Why did MEDIEVAL KNIGHTS stop using SHIELDS?

why did late medieval european knights stop using shields [Music] hi folks matt easton here of scholar gladiatoria now i've seen a couple of discussions in the last week talking about this very topic one person i know and another discussion actually under one of my videos and the basic question is why did late medieval so let's talk about 15th century primarily why did 15th century european knights stop using shields well we need to unpack that question um the first thing that comes up is people always answer immediately oh well you know it's because of gunpowder shields

weren't very useful anymore so people went to using two-handed weapons or they talk about the armor developments now i think it's a much more complex question than that but nevertheless i think i can give a relatively concise um answer to at least my theories for why that should be the case and also importantly was that actually the case i think there's a lot of assumptions made about late medieval nights based on looking at certain sources and there's a source bias based on what we look at did they actually stop using shield so this is actually

a two-part video in a sense did they stop using shields and secondly if they did or at least if they they started using less why was that the case now this is mostly considering combat on foot but it does to some degree apply to knights on horseback as well anyone who's looked at medieval sources will notice that 15th century knights are often shown with a variety of varieties of two-handed weapons two-handed versions of this essentially warhammers pollaxes glaives things like that rather than this type of weapon in the shield but that being said if we

look at reenactment living history if we look at something like battle of the nations the hmb full contact um steel armored fighting leagues then indeed in those we see that one-handed weapons and shields are very popular but of course we have to remember that isn't a real medieval battle scenario and they are their own type of tournament now before i get further into the video i want to have a little word about our sponsors for this video who are the awesome raid shadow legends as you almost certainly know raids the hugely popular turn-based fantasy combat

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with me now let's get back to the main topic of this video which is why did one-handed weapons and shields at least for the fully armored high status top level 15th century so we're talking about late medieval early renaissance knights fall out of favor and did they fall out of favor with a simple answer to the second part of that question did they fall out of favor we have to answer kind of yes but we need to unpack that comment slightly because they didn't completely go out of use and i see people as is often

the case on the internet people make black and white hard and fast statements that knights stopped using shields because of armor or because of firearms neither of these things are true okay firstly knight didn't completely stop using shields at all and we'll go into some detail on that in a second they didn't completely stop using one-handed weapons either additionally it neither of those things were i think anything to do with firearms or at least not directly to do with firearms and equally i don't think it was completely to do with armor either so the first

thing to address is that absolutely the shield and the one-handed weapon were the typical sidearms of the medieval night right the way through the medieval period since knights existed all the way up until about the middle of the 14th century now there were a number of large changes that happened in the middle of the 14th century in terms of society the black death in terms of the way that knights functioned on the battlefield the way they fought certainly in england for example additionally their armor the armor development was going under huge leaps there were a

lot of external influences as well there were a lot of things going on on the fringes of europe and within europe changes in warfare cultural interactions and so on so forth so the middle of the 14th century is a hugely interesting period of time which obviously i can't go into much detail on in this video at least um but the fact that you need to recognize is that there were changes going on in the 14th century in terms of the arms and equipment and fighting um characteristics of the night and the way that they functioned

both in nightly society there was the the kind of rise of the kind of nightly dueling culture and the the sort of romanticism of chivalry that happened in this period but equally there were changes on the battlefield as well so obviously on horseback the lance was the main weapon on uh foot or after the lance had been broken or lost or expended in some other way then a one-handed weapon of some sort often a sword was worn at the side regardless of whether a person had something like a warhammer or an axe or even a

flail in some cases or a mace or something like this but they essentially did have one-handed weapons coupled with shields because of course the shield was used um shields of various types usually um so-called heater shape shields rather than this round shield but round shields were used as well it also was sometimes what are called hand previously so smaller versions of big pelvises so yes absolutely um that was typical up until the middle of the 14th century but those things didn't go away and it's very important to mention that knights did continue using these things

