"Burgundian Pike Units" Topic

I have been putting together an orbat for Morat. The excellent book by Pat McGill has been especially helpful. It suggests eight battles separated into four corps and a reserve. Each battle is distinct in its leadership and the companies involved in each battle. Each corps is made up of MAA, archers, pike and skirmishing elements of Handgunners and crossbow men. Easy to follow so far? My question is not based on how the battle was fought at Morat as it was a piecemeal affair but how would the army have fought under Charles' terms?
The way the book portrays the make up of the army is as battlefield formations. Would the pike have stayed as part of the corps on the battlefield supported by other units in the corps or would the Pike have formed one or two larger units? If this was done what happened to tge battlefield commands? I envisage the battles fighting on their own hence their inability to deal with the huge Swiss pike kiels.

Wow, that army must hurt….lol

Unfortunately, TMP is not the best site to fix your subject header. People coming on later won't understand.

The joy of fat fingers and an iPhone keypad…

I have been thinking of adapting a set of rules, in which each player arranges their own "battles" – arranging dispositions, which may effect cohesion or movement.
Then, what happens with mounted bowmen who may be detached…? it got too hard, so I have shelved that project for now.

Not at all a very informed opinion, and I use only in gaming. My Household Burgundians are used as 'mobile stakes' protecting Household Bow, while my Flemish Pike are in traditional pike blocks.

My Household Burgundians are used as 'mobile stakes' protecting Household Bow, while my Flemish Pike are in traditional pike blocks

Yes I agree with this completely…and how I try and use my Burgundians on the table

Hint: Hit the complaint button and ask Bill to fix your title for you.

I wish you a speedy recovery.

This is a post on LAF that was replied to by a chap there who has a lot of knowledge.

What are the differences from the WOR period to Renaissance. In particular early period.
This query is due to the Burgundian army I am currently painting. We are trying to decide the best way to handle Longbow within this army.
During the WOR, Armati 2 allows for Longbow to stand in front of Bill then melt into them once melee is imminent.
They add their fighting power to the melee Bill as well.
However the Burgundians did not do this, or did they?
I know Charles tried to mix bow with hand weapons on occasion but was it successful? Would the above rule be to liberal for this period?
The other discussion we had was to just make Longbow a Skirmish type unit.

Burgundians aren't my speciality by any stretch, although I'm currently digging into the period after Charles's death (and I thought WotR was hard going!). The main point is that effectively the Ordonnance Companies were a standing army (not quite literally, but close enough), they drilled, they tried out innovative ideas… quite advanced stuff for the day. We have no proof that these ideas were actually used in battle, or whether they were shelved after they didn't work out in practice.

The bow/pike experiment appears to have involved the archers forming up within a combined unit, with several ranks of pikes to the front. They would kneel, allowing the archers to shoot over them. No counter-marching or exchanging of ranks required. How many companies tried this out, we don't know and even if universal within the Ordonnance Companies (very doubtful as the border garrisons were almost constantly involved in raiding and counter-raiding), it wouldn't apply to the contingents raised from the Flemish cities for the duration of the campaign, as well as the English and Italians hired, who almost certainly contained 'native' troop types and compositions – in other words they weren't organised like the 'Burgundian Companies'.

Contemporary illustrations that have survived (believed to be c.1475), show a single row of archers in front of a single row of voulgiers (as opposed to the 'mounted' pic, which has the archers to the rear). As the archers in the 'Infantry' picture are wearing riding boots, I'm almost certain that these illustrations represent the mounted archer and 'coutilier' of the companies, especially as the third illustration shows a single row of men at arms without other troops.

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What is odd is that the 'Infantry' picture shows a single rank of archers, instead of a double rank, like the 'mounted' picture does… besides the fact that both infantry and mounted troops (and men at arms) are depicted behind a row of stakes of course. How much 'artistic licence' has been used therefore is hard to determine, but they are the best 'evidence' we have. As the book they came from belonged to one of Charles's senior commanders and Charles himself would almost certainly have had a copy (he was an avid book collector), I suspect they would not be too far from the 'truth'.

This discussion is ongoing with our group. The Armati Renaissance army list I proposed.

