4 Misconceptions about Medieval Shield Walls in Movies
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- Опубліковано 1 жов 2022
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War Thunder is a highly detailed vehicle combat game containing over 2000 playable tanks, aircrafts, and ships spanning over 100 years of development. Immerse yourself completely in dynamic battles with an unparalleled combination of realism and approachability.
Medieval Shield walls have become a favorite of today’s moviemakers. But if you take a closer look, it’s clear that the historical shield wall has little to do with the heroic, spectacular, and often acrobatic mess we see in films  In reality, fighting in a shield wall was unspectacular brutal soldiering. However, in film, battles are an occasion for a hero to prove himself. Such scenes are climactic and popular media is often much more interested in good drama than in historical authenticity. Nevertheless, the medieval shield wall is a controversial topic not only among history buffs but also among historians. Still, there are some things that can be said about the historical shield wall with a fair degree of certainty - and thus some aspects of pop media depictions can be identified as myths. In this video, we’re going to tackle four common misconceptions about medieval shield walls.
Bibliography:
In this video we heavily relied on
Rogers, C. J., Soldiers’ Lives Through History. The Middle Ages, Westport 2007.
Other recommended reading:
Abels, R., Alfred the Great, the micel hæðen here and the Viking threat, in: T. Reuter (ed.), Alfred the Great. Papers from the Eleventh-Centenary Conferences, Ashgate 2003.
Bates, David, William the Conqueror, Stroud 2001.
Bennett, Matthew; Bradbury, Jim; DeVries, Kelly; Dickie, Iain; Jestice, Phyllis, Fighting Techniques of the Medieval World AD 500-AD 1500: Equipment, Combat Skills and Tactics, New York 2006.
Halsall, G., Warfare and Society in the Barbarian West, c. 450-900, London 2003.
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Reading list:
Warfare:
Duffy, C., Siege Warfare: The Fortress in the Early Modern World 1494-1660, Vol. 1, 1979. amzn.to/32dvvwM
Devries, K., Douglas, R., Medieval Military Technology, 1992, amzn.to/3IazYoC.
Rogers, C.J., The military revolution debate. Readings on the military transformation of early modern Europe, 1995. amzn.to/3geVDMM
Rogers, C.J., Soldiers' Lives through History - The Middle Ages, 2006. amzn.to/3j2kQvG
Parker, C., The Cambridge History of Warfare, 2005. amzn.to/32ggn1L
Van Nimwegen, O., The Dutch Army and the Military Revolutions, 1588-1688, 2010. amzn.to/2E3Fc95
Fiction related to the Early modern period:
Alexandre Dumas,The Three Musketeers amzn.to/2CJVAuu
Alexandre Dumas, 20 Years After amzn.to/32g82Lv
Alexandre Dumas, The Vicomte de Bragelonne amzn.to/2EnIOCB
Markus Heitz, The Dark Lands amzn.to/3ntZgEu
Military Si-Fi recommendations:
Bernard Cornwell, Sharpe (Series of 22 books on the Napoleonic Wars), amzn.to/3RZyty0
Dan Abnett, The Founding: A Gaunt's Ghosts Omnibus (Gaunt’s Ghosts) amzn.to/3vdGxkZ
Dan Abnett, The Lost: A Gaunt's Ghosts Omnibus (Gaunt’s Ghosts) amzn.to/3osvFvA
Dan Abnett, The Saint A Gaunt's Ghosts Omnibus (Gaunt’s Ghosts) amzn.to/3orikUk
Glen Cook, Chronicles of the Black Company (Chronicles of the Black Company Series Book 1) amzn.to/3PVgyGV
Historiography:
Neville Morley, Writing Ancient History 1999. amzn.to/3NCyoNl
Albeit focused on ancient history, it's a brilliant book for anybody who is interested in what history actually is. Is it a story? How does it work in practise? Can writing history be objective? Is it "scientific"? What makes it a proper discipline at university?
In this video we heavily relied on one of Clifford Rogers' book: Soldiers’ Lives Through History. The Middle Ages, Westport 2007. We recommend you check it out yourselves here: amzn.to/3j2kQvG
Play War Thunder now with my link, and get a massive, free bonus pack including vehicles, boosters, and more: wtplay.link/sandrhomanhistorywt
hello sir your fan from India 🇮🇳, love ❤ your work and plz make some videos on India( not about mughals ) Thank you
an unexpected sponsor.
Is there anyway to listen to your music?
What a liar. I see you never have even one minute in warthunder. You doing false advertisement. Your credibility is gone. Like forever. I bet, you lie about the shieldwalls too.....
Sounds cool but I can't stand the freemium model
The amount of people that overlook the role of a simple rock in warfare has never had one fall on them
Yeah, in movie sieges they always show the defenders pouring boiling oil on the attackers, but never just dropping a 15kg rock from 7m height.
Rocks are incredibly easy to find and will kill you dead.
Even the Spartans used rocks effectively at the battle of plataea.
Yeah, or they never seen a riot in a less developed nation. People throwing rocks can cause serious damage in a disorganized mob, let alone in a trained army.
@@relix7373 Even in developed nations. The hooligan riots are no joke, and some protests can get really violent when people see that they are walking on amunition.
The problem is to find the suitable rocks and whether it needed more logistic than arrows.
Ironically, the books on which "The Last Kingdom" were based emphasise how important it was to stay in ranks and not engage in individual duels. But that doesn't look as heroic on screen.
Plus Uhtred was wearing the wolf's crested helmet and the strongest chainmail armour he could as he was a rich Lord and was insanely proud of being a warlord in his shining glory. TV needs visible faces to show off the actors.
@@mattbiggs1992
Wait, he had an identifiable signature look that included a distinctive helmet? Now I'm even more disappointed.
"Pullo, back in formation!!"
@@eldorados_lost_searcher if I recall from the books correctly- I read them a couple weeks ago- some of his soldiers do eventually adopt his "signature," wolf shaped helmet design. But yes. Definitely could have worked for the show, very sad that they didn't include that.
@@mattbiggs1992 it would be funny if they did some kind of superhero type thing where a character’s helmeted look is used just as much, or more than the actor’s face
The fighting amongst the Italian city states was an interesting development of the shieldwall. Apperently they added a war wagon to tie the line together, give orientation to the soldiers and to improve morale. Supposedly the fighting amongst the lombard city states/communes was extremely brutal as surrendering the carrocio meant shame so there was an extra incentive to not back down from a fight. Which is partly why the lombard infantry men at legnano managed to be the first infantry to beat knights on the open field, when they faced the emperor Barbarossa.
What year was this and is there a book you would recommend on this sort of thing?
@@codyfarrell8965 May 29, 1176 which is more than 120 years than the traditionaly famous Infantry victory over cavalry battle of the golden spurs (11 July 1302). Legnano is actually pretty famous in Italy, and I assume in germany if you study the HRE at any point.
As for books, the ones I have are in Italian unfortunately. A good one on the Lombard League is "The Lombard League, 1167-1225" by Gianluca Raccagni
I read the opposite
That the fighting between Italian city states was least bloody and most ritualistic, because of major employment of mercenaries. Opposing mercenary captains were familiar with each other and often entered gentlemens' agreement to keep the fighting less vicious
The Italian states were surprised by the bloodiness of warfare which King Francis brought to their land when he invaded them
@@rohitrai6187 That is true afterwards. The rise of mercenary armies happened during the late 1300s and 1400s (partially thanks to the influx of English Mercenaries during the 100 years war). It nominally started with emperor Frederick II when he used a mercenary army in his wars.
But before that, especially in the 1100s and 1200s, italian warfare was much more brutal than in the continent, where modes of conduct were more ritualized.
Well they were not the first right.
Asterix and Obelix in England has a fairly realistic battle where the Britons form a shield wall and the Romans advance slowly against it. Of course that battle is then broken up when the Britons have to go for a tea break.
Love how out of all movies asterix is probably the most accurate depiction of shield wall I've seen in cinema, even if they break formation for tea
@@comradekenobi6908 asterix actually is quite accurate where it wants to be i always thought. Of course, most of the times it doesnt want to. It wants to make jokes, depict modern and ancient stereotypes and be fun for kids. But look at the armours, the organisation and the overall feeling of rome, its better than most "historical" movies
@@MikeOxlong70 ironically
Which part is the realistic one, the shield wall or the tea break?
@@Rig0r_M0rtis both
"Shield wall" is simply the most effective way of holding your ground when fighting in a group with soldiers carrying shields. We always do it in reenactment, regardless of whether we're doing early or late medieval.
I would say that one of the main reasons why movies "get" shield walls wrong is because actual fighting in a shield wall is, well... boring. It's just two lines standing about 6 feet apart from each other poking with long pointy sticks trying to find an opening between enemy shields and moving their shields to block their opponents' pointy sticks, until eventually someone's pointy stick manages to get through or you get stabbed by a stick on your left/right because you were focusing too much on the guy right in front of you. There's nothing cinematic or heroic to portray there that the average moviegoer expects to see in a big budget spectacle.
