Interresting point you have, and I agree that this is a very likely use for greatswords. It's so fun when things I like seem plausible, and not the result of exaggeration and over exposure to fantasy roleplaygames
Mm hm. Great thread here guys......I've been keeping up with it, and it keeps getting more interesting. Kindof makes me want to pick up on WMA.....
oh Gods yes! Thank you for pointing that out again...this cannot be said enough times. sort of like the young man who's response to a poster who was describing the "no-Dachi"...I had to laugh when he responded with "I know what a No-Dachi is, I play Bushido Blade". There are so many misconceptions on how certain weapons are used due to movies and even more so through video games and RPG's. One thing I pointed out in my article that may not have come across as clear as it could have was that a contributing cause of the "mythos" of the great sword was from the movies and popular culture...we see our "larger than life" heros with larger than life abilities and they in turn require a larger than life weapon as only a "hero" could possibly wield. What my good friend Domenico had described as a method of useage of the greatsword against the pike line is not "speculation" however...it's pretty much a standard tactic. I have been consulting with David Cvet of the AEMMA and Paul MacDonald of the Dawn Duelists Society, on this subject for a research project I am "sort of" working on. Both have provided information that leads me to believe that this was a common tactic of the greatsword wielding foot soldiers when dealing with the pike lines of the opposing forces. I am certain, but I will check with Domenico, if he can cite some literature that describes tactics of greatsword v. pikeline.
"...I will check with Domenico, if he can cite some literature that describes tactics of greatsword v. pikeline..." Sadly, I can't right now, for a few different reasons. For one, the English never seemed to have really required a two-handed sword in their ranks. As I'd mentioned earlier, it develops hand-in-hand with the polearms on the battlefield, and it's zenith is between 1450-1520. This era sees very little warfare in England, most all of the conflicts in Europe are in the Italian wars between the Emperor, France, and the Italies. Also the Welsh Longbow is still the preferred method of disposing of large massed formations. It's no small surprise to me that the majority of the two handed swords we find are either Italian or German. By the time England gets into the fray with Spain in the Low Countries and Ireland (1560's), the Caliver and Harquebus have replaced the Bow (and bypassed entirely the two handed sword) as the best way to dispatch a wall of Pikes. Furthermore, in George Silver's 'Paradoxes of Defence' he describes "...The perfect length of your two hand sword is, the blade to be the length of your single sword..." Clearly this is not the 38"-48" blade seen on the Claymore, Zwiehander or generic Continental "two-handed sword" Most all of the English documentation stems from this era onward. Of the 200 some odd English manuscripts I've got specifically on Weapons and Warfare, only 50 are written in the 16th century, and only 4 were written before 1550, one a book on shooting, two that are Henry VIII's rules for the Soldier to live by, and a translation of Sextus Julius Frontinus' 'Strategematicon Libri III'. So much for English sources, but as I mentioned, I'd doubt we'd find what we're looking for on the Island anyways. No, I'd start looking into the Italian and German literature for that type of documentation, and sadly, I couldn't tell you where to begin that search. European countries seem to thrive on independent little museums as opposed to centralized systems, and don't appear to have online repositories, not to mention 'nein spreckenzie Deutcher'... There are a few fight manuals that demonstrate them (Giganti among them if I remember correctly), but most manuals describe like against like. I've not seen a one yet that demonstrates Halberd vs. Sword, Sword against Pike, etc. The closest you get is George Silver describing which weapons have advantage over which: "...The two hand Sword, hath the vantage against the Sword and Target, the Sword and Buckler, the Sword and Dagger, or Rapier and Poiniard..." Additionally, he describes all manner of Polearms as having the advantage over the two-handed sword, but only by virtue of distance. Again, it's aimed towards the idea of single combat, not warfare. In the press of battle, the two handed sword offers some advantages to the press of pike, not the lone billman, and he bears this out later on: "...Yet understand, that in battels, and where varieties of weapons be, amongst multitudes of men and horses, the Sword and Target, the two hand Sword, the Battel-axe, the Black-bill, and Halberd are better weapons, and more dangerous in their offence and forces, then is the Sword and Buckler, short staffe, long staffe, or Forrest bill..." So, start digging into those German and Italian fightbooks looking for descriptions of battle, not single combat, and start digging into the German and Italian archives, wherever they may be.... I'm crawling through my copy of J. R. Hale's "Artists and Warfare in the Renaissance" to see if I can find some good sources of Artwork to bear out the application of sword to pike (Urs Graf looks to be a promising source), and I'll keep you updated with what I find. Matthew
Actually 38 inches for a Two handed sowrd as describe in Silver's works is possible u just have to taller an dhave long amrs. According to silve the perfect sowrd length for me is about 37-38 inches Not a huge sword with its atwo handed sowrd, but still nothign to sneeze at. And its nein sprechen Duetch waht u said was no speak you Germaner so yeah, not that my German is much better.
