LOTR-inspired army size/population question

Factual Questions
1

Perhaps this is a little silly, but…

While waiting impatiently for the extended ROTK DVD to come out, I have been re-reading The Lord of the Rings. In the Return of the King, during the scene in which outlying fiefs were sending troops to strengthen the forces at Minas Tirith, Tolkien lists the number of troops per fief. For the sake of brevity, I will list only the largest: Dol Amroth, which sounds like a major settlement on the coast, sends 3000 troops. The other fiefs sent maybe a couple hundred each.

Rohan, a allied country to the north, sends 6000 horsemen. These numbers sounds pitifully small to me. 6000 troops from an entire country?

But then again, I know next to nothing about the history of warfare. I think we can assume Middle Earth at the end of the Third Age is rougly equivalent to medieval Europe.

If that is the case, are 6000 soldiers from an entire country and 3000 troops from a major settlement typical numbers? What was the typical size of a major army in those days?

Or are the countries in Middle Earth unusually de-populated?

I’d appreciate any insight.

2

Well, remember that the southern levies appeared in very disappointing numbers, as the bulk of their strength was kept home to defend against the Corsairs of Umbar. And Theoden claims he would have ridden with something like 10-12k spears had it not been for the treason of Isengard.

Anyways, I know of no information regarding the population bases from which these troops are drawn, so it’s tough to say how the numbers would compare to medieval Europe.

3

I’m betting that Rohan had relatively little population density; Edoras itself (which is supposed to be the capital ) was little more than a bunch of houses built on a hill. There are a number of factors working against Theoden in mustering his troops-

Geography- True, Rohan was on a plain, and the riders were known for their speed, but I’m betting the bulk of Rohan’s strength was simply spread out.

Enemies- Even after the victory at Helm’s Deep, I’m sure Rohan probably still had to deal with the Wild Men attacking villages. While Rohan was trying to send as many soldiers as possible, they still had to protect their own villages from further attacks. I’m sure things are not as cut and dry as the books/films make them out to be (most armed conflicts aren’t).

4

According to Wikipedia, the English forces at Crecy (1346) numbered 12,000. Link while the French numbered about 30,000 to 40,000. At Agincourt (1415), the English numbered 5,900ish to the French 25,000 (Link). At the battle of Stirling Bridge (1297), you had 15,000 Scots up against 50-60,000 English. Link.

“Army”, as I understand it, was just the way you said “A bunch of guys on our side” rather than being an organizational unit of so many men.

I always got the impression that Rohan was a small country and that their horsemen were an elite unit, so small wouldn’t neccesarily be bad, but it’s been a while since I read the book.

5

In the Middle Ages, a typical army was assembled from the nobility and the yeomen. The peasants did not fight, because they were needed to work the fields; miss one harvest and everybody starves. This limited the size of fighting forces. I’m no expert, but I seem to recall that during the War of the Roses each side fielded fewer than 50,000 troops total, while the population of the country was between three and four million.

The rule about peasants not fighting wasn’t ironclad. Especially when someone got them into a religious fervor, they had a tendency to fight anyway. The two most obvious examples are the First Crusade and the German Peasant Wars, which happened at the start of the Protestant Reformation. In those two cases, and probably in most others, they tended to lose quite badly.

6

I’ve no idea how they compare to real life medival armies. But the forces of Gondor are meant to be small, effectively the last remants of a once great nation. The Lord of Rings final chapter of a long legendary history, detailed in The Silmarillion and Tolkein’s other writings. The Elves and Edain (of which the men of Gondor are the descedents) at the end of the Third Age are but only the remenants after the many wars and tragedies described in this history.

Although not many numbers are mentioned, the “hosts” that meet in the great battles of Quenta Silmarillion are described as much greater than those involved “Last Alliance of Elves and Men” (the battle in the introduction of the first film for the those who aren’t sad obsessive Tolken geeks :-). The forces in this battle are descibed as dwarfing those armies led by Aragorn in Lord of the Rings (he mentions that the seven Thousand troops led to Mordor after the battle of Pelennor Fields was “scarce as many as the vangaurd of [Gondor’s] army in days of its power” )

7

Granted, the comparison of late 3rd Age Middle Earth to medieval Europe is not perfect. It seems that the level of technology described in the books (let’s ignore magic for now) seems roughly similar to that time in Europe, in terms of types of weapons - bows, long bows, swords, catapults, cavalry, spears, etc, with stone castles.

Although, a Tolkien geek/medieval warfare geek could probably set me straight if I’m mistaken. And I use the term “geek” with the utmost respect, of course.

As for what I mean by “army” - the armies of Rohan and Gondor consisted of trained soldiers, with some reference to “husbandmen” from Rohan who accompanied the army to the Black Gates in the ROTK. So, it seems that Rohan at least conscripted amongst its non-military citizenry. Also, some of the fiefs of Gondor consisted of “a few grim hill men” and the like. So I guess the “armies” were a group of trained soldiers combined with relatively untrained, but armed, ordinary citizens, fighting as a combined unit against the forces of Mordor.

I believe I mispoke about Rohan. After the battle of Isengard, Theoden (king of Rohan for NTG [non-Tolkien geeks]), was able to gather 10,000 men. Out of that 10,000, he was able to send only 6000 to Gondor, not wanting to leave Rohan emptied of defenders.

According to this site, around the time of the battle of Crecy, the English population was 5 million, while the population of France (and the Low Countries) was 19 million.

In 1450, after the Battle of Agincourt, the population of England was 3 million while the population of France was 12 million.

So what the hell am I going to do with these numbers?

Well, since this is all wild speculation, maybe it’s safe to assume that in 1340, a small country (England) with a population of 5 million could send a 12,000-man army to war. So, maybe Rohan was about that size???

8

dont forget, 10 000 well nurished, very well armed, highly trained fighters wis much much superior to 50 000 of badly fed, poorly armed, ill-trained fighters.

Sun Tzu teaches us this so, as does many wars.
We take all the above for granted in our modern wars, but back then it was very difficult to muster up a powerful army in relativly large numbers.

9

Maybe where “Middle Earth” was filmed affected the numbers :wink:

Government armed forces:[1] 9,230 active, 5, 490 reserves[2]
[1] According to the New Zealand Permanent Mission in Geneva the most accurate figures are the following: Army: 4,395; Navy: 2,077; Air Force: 2,923 – Reservists: Army: 3,180; Navy: 416; Air Force: 46. Letter from the New Zealand Permanent Mission, Geneva, to CSC, 17/11/99.

http://www.child-soldiers.org/cs/childsoldiers.nsf/0/cbaab3594ba6aa2980256b1e00516337?OpenDocument

Half the NZ army were in the films after all :smiley:

10

FWIW, if you divide nation population and army size for Crecy & Agincourt, you get for the English 416 (C.) & 500 (A.) and for the French 542 (C.) & 480 (A.).