"The battle of Agincourt," Topic

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Amicalement
Armand

I was at Agincourt, and we didn't look that good!

I can't make sense out of the pics. The second one seems to show Henry V's "battle" (puny looking, if so), flanked by masses of archers, with the French cavalry attack coming in. The cavalry attacks only targeted the "wings" of archers, and ignored the dismounted English men-at-arms, so that's not depicted correctly. The archers are standing in the midst of their own stakes, which would be daft. The stake line was planted and then the archers withdrew BEHIND it (well, after advancing beyond it first to goad the French into attack by long ranged missile shot). As for the rest, I can't see the battle of "Agincourt" in any of it….

Oh my God, Great War Ace was at the battle of Agincourt and remembers everything perfectly! I have so many questions for you….hmmm tv…

Yes, I have "seen" the whole thing in panoramic vision. Just ask….

Also the battle of Hastings. Just ask….

Grwat War Ace I am appalled by your response, do you have a diaroma better then that? Wow.

Nope. But if I built one it would be better than that….

It is absolutely soul-destroying, having to re-base your dioramas.

The horror!

Archers on the wings ?

Robert Hardy would not approve

I thought that ALL the archers as two wings, with a single battle of MAA in the center, was the new consensus. It doesn't work if you look at the ranges involved, but who asked me?…

, I'm still on the three battles paradigm. No one ever tells me anything… ;-)

According to at least two eye witness accounts all of the archers were not on the wings.

There were three groups of men at arms with archers interspaced (probably the most heavily armored). The remainder of the archers were on the wings.

Archers and men at arms interspaced was typical of English formations during the HYW, and is mentioned at several other battles.

Hardy knows this because he actually reads the sources rather than spout revisioninst non-sense.

TomT

"All the archers on the wings" is Dr. Matthew Bennett's veiw (as quoted by Hardy)*
Hardy actually suggests two possibilities*:
1) the men-at-arms in three separate bodies with archers in between and on the wings in quincunx formation
2) the men-at-arms in three separate bodies with archers in front and on the wings in quincunx formation
* See pp 309-310 of
Hardy and Strickland, "The Great Warbow", Sutton Publishing, 2005

Where do "they" get "in front" at Agincourt? As noted above, the eyewitness sources place archers between bodies of MAA. To me it is logical to assume that each battle of MAA had its own "wings" of archers attached. And when the battles lined up next to each other, the forward-angled wings of archers formed the "wedge-shaped" bodies of archers between the battles. Obviously the left battle's left "wing" of archers, and the right battle's right "wing" of archers were seen as the "archer wings" of the whole army.

But none of the "wings" were long enough to place archers outside effective range to defend their own battle. This is where the latter seminal writers have skidded off the rails: assuming all of the archers massed to the wings of one central body of MAAs places the outside half of each archer "wing" well beyond the range of the bows to even reach the attacking French first battle of dismounted MAAs….

TMP link Before this goes any further, we should remember that this subject, and all tangents related thereto, has been seriously thrashed to death on TMP long ago. Note, how all of the participants have long since "fallen asleep", a warning to the wise, ;) ….

Despite any evidence to the contrary, I'm not really asleep ;-)

One of the artillery pieces looks a bit 15th Cent..?

To me it is logical to assume that each battle of MAA had its own "wings" of archers attached. And when the battles lined up next to each other, the forward-angled wings of archers formed the "wedge-shaped" bodies of archers between the battles.

It may be "logical to assume" that and as I said, one of Hardy's interpretations does indeed put bodies of archers between the bodies of men-at-arms. But he also makes a case for the possible deployment of archers in front of the men-at-arms, quoting St Denis "in fronte aciei", Pierre Fenin "tous ses archiers devant" and Monstrelet "au front devant".

Personally, I have always struggled with the concept of the wings of archers forming wedges. It is widely now believed that the concept of "wedge" is a mistranslation of the "en herse" quincunx formation. Also, if a wedge is formed of two bodies of archers facing away from each other, the apex of each wedge is actually the flanks of these two bodies – surely a weakness and a tempting target for the French?

It would follow that two battles of MAAs and their "projecting horns" of archers on the flanks would adapt to each other upon contact. The flanks, or exposed ends of each "horn" would face forward, as would the entire formation, until the attacking enemy came within the "horns", i.e. very close or "pointblank" range. We shouldn't visualize the forward-most ends of the archer flanks being a weakness by being projected. If the attacking enemy did not cooperate by attacking the English MAAs, and instead focused on reducing the joined "points" of the projecting flanking archers, no doubt the archers would fall back to a position in line with the MAAs and shoot up the attacking enemy as he negotiated the line of stakes just withdrawn from….

