Medieval fighting techniques
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- čas přidán 23. 10. 2019
- Warlord, Jason and Dr. Guy Windsor look into a medieval fighting manual and discuss how one part of it might work when done in practise.
Guy blogs about it here: guywindsor.net/2019/10/mounte...
Follow Jason on Twitter @RebellionJason
Credits:
Warlord
Dr. Guy Windsor
Direction, Camera, Sound, Editing Kasumi
Presenter Jason Kingsley OBE
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"We're volunteers. Warlords a conscript" that line had me roaring
I like the way he thinks.
Warlord: *Looks at you* Who are you calling a conscript?
Roaring? Really? It's not even an actual joke
@@ivanasukjadic1423 i thought it was funny. Eat me.
"Oh boy, my owner is doing that thing again where he pokes things with sticks." I love how as soon as the horse realises the lance in his peripheral vision is couched it's time to rock. What a good boy!
in all honesty its possible that Warlord is having just as much fun with the whole affair as the rest of the crew.
This is like watching two blokes debate Ikea instructions, only with stabbing things.
Thank you for this.
😂😂😂😂 by god you're right.
Only the Ikea instructions would be much more inscrutable and hard to follow
exactly xDD
The info is fascinating, but Warlord steals the show, such an intelligent and well trained horse.
His name works out!
That's what happens when you treat animals with respect they deserve.
i'm barely 20 mins in and the fact he seems to understand the difference when his rider is holding a "spear" vs holding a "lance"
@Stefano Dawg Jason Kingsley, the guy riding the horse, trained the horse
He nods when someone says something good.
My 7 year old son is absolutely addicted to you and your horses and all of your videos and he loves the Middle Ages too. I am an archaeologist and I would like to thank you for being so realistic about the way life really was at the time. Greetings from Italy 🇮🇹
Cheers
Your son's gonna grow up a fine lad
I wish I could've learned these informations at a much younger age, so glad technology gives easy access to informations like these
I've started watching with my 12 year old. He really likes the series (particularly the combat oriented stuff lol)
@@One01Zero as any good 12 year old should!
7 anni e capisce l'inglese così bene?
Complimenti!
Jacopo Del Bo' eh magari!!!! Glielo traduco io ma a lui piace un sacco anche solo guardare
Amazing! I swear that Warlord is studying just as hard as you guys are. He's constantly checking on his companion and considering how to protect him against the ground attack. He didn't show any signs of concern for his own well-being. He would have been a fine soldier, that horse.
Although he didn't like him letting the other man make loud noises RIGHT beside his ear. No, not once.
@Colin Killian clearly you've not spent much time around animals
LOL if horses didn't look out for anything, they would not exist. You are confusing a sensitive, reacting animal with a lounge chair... why the contempt?
@Colin Killian animals are much more intelligent and interested in survival than credited with
@Colin Killian true enough, but often what's dangerous to the horse is dangerous to the rider too.
"Warlord, this is not dangerous. Or edible." This is a pretty good summation of a horse. lol.
Horses are scared of only two things: everything that moves and everything that doesn't.
insaneweasel1 ???
@@johnlamb95 r/woosh
quite tasty, in fact, a bit dangerous at times
the horse, of course
The most fascinating part is that the horse must now be trained deal with more things than just running in a strait line for a joust. It's like the horse effectively is learning martial arts as well, in its own way and participation.
Im only 10 minutes into the video. I really like how your showing how you two are reading the book & figuring it out on camera.
Thanks for sharing, very interesting stuff.
That's something that stands out to me as well. I love the honesty and rawness of these videos. It's a wonderful teaching approach and so much better than watching highly scripted educational videos.
-"Gentle contact"
BONK goes the head
-"... Perfect !"
Makes me realize how important horse training back in those days must have been. Not every horse would be cut out for this sort of stuff.
I imagine a group of ancient warriors all standing around having the exact same debate upon their first few battles with concentrates cavalry force. Quite the image to have.
Most guys might only fight one big battle in their whole lives as well.
This is great, just watching u guys work through all of this. No fancy camera edits, or crazy music, it's as if I'm literally sitting there next to u guys just watching all of this.
Exactly!
