"Peasants- where battles are units." Topic

Where you have a medieval wargame, and units are generally organised into battles, where do peasants fit in?
There may be an independent command of bowmen and perhaps the mounted Knights may be hanging to the rear, where would the peasants be?
Embedded tin the front of the battle or a separate mass?
I would be interested in your input.

How many medieval battles do you know that really horded a host of peasants into battle?

Way back in the 80's I bought a prepacked 15mm set called "Peasant's Revolt" from I think TTG? It had 100 peasants and some quantity of various knights and men-at-arms to oppose them.

That doesn't mean anything historically of course.

Given that this period spans over 500 years, being definitive is problematic. However, making a general statement that the landed Knights (class) made up 5% of the population, they would have garrison troops, then as part of the feudal system, the population would have to provide service to their lord.
So, without being too historical, after all it is a wargame, I would venture to suggest that the majority of a force a lord may field, would probably be classed as peasants, or troops of questionable quality. 😉

Flashman14: there certainly were a good number of peasant rebellions of various sorts in Europe during the Middle Ages, and even after (like the German Peasant's War in 1520's).

That would be a suggestion that you'd have great difficulty verifying.

The 'peasantry' served their lord by tilling the land and providing food & other products both for consumption and for trade.

Their services were called upon for military duty in two roles. In cases of dire need, such as a foreign invasion in their area when nothing else was able to get there in time OR as porters and labourers with an army or at a siege.

Part of the problem is that what you refer to as the 'Peasantry' include men who would not have been thought of in that class at the time – the higher classes of non-nobles. It is they who provided the bulk of many feudal armies and were sometimes, as you say, of questionable quality – but so were many of the mercenaries and household troops of the time.

Remember that many medieval armies were quite small and composed of the retinues and households of a fairly large number of the King's vassals. In England this would have been increased by the local 'muster' of the counties and similar arrangements were in place across Europe. The difference is that in England these county forces were used quite often whereas in continental Europe they were used less and of very variable quality.

I sometimes have trouble distinguishing between peasant rabble and feudal levy from historical descriptions. There were certainly cases where peasant "units" ended up in the fight such as the groups of pilgrims during the crusades. Also, they might be groups of camp followers or the "small folk" as mentioned during the battle of Bannockburn, where they charged towards the English wielding their homemade banners when they saw that the battle was going well for the Scots. I could also envision situations where an enemy force was invading for a chevauchee and all bodies were mustered to protect the town, including peasants with whatever farm implement they could find for an improvised weapon.

The "small folk" intervention is a bit questionable to say the least. Nobody mentions them until 50+ years after the event and even then Barbour 's account is pretty clear that the battle was already won before they set off to join it. Should we expect that camp staff would try to get in on the plundering after a battle? You bet. Should we expect that the unarmoured and unarmed threw themselves into the fight? No.
There is an extremely good case to be made that Barbour invented their advance as part of his political agenda. He is at paints to point out to his (aristocratic) audience that they do not 'own' the people and that the nobles must therefore lead and inspire rather than simply command. He was certainly over-egging his pudding, but he was n't entirely wrong since servile status had disappeared in Scotland by the time Barbour was writing his epic biography.
Peasants with improvised weapons are important to the wargame figure industry, but not to the general practice of medieval warfare.
Groups of pilgrims may be a different matter, though it may be the case that one would have to be very wary about narrative evidence from writers far removed from the fight in distance and possibly in time also.
Given the cheapness of basic weaponry and the obligations of even very poor people it's probably best to avoid blokes with scythes and such like. If a spear cost about the same as a day's unskilled labour and was easily available, we should expect that pretty much anyone could equip themselves with a spear; in fact a scythe was probably rather more expensive and would have been incredibly awkward to fight with – I don't think a scythe-wielder would have stood a hope in hell against a spearman.

"Scythe-wielders" are iconic of the medieval peasant at war. What it would be is a "weapon" snatched up in the event of a sudden raid by the neighboring enemy lord and his mounted household or small mercenary company he's hired to "use up" his rival's "resources", i.e. peasant husbandmen and women. There is either no spear to grab, or it is in the cottage too far away. The scythe will have to do because there is nothing else to hand.