It would follow that two battles of MAAs and their "projecting horns" of archers on the flanks would adapt to each other upon contact. The flanks, or exposed ends of each "horn" would face forward, as would the entire formation, until the attacking enemy came within the "horns", i.e. very close or "pointblank" range.

Given the small size of the bodies of men-at-arms any French attack would easily overlap both the wings of archers, so there would be no opportunity to change facing. The confluence of the two bodies of archers would be a weak point if for no other reason than that they would be under different command (belonging, in effect, to two different battles). The junction of two commands is always a weak point regardless of formation.

If the attacking enemy did not cooperate by attacking the English MAAs, and instead focused on reducing the joined "points" of the projecting flanking archers, no doubt the archers would fall back to a position in line with the MAAs and shoot up the attacking enemy as he negotiated the line of stakes just withdrawn from….

But by your own definition, the two wings of archers in the gap are bigger than the available space between the men-at-arms (otherwise there would be a gap between them when they projected outwards), so falling back into a position in line with the MAA is not an option.

I don't see why not: the archers would simply be in deeper ranks when they fell back to a line even with the MAAs. Archers are not in files, they are in "checkerboard" formation, and apparently far more mobile/fluid than a static "phalanx" of MAAs in "ranks and files" (at least theoretically, with rear ranks physically supporting forward ranks in the "pushing" part of a melee), so archers should have no trouble at all falling back into a space of any width whatsoever: if wider, they would have thinned their formation, if the space were narrower than their projected frontage, then their formation falling back would be deeper….

if the space were narrower than their projected frontage, then their formation falling back would be deeper….

- which would effectively reduce their combat effectiveness to just those in the first few ranks. The rear ranks of deep formations cannot contribute effectively to the fighting. Archers need to be able to see a target to shoot at it.

I disagree. Most missile troops of the era were skirmishers who shot at individual targets. English longbow men fired in volleys at an area. In this the area was in front of the battle line. The sheer number of archer running from one side if the battlefield to the other would have made it several ranks deep meaning the men at the rear couldn't fire. Compound this with them not doing that means that the accepted belief of 6000 shafts in the air at once is either a lie or men firing with no specific target.

The general discussion should remember that

1. English archers were not skirmishers, they were part of the battle line and expected to fight with the MAA. They would likely merge with them if necessary.

2. Its not a war game were you engage a missile unit in melee and it can,t fire. Them at the front would melee and the rest would fire.

I'm not sure where you stand in this, Adrian. You need to be more specific in your details. On the one hand you seem to be saying that meleeing archers in the front ranks would be backed up by archers in the rear ranks continuing to shoot. But you also said that "the men at the rear couldn't fire"(?).

Here's my take on this convoluted and fascinating subject (yous interested guys/gals really ought to spend some time on that old 2008 thread that Rich Knapton started):

The English yeoman was a lifelong practiced archer. The HYW continental English armies were the best of the best archers in England. Their training was in volley combat, with the best "marksmen" always occupying the forward ranks. When an enemy formation came within long range, the front rank "marksmen" raised their bows to obtain the angle and trajectory required, and on loosing, the rear ranks also loosed as closely to the same time as possible. They could all see the angle and degree of elevation of the bows in front. Thus volley shooting was obtained, which would arrive more or less "on target" as a saturation of missiles. This occurred every c. ten seconds, or c. six rounds per minute. That's where the calculations of missiles delivered derive from. As Agincourt field could produce an archers depth of anywhere from eight (minimum) to well over sixteen ranks, it is obvious that a lot of archers could never see what they were shooting at, but didn't need to, since the system created a mass of missiles all going to close to the same spot "somewhere out there". Obviously any rear ranks archer could deduce how close that unseen enemy was by how high he was being required to elevate his bow. Once the missiles ceased to barely clear the bows in front, the archers in the rear would know that high "dropping shot" was about to begin, because the target was too close to volley into anymore: the front ranks guys were now doing the last closing shots as quickly as they could, c. twelve rounds of AIMED shooting per minute. This is when the individual archers became really deadly, targeting visors and joints in the target's harness with intent. The rear ranking archers would continue to shoot very high, to achieve a distracting, disorienting "hail" of vertically dropping shafts while the melee up front continued.

Once the archers ran short of missiles, as at Agincourt, they grabbed their melee weapons and "got stuck in", and with murderous effect too.

Archers were part of the "battle" they were assigned to and were melee troops from the end of the "archer phase" on. If there was a lull in the battle, again as at Agincourt, then missiles would be brought up from the wagons to replenish the quivers….

GWA – thats what I was trying to say while far to tired using a rather flaky tablet. I gave up and went to sleep – sorry.

Its only a model

Archers are not in files, they are in "checkerboard" formation

Crap! That means I have to re-base all mine!