Yes, there is no great mystery to it, really. The ancient hoplites were forming up their phalanxes in shield walls as well. You can see even older pictures from mesopotamian kingdoms showing their spearmen forming up in rough shield walls. It's likely to be as old and natural as organized warfare.
16th century Japanese entered the chat
You're all getting it wrong. Shield walls aren't about all standing shoulder to shoulder and doing literally piss nothing. That's not a real formation. That stopped being a thing after the phalanx got absolutely steamrolled by the superior tactics and formational flexibility of the Roman Legions. It's just not a real Medieval formation. Variations that were much more active and actually had a purpose, such as breaking apart other defensive formations, are where you actually see something akin to what we think of as the shield wall.
Idk about it being boring, i mean tons of people like Dunkirk, a war movie with very little fighting just soldiers fleeing, waiting for ships and getting bombed, so I won't imagine a historically accurate shield wall to be that boring 🤷♂️
2 lines, chilling on the battlefield... 6 feet apart cause they're not gay
One of the issues with depicting the use of missile weapons against massed infantry, for filmmakers, is safety. With movie magic, you can get a few individual shots using dummies and jump cuts. However, in a open battle scene with extras in mock combat, it's too dangerous to allow extras to throw missiles at each other. IIRC, this is the reason why there were no pila being thrown in the Battle of Philippi in Rome Season 2, while the legionaries are shown marching with pila, the scene skips to them engaging in melee.
They could throw rubber stuff lol
@@carsonjones528 It wouldn't work on screen. Foam props are often used for melee fights as camera angles and special effects can "sell" the hits. However, with foam missiles, they bounce. Foam javelins wouldn't fly very well, and you'll end up laughing as the camera sweeps over to show the "donks" on helmets and shields. If you create a sharper, heavier spear that will stick in the target... then you've got a real spear that will kill someone.
That is when CGI can do wonders: just a background detail that doesn't steal camera time, but helps to tell a story.
you could possibly make a foam missile project with bits of hard rubber on the tip and the back or something, just enough weight on certain points that it can mock the flight pattern of an actual heavy missile, I'm just spitballing but it doesn't seem that unreasonable
You could very easily make this work with tricks of editing and filming though... Not much of an excuse really if one truly cared about portraying an accurate battle
Shieldwall means nothing if an enemy is using a tank from war thunder.
What if it’s a really bloody large shieldwall?
you can angle your shields so the shells will ricochet off of them and enough men packed together will stop any charging tank in its tracks🤓
That's a ramp.
Yeah, I have always loved the fact that in Vikings there's always a commander shouting SHIELDWAAAALL! with such emphasis only for the men to break formation seconds later and charge like a bunch of maddened boars
What I hate about war movies is that they usually give very little attention to tactics and formations. Instead, it's usually just one or a few guys slashing their swords left and right in the middle of the enemy.
You forgot the fact that horses, no matter how well trained, aren’t suicidal and will most likely be scarred by 100 pointy things in their direction
Not only that, but they will also be scared by the screams of the ennemy in front of them. Animals are not stupid. Doesn't take much to startle a horse, it's very easy to trigger a horse's flight or fight response. If the horse doesn't want to go, he'll let you know by throwing you off its back.
I think a modern riot or a brawl between hooligans is a pretty good glimpse at what the warfare of old would have looked like: Lots of hesitation, lots of posturing but very little actual crashing into each other, since nobody wants to be the first to take a spear to the face. Formations are essentially the back rows shoving the front rows into the enemy.
"Nobody wants to be the first to take a spear to the face."
Taxed!
Nobody wants to get a spear into their faces UNLESS someone throws a projectile first :D
Yeah I always think of those riots in Ukraine back in 2014 as having depicted medieval combat the best. Soldiers fighting in groups with sometimes a man getting caught out of formation.
I once saw a video about "the fighting gap", but I can not find it anymore
I always see this idea thrown around but I simply don’t believe it, the idea that formations of soldiers would’ve constantly hesitated to fight one another and would have skittishly postured around the field. Trained, disciplined soldiers - especially ones with experience and good morale - would fucking fight.
@@autokrator_ Bro 80% of modern soldiers don't aim at their enemies when engaging in a fire fight, so if they can't squeeze a trigger to end another human being do you seriously think they could just walk up there and cleave a skull? Also trained disciplined soldiers with experience and good morale where an absolute minority on the battle fields of old, mostly you'd get conscripts/militia who trained a couple weeks per year and probably never saw a battle before. Now if you actually had them, like the Legions of Caesar or the Phalangites of Alexander who spent decades at war, then they'd cut through multitudes of regular soldiers. But again, they are the exception.
In ancient warfare, cavalry wasn't a bulldozer, but instead it was fast moving infantry.
Hard saddles, and Stirrups hadn't been invented at the time, so trying to ram your horse into the enemy would more likely knock you off your horse.
So, when you imagine Alexander the great executing the hammer and anvil charges, think of it like the horses moving behind the enemy line, making quick stabs with their spears, then leaving before the back rank of soldiers can turn and hit your cavalry.
Before this invention was finally brought to Europe by Huns
even a stirrup wouldn't save you from such collision lol . french cavalry at eylau charged at a fast-walk speed and managed to make a russians withdraw. heavy cavalry was never a "bulldozer"
@@dolsopolar Heavy Cavalry was a bulldozer for sure.
As a War of 1812 reenactor, Jean du Bueil's point that "It takes only a bush to break them up" shows the difficulty of moving in formation and how important battlefield communication is. This year, we were assembling by battalion in 2 ranks to give the crowd a good show of our numbers before marching onto the field, creating a very long line. However, as we marched onto the battlefield, there was a fallen tree blocking my company's movement and then there was confusion between the officers, as I heard "form up behind the tree" while another to "move around the tree," which then rippled down to us infantrymen, as our company was then the only unit standing still as the rest of the batallion advanced. We then had to break our formation and sprint around the tree to get back in line, which just kinda looked bad on our behalf and made us really cranky with the officers for the rest of the battle.
Extrapolating this to an actual combat situation if we were under fire, this would've reduced the strength of the advance by 1/3 and only added to the chaos, especially for the company we were supposed to be standing beside. And that kind of screw up was about the panic it caused for cohesion for a ranged battle with drilled NCO's who can still coordinate with each other: if such a thing were to happen while attempting a running bayonet charge, we probably would've just been left behind in the confusion, and the rest of the battalion would either continue at 2/3rds strength or realize the mistake and break off the charge--mostly likely descending into a rout due to the amount of casualties suffered by advancing so close.
For a group of vikings to perform a perfect formation advance without any complications would be quite amazing, especially since interlocking shields means that one person tripping on a root or a small depression could potentially trip up several men and greatly weaken the whole integrity of the wall.
There are some misconceptions here too.
The proper shieldwall was evolved in the north by Anglo Saxons and Vikings as the use of cavalry was not prominent and infantry was the way of warfare. It was not different from what the Greek did with the hoplite, as Calvary was not numerous or effective and acted mostly as an harass tool. Unlike the hoplites, which were heavily armoured footmen, the shieldwall was born out of necessity, not different from the Sassanid "Chained" infantry, which was not probably in shackles, but rather fighting in tightly packed formation under a wall of shield, composed by lightly armoured levies as Cohesion gave them confidence. Lombards and Goths infantries, due to the different fluidity of a warfare dictated by horses, choose to give prominence to the use of the bow (Aistulf law), but were "trained" (in a very loosely term) to fight in a defensive formation with shield and spear if needed. The fact that shieldwall never came out as a viable tactic in the Sarmatized steppes, is because they were not supposed to actively fight like that during warfare, but rather try to keep pace with their cavalry, acting both as support and anchor for their charges, like the Normans did at Hastings.
Another characteristics which defines the "proper" shieldwall tactics is the two handed Axe, which is necessary to break the wooden shield of the enemy shieldwall when in contact, carried by both the Huscarls and the Russ. The axe was a common everyday item as it was both a tool and a weapon easy to own and practice for levies coming to the battle. The shieldwall formation works best for untrained warriors to give them a sense of security and giving them several tasks to perform is the best way to create problems the enemy can exploit.
The tactic of throwing weapons was mostly used by the early Frank tribes, which were often fighting offensive wars facing better equipped Romans, used to charge the opponents line like the Celts before them, but not very relevant in the British isles for example, where a less aggressive stance on the battlefield was adopted. For shooting the enemy line proper light units made of archers were present, which were much more effective at showering the enemy then a bunch of footmen packed together and impeding each other while trying to throw stuff. Even the Franks, which were equipped with Franciscas, used it as a shock weapon while charging the enemy line, or taking a charge, like the Roman Pilum, but not across the whole battle, due to the limited supply of axes.