I like my "scythe-wielders", and they join the rest of the rabble when I field my peasants. There're only two or three out of some sixty total figures. They look cute. And it is a game.

In reality, "peasants" stayed on the land unless the more restive and able of their ranks joined the lord's household as common troops. This is how MAA got created, and how "knights" before them came into being. The most warlike men were taken into military service. Where else would the warlord get his recruits on the local level? Knights, MAA and other professionals don't grow on trees.

I like to take the Battle of Northallerton as my "standard" model: the "peasants" (and the bulk were exactly that) formed up behind such trained and armed feudal troops as the local lords had brought to the muster. The mailed and shielded men formed the front ranks and the unarmed bulked up the line in the rear.

There isn't an example that comes to mind of "peasants" simply forming or being formed into a "unit" of their own, with the intent of entering the field battle. If such worthies counted for anything, as a separate group, it was in the camp, possibly as a told-off camp guard. Even then, the officers would be some wounded, ill or otherwise indisposed nobility or mercenaries that knew how to do the job.

That doesn't stop me from massing my "peasants" in a single battle and using them as a large "sponge" to soak up the enemy knights and buy time (or even win, on rare occasions, and nothing is quite so funny and satisfying as beating up your opponent's best troops with your worst "troops")….

Bloke, I think we are saying the same thing about the small folk. They saw the battle turning to a rout and advanced into it, no doubt for plunder I would say. That being said, they were there and they were a blob of peasants and that can be recreated on the wargaming table. They might be behind the ranks protecting the baggage, but they can be fielded on the table as a "unit" I think.

Ok, thanks.

I think there is a traditional and widely held misconception of what a peasant is. In figure sculpting terms it appears to suggest field workers with improvised weaponry. Suggestive of 'the poor' this rabble or 'small folk' in the above instance have essentially no place in warfare.

Whilst the medieval period is a vast timeline, I think it fair to say that the town militias who made up the rank and file foot are mirrored by the levies raised from the counties – from the peasantry. I believe they would in fact be largely mixed and indistinguishable 'battles'. The time-honoured wargaming conventions of identifying peasant 'units' as an homogenous force needs to be applied carefully and will in most cases have no place in an army list.

I should perhaps emphasize that this is in reference to the English tradition – the use of peasant soldiery may vary significantly between cultures.

I suggest they have even less a role by the time the levies were replaced by the end of Edward I's reign and into the 14th century by paid soldiery. Unless you are planning some defensive skirmishing amongst the strip farms I wouldn't bother. This is all of course if you are worried about historical representation … which you don't have to be.

Well-put Unlucky General.
Of course it's just a game- and all wargames are fantasies anyway – so we do what we fancy…and why not?
OTH, if we're just doing what we fancy we should n't dress it up as if we had really engaged with primary source material. Barbour's 'small folk' would certainly have existed in the sense that there was a camp full of farriers, blacksmiths, cooks, grooms and all sorts of other skilled or semi-skilled workers, but they mostly would n't have thought of themselves as peasants but as artisans. Of course they were likely to try and get a spot of plundering when the opportunity arose – just like their counterparts in other armies.

I have the original 1978 edition of WRG's 'Armies of Feudal Europe'. Illustrations 35 to 37 on pages 66 and 67 depict 'Armed Peasants'. Figure 35 wields a scythe.

The commentary states that the figures "come from mss. which depict peasants in military rather than agricultural situations so can be taken as accurate representations of such 'soldiers'." It also says that in Germany peasants were forbidden from bearing swords or spears by order of Emperor Frederick I.

Yet in England, by royal edict, the various "assizes of arms" require "peasants" to be spearmen at the very least….

As Unlucky General and UFB posted, the problem is what we mean by peasants.

The assizes, for example, concerned the obligations of freemen not serfs such as villeins and cottars.

A villein or cottar is the lowest order of "freemen". They are not serfs. They can't take their property "where they would", it is bound to the land of the lord. But the body and personal material property (movables) are not bound. S/he can leave the land behind and go elsewhere. The actual serf class in England was small, especially compared to France for instance….

