The cavalry rushes, the sword flashes and spears glisten.
Nahum 3: 3
Military affairs at the turn of the eras. The Chinese have a good saying, or rather, a wish to those whom they do not like: "So that you live in times of change!" Indeed, what could be worse? The old is crumbling, the new, although it is being created, is good or bad, so far you cannot understand. It seems that everything is gone. How to live further? In a word, one continuous stress. So it is, so it will be and so it was. On "VO" there was a whole series of articles devoted to the knightly armor of the era of their decline, 1500-1700, but many asked, how then did they fight in this new armor? That is, how did the tactics of the troops of the new era affect the changes in the equipment of soldiers, and the equipment affected, accordingly, their tactics? And since until now it was mainly about the armor itself, now it is time to talk about how the warriors dressed in them fought with each other at the turn of the Middle Ages and Modern times, that is, during times of change!
Ordinance companies of the French kings
So let's start with the source of change and the collapse of the old way of life. The Hundred Years War became such in Europe. She showed the incapacity of the old knightly army and at the same time led to the massive ruin of the nobility. Poverty reduced the lords' arrogance and forced them to hire themselves to serve the king, who became the giver of all goods. Already Charles VII replaced the knightly militia with ordinance companies: "large ordinance companies" (organized in 1439), in which a rider in full knightly armor and his five henchmen were paid 31 livres per month, and "small ordinance companies" (created in 1449.), or "companies of small salaries", where the "waste" of the mouths of large ones fell.
In total, the king had 15 companies of the "Grand Ordinance", each of which had in its composition 100 horsemen at arms in full armor and 500 in lighter ones, including one hundred pages, then three hundred archers and one hundred revelers - infantrymen with a sword, a kutile and a spear with a hook. However, he only fought on foot, just like the archers, and the whole company moved exclusively on horses, and the same reveler had two horses. The gendarme - the commander of the "spear" had four horses paid by the state. The page was content with one, but the shooter, like the boozer, had two of them. In total, there were 900 horses in the company, the care of which was entrusted to the horsemen, blacksmiths and other hired people, who also fed from the royal cauldron.
The knights of the ordinance companies (and the gendarmes on horseback wore full tsarist armor at that time) from the former knighthood was distinguished primarily by discipline. They were not allowed any feudal willfulness. On the battlefield, they acted as a solid mass, they were supported by archers and revelers. Moreover, at different times the number of riders in the "spear" could change. In the companies of King Louis XII, who fought with the landsknechts of Emperor Maximilian I, for example, there were first seven, and then in 1513 - eight. Henry II had six and eight people, and sometimes even 10-12. However, in general, the number of "royal men at arms" was small. Although the same Charles IX had 2590 in his 65 companies, only four of them had 100 men each as it should be, while in others it was much less. The riders were respectfully called "master", thus emphasizing that they are masters of their craft. However, gradually the quality of the training of the gendarmes at arms was steadily declining. As a result, in 1600 they were completely disbanded.
The reason for this change lies not in the fact that the kings became poorer and could not support such a horde of armed horsemen, but for a very simple reason. The main weapon of the gendarmes was a spear. And in order to master it, it required daily training, which means more fodder for the horses. But their effectiveness at the same time fell from year to year due to the improvement of the means of attack and defense, and … who could have thought of paying money to the troops that have ceased to meet their purpose ?!
To reduce the cost of the army, the same Louis XI most decisively expelled all luxury from it, forbidding the wearing of velvet and silk clothes. True, Louis XII started a fashion for lush plumes of feathers, which Francis I decided to somewhat shorten. Horses of gendarmes in a combat situation no longer wore armor (for example, in 1534 a special decree was issued prohibiting the wearing of a shaffron), although it was preserved for parades.
Ordinance companies of Karl the Bold
The dukes of Burgundy were the original, so to speak, enemies of the French kings ever since they fought against them side by side with the British in the Hundred Years War. And naturally, they all did the opposite of what their opponents did, even when they borrowed their initiatives. And it is not surprising that Charles the Bold in 1470 also created Ordinance companies. Initially, the "company" included 1000 riders and 250 service personnel. But the connection seemed too cumbersome and in 1473 the company began to include one hundred "spears", and each "spear" consisted of one rider in full knightly armor, one servant, one boozer, three riflemen and three more foot soldiers.