Well, what Domenico writes fits with what I know about longswordfighing. I'm using this site http://www.varmouries.com/wildrose/fiore/section5.html and as you can see from the pictures, this is NOT greatswords. The german styles seem to operate with slightly longer longswords than the italians; their techniques work at least better with longer swords than Fiore but the manuals survived from germany that I know about do not show greatswords in action, only longswords. The fact that we today can study a longswordmanual and then wielding the greatsword with some of theese techniques doesn not prove that they were used in war. That's why I was so surprised and joyful when mr. Shore talked about the find in the armoury in Leeds about greatswordtechniques. (It's by the way not futile to search for european manuscripts in england; I-33, the oldes fightingmanual from europe, written in germany some time around year 1200 was found by accident in the archives in the armoury in Leeds around 1995) As much as I'd like the greatsword to be a genuine weapon for war, I'm not gonna present the greatsword in this role as more than a theory until some documentation surface. :Angel:
Ive seen some manuals with can only be greatswords, maybe not zweihanders but still big swords. http://www.schielhau.org/images/29.jpg ONe of which is Goliath and it is one of the manuals in the Liechtenaur Tradtion of Sword play ie Germans swordplay. How ever as all they have in the manuals is single combat, the great sowds could still be only dueling sweapon and not a weapon of war. INtersting how You seem to be changing my view point on the great swords Stolenbjorn http://www.schielhau.org/ and here is an online repostory of Fechterbucher in the Liechtenaur Tradtion. ot taht I really care whether or not its a weapon of war. As long as it can be proven that it was a sued in single comboat, armored or unarmored, im happy. I dont do much mass battles with the SCA, and a new form that has been made in my locality is based heaviy on the hirotical manuals and seems to only be one on one.
"...the great swords could still be only duelling sweapon and not a weapon of war..." While I can certainly respect both of yours' reticence, and I'm certainly going to do my best to document their application on the battlefield, I will offer you this. The idea of a weapon whose only application is for Single combat smacks of sheer Victorian Romanticism. People in the Renaissance were practical, if anything, and their weapons were functional tools. Few and far between are items that serve a limited function, especially in judicial or extrajudicial combat. The only examples I've ever seen of something existing solely for sport were the hooked shields shown in Talhoffer, and the whole branch of Tilting armor (and even that was in many times only a few replacement pieces for a standard suit of field armor). The idea that someone would fabricate an entire longsword for as rare an activity as the duel seems kind of naive to me, but I can respect the "prove it" mentality... At any rate, I'm going to do what I can to help paint the picture with period documentation, and while I'm waiting, I'll offer this. Sure, the Zwiehander itself appears as a fantastical design, and is certainly not the most common weapon out there, but the Longswords in general are quite prolific, quite often seen on the battlefield, and definitely have a presence in Fight Manuals of the period. The Zwiehander, to me, should be viewed as a simple design branch of the Longsword. A parallel case is the Pappenheimer Rapier, a distinct design, limited in geographical distribution, but certainly a part of a larger collective of weapons types (Rapiers). At any rate, I'll answer to the thrown gauntlet, and will see what I can dig up for you... Sincerely D. Matthew Kelty
My position is actauly closer to yours than to Stolenbjorn's, but his doubts as to whether its was truly a weapon of war seem valid. Whether or ot it is a weapon of war or one suited solely to single combat maters little to me. I feel it is a worthy weapon for teh battle feild as the few times I used a sparring replica on one in a group battle, and the reason I found myself gravitaing towads it was no one was willing to actually teach me how use the pole arms but they didnt care if I mocked up a great sword an dused it agsint said polearms. The funy thing is, I used my greatswords in a very simlar manner to described earlier. I would tie up opposing polewarms so the otehrs could rush in and kill them, as wellas using it defend our lone polearm weailder.