..and servile status was in decline from 1100 or so anyway; in Scotland (and nobody knows why exactly) servile status had disappeared entirely by 1360 or so.
There again a serf might not be poor and we might be better to think of serfs as tenants with rights in the land to which they were bound; it could be very difficult to evict them unlike a great many ordinary tenants on annual leases. Just to muddy the waters further, a serf might also rent land in he same way as a free person and even sub-let it.

villein or cottar is the lowest order of "freemen". They are not serfs

In my view villeins were either legally tied to a lord (villein in gross) or their land (villein regardant), and they sat between freemen and slaves. Cottars, aka the cotarii were akin to villeins. So, as neither group were entirely free, in my opinion they were not freemen, but serfs. Although showing signs of decline, serfs were separate from freemen at the time of the Assizes.

They sure were free in A-S times. I doubt that the distinctions impressed their new "Norman" lords much. If a man insisted that he was not a "serf", he had to prove it through witnesses and documentation. The A-S distinctions were lost on the new aristocracy, but not on the common people. That is why "serfdom" never caught on in England.

The assizes were all about wealth. If a man had land and goods totalling a certain minimal amount, he was assigned a level of military gear. Failure to provide and produce it resulted in fines. That is also why a man of a certain level of wealth could pay for a substitute. The fine worked better than the man himself. So the assizes were in actuality more of a military tax, converted to hiring a competent soldier. I doubt that the system ever worked as intended, i.e. did not turn out a significant body of troops armed at their own expense, ready to fight and die for king and country. "Serfs", like most knights, preferred to remain at home and work at bettering their private situation.

Were "arriere ban" musters still called up? Yes, but only occasionally. And when they were, the peasants stayed out of it as much as they possibly could. (I will still throw my mob of peasants at my opponent's knights, or at least line them up in his way, because it is fun….)

I assume you have some sources to back up your statements that serf-type groups did not exist before the new aristocracy – after all cottager was part and parcel of the A-S/A-D system, and Domesday suggests 9% of the population were slaves at the time of the conquest. These were gradually converted into serfs. So I'd argue that they enjoyed greater liberty, not less post (French) conquest.

On the assizes, I'd agree that they increasingly became a source of tax revenue, but are you sure that you can apply that across the board, eg including the 1181 Assize?

I have a nifty "little" book called, "The Domesday Book, England's Heritage, Then & Now" (Editor, Thomas Hinde).

"Serf-type groups" in pre-Conquest England did not exist except in the most generally comparative way, other than slaves of course.

Villagers (villans) make up c. one-third of the recorded population. "Freemen" or "Sokemen" are probably interchangeable at least most of the time. They are most numerous in the Danelaw. Bordars and Cottars were the lowest level of landholding peasant. Only the last two could be considered close to "serf-type", being tied to the land and personally unfree: i.e. they were obligated to perform duties of various types each year for the lord.

Villans were considered higher in status than bordars and cottars, with most, but not all, obligated to also render services to the lord.

Former "freemen/Sokemen" declined in numbers markedly after the Conquest, indicating that if the individual could not prove their former status then they were reduced to peasants bound to the village and manor. I'm assuming that villans tended to be the freemen and Sokemen who had difficulty, or found it impossible, convincing their new lords that before the Conquest they had been personally free to move and "take their land where they would".

The thegn class vanished in the first generation, in other words, was depressed into the "free" peasantry and effectively disappeared.

Slaves, as you point out, were slowly emancipated and raised to the same status as the rest of the peasantry. Slavery, as a class, disappeared because of the Conquest.

By the 12th century, the "fyrd" system had vanished, and soon was replaced with the assizes of Henry II, and restated/modified numerous times after that throughout the middle ages.

For the purposes of this discussion, it seems reasonable to me to accept that the English "peasantry" after the Conquest continued to reassert their pre-Conquest rights as "freemen", and this tended to raise the lowest A-S/A-D classes as a result. "Serfdom" was pressed for but never attained universally, and finally it vanished altogether, with common people being free to remove themselves "where they would", even if that meant losing the hold of their lands in the village or manor, which they held only as subtenants. Very few "freemen" could have survived into post-Conquest England as landholders in their own right.