after that point even if they proportionately at least for the nightly classes seem to have become less popular and new two-handed weapons seem to have come in and got more popular most particularly the pollacks so if we look at the late 14th century into the 15th century really the um the weapons that we most often see knights using on foot and fighting with are the polax in its myriada form sometimes with a hammer sometimes with an axe various forms of spike or hammer on the back also they use things like glaives and various other types

of polar but essentially polar and additionally we also notice in this exact same period in the second half of the 14th century the two-handed sword or rather the long sword or bastard sword so swords that are able to be gripped two-handed are various lengths um obviously these are big survive handlers that's kind of a later development but swords essentially like this start to become more popular as well in the second part of the 14th century and even more popular in the 15th century so what we see is a movement certainly for fighting on foot but

to some degree on horseback as well a movement of knights using two-handed weapons in preference to using a one-handed weapon and a shield so we're going to unpack why but it's very important to keep reiterating that the shield didn't go away the shield was still used in mass by um less armored and lower social status soldiers on the battlefield and we can see it in numerous manuscripts shields of various types big palaces medium-sized shields heater shields and round shields like this early forms of rotella and indeed obviously bucklers of various types as well so all

sorts of shields from massive to tiny were used by lots of different uh lots of different soldiers on the battlefield including people like archers billman and spearman pikemen had it as a backup of gunners all of the other types of troops now you have to remember that certainly within war the nightly classes are a tiny percentage of the army there may be you know five or ten percent maximum the rest of the soldiers are made up of common people who in many times would be carrying a form of shield be it a small buckler or

a larger type of shield so shield didn't go out of use so when people talk about things like gun powder it's pretty much irrelevant as an answer to why did shields become less popular for the nightly classes because most of the other soldiers still use shields okay and in fact gunners are one of the people who still carried shields so the very people using the firearms were often the people who had large shields in the form of pelvises so hopefully it's clear now that shields did become less popular for the nightly classes but they were

still massively widely used by people who weren't knights or weren't high status men at arms okay but in addition to that shields did continue to be used by men at arms and by knights now what scenarios did they continue using them in well as i've said they did occasionally keep using them in war and it does seem looking at the manuscripts that there does seem to have been a preference for shields in a siege context and you can understand why if you're besieging a fortification you're more vulnerable to missile fire because they're just up there

reloading and shooting at you continually so even if you're a knight in full armor you might want to carry a pavis around for your general protection okay but there are other scenarios as well where shields are shown in nightly use most obviously in certain dueling and tournament and joust context so when we look in those when it's a one-on-one fight if it's in a tournament or a nightly duel to the death and remember they're two separate things you can have tournaments that are peaceful tournaments just intended to show who's tough enough and then you have

nightly deals that are decided they're essentially a duel to the deck in addition if we look at jousts obviously when you're holding the couch lance very often a shield was either held or worn actually attached to the armor itself and so shields were used in that context as well so knights did continue using shields just not as much as they had done before but within certain contexts they were still using just as much as they had before so in answering this question of why did shields become less popular for knights i've thought up three points

which are definite reasons why for them not not reasons in other words these are definitely not reasons one of them is because of missile fire so i've talked about firearms but additionally longbows and crossbows i think we can categorically say that improvements in missile weapons be it crossbows longbows firearms or anything else were not a reason why they started carrying shields less another reason why which was not a reason for them to carry shields less was not because armor was invulnerable just because armor had improved and we'll talk a bit more about that in a

second just because armor had improved both in terms of design and technology the the metal that was made from and the way it was heat treated and how prevalent it was and things like this just because armor had improved people in armor were not invulnerable they could still be wounded with arrows and crossbow bolts and obviously firearms as is mentioned in various sources they may have been slightly more protected but that doesn't seem to have been purely a reason for them to abandon shields indeed we see plenty of examples in art of people wearing complete

plate armor and still carrying shields especially something like a pavis a pavis will protect you better against the crossbow bolt than armor ever will because there's no gaps in the pavis and a pave pavis is a very thick piece of wood and leather um so quite simply shields can protect you from things that armour can't and finally and connected to that point we can also say not a reason for shields becoming less popular with knights was because shields didn't have a place on the battlefield anymore because somehow uh warfare had changed so much that shields

