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and no hand bows are recorded in surviving castle inventories from 1230 to the mid-i4th century. On the other hand these listed an increasing number of various crossbows, one bow to 50 ąuarrels, bolts or arrows being a typical proportion. Other specialised infantry weapons from the mid-i3th century on-wards were faussarts (perhaps early falchions), large axes and maces.

At the same time trained infantry were steadily growing in importance, playing a major military role by the late i3th century. New types of foot soldiers were also emerging, including the French bidauts light skirmishers of 1302. The famę of the Flemings in siege warfare had been known for centuries, but they were also developing effective tactics in open battle. Flemish pikemen supported by men wielding goedendags, massive wooden maces, certainly came into their own in the early i4th century by over-throwing the pride of French chivalry at the battle of Courtrai. The goedendags though mostly associated with Flemish cities like Brugge and Gent, was also used in northern France.

Militias

A lot is known about the recruitment and organis-ation of militia infantry. The old Carolingian concept that all free landholding men could be called upon to fight had not died out, but the obligations of the common folk had declined considerably by the I2th century. Duties excluded ost and chevauchee, the peasantry being regarded as ‘rear vassals’ only to be called out under a generał arriere ban. A generał levy of 1124 against a German invasion included many peasant pedites infantrymen, but in case of war between a nobleman and the king, commoners were excused from following their lord. Other obligations of ordinary people involved the building and repair of fortifications.

No serious effort seems to have been madę to limit the carrying of weapons until the second half of the i2th century, though only in the towns would some men have been wealthy enough to possess proper arms. The waggons that the countryside could supply often seem to have been morę important than the warriors; but in 1284 the abbot of St. Maur-des-

‘Charlemagne’s troops sleeping’, c.1218. Here the kiteshaped shields are of a shorter late I2th century form. An interesting feature is the rigid face-masks on the hclmets. (Roland Window, in situ Chartres Cathedral; author’s photograph)

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