I hope you find evidence, because I love the zweihender as much as you do; I'm just not completely convinced yet of their validity in war And Cudgel; that pic. surely looks closer to a zweihender than a longsword; thanks!!! (I'm gonna look through those threads more carefully when I find time)
We should ask on the swordforum; are there any manuals that were meant for/worked well for zweihenders (swords of at least 1,5m length)? I've allways been under the impression that Lichtenauer, talfhoffer and ringeck covered the longsword more than the true zweihender? But the picture cannot lie (unless it's drawn after the longsword/zweihender-period was over, and that they base their drawing on the zweihenders found in the castles and on their prejudices of their use; there's plenty of examples of historians of earlier days making errors we still suffer under today; the scale-armor and the horned viking helmet, for instance :cry: )
well if you do a search you will find that several otehr peopl have asked the same question. Which is more or less how I found http://www.schielhau.org/. Several popl said that goliath would be the bet since it portrays larger swords. But seeing how Goliath is based off another manual I belive and is also one of the manuals in the Liechtenaur Tradtion, you can most likely apply the concepts from another of the fechterbucher. All you would have to do is take into account the fact that a zweihander is heavier thna longsword and hence slower on the recovery. It is also my understanding that the latest of the fechterbucher date from teh 16th cen which is just prior to whenzweihanders began showing up, but a zweihander is really just a type of greatsword which is realy just a type of longsword.
"...a zweihander is really just a type of greatsword which is realy just a type of longsword..." Correctamundo! Yes, these are all synonymous with "...big a$$ sword...", and the term Zwiehander is usually associated with a particular design of these class of weapons, specifically having the flukes above the ricasso, and more developed quillons and port rings. "...It is also my understanding that the latest of the fechterbucher date from the 16th century, which is just prior to when zweihanders began showing up..." Umm, not quite. Most of the Fight manuals *are* from the latter half of the 16th century (or Later), including George Silver, Vincentio Saviolo, Joachim Meyer, Jacob Sutor, Giacomo DiGrassi, Niccoli Giganti, George Hale, Joseph Swetnam, Salvator Fabris, Ridolfo Capo Ferro, and others. Unfortunately, this puts them mostly 50 years or more *after* the height of the two handed sword in use in battle. The Battle of Pavia (1525) really was the zenith for the Zwiehander, and by the 1560's they were fairly well gone, except for as Parade pieces. With this in mind, the best Fight Book to focus on in regards to being contemporary with the era of the two handed sword would be Achille Marozzo's 'Opera Nova'. This work is primarily textual, not to mention written in 16th Century Tuscan, a distinctly unique Italian dialect, and is usually overlooked, except for the nifty buckler shapes... http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~wew/fencing/manuals.html At any rate, I've not met a translation yet, but the two handed sword plates all show commonalities with our described (yet undocumented) manner of using these weapons against pikes. To wit: 1) Almost all of the guards are firmly on the middle position, with fairly horizontal blade positions. 2) 4 Cutting postures, and 15 Defensive postures. Sense a slight bias in it's intended application?... 3) Of the 15 Wards, 6 are point down, 3 are point up, and 6 are point level. Again, sensing a theme... Now, to my documentational challenge. I have to confess that going after the "1%-er" here is proving troublesome. Add to that that the majority of the Artists I'm going to mention are known everywhere for talents *NOT* in line with the works I'm citing, not found anywhere in the Internet, and most of my references will cost a pretty penny to see for yourself, until I get my scanner up and running... But here we go: First off, many Landsknecht re-enactors describe the Doppelsoldier armed with Zwiehanders as "shock troops". This does not appear do be the case. Most often they are deployed with Halberdiers to guard the Ensign, or flag-bearer. They are usually placed in the center of the formation, so are a last-ditch defence for the Captain and flag. They do get used in the manner described (charging down the pike ranks), but since their numbers are so small (1/2-1% of the Soldiers), it's not their normal task, to be sure. Now, as I've already stated my lack of written descriptions, all I can do is look into the artwork. Most of it stems from the Maximillian era, and reaches it's peak with the Battle of Pavia. Again, the low numbers mean very little pictorial evidence, but there are some very telling works out there. Hans Holbein the Younger: Primarily known for his Court Portraiture (Henry VIII's portraits being the most familiar to us English-descended folk), there are two drawings he made simply titled "Infantry Battle" that demonstrate a couple two handed swords in the fray. They are depicted in a strong downward chop in the middle of a Pike/Halberd fight. No online references found, they are in the Leeds Collection in London, and are published in the Osprey book for the "Battle of Pavia" (~$14.00) Bernard Van Orley: Ahhh, the Pavia Tapestry. One of the best works