What the Anglo Saxon evolved was a two line fighting system, with the first line was tasked to hold the shield and the second could use the two hand axes which could reach the enemy, like a sort of proto halberd, but was not very effective when facing a more mobile mix of cavalry and infantry as Harald experienced. This is why the Shieldwall did not become widespread outside the "Viking people", which came via longships not viable to carry horses, and the Saxons, which did not have wide access to horses as well. As widespread use of horses came in Britain the Shieldwall lost it's value and the armies quickly diversified.
Outside the Ango Saxon wars, the only notable use of proper shieldwall we have was the Anglo-Saxons Russ mercenaries as bodyguard of the Byzantine generals and possibly two other cases: Poiter, by the Franks and Tagina by the Lombards and Gepids. The Russ were supposed to work as a bastion bodyguard for the commander in chief of the Byzantines, superbly equipped and motivated, but not supposed to fight directly unless things were going very badly. I can't remember any instance where a Shieldwall, even performed by higly motivated and trained troops, could survive facing a traine heavy cavalry (not even true knights), Dyrrachium (1081AD), Monteploso (1041AD), Montemaggiore 1041AD Olivento (1041AD), Charrae (53BC): as soon as the shieldwall become isolated from the main line of friendly cavalry, it inevitably crumbled as the enemy could choose where to fight and where to muster it's force, as the shieldwall could not actively counter that. In this era, Normans and Franks were still using a "fencing" horse combat style, despite having adopted Stirrups from the Lombards, with spears kept high, used to hit the enemy form above, rather then as true "shock lance" formation with a rest and the weight of the horse behind it, but the shieldwall was already failing. It were the Swiss that gave back Infantry its dominance 300 years later.
Poiter and Tagina were two cases where a dismounted heavy cavalry fought on foot on a battlefield of choice to fend off a numerically superior enemy cavalry, while acting as anchors for their own cavalry units. In case of the Gepids and the Lombards it was also a cioice by Narses to keep them on the battlefield as they were not considered reliable allies and his army had a fair number of horse units anyway.
As the Hoplite was succeded by the Phalangite, the Legionary, the shieldwall due to the Hunnic wars, and the heavy cavalry, so the Shieldwall became obsolete as the horsemen were equipped with stirrups and were able to stand their ground against a poorly armoured footman hiding behind a rounded shield.
The most often result of a cavalry charge vs shield wall was actually that the horses would just stop or turn. Because horses aren't stupid, they're not trying to kill themselves and would rather not impale themselves...
That being said, a well train war horse can be trained out of its survival instincts. Or a large hormation can be used to put the horses into a stampede like frenzy that would trample any formation in it's path (however it could be theoretically hard to control said stampede)
"hold the line" "testudoooooo" "Shield Wall" "fix bayonets" "chaaaarge"
if your historical movie doesn`t at least contain one of these tropes, fire your director and get an new one.
of course all your arrow are fire arrows, and you wield your bow like its an assault rifle while you tactically move with your bowbuddies. cuz that how castles where taken. Not by guys wielding blunt force weapons, halberds and swords.
Or sieges.
Frankly, I never understood all the charging and shouting and utter shaky cam chaos. Even as a child I always thought it looked kind of stupid. This feeling has only strengthened ever since.
I've always held firm to the belief that a faithful depiction of battlefield condition does a much better job of portraying drama and excitement than most artificially created drama. Because it gives the filmmaker the chance to bring out the human aspect far more than focusing on intricate set pieces with complicated choreography focused on making singular characters look good.
You never see slingers in war movies, at least I haven’t
They were common in ancient times and used into the Middle Ages
As I've always seen in video games at least. It is never a good idea to send a cavalry charge head on into a formation. Best to maneuver them around to flank the formation from either the side or behind. Ideally while your infantry their front line engaged/distracted.
In fact, would about say LoTR: The Two Towers, used their cavalry really well. Note that Gandalf shows up late with his Cavalry reinforcements while the orcs are distracted with their siege. Effectively flanking them from behind. Afterword, Theoden and his Riders of Rohan charge out from Helm's Deep once the orcs were sufficiently distracted by Gandalf reinforcements. Effectively flanking then yet again.
Good old hammer and anvil strat.
One of the most infuriating uses of a "shield wall" was in vikings, The Great Heathen Army forms a loose wall, only to immediately break it and charge
Vikings is a historical drama loosely based upon real events. Perhaps you have a mental health issue if you cannot accept that fiction is for entertainment purposes.
If hero confronts the enemy for the first time and is shot full of arrows.... it is a pretty short episode and TV series. What makes fiction entertaining is it allows viewers to 'befriend' the protagonists, dislike the antagonists, and to pretend they could live like one of the characters in another timeline.
@@willmuny9201 I take it that you have never read a novel then if you cannot do fiction?
Mate, you sound like a walking, talking peanut.
Horse warfare is more about psychology than it is about strength or attack power. I had always wondered why, if cavalry charge is so effective, Napoleon's men in tiny square formation wouldn't had worked. Well, it turns out a horse is not a suicidal animal and it would not charge into anything it thinks could be fatal. So, horse psychology has come into play. Later, I learn that horsemen are also not suicidal animals and in fact value their own life more than the plebs that made up the infantry. Hmmm… so that's what those pikes with hooks are for.
All armor is futile in the battle. Soldiers with helmets die like flies in movies but hero whose long hair and braids are free survives. And if he has taken of his mail and shows his bodybuilder physics hes even more likely to come out victorious.
Ha! Rippling muscles and flowing locks win the day!
There was, apparently, a technique for breaking shield walls, called The Boar's Nose. This was a group of large and or veteran fighters placed within a shield wall at one place, to create a strong point that could force gaps in the enemy line. It was, apparently, used by Nordic fighters, especially against the shorter infantry they met as mercenaries for Byzantium.
The Vikings show has made the norse popular again but the thing to remember is that they lost most of the fixed battles they were in. They were great pirates, but not great warriors. Even their own saga states one english housecarl is worth 10 vikings.
@@biffmarcum5014 Decent warriors, skirmishers and raiders. Not ready for close order combat.
The time-honored adage in military planning is "the best plan dissolves with the first contact with the enemy. So, "improvise, adapt, and overcome".
@@morganspector5161 Von Moltke also said that planning was nevertheless very useful.
I imagine blunt force weapons would be good in these situations? Better than spears or swords at bashing in shields and causing the enemy to reel. Heavily armoured guys with warhammers, maces etc.
One thing I've always wondered about using Pikes vs horses...Would a cavalry charge really try to attack rows of pikes head on? Even the documentary Braveheart made out the Scottish had their spears lying flat in the grass, only putting them up at the last minute when it would presumably be too late to stop a charge. If the pikes are dug into the ground and prepared, you'd imaging even the horses themselves wouldn't be stupid enough to run straight into it?
I think horses have this things on their eyes so they can't really see what's going on the battlefield, also they are trained to do exactly that.
You're right. Any solid mass will deter most horses - even just a compact infantry without spears. I'm sure some war horses were well bred and trained and armored enough to follow through with a suicidal charge into a dense mass of men, but I doubt that was a good tactic considering the value of those types of horses and horsemen. Why charge infantry head on when your cavalry can outmaneuvre and outflank them so easily? I bet just the psychology of having cavalry behind an infantry block will cause them to spoil formation as they try to cover ALL the angles.
@@abdulkarimelnaas7595 Also, in XVI and XVII century Polish Winged Hussars used specific tactics to counter pike rows. They attacked in loose formation, mostly to avoid musket fire, and created tight formation just before enemy lines using their long pikes to break trough enemy formation. In such manner, horses were unable to stop or turn.
Things like giving the horsemen longer spears worked for a bit, but eventually pike would win out over lances for length.
But against an unbroken formation, even bayonetts were usually enough to keep mounted units at bay. Some of the main notable exceptions I've seen were where a horse panicked and lost control (both the rider's control, and the horse's control of itself) and basically rammed itself onto the bayonetts which then made a hole that could be exploited. Or similarly if a horse was killed just short of the line but its momentum carried it into the infantry, again making a hole.
As well as others noted, of having the horses packed tight enough that they CAN'T avoid it, but unless the infantry breaks that's going to be fiendishly expensive. Especially since after the initial impact, now your horsemen have lost momentum in the middle of a dense infantry formation, where being mounted now becomes a disadvantage.
However your solid mass with long spears, effective against cavalry then turns into a slaughterhouse when engaged by archers.
I haven't watched the Last Kingdom show because, as a fan of the book series it's based on, it looked pretty bad.
One of the aspects that I really loved about the books was how Uhtred (who in-universe wrote the books in first-person) always talks about how the shieldwall is how armies fight, and how it's a nasty, horrible pushing and shoving, and stabbing trying to get past shields with smallish weapons. He had a big longsword for dueling, but the shieldwall was no place for it.