weren't useful well we've already seen and i can demonstrate with countless examples from art that huge numbers of soldiers who weren't knights on the battlefield still carried shields right the way through the 15th century and into the 16th century and the spanish sword and shield guys were still being talked about by people like machiavelli and they were famous okay shields were still carried in the exploration of the new world when fighting the aztecs so shields were still an important thing and in fact we see steel shields like this rotella still being used in the 16th

century and there were even bulletproof types of shields we found some on the mary rose even with guns fitted in the center in the case of the mary rose ones my gun shields we still seal shields being a thing in the middle of the 16th century so absolutely shields did still have a place on the medieval battlefield so finally some answers for you so i know that this is probably what you started watching this video for some actual answers to the question so i'm gonna give them but i think that everything i've said up until

this point definite reasons not why written why shields became less popular for knights and also showing that yes indeed shields did become somewhat less popular for knights in a battlefield context or at least in certain battlefield contexts but they were still being used and they were still being used by lots of other soldiers very important to reiterate those points so the first and i think a very important and can't be overlooked an understated point for why shields did become less important for that certainly the top echelons of nobility be they knighted or not but the

high the high level men at arms is simply yes armor did play a part and the simple fact is that armor changed in various ways numerous ways actually which meant that shields were less needed okay now that's not to say that a late 14th century night was not well armored in fact late 14th century armor was very very complete okay certainly in the best case scenarios in some areas they wore slightly less armor than others but if you look at an english night of the year 1400 or 1390 or french night or an italian night

of the same date you'll find that they're pretty much covered from head to foot in plate with male either in the gaps or a full male shirt underneath and so the simple fact is they did have complete armor but there were further improvements that happened in armor during the 15th century or rather and this is probably more correctly stated there were changes that came in which became more prevalent and more widespread okay so a couple of those changes for example are the material that the armor was made from so yes indeed some armor in the

14th century was made of carbon steel hardened okay but in the 15th century it seems to be that a lot more armor was made of carbon steel and hardened so much so that even brigandines many brigandines were proofed tested that is against crossbows okay so there were many hardened carbon steel brigandines being made in certain parts of europe that were tested against crossbows and you paid extra to have one of those uh crossbow proof i'm gonna say bulletproof for a second there but probably would be against the pistol um but crossbow proof uh brigandines and

that goes for all other armor as well so this helmet i'm holding here is made of hardened modern carbon steel but you could get uh many many helmets that were made of hardened steel in the 15th century so absolutely armor technology went on but also armor design the simple fact is that if we go into the 15th century certainly by the middle of the 15th century we find the armor is so complete certainly on the nightly classes that it really closes and covers all of the possible gaps and is hugely protective and moreover if we

look at certain styles of armor particularly italian styles but also this runs over into certain english and french armor as well and spanish armor we see that they are more heavily protected on the left hand side where a shield was so clearly what they're doing they're still acknowledging that the left-hand side is still very vulnerable more vulnerable than the right-hand side the right-hand side might be wielding a weapon one-handed sword for example or a couching a lance and so needs to be a little bit lighter and more movable maneuverable and the left-hand side when you're

using all sorts of weapons even two-handed weapons the left-hand side is often presented to the opponent a lot of the time until the moment at which you're striking and then you'll come back to guard and you'll be left-hand side presented again and obviously on horseback uh couching alliance the left hand side is going to take the brunt of the trauma and most people are right-handed and strike strong most strongly from the right-hand side so that's the side that's going to hit get hit the most so quite simply armor technology design preference for a lot of

protection on the left hand side meant that shields weren't so necessary as they had been before now the next probable reason which is connected to the previous one why shields probably became less prevalent for the nightly classes was quite simply that two-handed weapons are more potent they're more powerful not only in the case of hitting although obviously yes they can hit more powerfully you can wield bigger and heavier weapons if you're wielding with two hands you can wield your big bill with heavy language on it or an al space or a polax of course paul

