Explanation: After the Classical era, the size of polities decreased… dramatically. While in many cases, medieval polities had access to superior military material technology than the great empires of antiquity, they suffered greatly from a lack of economy of scale, and especially a lack of organizational technology. When everything is ad-hoc, getting just 3,000 men together takes a herculean effort.
The core of military service in the medieval period was feudal obligation and short-term mercenary contract. A big part of the issue is that most forces were not actually owed to the central polity in the medieval period.
When an empire of antiquity sent out the call for troops from vassals, it was done on the basis of “When we say ‘jump’ you say ‘how high, sir?’”, allowing them to marshal large, long-term forces for military campaigns, even if not all of those troops were professionals. This same imbalance of power between the central government and local aristocracies made extraction of tribute and taxation possible.
But feudalism was built on a much more ‘equal’ basis - that is to say, when the central government demanded anything of the aristocracy, the inevitable response was “I don’t see how that’s my problem, Your Majesty.” Forcing the aristocracy to do anything beyond what their feudal contract demanded would necessitate, both by custom and by balance of power, a war - which would require troops, which would require the cooperation of the aristocracy, which… would not generally be forthcoming. Even regular taxation would not be a feature of most medieval polities until the ~12th-13th century AD, and medieval writing on government lionized the idea of a monarch that did not tax his subjects (read: the aristocracy).
That’s not to say that ordinary people didn’t get it in the pants - they very much did. But their feudal ‘dues’ were owed to their immediate overlord, not the monarch.
TBF, a lot of those troops were horseriders, and those are several times as powerful as regular infantry (especially with all the innovations to saddles and horserider lances that didn’t exist in antiquity). And in late medieval times, they were also extremely better armed and armored than professional soldiers from antiquity - full plate armor was an extreme advantage, if you could afford it.
I wonder at what point (well-trained) medieval european infantry was actually stronger than Roman troops at the height of their quality. Antique arms and armor weren’t that great compared to later technology, but early medieval polities weren’t able to supply most of their troops with state-of-the-art gear, and the training of the rank-and-file was definitely not on par with Roman soldiers.
TBF, a lot of those troops were horseriders, and those are several times as powerful as regular infantry (especially with all the innovations to saddles and horserider lances that didn’t exist in antiquity). And in late medieval times, they were also extremely better armed and armored than professional soldiers from antiquity - full plate armor was an extreme advantage, if you could afford it.
We meme here a bit - I would only regard the (exaggerated) joke to be valid probably until around the 10th century AD.
I wonder at what point (well-trained) medieval european infantry was actually stronger than Roman troops and the height of their quality. Antique arms and armor weren’t that great compared to later technology, but early medieval polities weren’t able to supply most of their troops with state-of-the-art gear, and the training of the rank-and-file was definitely not on par with Roman soldiers.
I’m admittedly a Romaboo, but I probably wouldn’t give the material edge to medieval infantry until around ~1400, and even then, only professional and semi-professional soldiery, like mercenaries and personal retinues, not so much the partly-trained levies of freemen and yeomen (England excepted). As late as 1300, though, most infantry would be equipped with gambesons alone, or chainmail in the case of some professional or semi-professional troops. A brigandine (especially with gambeson) is where armor starts to reach distinct superiority over Roman forms.
Melee weapons, I would argue, basically always had parity, and probably superiority as early as ~1200 AD, at least insofar as a clash between a Western European and Roman (Principate) army would be concerned. The gladius was a good weapon, but it wasn’t advanced except insofar as it could be said to be superior to some traditional forms of Celtic longswords and Hellenistic shortswords. A Principate-era gladius probably is not much different in terms of quality to most post-Carolingian swords. And while the pilum is a magnificent throwing weapon, it’s not as core in combat between heavily armored opponents who are not primarily reliant on their shield for protection.
The medieval period has Roman troops beat without a question, though, when it comes to other weapons. The Romans were not fantastic at dealing with other heavily armored troops - in Roman civil wars, it was often noted that combat took on an exceptional gruesome flavor as men fought effectively to exhaustion rather than being put out of combat by wounds.
