Shapes and functions of blunt melee weapons and shields.

[drachillix]

@Blake

I’m not aware of any advantage of a “heater” shield over a similar sized round shield. It seems to have been just a continuation of the kite shield shape based on tradition.

As an SCA fighter who has fought with both one of the more meaningful differences to me is strapped vs center grip. Heater styles tend to be strapped, round tend to be center grip.

Both have their benefits and downsides. I fight with a strapped because I like being one of the guys who charge.

By having a strapped shield
It does not twist or pivot when my shield meets spearpoints
You have the ability to punch block and push far more effectively.
At least to me, easier to carry for long periods

Center grip shields:
Are easier to manuver over a wider area
Usually lighter and faster to block with

Im the one on the left
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2064879/pic%207.jpg

[silenus]

@hibernicus

I think the OP has been well answered, so I have another question (terribly vague, I’m sorry).

If one of you knowledgeable people were to time-travel from the present back to classical times, could you:

• using only the materials, technology and resources of that period; combined with
• your modern knowledge of tactics and weaponry;*

arm and train an army in such a way as to have significant advantage over other contemporary armies?

If the answer is “yes” for the case of Bronze Age Greece/Asia Minor, for example, then up to how recently could the time-traveller make a difference? Roman Empire? Feudal Europe? Peninsular/Napoleonic Wars?

• Note that I am not talking about arming them with mortars, hot air balloons and muskets. The scenario is their materials and manufacturing technology, and your knowledge of how best to put it to use.

That’s just it, none of us have ever commanded such a force, so we don’t know how to best use it. Anybody who says different is an [del]idiot.[/del] sorely mistaken. Once you get past the Bronze Age, contemporary commanders are going to be far superior to arm-chair dilettantes like us.

[Woeg]

Hey Drachillix - what kingdom? Meridies here…

I have fought with many different shield styles: scutums, kites, strapped rounds, centergrip rounds, centergrip ovals, bucklers, pavises, and heaters.

The scutum (a large rectangular shield, popularized by the Romans) was an excellent war shield, in that it provided enormous protection. It was also VERY heavy, and without having the time to dedicate to daily training using it, very tiring to use. It also has the effect of defending your enemy nearly as much as it defends you - it’s hard to maneuver a weapon around it. When used in formation with other scutums, it makes a very tough defensive barrier, but the wielder is pretty much just a living wall of blocking - its up to the spears behind you to take out the people in front of you.

Kites are a far more favorable style, to me, for a war shield. They are much easier to carry, and though they offer less total coverare, they can easily protect the majority of your body without trading off mobility/carrying weight. They don’t interlock as well as the scutums do, so a shield wall of kites is not going to hold a charge the way a shield wall will, but at least you can swing a weapon around one with relative ease.

Strapped rounds are very much like kites without leg protection. I actually think you can create a stronger shield wall with strapped rounds than kites, because you can have the front line kneel and a second line overlap their shields over the front line - the point of the kite makes this hard to do. In single combat, a strapped round is at a heavy disadvantage due to the distance it needs to move to protect the legs.

A centergrip round/oval makes this movement easier - in fact, centergrips in general are a lot quicker to move because you can pivot them around a single point, instead of around two on a strapped shield. However, as excellent as they are at single defense, they are a lot more vulnerable in mass combar because they can be pivoted so easily. In single combat, a centergrip fighter can move their feet to flow with the pivot, but in mass, its not always possible.

Bucklers are like tiny centergrip rounds - very fast, very effective if you actively punch block your opponents blade, but you have got to be quick and observant to not be torn apart when using one. Interestingly enough, they make excellent shields against polearms and spear weapons, as they focus more on redirection than blocking…and if you can get close, they are maneuverable enough to block buttspikes and backup weapons.

Pavises range from a form of centergrip heater-like shield to thinner scutum style shields. Lighter, maneuverable, but still vulnerable to pivoting and harder to carry long term than a strapped shield.

Heaters are my first choice in shields, and what I fight with these days. The have most of the protection of a kite, but with out a portion of the top and not as long, so they are a good bit lighter. Strapped properly, the corners of a heater provide excellent visibility while still imposing enough of a defense to keep that visibility from becoming a vulnerability. Often, a very slight movement of one’s body will shift the corner enough to completely rob the power from an incoming blow.

---

Hibernicus - personally, no. I am pretty good - I’ve been studying medieval tactics and warfare for 10+ years…but it is nothing compared to the daily practice and life of an ancient man at arms. Just as none of them could come and do my daily job, there is no way I could go back and do theirs as effectively. That’s not to say I couldn’t learn to, but I don’t think my own understanding of tactics and such would outweigh theirs.

