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having just come out of thcir fields, turn back uttering loud cries. The shepherds gather their flocks and drive them towards the neighbouring woods in hope of saving them. The incendiaries set the tillages on fire and the foragers visit and sack them. The terrified inhabitants are either burned or led away with their hands tied to be held for ransom. Everywhere belłs ring the alarm, a surge of fear sweeps over the countryside. Wherever you look you can see helmets glistening in the sun, pennons waving in the breeze, the whole plain covered with horsemen. Money, cattle, mules and sheep are all seized. The smoke billows and spreads, flames crackle. Peasants and shepherds scatter in all directions’ (trans. E. B. Krchbiel).

This, then, was the reality of war in the ‘Age of Chit alry’, and there was little role here for the heavily armoured knight. Instead such campaigns depended on common soldiers who fought for plunder and profit. The growing strength of medieval fortifica-tions meant that, throughout the i3th and early i4th centuries, w arfare largely remained a matter of raids by relatively smali forces lacking siege eąuipment. Defeat in a major battle could also open up whole provinces to enemy raids. This happened to the French after Courtrai w hen the victorious Flemings ravaged Artois, seizing almost ungarrisoned castles and trying to devastate the countryside. Only towns with professional troops, like Therouanne with its smali garrison of Italian mercenaries, could resist.

(A) Motte & Bailey castle atPeray, built for Robert II de Belleme in iogo-noo as a defence against the Counts ofMaine, plus a sectionaI view. (Ii) Circular donjon at Houdan, complcted in 1137. (C) Windowless donjon at Boussac, one of the earliest stone castles in Bcrry. (D) Castle ofLaval, showing the circular I2th century

ton er and other fortilications addcd in the ifth cen tury. (E) Castle of Yiliandraut, built in a ncw Italian style in 1306—7. (F) Fortress ofFoix on a stcep rocky outcrop, showing the

rectangular donjon and hall of the i2th century, a massive circular towcr and additional walls from the iyth century, and outcr defenccs from a la ter datę.

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