So seeing Uhtred fucking sprint out and roll over the enemy shieldwall in that clip was painful to watch.
Movies need drama 😅
to be fair, he only did that suicidal jump after he saw someone he cared dearly about killed in cold blood. Most of the time he is in the formation properly
Oh just watch it and nevermind the innaccuracies, it's an entertaining show, although i did find the character of Uhtred rather arrogant and annoying.
Movies: we shoot once then charge!
Archers at Carrhae, Crecy, Agincourt: haha you so funy.
its always "holywood can't get tactics right!"
but I wanna know of films and shows that DID get it right!
For example a stellar depiction of roman combat was done in the HBO Rome show and I heard there was a film that accurately portrayed the horrors of being under siege (disease, starving and just knowing in the end you will likely end up dead)
so does anyone know of movies/shows of any level of popularity that has done well in depicting combat from any period of history prior to the age of black powder would take off
Hollywood has no ability to recognise genuine drama that results from reality, so always want to create false drama from fantasy.
PS: I do not know of a movie that depicts any pre-blackmpowder battle accurately, or hardly any battle scenes from any era, accurately, at all.
HBO rome indeed good job depicting the Republic Roman Legion equipment and tactics, especially that battle scene in the first episodes, where the viewers can see how the roman legionnairies switched ranks to preserve the unit strength and stamina
Oliver Stone Alexander the Great = good depiction of a macedonian phalanx at the battle of Gaugamela + Good depiction of hellenestic states tactics against war charriots (opening ranks to flank)
Captain Allatriste = Good depiction of pike and shot warfare, especially for the depiction of the clash between two infantry squares ... But we're already in the black powder era
The Messenger (Film about Joan of Arc), ok depiction of Medieval Siege warfare, not great but couldn't find anything better
The 1955 movie "the dark avenger" with Errol Flynn depicts a nice siege battle. The defending castle has a ditch wich the attackers try to fill up and there are no stupid "loose"-commands to archers. Atleast I remember it quite fondly, could be childhood-nostalgia though
Horses do NOT charge multi rowed shield walls. They can not be trained to commit suicide, they bork at the wall stopping short. For this reason infantry form square formations that stop cavalry charges from all directions.
Or schiltroms or however it's spelled, a circular formation of spearmen to prevent cavalry outflanking
That is one thing I like about the depiction of fighting in mount and blade games. It isn't really trying to be historical at all, but when you go into a battle everyone is always throwing/shooting all kinds of crap at you. You got people shooting bows and crossbows, throwing javelins, throwing rocks. Battle formations break up a lot since it is a game but you get the sense of how deadly flying objects are.
A point I'd like to add for use of spears to stop cavalry dead in their tracks is that by the 6400s ε.Κ., the Romans(Byzantines) had as a core part of their military doctrine, in the military manuals left to us, the use of the menaulion to break apart charging cavalry forces(mainly Persian and later Caliphate cataphracts), by arraying two or more lines of specialised menaulatoi(menaulion holding infantry) in front of the first rank of soldiers.
@@preacher3958 Potato-potato. AD is Catholic. CE and AD can be used interchangeably.
@@axeltenveils6816 CE is a silly phrase what is so common about the "common era", and if your objection to AD is religious why still center it on the birth of Christ? if you want to dechristianize your dating system fully dechristianize it, don't half-arse it.
@@matthiuskoenig3378 Okay, first of all, this is a dumb argument. Second of all, who said dechristianise? I just said I'm not using the Catholic term. You do understand that Catholics are the part of the Church that broke away in 1054?
Using Common Era is a curtesy, either way. It literally does not matter whether you use CE or AD they are interchangable. Personally I use either when it strikes my fancy.
Completely agree Axel. Either term is valid, who cares. "Preacher" and Matthius, both your responses are far sillier than the term CE, not that the term is necessarily silly at all.
@@axeltenveils6816 You've got that backwards, the The Pope is the original Patriarch of Rome, the First among equals. The Orthodox were embracing new dogma, including deciding that their bishops had primacy instead.
This is very true and informative. When it comes to movies, I can only add that they have a lot of safety precautions so throwing stones and axes is generally out of the picture. You see it here and there, but it's mostly for dramatic effect and for special effects. Riding knee to knee also, though it is seen rarely, it's a safety risk and movie makers just don't wanna take that. Sure, there are movies from half a century away that look like they throw safety out the window, but this doesn't seem to be the case any longer. Though, yeah, if you wanna do it, you prolly have a trick up your sleeve to do it somehow...
The Charge of the Light Brigade from the 1930s is pretty much the reason why they can't do most of that stuff anymore.
@@eldorados_lost_searcher what happened in that film?
@@dominicguye8058
They used a running W rig to trip the horses, which is a bunch of wires tied to the horse's legs that would send them ass over teakettle. Usually ended up getting the horse injured to the point where they'd have to be put down.
But that wasn't the major concern.
What changed the safety regulations was the death of two stuntmen from their falls. One cast his sword away, as he was supposed to, but it still ended up stabbing him.
Just wanted to use the occasion to thank you for your videos. You're improving constantly and more than I had ever anticipated. Also, the sources in both the video and description are appreciated. That's one thing that is far too uncommon on UA-cam. It's annoying that other channel simply refuse to do it, which makes me question their content form time to time. It's just odd not to do it... you've read the stuff right? then put it in the description,..
for many battle-focused channels, they have to "fill in the gaps" to produce an unbroken narrative which is often done by their own speculation or imagination and thus they refuse lol
another reason is so that people don't start questioning them over their sources and thus link it to the bias
Battle of Rocroi from Alatriste is very accurate and terrifying
Fought in the SCA melee battles for years. I saw all sorts of strategies and "heroes" attempt to break well trained shield walls. Few worked. It always came down to how disciplined and well trained the people were. If a person went down in the front, the men behind either knew how to fill it quickly or a gap would begin to form and the spearmen would exploit it until a charge was called. The hole would open and sides rolled up. Well trained spearmen did the most of the killing but it was exhausting work and you had to be in good condition or run out of steam quickly. Those in excellent condition began an elite corps who would dominated sections. They knew how to fence other spears, work to tangle multiple enemy spears, move in, move back, thrust thrust thrust, move back, etc. Good shield men knew how to block, how to keep their shields from being pried open from spear hooks, how take a charge, and how to make a charge and also had to be in good condition. And most importantly, how to march in order without breaking the line. It sounds so simple but surprisingly hard for untrained people to do.
Those shields would get heavy, the press of bodies during a charge was difficult. If pressed beyond their brothers on either side a gap would open an could be exploited. Anyone who went alone would "die" quickly. The only respite being when the marshals, for safety reasons, would pause the fight so that the "dead" could walk out and not get trampled.
Thank you for the insight from your recreation experiences! One thing the video did not cover that I was curious about is what are the common tactics used to exploit a gap in the enemy line without breaking your own formation?
@@vinzettoducama7065 Shield walls weren't a continuous line across the entire field. You have groups of up to 20 to 30 for small units and 50+ for the larger units across and several men deep. You would attack groups of equal size or if they were larger you would shift to one of their flanks assuming you had the space. There were natural gaps in this formation but you were protected by mobile spear/pike and polearm skirmishers. Young shieldmen would learn really quickly that trying to raising your shield to protect your & charging alone at these skirmishers was a bad idea. A spear tip to the corner of your shield can turn around with your own momentum and become an easy kill. The same can lock you in place if your flank is trying to roll up these skirmishers.
Exploiting the gap is where those that practice and those that didn't really stands out. On the line you would have spear/pole skirmishers with their long reach. If they "killed" enough shieldmen to open the gap or if a lone shieldman tried to charge alone opening a gap, then you had to observe how long it took that wall to fill in the spot. Men behind the first line had a small space about an arm length and a half behind. That gap was important to allow spears to move in front and retreat behind the line as well as a place for fresh shieldmen to rotate in if the guy in front was getting too tired. Much like the Roman methods you watched the guy in front of you but were never physically held any rope or cord. It had to be flexible. We found if we were too bunched up we couldn't do anything and often lost cohesion.
Ok, so if the gap got big enough and they weren't filling it in the commander would call "SPEARS IN, SPEARS IN". All of the spear/polearm skirmishers would immediately back up quickly into the ranks. For the shieldmen, our lizard brains were getting super excited at what we knew was coming next. When the spears were in the commander would immediately call for a "charge" or "pulse". A pulse was fast movement of the entire line to right up on the enemy line. There was no press, just stop and fight. From there is was all swordwork and holding the enemy line in place. You would hear, PULSE PULSE PULSE for that command. A charge was a full press into the enemy wall. You would hear the command, SET, SET, CHARRRRGGE! You had your shield high and your sword covering your head. Your job was not to attack but stay alive and push the line while the spear/poles were doing the work above your heads. Others would be pressing behind you as well. In these circumstances the pulse was used to cut out a small gap into a larger gap. A charge was literally meant to push bodies into the gap and form a bulge. This also had the benefit of enemy line losing cohesion and turning into a jumble of bodies instead of a disciplined line.
