as basically shelter for cavalry, whereas cavalry did most of the work. Hence cavalry was the dominant arm. Mongol tactics on the other hand were built around horse archers. So overall, I would define dominant arm as one which creates conditions for victory.


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## .matthew. (Jan 27, 2020)

Some really good stuff here. I'm not 100% on the date mentioned, but I can talk a little about earlier medieval periods.

In relation to the size of armies, remember that feudal society worked through the positive opinion of those nobles beneath you. True about most governments even today, but in that time, uprisings mostly came from disgruntled dukes and counts. Having your subjects levy armies at great cost to themselves is a sure way to anger those whose loyalty you require to rule and they would try to give only the minimum they could get away with.

They were made of a very small number of professional soldiers and then large levies from the general population. The soldiers were supplied by their lord, but the peasants would have to bring their own equipment leading to a hodgepodge of equipment while simultaneously stripping their lords of field labour.

Against such compositions, cavalry charges would often break the line before impact. As has been said, it's morale and training and really long pikes that stand against a charge, none of which they had. At the same time, the cavalry would have to be very careful about becoming engaged like that; horses capable of war were horribly expensive and it doesn't take much to kill or cripple (running into a shield at ground level would break a leg which is why you'd often see them leaping before contact) and even a well trained knight would have a hard time after being thrown from a horse (though they were smaller than you'd imagine from horses today). Losses of a few dozen well trained soldiers would take a lord years to recover from, so they would more commonly use the levies as fodder and the cavalry as flankers when they could. Not to say charges didn't happen, but they only really used them to rout an enemy at that perfect moment.

Back to scales, the Roman armies, as a professional force, were over half a million strong at their peak (twenty times larger than most medieval armies). Fighting in Europe was conducted on a much smaller scale and with only a few thousand a side, a single unit may be 24x8=192 men. That seems reasonable (if not a little high) to me, and the more you put behind them the less mobility your force has not only due to the size of the unit itself, but also due to the reduction in separate entities that can be positioned on the field to take advantage of tactics and flanking (you're bringing less arms to bear at any single point).


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## Aldarion (Jan 27, 2020)

.matthew. said:


> Back to scales, the Roman armies, as a professional force, were over half a million strong at their peak (twenty times larger than most medieval armies). Fighting in Europe was conducted on a much smaller scale and with only a few thousand a side, a single unit may be 24x8=192 men. That seems reasonable (if not a little high) to me, and the more you put behind them the less mobility your force has not only due to the size of the unit itself, but also due to the reduction in separate entities that can be positioned on the field to take advantage of tactics and flanking (you're bringing less arms to bear at any single point).



Yes and no. Roman Empire in 1025. (Byzantine Empire) could raise around 250 000 men in ground army. Yet field armies were usually around 20 000 - 25 000 strong, oftentimes much smaller, though there were occasions where much larger forces were fielded. Roman armies of antiquity were also typically on such scale, though occasionally much larger. Battles in Hundred Years' War were on the similar scale - in fact, they were often smaller. Crecy had 20 000 - 30 000 men *total*, Agincourt as well. But Towtown in 1460. saw both sides deploy 30 000 men each. Outside Western Europe, Mohacs saw Ottomans field 50 000 - 70 000 men, against Hungarian 25 000 - 30 000.


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## .matthew. (Jan 27, 2020)

Aldarion said:


> Yes and no. Roman Empire in 1025. (Byzantine Empire) could raise around 250 000 men in ground army. Yet field armies were usually around 20 000 - 25 000 strong, oftentimes much smaller, though there were occasions where much larger forces were fielded. Roman armies of antiquity were also typically on such scale, though occasionally much larger. Battles in Hundred Years' War were on the similar scale - in fact, they were often smaller. Crecy had 20 000 - 30 000 men *total*, Agincourt as well. But Towtown in 1460. saw both sides deploy 30 000 men each. Outside Western Europe, Mohacs saw Ottomans field 50 000 - 70 000 men, against Hungarian 25 000 - 30 000.



I agree. I meant the combined forces of the antiquity Roman empire, including auxiliaries. Byzantine's empire were barely half of what Rome once claimed in land mass. By the most part you are correct in the sizes of the individual armies they usually fielded, although I will say that's more due to them not requiring any more men in many cases (they had borders across a sprawling empire and couldn't very well keep moving them back and forth.

A feudal nation would (in large cases) be able to match the 25k+ men (or even greater numbers in the odd case), but that would be their force limit so to speak. They would hold almost nothing back, committing their all to a war.


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## Aldarion (Jan 28, 2020)

.matthew. said:


> I agree. I meant the combined forces of the antiquity Roman empire, including auxiliaries. Byzantine's empire were barely half of what Rome once claimed in land mass. By the most part you are correct in the sizes of the individual armies they usually fielded, although I will say that's more due to them not requiring any more men in many cases (they had borders across a sprawling empire and couldn't very well keep moving them back and forth.



It is not just about requiremens - though you are definitely correct there - it is also about logistics. And not just supply, either - there is a limit on how large each individual column can be in order to march effectively. Normal marching rate was 15 miles per day. I could not find exact data on column length, but with large forces - larger than 25 000 or so, I think, and possibly even with as few as 10 000 men, I am not sure - column length would have exceeded the distance that could be marched in one day. As such, larger army would have been divided into multiple forces, and effectively coordinating movement of multiple columns is no easy thing. When Diocletian marched to Egypt, he divided his 70 000-strong army into four groups, largest of which had 25 000 men.


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