Unless, of course, it was for a specific battle where conditions outside of skill at arms were a factor. I could, for instance, tell the french that charging into a mired, swampy, muddy bottleneck at Agincourt would be a terrible idea…

…but why would I? I always fight for the English. For God, Saint George, and King Henry!

[Una_Persson]

@Alessan

Saying that a rapier provides significant defense isn’t always true. I mean, I’m sure it’ll help protect you from rapiers and other light weapons, but it won’t do much good against a halberd.

Well no, and it won’t defend against a mace, lance, nor a Glock either. The right weapon for the right situation.

And you can defeat a halberd very easily if it’s 1-on-1: once that halberd head is past you, your opponent is dead meat. Just like when you’re fighting with smallsword and you go passe - if your opponent has a knife or can strong-arm you, they win.

[Una_Persson]

To answer hibby’s question, I am not certain. There would be an enormous number of things in day-to-day management of a force which would be beyond most 21st-century folks. And weapons/armor sort of evolved to fit the need already. Aside from inventing gunpowder really early, or designing better siege weapons, the best I could do is something which could help an existing army quite a bit - try to reduce disease, improve nutrition, and treat battlefield wounds better. Develop a cottage industry of distilling alcohol for treating wounds might be one interesting option. Mandating fruits/vegetables with vitamin C for naval crews might be another.

[silenus]

That’s the ticket! Hygiene and wound treatment would make a world of difference. Anything that cuts down on “the flux” would be like summoning up a new army.

[MrDibble]

@Blake

:eek:

Kite shields were almost exclusively used on foot. While they were carried on horseback, it was primarily so they could be used once dismounted.

That’s not what the Bayeux Tapestry shows us. The Norman cavalry at Hastings is consistently shown to be using shields.

[MrDibble]

@Una_Persson

Because it’s a different era. The rapier is one of the first instances of the sword being an actual defensive item,

Forgive me, but no. The earlier sword-and-buckler style (like in I-33, Talhoffer and other Fechtbücher) does a lot of sword-based defence work. The idea of defensive use of the sword had been practised and taught in Western Europe for hundreds of years before the rapier even existed.

[Una_Persson]

@MrDibble

Forgive me, but no. The earlier sword-and-buckler style (like in I-33, Talhoffer and other Fechtbücher) does a lot of sword-based defence work. The idea of defensive use of the sword had been practised and taught in Western Europe for hundreds of years before the rapier even existed.

I’m very much aware of I33 et al; I have a whole section in my book about it. “One of the first” is very correct in terms that with a rapier you are relying a huge amount on the sword itself for parries as a fundamental core routine of the marital art. Otherwise every single-rapier match would be attack-counterattack-over-in-5-seconds.

And while anyone with a sword could parry, all the way back to a spatha or gladius, I guess, the practice was to use something which would absorb or deflect the blow and protect the blade, which on heavy weapons tends to blunt or break much easier than you would think, especially with relatively weak (compared to nowadays) blades. So yes the swords portrayed being used by Walpurgis and her friends in I33 could be used defensively, and typically were, it was not as fundamental to the core martial art of the weapon as from the earlier more heavily armored era. Blade parries are more difficult to do properly when you have a weapon with a high kinetic energy, and thus early marital art fencing manuals (and isn’t I33 the earliest illustrated example of such, IIRC?) focus on those, all the way past Angelo.

[Woeg]

For those interested, there is, as we speak, a great international tournament going on called Battle of the Nations, which uses rebated steel weapons and mostly authentic gear - this is the first year that the US has a team entered. Made up mostly of SCA fighters, including several reknowned dukes, the US team has been doing great in singles but we still have a lot to learn about the group tactics used by the other nations. Right now, I know we lost the large melee to Poland.

Here are some links for those interested in following the Team.

https://www.facebook.com/search/results … p_activity

http://bnfest.pl/index.php?option=com_k … 24&lang=en

http://www.usaknights.org

[Una_Persson]

Your first two links are broken.

Edited to add: I also note that on the third link, there is not one woman on the team. How unfortunate.

[MrDibble]

@Una_Persson

I’m very much aware of I33 et al; I have a whole section in my book about it. “One of the first” is very correct in terms that with a rapier you are relying a huge amount on the sword itself for parries as a fundamental core routine of the marital art. Otherwise every single-rapier match would be attack-counterattack-over-in-5-seconds.

And it’s the same for the much earlier Blossfechten (lit. “just (sword) fighting”) - no armour there, just like rapier, this was a strictly civilian fighting form.