Discipline ruled in these circumstances. Those that showed up to melee training once a week could easily fit into any other unit/company. Units that were trained and disciplined really destroyed units that did not. During one particular Gulf Wars, I remember a fight that had been ongoing for a while. Our spears/poles had inflicted lots of casualties and the enemy line was only 2 people deep. A gap opened and we did and immediate charge. I remember blasting through it forcing it 4 people wide. Suddenly I was standing by myself with no enemy around me and confused at what to do as I had charged too far. The gap was being rolled up on both sides and it was turning into a rout so I joined one of the rolls. From there it was like clubbing baby seals.
Now understand that during this "battle" we had to pull out the "dead" so that they wouldn't get hurt. I've been "killed" before and had big beefy guys trample or stand over me more than a few times. We're supposed to go into a fetal position with our shields over us to prevent getting hurt. I almost had my wrist broken as one 300lb guy's boot stepped on my wrist. So some of these results would have been ideal conditions. In reality there would be a lot of real dead bodies to trip over if you had poor visibility. Wearing a pig-faced bascinet I couldn't really see anything below my waist region. Example: I once tripped over a person that I couldn't see while marching in the line and did a full faced nose dive into the dirt. It was comical how my pointy helmet dug into that dirt.
@@brainplay8060 I never comment on UA-cam videos, but I found your comments very interesting. Cool that people train hard for that type of thing, must be very niche.
Goes to show how much more insane it was for infantry armies to win against each other after being starved, diseased, and with little sleep, i.e. no energy to do the "simple things"; like Hannibal did to invade Rome. And never mind doing all the things you mentioned in NAVAL BATTLE!
As a side note, some Military Armies had total disdain for the "heroes". Ancient Lacadaemon (Sparta) is one example, as their Phalanx Soldiers would look on their rogue soldiers who went out screaming and running towards the enemy in complete disgust, because to them, that one Soldier just put a hole in the whole Phalanx.
@@brainplay8060 Now, that's an activity I would love to partake in. Which SCA group do you train with and where can I find most of those?
The funny thing is the book series the Last Kingdom TV series is based, which is The Saxon Chronicles, depicts the battles totally differently. Cornwell doesn’t have Uhtred doing stupid stuff like leaping over enemy shield walls.
Uhtred spoke often of how he used his short sword in the shield wall to clip ankles and jab between gaps instead of his long sword that wouldn't be able to swing in the press of bodies.
There's a 2016 movie called Risen in which Roman legionaires are fighting against rebels in Isreal. My original comment got deleted because I linked a clip but I highly recommend this movie.
The Roman's advance in the tortoise formation while the rebels throw everything they can at them. At one point a large rock lands on top of a Roman who has to turn and roll it onto the ground.
The movie follows a Tribune of the Plebs and his perspective on the execution and resurrection of Jesus. I'm not religious but the movie is very good and I highly recommend.
Palestine was the Roman province. Israel didn't exist at that time.
Also that's a really awkward perspective, because Tribunes have no authority outside the city of Rome.
@@Zraknul Syria Palaestīna right?
@@Zraknul Tribunes acted as military officers which is exactly what this character does. Also, I don't care what a region was called then vs now. The movie is good, you should check it out for yourself.
@@1984Phalanx Oh Military Tribunes, not Tribunes of the Plebs. That makes a lot more sense. Entirely different positions.
Military Tribunes are military officers serving in legions. Extent of their powers within the legion varied with time periods.
Tribune of the Plebs are politicians, from the common class, with powers to protect common from the noble class Patricians. There were 10 of them. They hold no military authority. The most significant power was to veto legislation, propose their own legislation, and various others to protect plebian interests.
Wikipedia has articles on both.
@@comradekenobi6908 Yeah
If you run at the enemy, by the time you engaged, you will be too exhausted to fight and so.. die.
I agree, Steel armor and weapons are HEAVY, rushing at the ennemy is simply foolish.
"a simple face sized stone can do great damage to a face" the truest of statement
He said fist, whch in my opinion is deadlier because of the velocity that one can make when throwing, along with being "sharper", a smaller area of impact.
Funny - the book "the last kingdom" was full of shield walls walking slowly towards each other. The authenticity was one of it's main selling points
also the period described in the last kingdom was the dark ages not technically medieval
@@adeptusmagi yet the presenter of this video chose to include Uhtred of Bebbanburg anyways
@@adeptusmagiThat IS medieval. It's the Early Middle Ages.
10:42 I can attest that this is true.
Years ago we had a horse and it was settling into a new herd at a new stable. A psycho horse kept bullying and chasing her. That one wasn't right in the head, showed weird illogical heaviour.
I came into the pasture and our horse ran past me, hiding from the bully horse. So I raised my arms and shouted to scare it off.
Bully horse didn't stop... Last minute I punched the damn horse in the nose and I got thrown well over a meter back onto the ground and the landing winded me. My whole chest felt painful and it took hours before I could function normally again after the adrenaline faded.
Now at the time I was engaged in competitive kickboxing, weighing in at 81,5 to make 81 kg and in pretty good shape. Pretty sure I'd be the physical superior of most medieval fighters. The horse with a pretty small KWPN horse weighing maybe 400 kg.
Thing is if 400 kgs is coming at you at speed and you at 81 kg is standing still, sir Isaac Newton says you're going flying no matter how tough you are.
What a story XD
With how spears and later pikes were so predominant in warfare charging seems like really bad idea.
Its simple, really. You want to survive and go home as a victor more than you want to kill the other guy. True for all armies for all ages.
Unless you're a fanatic believer who thinks that death in battle will give you eternal paradise/valhalla.
The scene with the warrior jumping over the shield wall and starts fighting is ridiculous. He would've been killed almost immediately.
Nah bro thats Uhtred son of Uhtred
@@oldguy4615 more like Uhdead
Not Medieval, however, There is a scene in Alexander 2004 by Oliver Stone, where peltasts are depicted exiting a defensive shield wall to throw projectiles against incoming Persian forces. And also later in the movie at the battle of Hydaspes, Pauravas archers are depicted firing arrows from close range against slowly marching shield wall (pike phalanx) and from the Greek side projectiles against elephants, you can double check that I guess.
I think what´s often omitted is cavalry attacks on the wing(s) of infantry formations. If it was not expected it could have been quite devastating.
If I recall correctly, the Romans in England had a problem with Boudica's army. They were vastly outnumbered, but the Roman's were smart and positioned on the high ground with forests on both sides thus allowing concentration on a small front. Boudica's army poured into the valley and slammed into the Roman shield wall. The push from behind forced the first ranks to smash themselves upon the Roman wall and the Romans used their short swords, pilums, and other weapons as well likely as some artillery.
A Roman cavalry force got behind into the camp followers and such and smashed the logistics train and that saw to some dissolution of Boudica's army because people wanted to protect their camp followers and their stuff, but the situation at the front had to work itself out (enough dead locals had to happen) and then the Romans, tired but winning, did what the author suggests is hard to do - they slow marched through the valley pushing and killing a lot of their enemies along the way.
The wagon train's gear blocked off the rear and so the Romans got to just slaughter away. The kill ratios are hard to be certain but even conservative estimates see the Romans killing far more of the enemy than their own losses.
How could the Romans' manage this? Training. Experience. Competence. When they moved, they stayed tight and worked as a single body. They also had fortuitous geography going on their side.
So, it can be done, but by a very experienced and well trained formation, not just any old group of conscripts.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defeat_of_Boudica
The shield needs to be large enough to crouch behind, with only the helmet showing above. All warriors in the shield wall need to be of similar stature (and preferably heavily built). No running, as that breaks the wall. First row shields and spears, second row spears, third and fourth row weight and reserves. Those too tall / small / light for the shield wall get other jobs, like archer / cross bow men, or light infantry skirmishers.
There is an Anime called Maria the Virgin Witch which takes place in the Hundred Years War but with fantasy elements added like magic. It has arguably the most realistic depiction of a shield wall and medieval combat.
Late to comment on this, but maybe the reason movies don't show projectiles very often if at all is because it's a movie, if every stuntman got hit in the face with a projectile they'd either quit the profession or make the movie budget skyrocket with medical bills.
Considering how much else historical movies get wrong, I'd say the movie makers just don't care.
A great advantage that movie makers have over medieval soldiers is the fact that the actors aren't actually trying to kill each other
Nah, stuntmen can easily use protective masks against rubber projectiles, also visual effects are also a movie maker tool since decades.
make rocks out of soft foam. Not all that hard for a movie producer to do.