The above is an oversimplification, because different regions also had different socially identified classes, for example the "drengs" in Lancashire and Yorkshire held land in return for military duties rendered. This would likely have been mainly supportive rather than as combatants. But probably a lot of them were expected to be armed as well.

The later assizes of arms increased the demand for quality and tightened up the classes who were legally obligated to supply their own specified arms. But as with scutage, the value could be paid for a substitute, and it probably increasingly was resorted to that way, freeing the obligated person from serving in person….

"Serf-type groups" in pre-Conquest England did not exist except in the most generally comparative way, other than slaves of course.

I disagree and you seem go one to acknowledge the problem in that statement when you write of cottars and bordars – both of which existed pre-Conquest. Moreover, post-conquest, I think that your assumption that villains were not tied to their lands, but were free to move to new lands problematic.

By the 12th century, the "fyrd" system had vanished, and soon was replaced with the assizes of Henry II, and restated/modified numerous times after that throughout the middle ages.

I believe you've jumped the gun a little here, GWA, as the fyrd was called out numerous times in the twelfth century, especially during the reign of Stephen. Indeed, I would argue that Henry's assize of 1181 was designed to update the fyrd to better meet his needs and that it still existed. There is evidence to support an argument that Queen Eleanor used the fyrd in Kent to counter John's attempts to bring in mercenaries whilst Richard was away. In my view, even stating 'by the 13th century' would be problematic.

The problem with your view on the English peasantry is that the process took significantly longer than you seem to suggest, i.e. several centuries. Moroever, you seem to contradict yourself by saying 'very few "freemen" could have survived post-Conquest' when earlier you argue that villains made up roughly a third of the population. Unless I've misunderstood, this only makes sense if the villains were, as I am arguing, serfs.

By the way, I agree that it is a natty book.

Drengage tenure in N'umberland meant service as armoured cavalry, hence the easy conversion to knight service tenures. I would have thought the same would apply in Yorks/Lancs/Cheshire, but maybe not.
The last successful recorded writ for the return of a serf is about 1561 or 2 IIRC.

In trying to be spare in verbiage, I do make what appear to be fallacious assertions.

I did leave out the bit about "villans" being tied to the villages. But what does "tied to the land" mean? In some cases it meant that if the villan or otherwise "peasant" carried off his movables and left his land he was free to go. But in other cases he was breaking the law and could be arrested and brought back for his fate. Some "freemen" were in fact free to move. I think that most of them were technically, but most chose not to try it, out of fear of the unknown, much like any other time. (e.g. in the US South after the ACW, very few "freed" Black Americans left the places where they had been living for generations.)

In a world where it was legal to put a person into bondage for any debt until it was worked off, a "serf" was no different. Perhaps parts of the country maintained the actual term instead of adopting euphemisms to mask the reality that many people were living as forced laborers, no more free than medieval "serfs"?

"Fyrd": Yes, "by the 12th century" it was a thing of the past. I didn't mean that between 1100 and 1181 there was no fyrd and no assizes of arms. Of course the fyrd system endured to some extent for a long time into the 12th century. But was it the same thing as the A-S military system? It seems more like a call up of every able-bodied man, more like a levy than a regulated militia. Feudal instruments had replaced the A-S.

"Very few freemen survived with their landholding intact". The only ones would be those who went over to the Normans entirely and provided no excuse to disfranchise them. Was Toki of Wallingford, the vassal of Wm the Conqueror, one such? He seems to have been of the thegnly class, "converted" to the "miles" class by devoting himself to the service of the conquerers. Lower orders, already on the land as subtenants, and not required to move out to install an invader being rewarded, would have remained as subtenants of the new Franco-Norman lords. There must have been a majority of these, as an army of less than ten thousand men can hardly have replaced a native peasantry of a million or more….