And while anyone with a sword could parry, all the way back to a spatha or gladius, I guess, the practice was to use something which would absorb or deflect the blow and protect the blade, which on heavy weapons tends to blunt or break much easier than you would think, especially with relatively weak (compared to nowadays) blades. So yes the swords portrayed being used by Walpurgis and her friends in I33 could be used defensively, and typically were, it was not as fundamental to the core martial art of the weapon as from the earlier more heavily armored era.

I disagree. The sword-only guards and parries, and techniques like off-setting are clearly fundamental to the art, and remained essentially unchanged from the 1300s for 200 years.

Blade parries are more difficult to do properly when you have a weapon with a high kinetic energy, and thus early marital art fencing manuals (and isn’t I33 the earliest illustrated example of such, IIRC?) focus on those, all the way past Angelo.

Wait, are you saying they focused on them because they were so hard nobody did them? Or did you leave out a “not” somewhere?

And yes, I.33 is the earliest fechtbuch I know of.

[Una_Persson]

@MrDibble

Wait, are you saying they focused on them because they were so hard nobody did them? Or did you leave out a “not” somewhere?

They focused on them because they were hard to do properly. Simpler techniques don’t need as much instruction.

What is the weight/length of the swords you’re referring to used in Blossfechten? I’m at work and don’t have my references, nor can I Google right now. I mean, just the very fact of the physical size and weight of a buckler tells me these weapons could not have been high inertia weapons (I used the term “kinetic energy” improperly in an earlier post) because I can tell you from fighting single and double-rapier 3 times a week that using a buckler against a high inertia weapon will fuck you up.

[Glottis]

@Blake

Kite shields were almost exclusively used on foot. While they were carried on horseback, it was primarily so they could be used once dismounted.

Kite shields were used by cavalry in their own right at the Battle of Hastings. The Bayeux Tapestry shows them carried angled point-backwards to offer flank protection against missiles and spears for riders turning in front of the shield wall, when at their most vulnerable.

@Animastryfe

More generally, are there good internet resources about the advantages and disadvantages of different shield and (blunt) melee weapon designs?

You might be interested in the available episodes of Weapons that Made Britain found on YouTube, including one specifically on the evolution and use of shields. The other four deal with the sword, longbow, lance and armour.

[Sailboat]

@Blake

The round shield was preferred by cultures that relied upon single combat and heroics. It was still being used by the Scots up to the 18th century. It’s a good design for a soldier who intends to face the enemy as a single unit.

Cultures with trained armies found that elongated shields such as the Roman shield were far more effective because they allowed the shields to be locked together to form a shield wall.

@Wakinyan

I wouldn’t have guessed this. I am no expert on the subject but the two “cultures” I know of that used round shields – hoplites and vikings – used them for tight formation, the phalanx and the svinfylking respectively.

Yeah, the Greek hoplites were the original “lock the shields together” warriors and they used the hoplon, a large completely round shield. it may be that “tower” style shields like the Roman scutum worked better, I don’t know – but certainly round shields do not preclude locking the shields together and fighting as a team.

@Woeg

Flanged maces (like this one: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/Mace_IMG_3823.jpg) are a “best of both worlds” weapon, offering minimal surface areas for creating focal points of power while still providing a better number of striking surfaces to avoid glancing blows. Drawbacks, though, are that it is still heavier to swing, and does not penetrare as deeply as a war hammer/pick is going to.

I’ve always assumed that the flanges on a flanged mace were for splitting/peeling back armor – a flanged mace is a can opener.

@Alessan

Except the original pike formations - the sarissa-armed phalanxes of the Macedonians and their successor states - were eventually superseded by the Roman shield wall.

The success of “short sword and shield” against massed pike was later repeated in the Renaissance when Spanish sword-and-buckler men defeated pike-armed German Landsknechts at the Battle of Ravenna, by the curious tactic of flinging themselves flat as the line of pike points advanced. The points passed over them, and they stood up inside their foes’ reach and began close-quarters work with their shorter swords.

@drachillix

As an SCA fighter who has fought with both one of the more meaningful differences to me is strapped vs center grip. Heater styles tend to be strapped, round tend to be center grip.

Well, very early on (BC times), the Greeks were using the “Argive grip” on their hoplons, which allowed them much better leverage than a center grip. The hand grasped a handle near the edge of the shield, and the forearm passed through a strap at the center. This leverage facilitated quicker, stronger movements of the shield, as well as allowing soldiers to throw their weight onto the shield and push.

