Medieval warfare, tactics and technology

Model answer

A knight would wear a mail hauberk, a long shirt of interlinked iron rings, over a padded aketon, and a great helm, a heavy closed helmet that covered his whole head.

Model answer

Interpretation A is convincing up to a point. Around 1300 an English knight wore a mail hauberk, with a mail hood, mittens and leggings, over a thick padded aketon, a great helm that enclosed his whole head, and a shield; plate pieces such as knee-guards were also being added. Mail over padding gave good protection against sword cuts and glancing blows, and armour was so valuable that it was expensive to buy. It is also true that relatively few knights died in battle. At Dunbar in 1296, for example, many Scottish nobles were captured rather than killed.

However, the claim that a knight was 'almost invulnerable' is not convincing. Arrows from longbows and, especially, crossbow bolts could pierce mail at short range. Most warhorses had little protection and were easily wounded or killed, leaving the knight on foot and vulnerable; the king paid compensation for the many horses lost on campaign. Spearmen in tight formations could stop and kill mounted men, and terrain could be deadly: at Stirling Bridge in 1297 many of the English vanguard were cut down on the soft ground or drowned in the Forth, and at Moel-y-don in 1282 knights fleeing across the Menai Strait drowned because they were weighed down by their armour. At Courtrai in 1302 Flemish foot soldiers killed large numbers of French knights. The great helm limited sight and breathing, and armour was hot and tiring in a long fight.

The statement that few knights died 'because' of their armour is also misleading. Knights were valuable prisoners who could be ransomed, so their enemies often preferred to capture them, while ordinary foot soldiers were more likely to be killed.

Overall, Interpretation A is convincing that armour gave knights much better protection than most soldiers had, but it is unconvincing to call them almost invulnerable, because missiles, spearmen, terrain and water could all kill them, and the custom of ransom explains much of their survival.

Model answer

After the English defeat at Stirling Bridge in 1297, Edward led a very large army into Scotland himself in 1298. It included cavalry under the earls and under Bishop Antony Bek of Durham, thousands of infantry, many of them Welsh, and large numbers of longbowmen and crossbowmen. The campaign nearly failed before the battle: the army was short of food, and Edward was considering withdrawing when he learned that Wallace was waiting near Falkirk. According to one chronicler, Edward's horse trod on him in the night and broke two of his ribs, but he still led the attack the next day.

Wallace had chosen a strong defensive position. He drew up his spearmen in four schiltrons, dense rings protected by stakes roped together, on rising ground behind a marsh and a burn. Archers stood between the schiltrons and the Scottish cavalry waited behind, near Callendar Wood.

The English cavalry could not cross the marsh, so they rode round both ends of it. At this point the Scottish cavalry rode off without fighting, leaving the Scottish archers exposed, and the English knights cut them down. However, the schiltrons held firm, and the cavalry could not break the hedges of spears.

Edward then used his archers. The longbowmen and crossbowmen came forward and shot volleys into the packed schiltrons, which could neither move nor shoot back. As men fell and gaps opened in the rings, the English cavalry charged again and broke them. The surviving Scots fled into Callendar Wood, and their losses were heavy.

The victory came from Edward's numbers and from combining archers with cavalry against static formations that had lost their own cavalry and archer support. Wallace escaped, but he resigned as Guardian of Scotland. Edward, still short of supplies, could not follow up the victory and complete the conquest, and afterwards the Scots avoided pitched battles.

Model answer

Siege warfare was more important than battles in Edward I's wars overall, because his enemies usually avoided battle and conquest meant taking and holding castles. However, a few battles were decisive turning points, and battles and sieges were closely linked.

The case for siege warfare is strong. The Welsh rarely fought pitched battles, and after their defeat at Falkirk in 1298 neither did the Scots, so the wars were decided by strongpoints. In Wales in 1283 Edward's forces captured the last Welsh castles, Dolwyddelan in January and Castell y Bere in April. He then held Wales with castles: Flint, Rhuddlan, Builth and Aberystwyth from 1277, Conwy, Caernarfon and Harlech from 1283 and Beaumaris from 1295. In the revolt of 1294-95 Harlech held out with fewer than 40 men. In Scotland, Berwick was stormed in 1296 and Edinburgh Castle surrendered after a bombardment; Caerlaverock fell in 1300 and Bothwell in 1301 with the help of a great siege tower; and the fall of Stirling Castle in 1304, after bombardment by the Warwolf, completed the conquest. Edward invested enormous sums in siege engines, engineers and castle-building, which shows how important he thought sieges were.

However, some battles were turning points. Edward's victory at Evesham in 1265 destroyed Simon de Montfort. The death of Llywelyn at Orewin Bridge in 1282 broke Welsh resistance, and Maes Moydog in 1295 weakened Madog's revolt. In Scotland, the English victory at Dunbar in 1296 caused the collapse of Scottish resistance, while the defeat at Stirling Bridge in 1297 lost the English control of most of Scotland in a single day. Falkirk in 1298 destroyed Wallace's power.

Battles and sieges were connected. After Dunbar, Scottish castles surrendered because there was no army to relieve them, so the battle made the sieges easy. After Stirling Bridge, the Scots took Stirling Castle. And sieges could bring about battles: after Edward's death, the English army was marching to relieve Stirling Castle when it was defeated at Bannockburn in 1314. Blockade and devastation, as in the starving of Gwynedd in 1277 and the raiding of Scottish lands, also wore enemies down without either battles or sieges.

Overall, I largely agree. Battles were rare but could change a war in a day, as Dunbar and Stirling Bridge show. But Edward's wars were mostly won and lost through sieges, castles and blockade, because his enemies avoided battle and lasting control depended on holding strongpoints. Siege warfare was therefore the more important.