The only difference was in the names. In Burgundy, the company was called a "gang", and the commander of the "spear" was not a master, but a condottiere in the Italian manner. The company consisted of four "squadrons", each of which had four "chambers". The number of "chamber" - six horsemen, of whom one was its commander. The riflemen (300 people) walked separately from the horsemen, as well as 300 infantrymen. Both those and others were divided into hundreds, led by the centurion's "centenaries", and those, in turn, into three "thirties", which were commanded by the "thirties" - "trantenye". However, in addition to these specified soldiers who served for a salary under the contract, volunteers were also attributed to the "gang", who were hired to serve without a salary. Therefore, it is usually impossible to calculate the exact number of the Burgundian troops.
But outwardly, the "gangs" of Burgundians and the royal companies of the French kings differed greatly. They were allowed to dress in the fashion of those years in pleated skirts made of velor, gold-woven satin and gold brocade, and over their armor they wore satin cloaks and silk caftans. Ostrich feathers on helmets? Nobody even discussed it, it was such a routine! Karl the Bold himself sported in gold chain mail, a belt adorned with precious stones, and a sable fur coat covered with gold brocade. In it, by the way, he died, killed by some pitiful Swiss infantryman in utter severity! It is clear that the French horsemen, either completely chained in metal, or admitting only variations of gray and black cloth, complemented by white linen, in their clothes, could only arouse contempt among the Burgundians. So, by the way, it was not the Calvinist Reforms from Geneva, the French Protestant Huguenots, and not the English Puritans that brought the fashion to dress in Europe as easy as shelling pears. An example to all of them was shown by the King of France Louis XI himself!
Ordinance companies of Emperor Maximilian I
From the material "The Last Knight" readers of "VO" should remember that by marrying Mary of Burgundy in 1477, young Maximilian (then he was not yet the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation, but only the Archduke of Austria) received an excellent dowry, but at the same time a severe headache, since his new subjects wanted to live according to the old feudal laws, and they had not yet felt the winds of change. Maximilian did this: he did not dissolve the "gangs", but he greatly reduced their number and more … he never collected and never used in the war. In the remaining “gang” for the entire duchy there were only 50 horsemen, fifty horse and foot archers each, that is, in which case it would not play any role. But no one was offended - officially all these people were in the service and even got something from it!
Charles V in 1522 established the number of ordinance cavalry in the number of eight companies, 50 horsemen at arms and 100 riflemen each. The "spear" of 1547 consisted of five mounted warriors - a horseman at arms, his page, a boozer, and two riflemen. That is, the number of the company now reached 50 people, while it also had a captain, a lieutenant, a standard-bearer, a rifleman captain, several trumpeters and a chaplain. The divisions invented by Karl the Bold have survived. The infantry, although it was attached to the "gangs", moved separately during the campaign and had its own commanders.
Field armor of Emperor Ferdinand I (1503 - 1564). Manufactured approx. 1537 Master: Jörg Seusenhofer (1528 - 1580, Innsbruck). (Vienna Armory, Hall III) Sultans with feathers served not only for decoration, just like scarves over their shoulders, they indicated the rank of the commander.
The men at arms wore clothing over their armor. First of all, it was a fluffy pleated skirt or a caftan with a skirt and tight sleeves. "Archers" were only called archers. In fact, they wore arquebusses and pistols, but were armed with demilancez (half-spears) - cuirass, helmet and plate gloves. Hands could be protected with chain mail. Ordinance companies fought from 1439 to 1700, and during this time they experienced a complete rearmament from a spear to an arquebus and a pistol!
However, the Ordonance companies also had a predecessor, though regional, known in Italy and abroad as the Condotta. But we will tell you about the condotta and everything connected with it next time.
P. S. The author and the site administration would like to thank the curators of the Vienna Armory Ilse Jung and Florian Kugler for the opportunity to use her photographs.
