HIST 204
SYLLABUS
LECTURE OUTLINES

 

KNIGHTHOOD, WARFARE, AND REVOLT

Tuesday:

Videos:

“Agincourt: Myths and Misconceptions” (Wallace Collection; 8:03 min.):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uxHYQW2Nio

Gotland: Visby’s Last Stand (Timeline, 46:21 min.; armor, 20:00-22:45; battle wounds, 36:50-40:00):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxkgBDaVsP0

 

Music:

“The Agincourt Carol” (celebrates the English victory at Agincourt in 1415; 4:14 min.):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQZiW8zRSUY

“Henry V” (dir. and starring Kenneth Branagh, 1989): after the Battle of Agincourt, tally of the slain, and “Non nobis, domine” (5:54 min.):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPXXuEel0fU

 

Major tactics and technologies of medieval town and castle sieges included:

Besiegers’ tactics and technologies:	Defenders’ corresponding tactics and technologies:
Blockade supplies to starve town (very slow and expensive)	(1) Good provisioning & food rationing; (2) counter-attack or outside help to break blockade
Scaling ladders	(1) Moat; (2) man walls to repel scaler
Siege towers	(1) Moat; (2) fire arrows or other burning missiles
Siege engines (especially trebuchets)	Destroy siege engines by sortie or by rival stone-throwing engines
Mines	(1) Moat; (2) countermine
Battering rams (against gates)	(1) Moat; (2) drop rocks or boiling liquids on ram and crew; (3) shoot crew with longbows or crossbows
Cannon (beginning later 14 C.)	Destroy cannon and kill gunners by sortie or by rival cannon
Negotiation and threats (e.g., “Surrender now or face dreadful sack”)	Counter-negotiation(e.g., “If no relief arrives within 40 days, we will surrender peacefully”)

Click here to see photos of the 172 English longbows and more than 2300 arrows recovered from the wreck (1545) of Henry VIII’s ship, the Mary Rose. Click here for some descriptive details. Most of the bows and arrows were of poplar. The bows were mostly 6′ 6″ to 7′ long, and had a draw of about 80-130 pounds.

Click here to see a diagram of a crossbow

1337-1453 Hundred Years’ War between England and France:

1346, 1356	English victories at Crécy and Poitiers (at latter, French king is captured)
1347-1349	Black Death
1358	Jacquerie rebellion (France)
1381	Peasants’ Revolt (England)
1415	Henry V defeats French at Agincourt; he subsequently marries French princess (Catherine de Valois) and is declared heir to French crown
1422	Charles VI of France and Henry V of England die, and war resumes
1429-31	Joan of Arc, visionary peasant girl from Lorraine, turns tide of war to France and gets Charles VII crowned; is captured by Burgundian forces, sold to English, tried at Rouen (capital of English-held Normandy) by French churchmen, insists on authenticity of her religious visions, and is burnt for heresy. (Click here to read a letter sent by Joan to the English generals, ordering them to leave France or be slaughtered. Click here for a contemporary sketch of Joan, made in 1429 by a court clerk in the margins of the rolls of the Parlement of Paris.)
1453	Fall of Constantinople to Ottoman Turks; end of Hundred Years’ War

1455-1485

War of the Roses in England (dynastic war between houses of Lancaster and York) ends with victory at Bosworth field by Henry Tudor, earl of Richmond (becomes King Henry VII, Lancastrian) over King Richard III (Yorkist)

Parliamentary developments:

In England, Parliament is divided into two houses, Lords (peers and prelates) and Commons (shire knights and burgesses). Lords develop into royal advisory body on policy and high court of appeal; Commons gain right to approve or veto new taxes and use fiscal control to gain broader legislative powers.

In France, the Estates-General briefly secure shared power in 1357 (through the Great Ordinance) from the Dauphin Charles (shown here with Etienne Marcel), but this ends in 1358 with the suppression of the Jacquerie rebellion

Fifteenth century sees development of absolutist rulers throughout Europe:

(Click here for maps of Europe c. 1400 and c. 1500)

• France (Louis XI, r. 1461-83)
• England (Henry VII, r. 1485-1509)
• Spain (Ferdinand of Aragon, r. 1479-1516 and Isabella of Castile, r. 1474-1504; conquer Granada in 1492, leading to expulsion of Jews and Muslims from Spain, and uniting of Spain)
• Papacy (Pope Martin V, r. 1417-31; restores papal power after Great Schism and Conciliar Movement)
• Russia (Ivan III, “the Great;” r. 1462-1505, repudiates Mongol authority, adopts Byzantine symbols of autocracy, calls himself “Czar” [Caesar] of the Russians and heir of Byzantium)
• Italy remains divided into 5 main powers: Kingdom of Naples, Papal States, Duchy of Milan, and Republics of Venice and Florence, all ruled by autocrats (or, in Venice, oligarchs)
• Holy Roman Empire remains fragmented into numerous principalities, free cities, etc., but in the 15th century the Hapsburg emperors, through judicious marriages, gain great wealth and territories, and thus power

Some aspects of developing absolutism:

• Legal concept, derived from Justinian’s 6th-cent. Corpus Juris Civilis, that “the will of the prince has the force of law” (tacitly rejected in England since Magna Carta, 1215)
• Suppression or erosion of representative assemblies (rejected in England by development of strong Parliament)
• Development of standing army and professional administrative bureaucracy (especially staffed by lawyers)
• Suppression or erosion of aristocratic power, or of any other domestic rival power