"Fyrd": Yes, "by the 12th century" it was a thing of the past. I didn't mean that between 1100 and 1181 there was no fyrd and no assizes of arms. Of course the fyrd system endured to some extent for a long time into the 12th century. But was it the same thing as the A-S military system? It seems more like a call up of every able-bodied man, more like a levy than a regulated militia. Feudal instruments had replaced the A-S.

I agree with the broad thrust of your argument, i.e. that constraints on the mobility/freedom of peasants were a mix of the legal, economic, and social. So I'll focus on the one point I think is most relevant to our gaming, i.e. the composition of A-N/Angevin armies.

I would argue that Feudal instruments were operating side by side with the Fyrd as that is what the evidence suggests. However, I see that time is not on my side. So I will follow this up when the message boards reopen later today.

While waiting for you: Henry I's training period of the fyrd, while waiting for his brother Robert to invade southern England in 1101, indicates that the fyrd was no longer remotely the same "instrument" as in A-S times. His "troops" required arming and drilling in order to get them ready for war. I wish that I could readily recall other instances of the fyrd under the Anglo-Normans being seriously reduced in effectiveness. The legal requirement upon the population was still there. But the regular adherence to the arms, horses and other equipment required of a "fyrdman" (who used to be primarily a thegn, or housecarle) had slipped away. This would have probably been mainly because the new lords did not welcome their "peasants" being armed. So the "fyrd" produced unarmed peasants for the most part, instead of mounted, mailed and shielded spearmen….

Traditionally, it's been argued that the removal of the fyrd's officer corps (the thegns) may have something to do with that, but Hollister's work on Peterborough (English Historical Review vol 130) indicated a substantial number of sokemen were retained under the AN and were, he argues, the select fyrd of the AS/AD. Moreover, sheriffs had the role of overseeing the fyrd with AN knights choosing to dismount to lead them on occasion, such as at the Battle of Northallerton in 1138 and Lincoln in 1141.

So I'm inclined to agree with Morillo that the AN army built on the core of the royal household to include elements of a feudal host (knight service), a reformed version of the select fyrd, and the original, and still somewhat makeshift, general fyrd usually left for emergencies. Like the AS/AD nobility, regional magnates would still rock up with their own retainers – often in excess of the number they were required to field for reasons of status.

As an aside, I am unaware of anything to support your idea that the (two forms of) fyrd were less well equipped than previously. Did you have anything in mind?

First of all, the terms "select" and "great," (or "general") fyrd were first coined by professor C. W. Hollister in 1962, as an elegant solution to the debate that had for years been waged amongst scholars: was the fyrd only composed of the noblemen warriors who fought for the king and earls in exchange for lands and privileges; or was it a general levy of all able-bodied freemen, mainly the ceorl class, but inclusive of the nobility? The former was referred to as the "select" fyrd, the latter as the "great" fyrd, or the nation under arms. Further study has shown Hollister's neat theory to be too simple: the fyrd system was undergoing changes all the time. The early history of Anglo-Saxon England is more obscure the further back you look. But by the time of the Conquest, it seems clear that thegns, housecarles and well-off ceorls -- called geneats ("companions") -- comprised the fyrd, or standing militia, of the realm; while the general population of peasant freemen only fought when their own shire was endangered. Therefore, at Hastings, the only peasants -- rustica gens -- in the English army were the locals of Kent and Sussex.

As the Conquest completely eradicated the old order and replaced it, the only part of the fyrd remaining was the peasant class. A few old order fyrdmen, e.g. Toki of Wallingford, remained in service. But these were taken in as vassals, not fyrdmen. When the Anglo-Norman kings called out the fyrd, they got the general levy. Any feudal troops were already in service to their immediate lords. So in 1101, the new, untried Henry I had to bolster his numbers with the general levy of "freemen". These were not part of the fyrd in the original sense governing the military equipment obligated as part of the thegn class, much less the housecarles. I believe that the heriot (death duty) shows the equipment of a thegn (or housecarle for that matter, by that late date). No such equipment is assessed on the general levy. But it seems reasonable to me to see each landed thegn as raising a retinue of one or more "ceorls", as "geneats", mounted and armed at his expense. So the fyrd included, de facto, all thegns and housecarles, armed in mail, mounted and etc. Plus "geneats" whose arms were not as comprehensive, not being covered by the laws governing the fyrd.

