"mounted archers Compagnies d'Ordonnace early 16th century" Topic

I'm still doubting how to organise my early 16th century French Compagnie d'Ordonnance and Dutch Bandes d'Ordonnance.
David Potter in 'Renaissance France at war' mentions for the later 15th century lances of 1 MAA, 1 Coutillier and 2 archers. I neglect the pages and valet who took care of the spare horses etc.
The coutillier is later called a sergeant or lighter armed MAA. He is vague in the role of the mounted archers. Where they really mounted crossbowmen. And if so, did they shoot from horseback or did they dismount to shoot.
Other question is whether they were organised in seperate squadrons or tactical formations in the field.
Dealing with the 1550's Potter suddenly states that the lance in which the mounted archers of course were lighter armed MAA, were suplemented by mounted arquebusiers!

For the Dutch Bandes d'Ordonnance I have read Guillaume 'Histoire des Bandes 'Ordonnance des Pays-Bas.
He states that at the start of the 16th century, after a reorganisation, the lance comprised of 4 mounted combattants: 2 MAA of which one coutillier and 2 mounted archers.
But also this source is vague about the true appearance and role of the mounted archer.

There has been a discussion before on the subject, but as I can remember without a really satisfying conclusion for me.

How would you display a Compagnie d'Ordonnance on tabletop?

Le Duc

For me I ignore the confusion around the role and call them back ranks of a gensdarme figures. It's just easiers.

Though not sure what to do with the Archer figures I have.

The mounted archers were as far as I can tell never mounted crossbowmen, Potter makes an error when he refers to them as such when refering to the 1515 regulations. Having read the origina document it is so obvious that I suspect that it is a case of an unintentional editing error while reworking the text or a change made by an editor rather than Potter misunderstanding the original text.

Archers were armed with longbow/warbow and dismounted to fight in battle. (Ravenna 1512 is a good example of this as is Fornovo) They always possessed some ability to fight mounted but were not fit to face heavy infantry or true cavalry on their own.

The change from mounted bowman to lancer is sadly obscured by the gaps in the sources. Don't have my notes next to me but IIRC the first reference to Archers fighting with lance is to be found in the 1530's and it took even longer for the regulations to reflect this change.

My personal theory is that the massive losses at Pavia finaly ended the French use of the bow but an alternate possiblity is that they were pressed into service as emergency cavalry during the numerous charges against the Swiss during the battle of Marignano 1515.

Personaly I would field the archers on foot up to 1515, between 1515 and 1525 dual use but without lance and post-1525 as lancers.

Thanks Daniel for your reaction.
perhaps I was not quite clear about Potter, but he calls them mounted archers, but does not speak about there true appearance in the field during the early decades of the 16t century. So probably he also doesn't know, but it would have been clearer to say so. He seems not to be the author to make such mistakes.

I agree with you that mounted archers/crossbowmen in general will not have been intended to cope with gendarmes. So probably they were organised in seperate units and question remains whether they did shoot mounted or dismounted.

I've mentioned before on TMP, I think, the illustration at link that shows archers of Beraud Stuart, seigneur d'Aubigny's company mounted and carrying their bows – in the context of Agnadello 1509, the blog suggests. The same page mentions that Bayard describes "archers" of his company armed with demi-lance shortly after that battle. This fuels my suspicion that the transition from mounted bowmen to "demilancers" was a gradual change on a company-by-company basis.

You might find my book, The King's Army (Cambridge University Press), interesting in regard to the French gendarmerie for the period of the early wars of Religion, 1559-1576.

Gurkahn, I start sharing your and Daniel's opinion.
I'm starting up a 1507 scenario in the Low Countries now and probably this transitional period allows me some freedom in choice.

James, your splendid book is for a long time on my bookshelves already, as I'm also researching the early period of the Dutch Revolt, in which French help was often at hand. Your book has given me already much info I needed.

>question remains whether they did shoot mounted or dismounted.

I think you can safely assume that bows were not used from horseback in the period and armies you investigate, so once you decide they had bows, they certainly dismounted for their usage.

There is an illustration of French mounted archers in Le Voyage de Gênes by Jean Marot dated to 1510-1520. A couple of pictures from this are used in the Agnadello article linked above, but they portray the 1507 Genoa campaign.

MIRROR SITE
A detail of the French archers & Stradiots and the Genoese

Druzhina
16th Century Illustrations of Costume & Soldiers

One thing to keep in mind about period illustrations is they often are biased in favour of earlier depictions. In an age of books and illustrated manuscripts, but no photos or videos, artists who might never have seen troops in the field probably copied from illustrations in existing books.

I've always suspected that the very old-fashioned High Gothic depiction of Swiss troops in some early 16th century illustrations is due to this, especially when Swiss sources as late as the end of the 15th century are already lamented the slashing of clothing in favour amongst young men, which was considered tacky by old-fashioned types.

Druzhina, thanks for the links.
One of the pics by the way features on the cover of Potter's Renaissance France at War.

Puster, I'm just reading The Italian Wars by Mallett and Shaw. A good read by the way.
On page 180 they write 'In the lance unit which he led, the French man-at-arms had two mounted archres who would have normally dismounted to fight; the surviving musters reveal that this practice continued into the 1530's, although there is evidence that the archers of a cavalry company tended to be mustered as a single unit.'

An interesting conclusion, but unfortunately without reference to sources.
This would underline your opinion that in case the mounted archers still were mounted shot, they would dismount to shoot.
But it contradicts the general belief that the mounted crossbowmen gradually changed into lighter armed men-at-arms during the early decades of the 16th century.