I myself partake in a activity called larp(live action role play) where we have a final battle at the with more then 10 different camps. After a initial chaos where those that dont want to stand around a long time duke it out 2 sides form and its just 2 shieldwalls facing each other allong the whole battlefield and then the battle takes 2 hours more because nobody is sacrificing himself for progress.
The only faction that really charges shieldwalls are orcs and thats for roleplay reasons.
Most people have learned that the shieldwall is the strongest and most boring formation.
Flanking my dude. Assuming you have the ground for it, getting some people round the side will make fights a whole lot more interesting.
You can also use weird staggered formations or broken ground to break up enemy formations and thereby create a weakness. Though those rely on good discipline and permissive refs to pull off.
Excellent point on the axes, spears and stone throwing backline soldiers. I never understood the effectiveness of a passive shield wall. It really makes sense now!
@SandRhomanHistory
Troy - while a battle shrouded in myth and mystery - has its movie depicting two massive shield walls fighting outside the city wall. Trojan archers loose arrows down onto the men in the back ranks, Hector kills Ajax in the middle, and then as a gap opens the Trojans order their Apollonian Guard (seemingly fierce dismounted cavalrymen) to throw their javelins into the fractured Greek ranks and plunge into them with swords.
CAPTAN ALATRISTE: The Spanish Musketeer by Viggo Mortensen. As an former member of historical fencing group, I can say this was the best depiction of the battle thrill as well as arms techniques
Medieval shield wall battles: "You come to me... no you come to me... no you come to me"
Cavalry charges in movies are the worst. You can train a horse to endure the sounds, sights and smells of battle. You cannot train a horse to commit suicide by running into a wall of spears.
Also horses are expensive.
In mongols movie they covered the horses eye with cloth, dunno if it was real event
Shield walls were rendered obsolete by the invention of the combine harvester.
Shield walls are great, but a wall of pikes is even better. And a wall of musketeers is even better. And a stone wall is even better.
But stonewalls weaknesses are their backs
Especially if the stone walls name is Jackson.
@@OilyOaf to be fair he died to friendly fire
The Roman legion's shield wall prevailed over the Macedonian pike wall in the Battle of Pydna.
@@tvgerbil1984 outlier
excellent info as always. films i can forgive for misrepresenting the essence of the fighting but many games that could simulate such environment much better also tend to make a mess of it, unfortunately. thanks for a great video.
Realistic combat is simply boring gameplay. I tried it time and time again but only a very few "4x" like prototypes where even remotely fun. All 3rd or 1st person prototypes where trash xD
@@TheNapkuchen The Viking Conquest expansion for Mount and Blade Warband comes close to representing shield walls well. The physics is somewhat simplified though.
@@ingold1470 true,
Shieldwall battle is basically just tiring and infuriating,
Especially when 7 out of 10 of my spear stab just glanced off their shield.
And spearplay in Warband is kinda mediocre in my experience
@@fridaynuggies4191 Spears are better in VC because of the overhead stab, though most Warband mods add this in.
@@ingold1470 Oh yea, the overhead stab work better than the vanilla warband.
But still, the damage dealt are kinda mediocre compared to axes or swords (unless u managed to score a headshot)
I love the fact that you use citations, no shenanigans, other history UA-camrs could learn a thing or two from your editing style. Keep up the suberb work.
To be fair 'The Last Kingdom' did a pretty good job in the earlier seasons with shield walls.
The problem I had with the Wessex shield wall in the last kingdom was how the "upper row" of shields had to be flipped dramatically every time they formed
Edit: I can't find an example of what i said. I may have mistaken some other show for The Last Kingdom. But I do remember seeing a shield wall in media where the second row flipped their shields dramatically before forming the wall.
@@shuvodipbarua6001 Like 0:09 in this video?
@@mightypirat9875 no the one i saw was worse. They literally rotated their shields so that the poiny side (lower edge) would point up
@@shuvodipbarua6001 Is there any evidence for the double layered shield wall?
@@damionkeeling3103 like i said, i couldn’t find out where i saw it, so it might not have been the last kingdom.
People must always think in movie battles especially before cgi you did only what was easy and posible cavalry battle or cavalry charging at each other with spears was hard and dangerous while infantry hitting shields with swords was much safer
Also don't forget the cost! Stunt horses take a ton of time and money to train and a single accident can end their career. They and their handlers cost a looooot of money
@@WWFanatic0 i get annoyed when i see modern expert on medieval weapons start telling what is wrong in movies with armies because those people were not geniuses if men today and in ww1 and ww2 wear no armour and protection is low and machine gun and rifle make more damage than spear and armour why would knight be obsesed with full protection also you get impression that if knights were obsesed with protecting himself with armor he was a coward a realy brave men feared no death and didnt protected themselves so much
@mrbloodylordbaronsamedi.9937 If I understand this comment correctly, then I assume you are comparing the high-powered weapons vs. little armor in the world wars against the low powered weapons vs. high armor in the Middle Ages. The reason people didn't wear as much armor in the world wars (I say as much rather than no armor because people in the world wars did, in fact, wear armor) is because weaponry started surpassing our ability to create armor that could defend against it. It wasn't that the men of ww1 and 2 cared less about their wounds, but that their mobility was worth more. Metal armor that is required to stop a bullet ends up much heavier than a knights suit of armor while simultaneously having less mobility. There was a point that full body armor was in development, but it was so heavy that it ended up not commonly used.
Contrary to popular belief, knights armor wasn't terribly heavy. In fact, a modern soldiers kit typically weighs more. Knights could sprint fairly well and had some fairly decent flexibility. All this while having the ability to properly defend against plenty of attacks.
And in regards to your comment about not fearing death being the more honorable route... that's simply untrue. Honor is to defend those who need you. Be it King, family, country, etc, etc. To die a pointless death because you wanted to appear fearless, isn't honor. It is foolishness. Your job is to defend and return to defend another day. Can't do either if you're dead.
In Alexander there's a scene where persians form a shield wall and behind it are some archers shooting at the pike phalanx. It also shows skirmishers on the edges of pike syntagmas I believe.
10:08 - _"As far as we're concerned, we couldn't find a single movie battle in which the use of missile weapons is properly depicted."_
LOTR had a couple instances of fighters like the Hobbits or beleaguered defenders at Helm's Deep throwing rocks. Gimli also threw axes, and the Elves and other defenders (particularly on high walls) used archery where possible through a melee, rather than only at the onset of the charge.
The siege of Jerusalem in Kingdom of Heaven depicts archers continuously firing from both sides of the wall, as well as oil and a variety of larger missile siege weapons being employed for pretty much the duration of the fight.
A lot of movies love to use improvised throwing weapons, almost to the point of comedy and being a trope in itself. Maximus throws Roman short swords at least twice in Gladiator and although one is more like a tantrum the other is a killshot over a laughably long distance through armor. In Braveheart he lethally throws a giant longsword into an attacker's chest, again straight through armor (in the same fight he slices clean through an armored leg and kills someone with deer antlers lol). The knight in Ladyhawke throws his sword but at least this one is in the manner you would throw a spear, and not end over end. He also uses his crossbow like a club in a way that doesn't make much sense and does not damage it, which is questionable. There's probably a bunch more. People love weapons being used in a way they're not intended for some reason, even before Jason Bourne made killing people with pens and magazines popular.
Credit where it's due in an otherwise supremely memeable movie: in Conan the Destroyer he remarks, giant sword in hand, that he doesn't have his dagger when he needs to throw something to kill a wizard, because he threw it in the scene before.
@@smockytubers1188 I'm not sure why you commented? I mean, I agree with you, of course it's ridiculous, especially in single combat.
But my comment was a response to this:
10:08 - _"As far as we're concerned, we couldn't find a single movie battle in which the use of missile weapons is properly depicted."_ In which case, LOTR actually did have correct depictions of these, even against a shield wall / mass of troops.
@@WritingFighter Idk I found your comment interesting and thought I'd add my thoughts to the conversation. I guess I should have responded to the video itself and not replied to your comment? Sorry.
@@smockytubers1188 Replying to both of you, it's actually nice to have both your comments in the same thread. It helps the topics of both remain linked and well, I really do need to watch conan the Destroyer at some point.
I sometimes play mount and blade in multiplayer captain mode on Kaue's server, which allows for battles of 1000's of men commanded by various players in a first person enviroment. You learn something about tactics with medieval formations, one of them is that for us shieldwalls are mostly only usefull to block arrows or in confined spaces. In mellee, formations in shieldwalls just tend to be standing around to get their shields hacked to pieces or get flanked.
Does the naked twohander still exist?
@@serotonin.scavenger Yeah. Tactically they are better to bring in with some surprise, or atleast not when they can be fired at with archers seeing as they lack shields and armor, they also come in somewhat greater numbers as a troop compared to heavier armored units.