Against heavily armored Persian cataphracts, exceptional methods were resorted to - and usually, what was achieved was driving the cataphracts off (as the nobility is generally not eager to die for their country) rather than stunning victories. Notably, both using their javelins as makeshift thrusting spears and having specially-made metal-tipped clubs/maces are recorded - as there wasn’t a ‘standard’ reply to that kind of head-to-toe armoring. Also notable, during a rebellion of particularly heavily-armored gladiators in Gaul in the 1st century AD, the entrenching tool/hatchet of the legionaries, the dolabra, was employed to get through. Basically, when Romans had to deal with heavy armor, it was all ad hoc.
As medieval warfare was dominated by the noble, knightly classes, getting through the other fellow’s armor was pretty core to the thinking of medieval weaponry - the rabble can be dispatched by trot of the warhorse, or the level of a lance, but a fellow knight is going to be trickier to handle! Not only that, but also, the proliferation of quilted armor in the form of gambesons (themselves generally thicker and more protective than the Hellenistic linothorax) meant that even the rabble might need a ‘firmer’ touch! As such, even just the common usage of flanged maces and dedicated battleaxes would give the medieval troops a distinct advantage - not even getting into later warhammers and specialized polearms. That even swords developed with an eye towards armor penetration - as seen in opposite ways by thrusting swords and falchions - is further advantage to the medieval infantry in that regard.
At the same time, the Roman use of the scutum doesn’t have much in the way of equivalents in medieval warfare, to my knowledge. Even the largest heater shields were very much still designed for cavalry use; that they were used by infantry as well was secondary.
The blast furnace didn’t come into widespread use in Europe until the 1500s. Before that, European metalworking wasn’t really much better in terms of quality to Roman cementation (itself pretty primitive) steelwork.
In terms of organization and discipline, I would argue that Romans maintain the edge probably even into the mid-late 1500s, or even later on specific details of professionalism. I would probably hazard early 1500s for parity on army leadership, NCOs exempted.
Alphapuggle PieFed
PugJesus
Share on Mastodon
Share on Reddit
Share on WhatsApp
Explanation: After the Classical era, the size of polities decreased… dramatically. While in many cases, medieval polities had access to superior military material technology than the great empires of antiquity, they suffered greatly from a lack of economy of scale, and especially a lack of organizational technology. When everything is ad-hoc, getting just 3,000 men together takes a herculean effort.
The core of military service in the medieval period was feudal obligation and short-term mercenary contract. A big part of the issue is that most forces were not actually owed to the central polity in the medieval period.
When an empire of antiquity sent out the call for troops from vassals, it was done on the basis of “When we say ‘jump’ you say ‘how high, sir?’”, allowing them to marshal large, long-term forces for military campaigns, even if not all of those troops were professionals. This same imbalance of power between the central government and local aristocracies made extraction of tribute and taxation possible.
But feudalism was built on a much more ‘equal’ basis - that is to say, when the central government demanded anything of the aristocracy, the inevitable response was “I don’t see how that’s my problem, Your Majesty.” Forcing the aristocracy to do anything beyond what their feudal contract demanded would necessitate, both by custom and by balance of power, a war - which would require troops, which would require the cooperation of the aristocracy, which… would not generally be forthcoming. Even regular taxation would not be a feature of most medieval polities until the ~12th-13th century AD, and medieval writing on government lionized the idea of a monarch that did not tax his subjects (read: the aristocracy).
That’s not to say that ordinary people didn’t get it in the pants - they very much did. But their feudal ‘dues’ were owed to their immediate overlord, not the monarch.
Afghanistan today- “deal!”
*wins.
More like “50,000 fighters with backing from Pakistan”
Metaphorical, naturally.
Armed with whatever pointy farm tools they have on hand.