Burgundian—CR: H:8; L:4; BP: 9; Init: 4 (95 points)
1-KN+ 6 [2] 0 +3 Lances
1-HC(Men at Arms)+ 5 [2] 0 +2 Lances
2-FT+ 6 [0] 0 +1 Pikes
2-FT+ 5 [1] 1 +1 Bows
1-ART 2 [0] 0 +1 Medium

Bonus Units
2-KN+ 6 [2] 0 +3 Lances (15)
2-HC(Men at Arms)+ 5 [2] 0 +2 Lances (12)
4-FT+ 6 [0] 0 +1 Pikes (9)
2-FT+ English Mercenaries 5 [1] 1 +1 Longbows (8)
1-FT+ 5 [1] 1 +1 Bow
2-SI 2 [1] 1 +2 X-Bows (2)
1-ART 2 [0] 0 +1 Heavy (8)
1-ART 2 [0] 0 +1 Light (4)
Terrain: 2 selections: 2 GR; 1 SH; 1 RG or 1 W

Cheers,
Thomas

Contemporary illustrations that have survived (believed to be c.1475), show a single row of archers in front of a single row of voulgiers (as opposed to the 'mounted' pic, which has the archers to the rear). As the archers in the 'Infantry' picture are wearing riding boots, I'm almost certain that these illustrations represent the mounted archer and 'coutilier' of the companies, especially as the third illustration shows a single row of men at arms without other troops.

These are probably Prints by the Master WA of Bruges (or Master W with a key) showing Burgundian soldiers

Druzhina
15th Century Illustrations of Costume & Soldiers

Thanks for the info. My current army disposition for Morat is as follows:

Vanguard – Duc D'Atry
Mounted Men-at-arms under Tagliant & Mariano
Garde & Household (Mounted Men-at-arms) under Marche
Coustilliers

Infantry of the 1st, 21st, 25th and 27th Companies.
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Pikemen
Ordonnance Crossbow
Ordonnance Handgunners
English MAA on foot

Midward -Prince De Tarente
Mounted Men-at-arms under Troylus' sons.
Mounted Men-at-arms under G. & A de Lignana
Coustilliers

Infantry of the 17th, 23rd and 24th Companies
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Pikemen
Ordonnance Crossbow
Ordonnance Handgunners

Rearward – Comte de Marle
Mounted Men-at-arms under de Vergy & Galiot
Mounted Men-at-arms under de Somme & Campobasso
Coustilliers

Infantry of the 2nd, 11th and 16th Companies
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Pikemen
Ordonnance Crossbow
Ordonnance Handgunners

Savoyard "4th" Corps – Comte de Romont
Mounted Men-at-arms under de Sellenove & Don Denys
Mounted Men-at-arms under Neufchatel
Coustilliers.

Infantry of the 10th, 13th, 19th and 20th Companies
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Archers
Ordonnance Pikemen
Ordonnance Crossbow
Ordonnance Handgunners
Savoyard Halberdiers

Reserve Corps – Merechal des Logis
Infantry of the 4th Company and the Household Infantry
English Archers (Dickfield)
English Archers (Ebrington)
Ducal Guard/Household Infantry (D'mtd MAA and Halberdiers)
Ordonnance Crossbow
Ordonnance Handgunners
Demi-lances (Coustilliers)

Artillery Park

These are the battle field contingents mentioned as corps by McGill, made up of two battles each. Do you think these battlefield corps would have fought together as a formation on the battlefield, ie supporting one another, or would the whole army have been combined into one large pike block, two or three large archer units and a battle made up solely of knights?

Most likely they grouped them by weapon for battle (the companies like English retinues were administrative not tactical). Otherwise they would have fielded penny packets of various weapons scattered about the field.

Archers "fading" into billmen is theortical – not sure any source mentions this as a actual tactical practice.

TomT

That was my thoughts but Battle and Corps would suggest battlefield formations? This would be an amalgamation of companies (the companies which I would assume would be administrative). My plan was to field them as the corps are shown above as it seems correct but McGill is the only source I have seen the formations in.

I'm just reading GUsh who also states that the Company could have been a tactical unit?

Pointy Stick and Missile Weapon coordination is one of the Great Mysteries of military history and wargame design.

I have yet to see a plausible description of how pikes or spears protected missile troops except for (perhaps) ranks of archers lined up behind a thin line of spearmen (think Richard and his Crusaders) or (maybe) a few pike projecting beyond a front rank of missile troops.