hammer looser and hammer things like this even bills and halberds although they tend to be more for lower class soldiers but essentially pole arms and bigger swords are gonna hit harder okay that's pretty obvious not only do they hit harder because you're applying more leverage but also you can use a bigger longer weapon with more leverage and it can be heavier and things like this but in addition to that think about against other armored opponents so a lot of you will know that often we'll be using the weapon like this if it's a sword for

example to get the point into gaps and a large weapon like this has the capacity to still be used fantastically in half sorting and because it's longer it provides more protection against people with spears and things like this it's also easier to protect against people swinging halberds at you when it's a larger weapon so quite simply you know smaller swords and one hand swords have their own virtues which maybe i'll discuss in a future video but two-handed weapons if you can free up your left hand and not be trying to fuss around with a shield

or a buckler because you're protected by armor then clearly a two-handed weapon offers some advantages and importantly remember most of the time statistically so if let's say in a well-equipped army 10 of the army is made up of knights if we call them that menatans then 90 is not that means your odds of fighting another night are actually not that high sometimes they might have singled each other out they may have had a grudge and people may have let them go at it that did happen and it's mentioned in the sources but statistically in a

normal skirmish or battle if you're a knight you're fully armored you've got your two-handed weapon the people you're fighting against are usually going to be common soldiers with pole arms aren't they because pole arms are the most prevalent weapons on the battlefield so in many situations if you're fighting against people who have got bills or halberds or spears or pikes you want a weapon that is able to um either um you know defend against their weapons or indeed reach them if you're fighting against infantrymen with pole arms then clearly something like that like a warhammer

might be great if you're up close and smashing someone's armor if they're another arm at night but if you're trying to get at that lightly armored billman or spearman who will want to keep distance they don't want the armored knight coming in close with his rondelle dagger and his armor and all of this stuff they want to keep them at range where they can get the massive percussive effect of their pole weapon and in that situation a weapon that can actually reach the opponent and more easily defend against that massive pole arm so you can

try and get in close is going to be advantageous so big two-handed weapons have lots of advantages if you don't have to worry so much about the shield because you're more protected against missile weapons you're more protected against random hits you didn't see coming you've got your visor down you're you've got all encompassing protection you don't need to worry about your shield so you trust in your armor so that you can dish out bigger blows have a longer reach more control of your weapon and more stamina as well to keep giving those blows and be

more offensive okay and we're into the final two reasons why i would give why shields became less popular for knights and that is quite simply that as warfare changed the majority of the men who were being led on the battlefield in the late 14th century and certainly through the 15th century were wielding either missile weapons or pole weapons and quite simply you are as a knight a an officer essentially a commander of men might be a small group might be a large group some type of rest in you and you're in charge of people who've

got a certain type of weapon category now once we get into the 15th century the majority of troops on the battlefield who you're likely to be leading are either archers or crossbowmen or gunners or they are billman halberdier's pikeman this type of thing now in that context a shield and a one-handed weapon doesn't fit in very well it's archaic it's you know something of the past and back in the days of shield walls or if we go back to the you know the kind of 12th or even 13th century a lot of soldiers would have

had a shield and a spear the common soldiers would have had a shield and a spear so if you having a shield and a sword or a shield and an axe or shield and spear indeed you fit in well to that unit you can fight with that unit you can lead that unit you are harmonious with them but within the context of a 15th century battle if most of your men have bills or halberds you want a weapon that kind of is similar to their weapons it kind of doesn't make sense for you to have

a little short uh stubby axe one-handed axe or a short arming sword and a shield because they're going to be hitting the enemies and you won't be able to reach the enemies equally the enemies are likely to have the same weapons and for the aforementioned reasons you want to have kind of something big that can oppose and reach those enemies so quite simply within the context of the time as a leader of men as an example fighting from the front and commanding and still trying to fight and be effective as well you're going to want

to have weapons in other words pole arms for the most part that are more similar to your men even if you want a sword then you still want a sword that is of a reasonable size a lot of the time and you know some long swords as well especially with one hand of thrust you can get pretty damn good reach on them but you're going to want to have weapons that can somehow fit in with the unit that you're leading so the last point which i want to state here is a possible answer this is

