"Third crusade sergeants shields & liveries?" Topic

Hi,
I'm putting a Crusader army together with Fireforge figures. I'm not doing Military Orders but 'normal' knights in their liveries. Now OK for the knights but what would the shields/liveries of the mounted and foot sergeants be. Like the knights? And if so would they be mixed in the same unit or would a unit have just one shield. Or would they just be random (like the Battleflag decal set)? Crosses? Something else? Always having difficulty with deciding this.
Who can help?
Henk

What was on the shields of people who were not knights is a question that nobody seems to know the answer to. I doubt it was heraldry though. A knight's 'arms' were his own personal device, designed to make him recognisable. My guess is his retinue would have something else on their shields.

I think it is reasonable that a retinue or company would have a unit shield design though. Partly because it would help them recognise each other in battle, but also because people seem to like identifying themselves as part of a group. Look at modern football (soccer) fans who wear replica team shirts, for example.

It was in the Third Crusade that we have the famous agreement on "national colours" of crusading crosses – white crosses for the English, red for the French, green for the Flemish – see for example link. So you could just give your sergeants and footsoldiers uniform cross-blazoned shields (though that would not apply to the local Franks of the Kingdom of Jerusalem).

Although arms were to identify individuals, there do seem to be some cases where they were used for retainers. The following is from Joinville's account of the Seventh crusade (1248), but it's possible the same kind of thing might have been used earlier:

"The Count of Jaffa came ashore upon our left, who was cousin-german to the Count of Montbeliart, and of the lineage of Joinville. He it was who made the most noble show at landing; for his galley came up all painted above and below water with his escutcheons, the arms of which are "or with a cross gules patee." He had about three hundred oarsmen in his galley, and each oarsman bore a target with his arms, and to each target was attached a streamer with his arms embossed in gold."

We have to remember that one thing is the apparition of "signals" on shields and other parts of the warrior equipment (mid XII century) and other the Heraldry science, with the concepts of familiar or territorial arms and their transmission. The shields in the Bayeux tapestry were decorated but the designs were differen from these that in the following centuries was used in the Heraldry. The use of signals that evolved after in the heraldic system is previous and althoug there are many theories one of the most accepted is that the purpose was to identify individuals, nobles or not. Indeed, in Spain, for example, the process begun with the simple soldiers and after was adopted by kings and nobles. The first apparition of signals was on the shield of simple soldiers that are representing the roman soldiers guarding the Holy Sepulcre. In the codice "Las Cantigas de Santa María" (third quarter of the XIII century), all the soldiers and knights bears arms on their soldiers, althoug many of the common warriors bears simple heraldic devices (stripes, bars, diagonal bands, stars, flowers, etc). But there is not a single individual who has not a heraldic design of one or other form on the shield, helmet and horse caparison.