Feudal Troop Types

Historical References on Medieval Europe

The Assize of Arms (1242) - Henry III

Freemen:

• "Furthermore, all who, outside the forest, can have bows and arrows are to have them; but those in the forest [are to have] bows and bolts."

Command Structure:

• And in the various cities and boroughs all men sworn to arms shall be obedient to their mayors, or to their reeves and bailiffs where there are no mayors.
• In each of the other vills, moreover, there shall be established one or two constables, according to the number of the inhabitants and the decision of the aforesaid [officials].
• Besides, in each hundred there shall be established a chief constable, at whose command all men sworn to arms in his hundred shall be assembled; and to him they shall be obedient in carrying out necessary measures for the conservation of our peace.
• The chief constables of the various hundreds, moreover, shall be obedient to the sheriff and the two knights aforesaid, in coming at their command and in carrying out necessary measures for the conservation of our peace.

Contamine, Philippe. War in the Middle Ages. New York: Basil Blackwell, 1989

Crossbowmen:

• "Employed since Antiquity under various forms, the crossbow, after a period of relative eclipse, once again came to prominence in the last decades of the eleventh century."
• "The Byzantines were not the only ones to recognize the diabolical qualities of the crossbow. The Papacy shared the same opinion and for this reason the second Ecumenical Lateran council (1139) anathematized all those who used the crossbow (and also the bow) in wars between Christians. Already in 1096-97 Urban II had condemned the action of crossbowmen and archers against Christians. Naturally this prohibition was very unevenly observed according to circumstances, times and places."
• "But from the end of the twelfth century the crossbow was widely used on land and sea, amongst horsemen as well as infantry, more deliberately in sieges than in pitched battles and more often in southern Europe than in the North."
• "The slowness with which the crossbow was reloaded between two shots led to the creation of a new corps of pavesari whose great bucklers or shields (pavois) protected the crossbowmen during this time. During the campaign of Montaperti in 1260, Florence employed 300 pavesari to protect the 1,000 crossbowmen she had."

Bowmen:

• "Whatever may have been their importance, the crossbowmen on foot were not the only form of infantry. There were also archers, known in Italy as well as in England, where their role appears to have increased from the middle of the thirteenth century as the diffusion of the long bow, utilized in the Welsh wars, rejuvenated this traditional weapon. At the end of Edward I's reign archers enjoyed a preponderance which was almost absolute among the English infantry."
• "In 1264 a process of selection was only practiced. Each village (vill, villata) had to pick four, six, or eight foot soldiers, particularly reputed for their bravery to be armed with spears, bows, arrows, crossbows and swords. These men, grouped in tens and hundreds, were to be led by standardarii and mounted constables."

Other Missile Troops:

• "At the end of the twelfth century Gerald of Wales, who had accompanied Prince John on his expedition to Ireland (1185), indicated in the Expugnatio hibernica the methods most likely to defeat the Irish: 'In Irish warfare it is above all necessary to ensure that archers are added and mixed up with squadrons of knights, so that the stones thrown by the Irish, with which they are accustomed to oppose heavily and well-mounted troops, as well as their manner of attacking on all sides, then withdrawing without injury because of their agility, may be countered by arrows shot in every direction.'"

Nicolle, David. Medieval Warfare Source Book Warfare in Western Christendom. London: Brockhampton Press, 1999

Crossbowmen and Bowmen:

• "But the most prestigious and most highly paid infantry of this period were undoubtedly the crossbowmen. The first crossbow mercenaries to be recorded in substantial numbers during the 12th century appear to have been Genoese from northern Italy and Gascons from southwestern France. As yet they were still often associated with ordinary hand-bow archers; Genoa itself sending only ten crossbowmen accompanied by two hundred other archers to support neighboring Alessandria in 1181."
• "By that tome (1300), the elite of the professional crossbowmen were already mounted, though they probably fought on foot and should thus be classed as mounted infantry."
• "Yet there is also clear evidence that the knights of the French Midi could treat infantry crossbowmen as fellow professionals, even if this did not extend to other foot soldiers."
• "In France, the longbow was not ousted by the crossbow until the early 13th century; nor did the longbow ever disappear in England."
• "A clearly increasing importance of archers, and more particularly of crossbowmen, may actually have been in response to the increasing effectiveness of the armored cavalry charge; even crossbowmen had initially appeared as a consequence of increased siege warfare. Such infantry were also more effective than is generally recognized."
• "Crossbows of composite construction had probably been known in the Islamic world for some time, but were first recorded in Europe in the second half of the 12th century."

Other Missile Troops:

• "Other light infantry still used javelins; particularly the dardiers of Gascony and several other parts of southern France. Light infantry axes appear to have been characteristic of the Lithuanians, while many Irish foot soldiers still used slings to good effect, particularly against Anglo-Norman cavalry horses."
• "Mercenary infantry were recruited from an even wider area: ranging from Wales and Scotland, both of which were under English suzerainty, from the English-ruled regions of France, from among the spear-armed infantry of Flemish cities, from Spanish Navarese, Aragonese and Basque spear or javelin troops; perhaps even from among the Muslims of the Norman kingdom of Sicily." (England)