@Wikipedia

The revolutionary part of the shield was, in fact, the grip. Known as an Argive grip, it placed the handle at the edge of the shield, and was supported by a leather fastening (for the forearm) at the centre. This allowed the Hoplite soldier more mobility with the shield, as well as the ability to capitalize on its offensive capabilities and better support the Phalanx.

It may be that the SCA tends to use center grips on round shields, but that’s a quirk of theirs – the problem was solved more than 2500 years ago.

[TriPolar]

@hibernicus

If one of you knowledgeable people were to time-travel from the present back to classical times, could you:

• using only the materials, technology and resources of that period; combined with
• your modern knowledge of tactics and weaponry;*

arm and train an army in such a way as to have significant advantage over other contemporary armies?

Not knowledgeable in this area, but maybe guerrilla warfare tactics could have been implemented instead of both sides lining up and charging at each other. I assume there must have been some techniques like this in use, but maybe it’s become more sophisticated over time.

[Woeg]

@Sailboat

Yeah, the Greek hoplites were the original “lock the shields together” warriors and they used the hoplon, a large completely round shield. it may be that “tower” style shields like the Roman scutum worked better, I don’t know – but certainly round shields do not preclude locking the shields together and fighting as a team.

I’ve always assumed that the flanges on a flanged mace were for splitting/peeling back armor – a flanged mace is a can opener.

The success of “short sword and shield” against massed pike was later repeated in the Renaissance when Spanish sword-and-buckler men defeated pike-armed German Landsknechts at the Battle of Ravenna, by the curious tactic of flinging themselves flat as the line of pike points advanced. The points passed over them, and they stood up inside their foes’ reach and began close-quarters work with their shorter swords.

Well, very early on (BC times), the Greeks were using the “Argive grip” on their hoplons, which allowed them much better leverage than a center grip. The hand grasped a handle near the edge of the shield, and the forearm passed through a strap at the center. This leverage facilitated quicker, stronger movements of the shield, as well as allowing soldiers to throw their weight onto the shield and push.

It may be that the SCA tends to use center grips on round shields, but that’s a quirk of theirs – the problem was solved more than 2500 years ago.

A flanged mace was very much a can opener, but would require more work for lethality than a war pick.

And the Arguve grip is basically how most SCA members strap their “strapped” shields.

Sorry for the broken links, Una… Let me try again…

https://www.facebook.com/search/results.php?q=greenem7%40yahoo.com%20&init=quick&tas=0.05276012491840776#!/groups/115904041790980/358120087569373/?notif_t=group_activity

http://bnfest.pl/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=66%3Abattle-regulations-for-the-world-championship-on-historical-medieval-battle&Itemid=24&lang=en

I believe the US team was open invitation - the lack of women is simply due to no women throwing their gauntlet into the ring.

[MrDibble]

@Una_Persson

They focused on them because they were hard to do properly. Simpler techniques don’t need as much instruction.

It’s an interesting theory.

What is the weight/length of the swords you’re referring to used in Blossfechten?

They’re all over the place in illustrations, but generally Oakshott Type XIIa, XIIIa, XVIII and XVIa look to be common. Longer hand-and-a-half swords suitable for cut & thrust. Anywhere from 30"-45", 2-4 pounds.

[Wakinyan]

@Blake

The round shield was preferred by cultures that relied upon single combat and heroics.

@Wakinyan

… the two “cultures” I know of that used round shields – hoplites and vikings – used them for tight formation, the phalanx and the svinfylking respectively.

@Sailboat

… round shields do not preclude locking the shields together and fighting as a team.

I’m sorry, but I fail to see your argument here. Blake said – as I understand it – that the round shield was favoured by cultures who favoured man-to-man combat; I said that it seems that the round shield was favoured by cultures who favoured close formation, and you say that round shields do not preclude locking shields together. Ok, so, what?

[Lemur866]

@TriPolar

Not knowledgeable in this area, but maybe guerrilla warfare tactics could have been implemented instead of both sides lining up and charging at each other. I assume there must have been some techniques like this in use, but maybe it’s become more sophisticated over time.

People at the time were well aware of skirmish tactics, raids, ambushes, and so on. You could damage an enemy that way. But you can’t win a battle that way. It’s “lining up and charging at each other” that’s the sophisticated tactic, not “wander around and if you see some enemies and you outnumber them kill them, or if they are more numerous run away”.

I understand that to modern eyes the notion of standing in a line of battle seems suicidal, because modern (ie, American Civil War and later) weapons make it impossible. But this is how armies used to win battles, they didn’t line up shoulder to shoulder because they were idiots who liked to get killed, they did it because the armies that lined up shoulder to shoulder would defeat armies that didn’t.