contemporary with that event, and so little is published about it... The Osprey book has a few pictures from it, but they are all black and white photos, and miniscule. The Original is on display at an obscure Museum in Italy. The best images I have are from a book published by Banco Toscano, and is titled "Giovanni Delle Bande Nere". It's in Italian, and is a Coffee Table book with various essays about Giovanni De Medici. ~$35.00 plus shipping, kind of hard to find. While not a complete record of the Pavia Tapestry, it has a few excellent plates of various sections. Of particular note is one section, where a Doppelsoldier is pictured about to dispatch of a Pikeman (or Halberdier) who is weilding a pole that has been cracked. This might be where the myth of the "Pike Breaker" comes in. This sword is quite decidedly a true Zwiehander in it's design. There are a couple other Zwiehanders pictured in the Tapestry, but they are usually in the center of a Pike square, so are not really seen so well "in action". Giorgio Vasari: Mostly known for his book about Michelangelo, and his Architechtural design, he was also a fairly well regarded Fresco painter. Again, in the "Giovanni Delle Bande Nere" book, there is a picture of a particularly interesting Fresco he did in the "Sala de Giovanni Delle Bande Nere" in the Palazzo Vecchio. It's title was in Italian, but translated out as something like "The fight between Giovanni and the Orsini at the Bridge to Sant'Angelo". In it are several two handed swordsmen fighting a knot of pikemen. They are in what *ALMOST* appears to be what Morozzo calls the "Guardia de Coda Lunga et Alta", or "the High, Long Tail". Marozzo's guard has the Right hand at the quillons, left hand on the pommel, blade set horizontally straight out, sternum high, towards the right side of the body. This is almost identical to the painting, however the painting shows all of the swordsmen with their left hand at the quillons, their right on the pommel, and a slight downward angle from the sternum to about the navel. They engage the pikemen with this guard, and are seen to be charging down the shaft, using the edge as a shield, and running point first towards the pikemen. Imagine the two handed sword as the tusks of a boar, yeah, it's gonna leave a mark. At any rate, there are other paintings, most of which are seen in the Osprey book (although poorly reproduced and *tiny*), most of them painted by Anonymous artists, and simply described as "the battle of Pavia", or 'the taking of Tunis", etc. I have ordered another book on the Battle of Pavia, and I'll let you know what I find. It's out there, I think I'm going to make my case, I just can't show you all the goodies right now unless you come visit me (Anthony, they may have to take your word for it... At any rate, still hunting.... D. Matthew Kelty
---> it seems as though you are assuming that it was used "more" as a polearm and less as a sword when it was good for both. It has the advantage of "reach" over other swords but not the disadvantage of being so heavy that it it would be out fought by a smaller weapon and in fact, has greater advantage over a smaller weapon by having a wider variety of things you can do with it.
Whoa information out the......well thats a lot of info. Now when I typed fechterbucher i was refering to the German Mauals, although I wasnt aware that there were quite so many other manuals out there. Put of all the named manuals I am only famialr with the German ones and Silver's Paradoxes. In silvers paradoxes I am quite sure that his two handed sword is only longsword sized, but since he sates its very much like the longer shortstaff which is longer thana zweihander....... So im farirly certain that majority of longsword techniques can be used with a zweihander but there are certainly specialized techniques that can only be done with a sword of a zweihanders dimesions. And for seom reason i think I just repeated myself.....
Forgive me, as I only quickly skimmed this thread (and the answer may lie somewhere here), but where do you get the figure of sword-armed doppelsoldner making up only 0.5%-1% of any given landsknecht force? I ask this because, at least on paper, the percentage of total doppelsoldner (arquebusiers & "armed men") is considerably higher. A landsknecht fahnlein was supposed to have a theoretical strength of 400 men, with 100 of those men being doppelsoldner. In turn, about half of those doppelsoldner were equipped as "armed men" (armored close-combat troops), with either halberds, or two-handed swords. By my computation, that means that well over 12% of a fahnlein's men were doppelsoldner armed for close combat. Now, of course, not all of those doppelsoldner were armed with two-handers--as has been mentioned elsewhere here, polearms were more common, due to (among other reasons) their lower cost. Still has it been concretely ascertained how many men "typically" used two-handers? Just Curious, E