Running as a shield wall is far harder than anyone would think, for starters a simple explanation is to have 10 different people to walk at the same speed but do not tell them how fast or how slow to walk.
And for sitting still, I will say in many examples and battles in Total war, I can say letting the enemy come to you is a great strategy especially if you have artillery.
The enemy gets 2 choices, get pelted or get moving to not lose numbers
Also a number of people would think firing arrows on a wall of shields is foolish however sure it is foolish but the issue is those who take part in the shield wall aren't always armored and the block isn't perfect.
Edit: Do not ask me for tactics as I know I said Total War, I meant Total warhammer, sure its different but similar idea, plus when it comes to walking, its an obvious study not everyone has the same walking speed as each other, what is normal speed for me is fast or slow to you.
I used to play a part in 18th-century reenactments and in one of the reenacted battle, the main turning point is retaking a small bridge with fixed bayonets in a half-circle formation (usually, often just a single unit two lines) slowly marching, and even that often ended up just looking like an unorderly mess so I can't even begin to imagine how hard it was to move as a shield wall in an actual battle.
Yea, its a mental massacre trying to get everyone to walk in uniform formation and it will always stem from that everyone has very different walking speeds.
the lifehack for that is having your commander set the pace. By shouting. Commanders shout a lot. And your repeat those orders, cuz you don't hear shit, tbh. As our larp unit, we train to walk a step at a time, while we all shout: "Step, step, step" (it sounds better in my native language, lol) and we can maintain formation like that. Also generally, you watch the two dudes next to you and adjust to their pace.
The worst possible depictions of horse vs infantry is in the LotR movies. In Two Towers the Rohirrim charge down a very steep slope (so steep it would have caused all their horses to stumble and roll down the hill) and the Uruks prepare a pike wall at the foot, but then the horses simply plough through that formation without casualties. No, the sun going up wouldn't matter because the Uruks were not lifting the pikes up and even then they were so densely packed that it's unlikely any horses would have gone through. Same thing happens in RotK. Whenever necessary Orks have all the mass of helium balloons.
And the Rohirrim aren't even employing heavy cav but light to medium cav at best.
No, horses can in fact run downhill. Ever seen Man From Snowy River (that was the real actor, not even a stunt man)? Or read Xenophon (he literally says this is a critical skill to be mastered by both horse and rider)?
@@wilfdarr Dude, that was a slope of almost 45°. Horses are not mountain goats.
@@shiroamakusa8075 I've ridden 30° at a gallop, and I've done 45° at a trot, and I'm not even a good horseman, not like some I ride with. Mountain goats can stand on the side of a damn, so I'll concede your point there, horses are not mountain goats, but 45 degrees isn't 80° either!
@@wilfdarr Yeah yeah, another Navy Seal/Nobel Laureate on the web. Met dozens of you guys already.
@@shiroamakusa8075 Well, you're the one who's so arrogant he thinks that if you can't do something, then certainly no one can: I at least stay in my lane(s)!
And in fairness, they weren't my horses, they were provided by an outfitter, knew the ground, were confident in their ability. It's certainly on the outside edge of a horses capabilities, but the point stands: people who train at that their whole lives can get it done, even if you can't.
There are many problems that filmmakers encounter when depicting medieval battles. They have not been able to successfully show the use of missile weapons such as archery, spears, stones, or axes. Cavalry charges against pikes and depictions of impaled horses have safety limitations for the horse, the rider, and the target. CGI of these events is expensive and requires coordination. The filmmaker wants to create drama and heightened visual effects of movement and chaos especially in large-scale battle scenes. They will sacrifice accuracy against the blood carnage of a true slugfest that often was seen in these battles. The audience wants to see their "hero" overcome and perform heroic deeds. So we are willing to see a Roman "testudo" instead of a true Scandinavian shield wall. We are willing to see "heroes" fighting single combat in a sea of adversaries. This sells movie tickets.
If you ‘run’ across a field to the enemy line, you will just arrive winded, and you need that wind for melee fighting, itself exhausting.
Yeah I was astonished to learn recently in battles of this era, soldiers only had about three minutes of fighting in them before they would need to be rotated out of the front line to recover some stamina.
@@glenchapman3899 I took epee fencing for a few years, and 'cardio' is a must!
@@OldMusicFan83 Yeah I am definitely a victim of too many movie sword fights lol. Those guys waving plastic broadswords make it look effortless.
Even punching is tiring. Movies have these 10 minute fight sequences with characters doing spinning back flip uppercut hadoukens. Professional boxers have trouble making it through a 3 minute bouts before they start feeling exhausted, especially if they've taken hits. Now imagine instead of throwing punches, you're thrusting with a 3 pound sword while wearing 100 pounds of armor. No fucking way are you sprinting 100 yards to somersault spin kick your way into the enemy's formation to hack your way through 50 dudes with your 80 pound, 10 foot sword.
I was in the SCA for decades, and my favorite part was wars. Most large units used a row of overlapping shields in the front, but most of the killing was done by spears and long axes behind them. There were smaller skirmish units which did not form a shield wall and had a mix of polearms and sword and shield. Our unit was heavy infantry and used scutums and short swords(backed by pikes) , we did not overlap but had an arms length between fighters. This gave room to swing a sword while charging. I don't know how historically accurate the formations were, but they were practical and more accurate than most of the fighting in movies.
I can trace my entire interest in medieval warfare back to the cavalry charge in The Return of the King. Plowing the horses into endless rows of spears and swords seemed like it couldn't work. And then I was thinking about how everyone put in the front in the battles in Braveheart must have a 100% chance to get killed, because even when you kill one enemy in front of you, there will be dozens behind to replace him.
Surely this couldn't be right, and so I first started trying to find out how medieval soldiers actually fought.
To be fair...... the Ride of the Rohirrim is awesome.
Also the "pikes" the orcs were using looked more like farm equipment, and they had terrible morale.
@@tylermcneeley3136 I can't remember if they had it at Pelenor Fields, but at least when relieving the siege at Helms Deep the movies specifically showed the sun blinding the Uruk-hai which caused them to waver and start to break right before the Cavalry hit. Which also makes sense since they had the proper formation and the perfect pikes for dealing with cavalry....which also makes sense if you're specifically fighting a mounted-specialized force like Rohan.
@@chrisc1140 that's part of the reason why the battles in LOTR largely sense. Saruman knew he'd be facing a cavalry force, so he equipped his forces with long pikes. The charge only worked because like you said, they were blinded by the sun. In Pelennor fields, the orcs aren't properly equipped to deal with cavalry. Also, in the final frames before the two forces collide, you can see the orcs braking their lines and starting to step backwards.
Ironically, in the Books, Uthred very much fought in shieldwalls. The books are way better than the show, from a historical standpoint as well, as any deviations made for storytelling are detailed in the afterword, and they were written by an historian.
I wish shows would just stick to source material. The books are so much better
In the movie and show he fights in the shieldwall
The series of books written by Bernard Cornwell, that the series The Last Kingdom is (sort of) based on, is a lot more accurate about such things! Uhtred never goes leaping over enemy shieldwalls for a start! In battles in the books, the formation is always tight and shields locked, armies advance to close distance before charging the last few yards, and while archers are often scarce, there are always spears thrown before the shields clash.
If you are interested in such stories and have not read the books then I strongly recommend you do so!
Great video there, explaining reality and the movies. Being a military history student and reenactor, I have always been somewhat annoyed at the movies disuse of history. You can ask some of my former girlfriends my wrecking their movie viewing with my pointing out historical inaccuracies. A point I would like to add is the ridiculous notion that the warriors would sprint at each other at fairly long distances, LOL. First this would break up the shield wall and by the time they had come into contact with the enemy, they would be winded, thus being somewhat ineffective in battle. I believe it as in the recent film about Henry V. they were sprinting into battle in full suits of plate amour, for the love of ST George, that was grating. I know it was basically a tactic in the age of muskets, the infantry would advance towards the enemy at a steady pace, then when they were about 15 yards away, they would charge in with the bayonet. I am not sure if there were armies made up of marathon runners who could actually sprint into battle, maybe the Zulus. I know as you said, the film makers want exciting battle scenes, so they have to modify history to achieve this.
Another point I would like to make is how uniformed the dark ages armies look in many films. The Last Kingdom was guilty of this. Maybe to differentiate between the Saxons and Vikings the film makers went this way. The Saxons seem to all carry these second rate Roman shields. I thing they made have made this choice to denote that the Saxons were the civilized side. The Vikings are carrying the correct round shields. Also the clothing was quite uniformed in some scenes. The only unit that maybe was somewhat uniformed was the warlords heath guards. So as many of you know, the Dark Ages was not really known as an era for uniformed armies.
I'm thinking about the horrible, but fun-watching "vikings" series on the former "history" channel. Of course I almost died laughing many times, especially when they had a black woman as the head cheese in Kattegat!!! The no-helmet scenes, the silly shield maidens, the stupid viking longboats with bare-chested men rowing in the snow and wing...the list is endless to the idiocies.
