"Kite shields in the 3rd crusade?" Topic

im about to start collecting figures for a crusade skirmish force, and am torn by my love for both Perry crusaders and those made by Crusader miniatures. the best answer would be to get both!

Were the older kite shields completely replaced by heater shields by the 3rd crusade, or would some troops still carry the old ones? I figure armour styles would still be mixed by then. I'm sure this has already been asked, but its so much easier to ask again.

thanks for any input

Shields were not "heater" yet, something in between. The top was flat on the majority of shields by the late 12th century, but a triangular top or demi "kite" would also be seen….

Yes, they would still have kite shields among longish heater shields.

The problem we have is a lack of surviving examples through any era and reliance upon pictorial or visual references. Nobody seems to talk about it much in any surviving records. Because historians are able to date those references we tend to stick to 'not before this date' or 'not until such and such a year' notions of the coming and going of technology on the battlefield. I believe this stems from a lack of applied and educated imagination and conservatism – a natural tendency. It might also depend on what sort of wargamer you are. If you want a simple easy answer to crack out another army and if gaming rather than research is your bent – then rigid and more widely 'accepted' answers should suffice.

I suppose we need to ask ourselves how long can a shield last? How long is a piece of string? None of this really helps but I think a generation (normally 20 years in the modern age) of latitude can be applied either side of the first and past evidence of any type of shield. Like cars today – wealthier people replace their cars with the latest models before less wealthy people. It might also be down to how much combat a soldier saw. Full time and repeatedly engaged soldiers on campaigns would most probably replace their shields more often than the farmer who might dust off his father's shield hanging in his house before joining the levy.

The 3rd Crusade was not engaged in by the farmer or his father, so shields would have been the latest. Contemporary artwork shows longer shields than "heaters", some almost as long as "kites" from a hundred years earlier. There was much overlapping. Scandinavian artifacts indicate that they were possibly the last to change and "kites" were probably in use there well into the 13th century.

A shield lasts long enough to be replaced. :) Alfred Duggan had his main character Roger de Bodeham's kite shield last the entire First Crusade. But then it was a c. fifteen pound monster of layered leather over a wooden frame, in other words, quality meant to last. And in the story "Knight With Armour" Roger's shield definitely outlasted him….

How long a shield lasts probably depends on what you are doing with it.

If you actually end up in a fight where your shield gets shot full of arrows and then hacked and stabbed with swords, axes and spears, it might be time to consider getting a replacement.

Here are a couple of pictures from 'Liber ad honorem Augusti', by Pietro da Eboli, Sicily, c.1197 with kite shields:
Folio 113r. Public discourse of Count Richard of Acerra and the Archbishop of Salerno because the Neapolitans will not leave the city.
Folio 123r. Episode of the assault on Capua by Count Richard of Acerra.

MIRROR SITE
'Liber ad honorem Augusti', by Pietro da Eboli, Sicily, c.1197

Druzhina
12th Century Illustrations of Costume & Soldiers