I’m looking for the origins of the three day pillaging tradition in ancient, medieval and post-medieval warfare. Who that we know of was first to institute this convention ? Was it the Romans? the Goths? and was it justified on religious grounds by the Ottomans or did they simply follow age-old tradition?
I cannot find any “rule” about three days of pillage (although it was common). Heck, such a rule would be worthless. It is war.
I suspect the three day “rule” existed as a realistic timeframe for the pillaging.
Getting people to fight in wars back then often meant that rape and pillage was part of the compensation package for the troops.
But, armies need to get on with being an army and moving to other places and, frankly, after three days a city is pretty thoroughly sacked and pillaged. Letting the army hang around longer probably just caused problems with keeping order among the troops for no benefit.
So, they got three days to run amok and then needed to get back to their job.
Presumably generals of the time had long experience with the whole pillage thing and settled on three days as a good balance.
I have never heard of such a habit/rule. Where is this referenced?
Here is one citation:
The Ottoman army is allowed three days of pillage (a depressing convention of medieval warfare),
How widespread of a convention it was I have no idea.
I’ve never heard of this either.
Having just finished The Anarchy, by William Dalrymple (very excellent book about the history of the East India Company, so a bit out of scope), one thing it underlines is the importance of maintaining the cohesion of your military force after they have taken a city / fort. If left loose to pillage they could just fuck off loaded with loot, or if hanging around be completely incapable of rallying against a counter-attack. Not a good thing for all sorts of reasons.
From the Wikipedia article on Hagia Sophia:
In accordance with the traditional custom of the time, Sultan Mehmed II allowed his troops and his entourage three full days of unbridled pillage and looting in the city shortly after it was captured. This period saw the destruction of many Orthodox churches;[111] Hagia Sophia itself was looted as the invaders believed it to contain the greatest treasures of the city.[112] Shortly after the defence of the Walls of Constantinople collapsed and the victorious Ottoman troops entered the city, the pillagers and looters made their way to the Hagia Sophia and battered down its doors before storming inside.[113]Once the three days passed, Mehmed was to claim the city’s remaining contents for himself.[114][115]However, by the end of the first day, he proclaimed that the looting should cease as he felt profound sadness when he toured the looted and enslaved city.[116][114][117]
This sounds like a made-up “fact” on a par with “they didn’t bathe in the Middle Ages”, “they only drank small beer, not water”, “knights had to be hoisted onto their horses”, and " droit du seigneur was a real thing". I can’t find any period sources that discuss this “tradition”.
I’ve never heard of this, but a little googling reveals a number of “three day” pillages.
A biblical one. Take your pick of quotes.
A Roman one. “On August 24, 410, the Visigoths entered Rome through its Salarian Gate, according to some opened by treachery, according to others by want of food, and pillaged the city for three days.”
A middle-eastern one. “Afterward, the army pillaged Medina for three days, though accounts of the plunder vary considerably.”
A crusaderish one. “The Crusaders looted, pillaged, and vandalized Constantinople for three days, during which many ancient and medieval Roman and Greek works were either seized or destroyed.”
An English one. “To stimulate the avarice, lust, and barbarity of the English soldiery, he had promised, that on the capture of the city, three days should be allowed, for the purposes of rape and pillage.”
Beyond that, I don’t know. Identical google searches with different numbers don’t provide similar results, so three days appeared to have been either a norm of practice or a norm of recording. Maybe “three days of pillage” was just a way of saying “yeah they pillaged the shit out of that city.”
William C. Davis says that one was just a war-time rumour, and that Pakenham did not give any such order.
The Greatest Fury: The Battle of New Orleans and the Rebirth of America
Probably. Ancient historians used round numbers a lot.
Not surprising given the language. It reads like a rumor. But it still supports the notion that ‘three days’ was at least perceived as a conventional amount of time for pillaging.
ETA: Your cite says the original false claim was 48 hours, so maybe not.
The next paragraph says it was supposed to be three days. Just sounds like an unsubstantiated rumour that was floating about. Good for Jackson to use to steel his troops for the battle.
I recall a conversation I had back in my USAF fighter days with an AH-64 air cavalry troop commander, an O-5. So the equivalent of a USAF squadron commander: a responsible experienced dude in charge of a bevy of determined warriors and a lot of concentrated firepower. The AH-64 community has basically fighter pilot mentalities, coupled to the Army’s more … earthy … sensibilities. And unlike us, after they defeat a target they can park nearby and walk around to survey their handiwork up close and personal.
As he so memorably put it after several beers:
We rape and pillage. We leave plunder to the supply weenies.
He was kidding of course, but it was funny.
In the Napoleonic wars, after the Third Siege of Badajoz, British and Portuguese troops went on a rampage, and it took three days for their officers to get them back under control.
It seems the Russian commanders aren’t even trying to keep their troops under control now in 2022. At least in some cases.
My theory is that the leaders knew that they would not be able to stop the violence until the men had exhausted themselves. In order to preserve the illusion that they were in control (and to avoid being murdered by their own troops), they “gave permission” for the pillaging. After about three days, the drunkards would be unconscious, the rapists would be exhausted, and the thieves would have stolen all they could carry. The leaders could then re-assert control without being fragged.
From the birthday song:
There is one thing you should learn,
First you pillage, then you burn.
That’s also the First Maxim of Maximally-Effective Mercenaries.
Those are all examples of specific pillagings that took three days, but none of them seem to suggest that that was the customary or expected amount. It’s possible that, if you searched for them, you’d find a similar number of two-day and four-day pillages.
It’s possible that you missed the last two sentences of my post. 
Yup, looks like I did. Sorry about that.