In A-S/A-D England, the fyrd was potentially twice or more as numerous as the A-N knight service that arose in its place. And there was no A-N replacement for the fyrd to raise "sergeants" or other armed troops until the assizes of arms. So it might be correct as you say, that the assizes were intended to return a higher quality of armed infantry to the "fyrd". But now it was based on personal wealth as assessed, rather than directly based on "freemen" status. An armed peasant who happened to be relatively wealthy would be required by the assize to arm himself (or a replacement) with the stipulated arms and armor….

Yes, I know a reasonable amount about Hollister, as well as subsequent research. It is a useful division in my opinion, but your summary seems off to me as I don't believe that his select fyrd was solely made up of noblemen. Moreover, your argument that the Conquest 'completely eradicated the old order and changed everything' just does not match the data in Domesday and elsewhere.

Did you look into Hollister's research into sokemen before posting, GWA, or Morillo's work as your point on there being a lack of quality foot under the AN suggests not?

As an aside, are you suggesting that coerls weren't peasants?

This is all very interesting stuff. I've no background in English history except where it collides with Scotland or France, but I wonder if 50-year-old research is still valid? It may well be, but I know that the early-1960s academic understanding (let alone the wider public) of medieval Scotland was – to use a fine historiological technical term – 'seriously rubbish' and I understand much the same can be said for France.
Of course it's fair to point out that for medieval Scotland there really was no scholarship worthy of the name until Barrow, Nicholson and Duncan emerged in the mid 1960s so maybe the English situation is very different.
OTH, despite everything. people still have some regard for what Gardiner and Oman had to say about medieval war between England and Scotland, so maybe it's not so different?
I'd be interested to read your thoughts.

It is dated, UFB, but Morillo's work is more recent (1994), and the core of Hollister's findings on Sokemen are solid, I believe. As you know, there aren't so many in the field and institutional history has been out of vogue of late

Moreover, your argument that the Conquest 'completely eradicated the old order and changed everything' just does not match the data in Domesday and elsewhere.

Are you going to quibble over a very few exceptions? Because listing "1066" data to compare with the A-N holdings of the same only points out that the prior holders in the vast majority of cases were free, while the current peasants were not free to "go where s/he would". The "noble" class of thegns and higher were virtually gone by Domesday, so to my mind that is a "complete" eradication of the "old order".

We are talking about peasants. And "ceorls", by any of their various other names, were peasants in A-S times. But, a ceorl could also be rich and therefore part of the fyrd. I agree that the fyrd was not entirely made up of "noblemen". Housecarles were elite warriors, not usually noblemen, but that was already changing by 1066, with housecarles beginning to be settled on their own land almost "in fee", like landed thegns.

The quality of foot under the A-N was not a result of employing an unchanged fyrd system. It was a vassalage and mercenaries system. Any English called up as part of the "fyrd" were levied troops, and were almost entirely unarmed by the change of the century if not well before….

Cheers Janner; that's helpful.

You're welcome UFB

I'm not quibbling about exceptions, GWA. Like us all, I am seeking to piece together a reasonable view of the situation based on fragmentary and often contradictory data – such is the life of a medieval historian

There are parts of your interpretation I disagree with, especially that membership of Holloster's select fyrd was limited to the wealthy and that the Conquest completely overturned the fyrd, replacing it with another method of levying troops.

I did not say coerls were not peasants, I'm clear that they were. However, I asked for your position on this as you seemed to suggest they were not. Your response indicates that your desire for the select fyrd to be noble, or at least wealthy, causes you some problems when it comes to ceorls. You seem to be arguing that they were peasants except when they weren't, i.e. that a ceorl could not become a thegn if they became wealthy. Have you had a chance to look at the law codes laid out in the Geþyncðu? For example, Instituta Cnuti states,

And if a ceorl prospered, that he possessed fully five hides of land of his own a bell and a castle-gate, a seat, and special office in the king's hall, then was he henceforth entitled to the rights of a thegn.

