medieval warfare

medieval warfare

Skanderberg: Christian Hero of Albania

On December 12, 1466, a small group of horsemen led by an old man with a long white beard rode up to the gates of Rome. Read more

medieval warfare

Duke Philip III of Burgundy’s Near East Espionage

Duke Philip III “The Good” of Burgundy took responsibility in the early 15th century for overseeing intelligence missions to the Near East to assess the strength of the Ottoman Empire relative to the relief of the beleaguered Byzantines, as well as the possible recovery of Jerusalem. Read more

medieval warfare

King Pepin the Short

An event of great significance in early medieval Europe occurred in 753, when newly ensconced Pope Stephen II decided to journey north to Metz to confer with Frankish King Pepin III (known as “The Short”). Read more

medieval warfare

Bloody Revenge at Sluys

It was late afternoon on June 24, 1340, when the English fleet arrived off the Flanders coast, just short of the Zwin estuary, reputed to be the finest harbor in Europe. Read more

medieval warfare

Storm Of Arrows

For nearly half a millennium the crossbow and longbow served as the predominant missile weapons for field armies in Western Europe. Read more

medieval warfare

Battle for Jerusalem

The barefoot crusaders tramped slowly underneath a blazing sun behind bishops and priests chanting and holding aloft relics on July 8, 1099. Read more

medieval warfare

For Gold And Blood

The rain poured in sheets as the long column of French troops snaked its way through the Apennine Mountains of southern Italy along roads washed out by heavy rains. Read more

medieval warfare

Ambush at Morgarten

The logs and boulders came tumbling downhill, gaining speed before they reached the bottom of the hillsides in the mountain pass. Read more

medieval warfare

The Battle of Lechfeld 955 AD

When summer arrived in Bavaria in late June ad 955, thousands of unwelcome barbarians from the Carpathian basin were gathering on its eastern fringe, poised to invade the southern part of the East Frankish kingdom once again. Read more

medieval warfare

The Byzantine Army’s Varangian Guard

Byzantine Emperor Basil II suffered a massive defeat against the Bulgarians on August 17, 986, at a strategic mountain pass known as Trajan’s Gate in Bulgaria. Read more

medieval warfare

Joan of Arc’s Loire Campaign: The English Tide Recedes

None of those present at the war council held on July 18, 1429, at Beaugency in central France seemed to object to the peculiar sight of an armor-clad young woman advising some of the greatest military captains of the age on how to proceed with the campaign to crown the Dauphin Charles king of France. Read more

medieval warfare

Turco-Mongol Emir Timur: Scourge of the East

Egyptian medieval chronicler Ibn Taghribirdi relates an incident that occurred following Turco-Mongol Emir Timur’s conquest of Aleppo in 1400. Read more

medieval warfare

Roses In The Snow

On March 1, 1461, English Chancellor George Neville faced a large crowd of Londoners in St. John’s Field outside the city. Read more

medieval warfare

Sack of Constantinople

Dawn broke clear and hot over Constantinople on July 17, 1203.

All manner of war machines were clustered around the Latin crusaders’ fortified camp on a hill where the Monastery of Saints Cosmas and Damian was located. Read more

medieval warfare

Crusader Disaster At Nicopolis

In the late 14th century, a new and seemingly irresistible force was emerging in the East, the likes of which Europe had not seen for centuries. Read more

medieval warfare

Hammer of the Normans

Bright sunshine flooded the sedge-covered, damp ground in Sussex on the morning of October 14, 1066. Having attended mass at sunrise, Duke William of Normandy shouted commands to his senior officers outlining their positions for the coming battle with English King Harold II Godwinson’s army. Read more

medieval warfare

Battle of Barnet: Death of a Kingmaker

Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, was troubled by reports he was receiving in March 1471 that an invasion by King Edward IV was imminent. Read more

medieval warfare

Russia’s Four Immortal Generals

In 1242, Russian Prince Alexander Nevsky faced the armored might of the Teutonic knights. Generals Alexander Suvorov and Peter Kotlyarevski were Napoleon’s contemporaries, while General Mikhail Skobelev exemplified the panache of the Victorian Era. Read more

medieval warfare

Soldiers of God

In November 1177, Saladin launched his first significant military campaign against a crusader state. With 26,000 men, siege engines, a huge baggage train, and his own personal force of elite Mamluk bodyguards, Saladin marched his Ayyubid army across the Sinai Desert from Egypt into southern Palestine. Read more

medieval warfare

Incomparable Bravery

In the early evening of September 12, 1683, the citizens of Vienna watched from the ramparts of their beleaguered city as 3,500 winged horsemen poured down the slopes of the Kahlenberg Heights and into the heart of the besieging Turkish army. Read more