This is why i like the tv series "rome". When antony send his legions, they all march, slowly. Great video.
But we know that Roman legions did charge into battle.
5:30 There was one famous charging shield wall - or perhaps just running to close the distance as fast as possible. It was the Spartans at the battle of Plataea. They knew that the Persians would use their rain of arrows to their advantage in an open area. So the Spartans trained to run quickly to the enemy - in close formation. And so they did. They avoided being weakened by projectiles and could fight in their preferred style.
Except it probably didn't happen. Running on a parade ground in close formation is one thing, trying to run on rocky, uneven ground, with some spartans having more armour than others makes too hard to believe. Remember after the run you got to fight and no matter how hard the spartans trained, if they RUN, they will be quickly oxygen deprived when it comes time to actually fight.
@@biffmarcum5014 They trained for this moment! Not on a parade ground but in open field. And running doesn't mean that they ran like hell. They still had to keep order while advancing. So I think that they found a pace that allowed them to keep formation, discipline and enough stamina to start fighting.
The movie Alexander, has pretty accurate depiction of ranged units.
Opening scenes in the movie "Gladiator" (R. Crow) were depicting the use of long range projectiles fairly good. Germanic tribes were under heavy barrage from Roman artillery and archers while the Roman infantry and cavalry were advancing forward Germanic positions.
That scene of Utred was in my head minutes before this popped up on my feed. Weird
Speak of the devil, and he shall appear.
I personally like the shield wall in movies and series because at least it’s a step away from the mayhem we get to see so often.
Holywood has always made a mockery out of history and probably always will.
Thanks for such a great video, please make more videos like this to cover other misconceptions in depth.
Also worth mentioning human nature. Humans have a tendency to bunch together in danger. We see this on the modern battlefield, even amongst soldiers that are trained for dangers such as explosives and machine guns. As a combat veteran, it takes training and discipline to overcome that urge to bunch and group together.
This is why I think we can discount the Hollywood melee where everyone is jumping and running around on their own. It's simply not how humans are wired to behave...and many soldiers on a medieval battlefield had minimal training.
great info, isn't it amazing how the bronze age world had massive phalanx shield walls with up to 21ft long pikes , and latter the Romans had mobile shield walls "testudo" , all of this seemed to be forgotten and had to be relearned in the middle ages, its like they forgot everything after the fall of Rome around 400AD
The "testudo" was rarely used, mostly static and likely not as effective as people think. Most of the strategies from Rome didn't apply in the middle ages. The technologies were different, the army sizes, fortifications, logistics..
@@EnricoDias can you explain the difference in Army sizes, Fortifications and logistics. the armies were no bigger and maybe smaller in middle ages, Castle and city fortifications were strong in the roman era and siege warfare didn't change much until the introduction of the cannon and as far as logistics they all used horses and ships . not much difference
A great Hollywood depiction of projectiles was the Battle of Winterfell...did I say was? Damn I meant to say should have been.
We got to make a shield wall in school and your other class mates got to pelt you with tennis balls
Bro, that's sick!
As I'm getting older, and playing Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord, I've become way more interested in history. Mostly about medieval warfare and tactics, and this channel is really cool! Great job on the videos! Your effort and education really shine through your channel, you definitely have a new subscriber in me!
That's not what a kite shield is for. The tip at the bottom is supposed to be leg protection for cavalry, It's not a roof-tile for a shield-hog 😂
Those shields were used a lot as infantry shields too
kite shields serve the sole purpouse of not getting stabbed, I'll have you informed, lol. They're great for infantry. Speaking from experience. But true, you aren't raising that above your head. Not for longer than ten minutes anyway.
Horse charges didn’t strike infantry formations head on. Instead horsemen would attack at an angle. This is because it’s difficult to turn a spear in a tight formation, and doing so requires a high level of training and cohesion. The defenders are also more exposed to missile fire when they’ve turned. Of course attacking from the sides or rear is even more effective when possible(still at an angle to the defenders). But charging directly into a wall of spears was a quick way to lose an expensive war horse.
Surpirsed that the biggest misconception was not mentioned. That movies very often show both sides shields comming into direct contact and the whole mass turning into what looks like a ruggby scrum as men several rows deep push against each other. This would simply have crushed both sides front lines to death. While the Roman legionaries short Gladius would have been usable in that close a spear based formation would have rendered it's front few ranks uless as the enemy would be past their spear tips with the enemy easily able to push the spears up and out of the way. Real fights were done at weapon distance between the opposing shields.
Thank you for speaking the truth ! I'm so pissed of by big pseudo rugby scrum when everybody has a 3 meter long spear in hand...
I laughed my ass off at one point in this video when a dude dried to drop kick a shield wall XD fell on his ass too which was realistic.. still stupid looking though like.. what was he expecting to happen?!
The Greek writers who fought in actual phalanx warfare seem to disagree with your assertion.
The scrum isn't that unrealistic, it just wasn't the entire battle. Battles tended to fluctuate between further back and pressing the shields together. Remember, Greek phalanxes explicitly had the first three ranks all able to stab with their spears, and the Macedonian version enabled FIVE ranks to engage at once. Neither of those would have been possible if they always stayed at the outer edge of the front rank's reach
what a good video, makes me wanna re watch/read all the historical shows / books shown.
I watched brave heart so I'm basically a historian.
I think film makers get carried away after seeing pictures of a Roman Testudo formation..
No, the reason is that making a movie realistic, nobody would watch it. A movie must have some mythical and heroism to show. It 's a story, otherwise it would not be a movie, but a documentary. With the exception of psychopaths no body would be able to stomach a realistic war scene, especially a medieval one, or further back in time as they were beyond cruel and bloody .
Go watch the opening scene of HBO’s Rome series. The most realistic depiction of Roman fighting tactics on screen and better than 99.9% of other on screen depictions.
@@jpsholland the problem is show and movies that are like ''We are historical!'' and proceed not to be, at that point just write a fantasy
I still not sure about the horse part. You can breed all you want. An animal will not willingly kill itself, it has no concept of honour or a just cause, no matter the training. And let’s say you’re the knight/ rider “yes I’m going to ride my most valuable animal in to spears, so it dies, I fall off and get stomped to death, just so I can make a hole in this shield wall for the king who actually is paying me a wage to be here that I won’t be able to get because I’ll be dead” Charging flanks, separated troops or dummy charges, definitely, but a walk of shields and spears? No chance. Who would take that job? Especially as knights were generally wealthier than others. It doesn’t make sense.
Are u American…gotta be American 😂
Why are you assuming that a horse would kill itself by charging into a spear wall? Armor works.
However, it is true that they would not willingly kill themselves.
I believe three things:
1. Horses understand spears. And with a lot of training really well.
2. Horses probably understand armor as well.
3. Horses have all the concepts required to actively particpate in battle: fighting, enemy, friend, wining, losing, injuries, death. They probably understood a lot better what was going on, then we can imagine.
@@hemelinger7792 most army didn’t use house to charge shield ways unless they had to
@@hemelinger7792 A horse may be trained to understand the concept of splitting/ dodging spears. There is no way a horse understands the concept of armour. But either way it’s not just the horse. Knights generally wanted to fight in more than one battle, not be a “suicide bomber”. If a knight thought he and the horse would be killed they would look for better more effective tactics.
@@callumbiasnow4825Horses were literally trained from day of their birth, and they trusted their rider for life, most horses would jump into fire if ridder wanted to do so, and knights didint think they do, that's called order, if general told you to charge, you do it, that's how almost every army works and worked.
Ahhhrrrrgggg.
Hollywood, I'm sick of their take on history.
Two blokes armed with chainmail,plate armour shields swords helmets face off, but within a minute they are punching each other !
Can’t get enough of this guys content. It’s always interesting
If anyone played CTF at school we all know what happens if someone just decides to rush towards the flag. The person is likely to get themselves captured instead. I always thought it was kind of weird how some of the medieval soldiers were capable of fighting in such a mess (other than just a movie portrayal) and it's not like people don't know a dude who just jumped over the shield wall. I even had an argument with another kid about it and it almost turned into a sort of fight to prove a point (without the lethal - we agree to not hurt each other) but a teacher stopped us. xD
I know how they were capable of it. Commanders shouting at them. And everyone around you repeating the orders so you would actually hear them over the sounds of battle and your helmet. And staying in a tight formation is great for maintaining morale, too.
Game of Thrones has a nice "shield wall" sequence in the episode "Battle of the Bastards". Robin Hood (Russell Crowe) also has some imaginative use both of the shield wall and archers.
This isn’t anything new, but I really do appreciate the sources you show on screen… sources are always an important thing!
Actually during the medieval ages shield walls were very well organized and worked well the Scandinavians used this tactic going into the late middle ages because it was effective.