Medieval Warfare

So i made a long post in 30K because its long and not many can read it i will post it here just to share all i know about medieval warfare and at least get some value out off it, i spend 2 hours making this straight from my head, so enjoy.

The medieval era are split into three periods: the early, high and late periods. I'm going to talk about each one, how they fought, and what advancement they bring at the time.

-Medieval Warfare

warfare in the Middle Ages are similar to the way Romans wage wars, in fact warfare stayed the same, it was improved upon and adapted to answer the military problems at the time, in essence the Middle Ages are split in three different periods the early medieval period, the high medieval period, and the late medieval period, these three periods have there own fair share of military and technological advancement, I will cover the military of these three periods, what they develop, tactics, and other manners of military.

-Warfare in the early medieval period

warfare In this period is characterize by heavy use of infantry and missile troops like archers, but the significant military development of the time is to develop the cavalry into an effective "shock troop". The idea to use cavalry as shock troops came because other armies like the Romans, Visigoths, Turks, Arabs, Mongols, and the French have a large force of cavalry, the role of cavalry of these named armies is to break the enemy formation with the Mongols an exception as mounted archers. The first advancement of the cavalry is to be heavily armed and armored as possible, the stirup was not invented at this period preventing the rider to use his entire weight in the charge, the cavalry of this period is more mounted infantry than actual cavalry but mounted cavalry also called light cavalry gives more mobility to outflank the enemy positions, the over value of Europe in their cavalry will later give rise to the "knight".

-Armour and weapons

weapons and bodily protection in this period is quite simple then those of the late medieval period. Because steel is expensive for Armour infantry and cavalry wear leather Armour with a chain mail mesh underneath, the simple Armour give the wearer protection from slashing blades and the chain mail protect them from arrows which is very common at the time. as far as weapons go the most common weapon are hand axes, much of the infantry are conscripted from various location throughout their territory and the axe is more cheaper and easier for untrained men to use, swords are mostly reserved for trained professional troops which take the role of "heavy infantry" or mostly called "elite" infantry, the spear is another common weapon it is used to repel cavalry and engage infantry before getting too close, shields are made out of wood with an iron rim for all unit types which tells you how expensive iron is, the cavalry is armed with swords, axes, and a wooden shield, and archers are armed with standard bows.

-order of battle

the common strategy in practice for most early medieval armies is as follow: 1)rain the enemy with arrows until the enemy formation become disorganized, 2)as the enemy positions become chaotic the infantry will move in to engage the opposing enemy infantry, 3) as the battle wage on the cavalry will attempt to attack the enemy rear position taking out archers and outflanking block infantry formations.

victory will be based on how an army be able to break the enemies spirit, casualties, employment of cavalry, even shouting curses to the enemy. This is to attempt to demoralize the enemy forcing them to retreat, in fact in every medieval engagement more people die retreating than fighting because the cavalry can easily chase down the runners.

-Pitched battles

a pitched battle by definition "a military engagement where two opposing armies decide and agreed where to fight". mostly much medieval

fighting are pitched battles one way or another, two generals will agree to fight on a determined place even if one of the generals are in a terrain disadvantage just to face the enemy, the reason of this willingness to fight even at a disadvantage is because of how warfare is fought at the time, as long as the enemy army is still present in the area no one can claim victory, avoiding the enemy will not last forever and it is impossible to hide a large army from the enemy to draw them to a disadvantage.

pitched battle is similar to "pivotal battle" a battle that will decide the outcome of the entire war, examples of pivotal battle is the battle of midway of WW2, the battle of the bulge, the D-day invasion just to name a few, in medieval warfare when you manage to defeat the enemy you do not just win the battle you earn a victory, which can end the war. another reason for pitched battle is the timing, most soldiers are conscripts, farmers that need to reap the harvest to avoid famine, pitched battle are organized battle of two armies to immediately and decisively end a war, before winter strikes.