The problem, as well described by numerous authors, is that pike, while terribly long, are not necessarily long enough to be really effective at protecting missile troops deployed to their front. The theoretical geometry says it should work but when things get messy in close combat those front ranks of missile troops will probably be slaughtered. If your archers are 3-4 ranks deep then you don't have much pike steel projecting ahead of them in an effective manner.

And pikes in front of missile troops can interfere with the missile troops ability to gauge distance and shoot effectively. If the front ranks of pikes or spears are sufficiently thick enough to be effective in melee, then the archers will be so far back they lose their ability to shoot effectively.

Worse yet, many illustrations and descriptions portray the missile troops in blocks between blocks of spears or pikes. The issue then becomes one of timing. If the intervals are too great then, as the opposing sides come to grips, the spears/pikes might not have enough time to close the gaps in front of the missile troops to protect them from enemy cavalry and infantry.

DBX has a pretty interesting PARTIAL solution. They allow blades to provide flank support to archers. For some reason switching the weapon from blade to pointy stick nonsensically eliminates the ability of melee infantry to support archers. Since the historical record clearly indicates that pointy sticks (spears and pikes) were the preferred weapon for supporting archers against cavalry I'd recommend a house rule for DBA allowing such troops to provide flank support.

You must also take ancient and medieval art with a grain of salt. Those artists were there to tell stories and decorate things. They weren't combat reporters and were working from very indirect sources and not on site. In very practical terms this meant that they might look to local soldiers for their depiction of gear whatever the actual time or location being depicted and formations could be based on anything from mere fancy to third party hearsay to "I need to fill this much space, now how should I space out the figures?".

In my opinion, the weapon system were probably concentrated into homogeneous blocks which were then interleaved across the army's front. Archers, when possible, were protected by stakes and ditches. When the armies came into close contact spear and pikemen moved to protect the front for infantry formations as best they could which would impose a practical limitation on unit frontage and require a response before contact was made.

For wargame purposes this means:

A. separate pike and bow units/elements and abstracting this "side support" (I like this approach)

B. separate pike and bow units/elements explicitly requiring the pointy sticks to move to protect the archers (clunky imo)

C. base units such that each unit includes both pikes and bows and then abstract their combat ability (ie it would be less effective in shooting than a pure archer unit and less effective in melee than a pure pike unit). Less flexible than A but easier to implement than B in terms of game mechanics.

In "open order" to the rear, pikes could easily allow archers to withdraw back through the ranks and then close up. It would take less than a minute.

The later illustrations of "shot" between pike blocks is not the medieval tactical order or drill, but rather what it evolved into. It must have been easier than open order to the rear with filing through and closing up. A quick step forward, while the "shot" blocks step back, would achieve protection and a solid front when the rear ranks of pike/halberd move forward on the flanks and double the frontage.

There were some places that used "screened fire", where the shot stood behind the screen and shot overhead. Byzantines and many Italian armies did this. Some, like the Byzantines, could even do it on the move. But most stood on the defensive to do it….

In "open order" to the rear, pikes could easily allow archers to withdraw back through the ranks and then close up. It would take less than a minute.

The later illustrations of "shot" between pike blocks is not the medieval tactical order or drill, but rather what it evolved into. It must have been easier than open order to the rear with filing through and closing up. A quick step forward, while the "shot" blocks step back, would achieve protection and a solid front when the rear ranks of pike/halberd move forward on the flanks and double the frontage

Great in theory but you need to consider three factors:

- effective range of period missile weapons

- time required for cavalry to cross that field of fire (usually 100-200 yards)

- time required to fire effective volley(s) while cav cross that zone AND then retire to safety while maintaining discipline and morale

The problem is that you MIGHT get one volley off. And then you better be hightailing to the rear. Meanwhile, you have to hope that your movement is quick and clean enough that you don't disrupt the pikes AND you provide enough time for them to set up before contact.

So a static defense of pikes/missile troops works. But if the missile troops need to move in any manner then the time required for the cavalry to cross the danger zone is simply too short relative to the time needed for the missile troops to complete their move AND for the pikes to set up. The cav might suffer 1 volley and then they're on the missile troops before their coordinated move with the pikes is complete.