A concise and entertaining explanation of how other accounts, and
popular culture such as films, have misrepresented medieval warfare.
We don't know how medieval soldiers fought. Did they just walk forward
in their armor smashing each other with their maces and poleaxes for
hours on end, as depicted on film and in programs such as Game of
Thrones?
They could not have done so. It is impossible to fight in such a manner
for more than several minutes as exhaustion becomes a preventative
factor.
Indeed, we know more of how the Roman and Greek armies fought than we do
of the 1300 to 1550 period.
So how did medieval soldiers in the War of the Roses, and in the
infantry sections of battles such as Agincourt and Towton, carry out
their grim work?
Medieval Military Combat shows, for the first time, the techniques of
such battles. It also breaks new ground in establishing medieval battle
numbers as highly exaggerated, and that we need to look again at the
accounts of actions such as the famous Battle of Towton, which this work
uses as a basic for its overall study.