I agree that by removing the bulk of the upper social strata, the Conquest removed part of the previous order. However, parts remained in place with others shifting gradually over time. I suspect that this is merely a disagreement on the balance between change v continuity. We can probably agree that the chances for social mobility amongst slaves improved, but the chances of entering the highest levels were curtailed.

Can you support your closing paragraph in some way, as it seems quite an emphatic position to take based on what you have presented to date and, I believe, runs contrary to the examples I have cited. Do you have, for example, evidence of the new method of levying troops you seem to propose existed under the AN?

Do you have, for example, evidence of the new method of levying troops you seem to propose existed under the AN?

Hmmm, difficult to point to a "source" and say, "there it is". What you are asking is for me to dredge up details of where I got to the point of believing that the A-N suppressed the English "peasantry". Let's start with "Robin Hood". Seriously, what evidence to the contrary is there? I didn't think that this was really being argued, which is why I jumped on this topic so fully. The A-S fyrd system remained technically in place, along with all of the other "systems" governing the social structures of English Medieval life. The "new order" took charge and didn't replace anything except which aristocracy got the bennies by being in power. At first, thegn families kept their lands. Wm settled his baronage and knights on the lands of dead thegns, marrying them off to English heiresses, widows, etc. Disturbing the existing status quo as little as necessary, for the most part (there are always exceptions). Everything was "frozen" in place until the conquerors got settled in. Society was not allowed to be mobile, unless it was to leave the country altogether. I see no evidence to show that people were refused exile, they could emigrate "oversea". Those thegns who survived 1066 were steadily replaced for the next twenty years. Iirc, I've read more than one seminal source stating that all the thegnly class was gone except one or two by Domesday. I guess I'm going to have to dig out my books and start looking for where I have read that the arms and training of the fyrd had degraded greatly by then. Such that Henry I had to drill and arm the fyrd in 1101, as I have already said. The fyrd did not show up in any combat ready state. Why? If the fyrd system was still the main recruiting method, why had it degraded?…

I don't have the time to spend looking further right now. And that probably isn't necessary anyway. I've just checked Beeler and Contamine, for a quick refreshment of the synapses on "fyrd" after the Conquest.

Okay, I was conflating 11th and 12th century evolution of the "shire levy". We seem to have the "select fyrd", or "one man in five hides" as it were. This is the armed and supported man going to the muster, mounted and somewhat drilled, with mail, shield and helmet, etc. The "shire levies", or "general fyrd" (great fyrd) are the pool of common citizens, peasants and townsmen, who provide the wealth that arms the "select" man. Mostly these are thegns who muster, i.e. the same man each time, not some kind of rotation among five men. It would only make sense to send the same man each time, especially if he was of the "aristocracy". And if not that, at least the one man in five would have the reputation of being the most suitable (and amenable?) to the task of military service.

Contamine seems to think that there was a "select" army of c. 20K men available. That might be a tad high, but not impossible. Between Fulford bridge and Hastings, well over half of this number had perished, leaving many manors and other holdings to be filled as feudal fees by the Franco-Normans.

For the next twenty years, the thegnhood was replaced steadily by Wm's men. This substantially altered the character of the former "select fyrd", for in almost all cases of replacement, the new man was already the vassal of some lord, secular or ecclesiastical, and therefore not part of the "old order". So the formerly "select fyrd" ceased to exist, while the "shire levies", or general/great fyrd continued on in the body of the common people.

When Wm II, Henry I and Stephen, or their lieutenants, call out the "shire levies" (e.g. for the battle of Northallerton), they are not getting the "select fyrd", or the formerly armed men of A-S England, they are getting the "general levy" of peasants, few of which would have possessed arms of any degree of completeness. The structure for providing arms to the "select" men had vanished with the passing of the last generation of "select fyrd" up to 1066 and during the first twenty years of the Conquest.

The replacements, Wm's men and those of his baronage and the church, were enfeoffed on the former lands/holdings of the "select" men and no longer constituted a part of the fyrd system….

"Fulford bridge", that would be Gate Fulford, Stamford Bridge and Hastings – was in a hurry….