Doppelsoldner and Zwiehanders >where do you get the figure of sword-armed doppelsoldner making up only 0.5%-1% of any given landsknecht force? I was referring to the Zwiehander in particular, not Doppel in general, but you do bring up an interesting point. I have extensive information regarding Renaissance Warfare in general, how the troops were armed and deployed, etc. However, most of that is contained in period English manuscripts. They primarily cover the English and Dutch practices, as well as there are several that describe the Spanish, French and Italian prctices, some from the point of few as an observer on the field, some as translations of other documents written by their respective foreign authors. As most of these documents are written in the last quarter of the 16th century, there is almost no written evidence at my disposal (read as "...in English") contemporary with the era or culture of the Landsknecht. With that said, I welcome more Primary reference information being brought to the table, and hope you can share some of your sources... To get where I'm heading here, I'll briefly describe what the general fielding is like, which seems to bear out regardless of nationality. About 70-80% of any given army is dedicated to Pike and Shot. The proportion among those starts off the Century with about 10% Shot to 90% Pike. As the improvements in arms and powder are made, that slides up to about a 50/50 mix near the close of the Century. The remaining 20-30% vary widely in their arms, and contain Cavalry, Bowmen, Crossbowmen, Polearms, and Heavily armored and armed Skirmishers, all in differening numbers and proportions depending on era and nationality. Now, back to our Doppel, I've heard Doppelsoldner described in two different ways. The first being as a "double-armed man", usually meaning an Harquebus and Katzpalger or some other single handed arm, and usually wearing 3/4 field harness. Their kit and experience made them the ideal soldiers, and were usally tasked with being the Seargents of the remainder of the Infantry. The other explanation I'd heard (and the one I got from what I beleive to be more credible scholars of this subject), was that they were still the Elite soldiers described before, but that they were primarily the Polearm and Zwiehander soldiers. They received "double-pay" for their extra expense and skill needed to wield the two handed weaponry, as well as their importance to keeping the Flag up. To provide a parallel in a different country, these would be the "Velites" of Machiavelli's description. If the Doppel are better described in the first sense, then their numbers would be about ~10% or so. If they are better described in the second sense, it would be even higher, ~20-30%. This latter number is dead-on with your 100/400 distribution you described. Now, as far as how many of them are weilding Zwiehanders? As I have no contemporary written evidence, I can only judge by the contemporary pictorial evidence. My previous post has a few of these examples cited. Unfortunately, not a one of them is displayed anywhere I can find on the Internet, so you'd need to buy the books yourself, or wait for me to get it scanned in and posted, but I can describe what I've seen. 1. Almost every example of a Zwiehander has it portrayed near Halberdiers and the Ensign. This would bear out the "Velite" theory described earlier. 2. Most distributions of these "Velites" are about 20%. Again, your 12% is perfectly in line with that, if you factor in the unarmored Halberdiers, Drum, Fife, Ensign, Cavalry, Bowmen, etc. 3. Two ratios are apparent in every single illustration I've seen: For every flag visible, you only ever see one or two Zwiehander. For every Zwiehander visible, you see about 20-30 Halberds/Bills. So, I think you're dead on with your numbers of Doppel, but I think they were primarily armored Billmen or Halberdiers, with a fairly small percentage of them using Zwiehanders. I generally treat companies as being a 200 men or so (Machiavelli's 12X12+ lending a hand in my thinking, admittedly... , and the "1 flag : 1-2 zwiehander" rule led me to the 1/2-1% distribution of Zwiehanders. Again, I am sorely lacking primary reference material for the Landsknecht and Swiss of the late 15th-mid 16th centuries, and welcome anything you can share. Sincerely, Matthew
-Provided you have the space needed to perform them. (A lot of sidestepping and swordwiggeling that provides you're not too cramped together) If you stood very tight, most things you are able to do with a twohander would be possible to do with a hellebard as well IMO
Two Handed swords in War vs. in Single Combat I was crawling through DiGrassi, looking for something else entirely, but I came upon an interesting section that might appeal to Cudgel and Stolenbjorn's earlier posts: Giacomo DiGrassi, His True Art Of Defence Translated By I.G., 1594 Chapter 7 Of The Two Hand Sword "The two hand Sword, as it is used now a daies being fower handfulls in the handle, or more, having also the great crosse, was found out, to the end it should be handled one to one at an equall match, as other weapons, of which I have in treated. But because one may with it (as a galleon, among many gallies) resist many Swordes, or other weapons: Therefore in the warres, it is used to be placed neere unto the Ensigne or Auncient, for the defence thereof, because, being of it selfe hable to contend with manie, it may the better safeguard the same." Additionally, and I'll not bother citing all 12 pages, DiGrassi describes one mentality, set of wards, ways of striking, et. al. for the application in war, and an entirely different set for single combat, thus supporting my earlier hunch that while fightbooks are useful, just because you only ever see a "dual" with a weapon doesn't mena it wasn't used elsewhere, and most fightbooks tend to focus on an application of single combat. This also supports my claims that the Great Swords are usually found at the Center of a company. At any rate, just sharing, happy research all... D. Matthew Kelty