purely a theory kind of off the cuff this is something i thought about earlier when i was making my sort of notes for doing this video and that's to do with the ethos of the nightly classes at this time so we know that the nightly classes had become they've had a crisis of security in the 14th century and it's one of the reasons why they were so heavy on reinforcing the idea of chivalry and uh kind of like oh we you know we need to be as great as the knights of old and we get

all these manuscripts looking at you know tales of king arthur and the song of roland and the romance of alexander and all of these things in the 14th century so the nightly classes were trying to reinforce their place in the world in their mind in the 14th century and certainly this goes through into the 15th century as well and so they were almost kind of cosplaying or reenacting what they perceived to be knighthood from an earlier age and this was of course because of numerous social changes the beginning of the renaissance the black death uh

the rise in the cost of labor uh all sorts of different complex uh social changes that were happening at this time which and their place on the battlefield as well the fact that you had the rise of semi-professional indentured soldiers who were better equipped better armored than they never been before better trained the birth of learning and treatises and universities fencing schools and this kind of stuff so the fact is that the knights started to question who they were and what they meant and what their place in the world was and um i think that

we start to see in the 14th century this attitude is carried out in a trying to um trying to win honor and trying to win glory and fame and if we look at someone like marshall busako of france he went and competed in every tournament he could he tried to fight in every war that he possibly could um there's the deeds of jacques de leyland as well burgundian knight who tried to fight everyone in the world with the polax and we've got this kind of period when these knights are trying to prove their value and

their worth in god's eyes and also society's eyes and the other knights and the church and the king and everyone else so they're trying to prove their value and their purpose and i think to a certain degree this is their improvement of armor freed them up to go on the full offensive perhaps and we there are a couple of sources which actually lament the fact that oh knights of these days um just charge into into battle um you know they they're not cautious they're not clever anymore they just want to win glory we certainly see

this at something like the battle of cressi you know one of the possible reasons why the english so annihilated the opposing army at the battle of christy in 1346 is because they picked a defensive position and fought essentially in the scottish manor plus lots of longbows and so they they fought a defensive battle and the waves of french and burgundy and another hungarian and other knights that turned up to fight sort of just stormed up the hill and kind of assaulted them in in a really uncoordinated fashion trying to win glory chanting trying to take

them down and i wonder and again this is complete conjecture supposition i wonder if this played a part in the preference and the move towards two-handed weapons because if you've got a big two-handed sword or a pole axe or some type of you know uh some type of large two-handed heavy weapon trusting in your armor you can go charging into the enemy ranks and trying whacking around taking out as many people as possible and you can't really do that so much with a one-handed weapon and a shield one-handed weapon and a shield is certainly one-on-one

you could say a more sensible weapon set um combination but it's more of a defensive thing and i wonder if the defensiveness of the shield had become not abhorrent but but almost less nightly and less manly now that might sound a funny thing for me to say but if you look at period sources we do see these sorts of things expressed we do see certain physical things that knights of that time if we look at you know people like busicom pietro monte said that oh a knight shouldn't do this thing because it's a sign of

weakness or it's a sign of you know whatever womanly behavior or weird things like this so they were very obsessed with trying to appear almost like superheroes of their time and i wonder if that somehow affected the move towards big two-handed pole axes and two-handed swords and stuff like this possibly possibly not as always i'd be very interested to hear your thoughts on this so do you think i've covered all the main reasons for why the shield became less popular for the nightly classes do you think there are other reasons that i've missed do you

think i've overstated or understated some reasons i'd be interested to hear your comments but just to reiterate once again because it's really impossible really important to point this out shields did not go out of use they did not go out of use because of firearms shields stayed in use and shields were still in use in the 16th century and they're still quite prevalent and important but yes it is true to say that shields became less popular not completely out of use at all but they did become less popular within some contexts for the late medieval

night i hope this has been useful and interesting to watch i hope i'll see you again back on the channel for another video cheers for watching i have been matt easton and i'm pretty sure i'll continue to be cheers folks