I'm sure you know this already, GWA, but a hide was sufficient land to support a single household. Indeed the world seemingly derived from 'family' (hiwan). Northamptonshire for example, was assessed in the early eleventh century as having c.3,200 hides, i.e. roughly 640 men for the select fyrd. See Stenton's, Anglo-Saxon England for more on this.

Thegns held their land either from the king or another magnate, i.e. they were retainers and, I would argue, distinct from mechanisms to man the select fyrd. These were the chaps who were displaced – not those making up the select fyrd.

I believe that Contamine's 20,000 originally came from Hollister. Bernie Backrach is a fan of large medieval armies and he also drew from Hollister (as well as Morillo) to do some interesting work on the select fyrd some thirty years after the Conquest in 'William Rufus' Plan for Invading Aquitaine', The Normans and Their Adversaries at War.

On evidence, in light of a lack of evidence to the contrary, the application of Ockham's Razer suggests a continuity of the fyrd under the AN. Personally, I'd expect AN/Angevin foot to be as well protected as that of the Anglo-Danes with the AN/Angevin elites either fighting mounted or stiffening the foot as their Anglo-Danish predecessors had done.

I'd suggest the chap representing five single hides wasn't usually a thegn/aristocrat, but the sort of yeoman that came to cause the French so much trouble in the fifteenth century with his warbow

That could be. Which is why I surmised "most suitable and amendable" to the job of serving in the fyrd. I'm sure that many a thegn "served" through a substitute. But there were many thegns who served in the households of landed thegns, who had no holdings of their own, who were expected to be part of the "warrior class." So I believe that thegns were the dominant demographic in the "select" fyrd. Every community knows who its more warlike and capable men are.

Nonetheless, it seems to me that applying "Occam's Razor" serves my pov better. I've not run into anything in reading over the years which portrayed the infantry of A-N armies as primarily "English". The fyrd was called out occasionally, especially early to suppress the rebellions in the north. After consolidation was accomplished, the fyrd languished rapidly into a "shire levies" force, with the armed and armored troops supplied by the invaders' already existing feudal structure transplanted to England.

I don't believe, either, that the A-N infantry forces were inferior to the A-S/A-D as supplied by the fyrd system. The feudal armies of A-N England were just as provided for through vassalage. There was no housecarle elite, but then the "miles" were at least the equal of the housecarles and far more numerous. And, as you say, they dismounted more often than not to form a very formidable infantry force that "stiffened" the feudal infantry and levied troops.

But that aside, how many or what proportion of the former English representatives of the five hide system could have remained in possession of their lands after the Conquest? That is the real question when asserting that the fyrd system endured more intact than otherwise. Because unless a majority of the former "defenders of the realm" kept their lands under the A-N kings, there would be no continuity: feudalism was the "new order", and the holdings of the former English tenants would have been assumed by vassals of the conquerors. That would have eliminated the fyrd system where the "select" fyrd was concerned….

The problem with your suggestion, GWA, is that, as retainers, thegns arguably already had military obligations to fulfil and I can't see the Hundred Ælders and Shire-Reeves being too happy at attempts to double hat

On ethnicity, didn't you mention up-thread Henry I's training of the fyrd, and that was some two generations after the Conquest, i.e. in 1101 and 1102.

However, you are right, the fyrd were shire levies – and had been prior to the Conquest. A shire being made up of groups of hundreds (Wapentakes in Danelaw). So named because they contained one hundred hides, which were grouped into tens (tithings) and then fives, which served as the administrative basis of the select fyrd. The AN's downgraded the reeve, bringing in sheriffs to oversee the shires, but the shires, hundreds, ten, and five hide system seemingly remained in place. For example, the number of hundreds was updated on occasion post-Domesday and the meeting of the hundred court increasing infrequency to once every three weeks in 1234. The hundreds also served as the basis for taxation for some six centuries post-Conquest.

One of the things that I enjoy about the Medieval period is that there is enough data to have a debate, but plenty of room left for conjecture

Far too much room to make me happy, in fact.

(I deleted that; I'm just repeating myself….)