TBF, a lot of those troops were horseriders, and those are several times as powerful as regular infantry (especially with all the innovations to saddles and horserider lances that didn’t exist in antiquity). And in late medieval times, they were also extremely better armed and armored than professional soldiers from antiquity - full plate armor was an extreme advantage, if you could afford it.
I wonder at what point (well-trained) medieval european infantry was actually stronger than Roman troops at the height of their quality. Antique arms and armor weren’t that great compared to later technology, but early medieval polities weren’t able to supply most of their troops with state-of-the-art gear, and the training of the rank-and-file was definitely not on par with Roman soldiers.
We meme here a bit - I would only regard the (exaggerated) joke to be valid probably until around the 10th century AD.
I’m admittedly a Romaboo, but I probably wouldn’t give the material edge to medieval infantry until around ~1400, and even then, only professional and semi-professional soldiery, like mercenaries and personal retinues, not so much the partly-trained levies of freemen and yeomen (England excepted). As late as 1300, though, most infantry would be equipped with gambesons alone, or chainmail in the case of some professional or semi-professional troops. A brigandine (especially with gambeson) is where armor starts to reach distinct superiority over Roman forms.
Melee weapons, I would argue, basically always had parity, and probably superiority as early as ~1200 AD, at least insofar as a clash between a Western European and Roman (Principate) army would be concerned. The gladius was a good weapon, but it wasn’t advanced except insofar as it could be said to be superior to some traditional forms of Celtic longswords and Hellenistic shortswords. A Principate-era gladius probably is not much different in terms of quality to most post-Carolingian swords. And while the pilum is a magnificent throwing weapon, it’s not as core in combat between heavily armored opponents who are not primarily reliant on their shield for protection.
The medieval period has Roman troops beat without a question, though, when it comes to other weapons. The Romans were not fantastic at dealing with other heavily armored troops - in Roman civil wars, it was often noted that combat took on an exceptional gruesome flavor as men fought effectively to exhaustion rather than being put out of combat by wounds.
Against heavily armored Persian cataphracts, exceptional methods were resorted to - and usually, what was achieved was driving the cataphracts off (as the nobility is generally not eager to die for their country) rather than stunning victories. Notably, both using their javelins as makeshift thrusting spears and having specially-made metal-tipped clubs/maces are recorded - as there wasn’t a ‘standard’ reply to that kind of head-to-toe armoring. Also notable, during a rebellion of particularly heavily-armored gladiators in Gaul in the 1st century AD, the entrenching tool/hatchet of the legionaries, the dolabra, was employed to get through. Basically, when Romans had to deal with heavy armor, it was all ad hoc.
As medieval warfare was dominated by the noble, knightly classes, getting through the other fellow’s armor was pretty core to the thinking of medieval weaponry - the rabble can be dispatched by trot of the warhorse, or the level of a lance, but a fellow knight is going to be trickier to handle! Not only that, but also, the proliferation of quilted armor in the form of gambesons (themselves generally thicker and more protective than the Hellenistic linothorax) meant that even the rabble might need a ‘firmer’ touch! As such, even just the common usage of flanged maces and dedicated battleaxes would give the medieval troops a distinct advantage - not even getting into later warhammers and specialized polearms. That even swords developed with an eye towards armor penetration - as seen in opposite ways by thrusting swords and falchions - is further advantage to the medieval infantry in that regard.
At the same time, the Roman use of the scutum doesn’t have much in the way of equivalents in medieval warfare, to my knowledge. Even the largest heater shields were very much still designed for cavalry use; that they were used by infantry as well was secondary.
The blast furnace didn’t come into widespread use in Europe until the 1500s. Before that, European metalworking wasn’t really much better in terms of quality to Roman cementation (itself pretty primitive) steelwork.
In terms of organization and discipline, I would argue that Romans maintain the edge probably even into the mid-late 1500s, or even later on specific details of professionalism. I would probably hazard early 1500s for parity on army leadership, NCOs exempted.
Well, that answers that question! Thank you for sharing your wealth of knowledge.
Always happy to ramble on my favorite subjects! 🙏