It's how they trained back then so it's really great to see it like that. Like you were sat on the side watching 2 knights train and figure out ways to fight! I agree, it's super relaxing and I could literally watch it for hours! Just fascinating to see how they actually did things rather than it all being all killing and drama like in most documentary shows and movies and such!
"It's a sword...mmmm." Has got to be the best line ever.
I love this channel so much.
haha Yeah that cracked me up
So I am a real-life martial artist, I even used to teach karate. Ive been in many classes with many instructors, with people of various experience ranging from complete novice to expert. How you guys approached this subject is exactly how all real martial artists approach fighting and likely how the knights and men at arms face it as well. It usually starts with something simple, in this case you guys looked at a parry-counter, a very easy concept that can be taught in about 5 minutes. From there questions get asked which leads to more questions. Ive been in classes and taught classes where only one technique was taught, then people started playing with it and asking questions and soon everyone had something completely different from the original lesson. I think this is one reason the old fight manuals were so vague at times. They werent a comprehensive guide to fighting, but rather an overview of concepts and strategies that fighters then took and played with and came up with their own things unique to them.
That's definitely something. I think that there's also a case of where it's not expected someone to learn on their from the manual necessarily but to be taught from it by someone who already knows the material.
@@Riceball01 and the manual serves as a reminder
@@jomess7879 Exactly.
Brilliant observation. I never thought of it quite like that before.
What I find fascinating is that this is a manual from a time when they were used to teach combat techniques to people who would actually face death in combat. So everything you say really takes hold. If you were preparing for a true life and death situation you would want to be as thorough in your training as possible. You would want to ask real question and anticipate real behaviors. This type of training is the only way I can think of to get there. You can't exactly have the enemy politely offer to do a few trial runs to see if your sterile practiced techniques are valid in the real world.
The French dismounted because the English set up their defense across a muddy field, with dense forest on either side. They also dug trenches and put up stakes on both flanks and stationed their longbows behind them. They left the center open, stationing their foot knights there most armed with poleaxes and cavalry destroying polearms. It was a horrible decision to charge the English in that position. The English were not playing by the "rules" of lining up on open fields and deciding the battle with a cavalry charge.
"Some fight to win. I fight to kill."
We few, we happy few
If I may, I think another thing that's 'saving' Guy is Warlord was starting to anticipate the clack of the lance. You can see after about the third or fourth time, he starts to move away a bit as you make your approach, which gives Guy more room to maneuver. I think that with practice and holding Warlord on a steady line, Guy will be forced to move away to perform his counter.
As always, love watching your videos, and give Warlord an ear scritch or two for me! XD
yes you're right, Warlord was learning to anticipate.
15:20 wow, that was some amazing calm on Warlord's part. He tossed his head a little, but that was as much response as he gave to a loud clack right by his head and a shaft passing right by his ear. That is an incredibly well-trained horse.
"we're volunteers, the horse is a conscript" lmao
i love the rapport between them
Agincourt would have been a line of horses charging. no where to "step" when that occurs. I always figured they dismounted because of the muddy terrain which is often mentioned?
one things for sure, warhorse training must have been a very important career, much in demand.
@Jon Goat interesting. thanks.
Yes, the muddy terrain & the greater vulnerability horses have to arrows.
I heard somewhere the English also had stakes set up that would mitigate a cavalry charge.
@@tomaszlosinski875 The vaward 'battle' of the French advanced on foot and after a long slog through clay mud were reputedly exhausted by the time they had closed with the English line, as well as being funnelled by a narrowing field into an unwieldy mass. Being accustomed to fighting on horseback many were simply not battle fit.
This is true, but would be made up for in the fact that an English schiltron would have presented a lot of spiky bois at those horses, making it very likely something's going to get impaled if it charges in headlong.
There was a small cavalry action at Agincourt, it just wasn't very effective because of where the English set up and because of the stakes and ditches etc. they dug in.
The secret to success " read the whole book".
Very impressed by Mr Windsor's handle of Medieval Italian, albeit with a very English pronunciation.
Thank you for teaching us about Fiore dei Liberi on your great channel.
I really like seeing you working with spears here, especially on foot. I think a lot of the historical channels focus a lot on swords because swords are popular today. Yet spears and polearms were used a lot more on the battlefield than the sword, and when we see people looking at the original documents and using them competently we can see just how superior a good pole arm can be compared to an arming or even long sword.
Warlord was so motionless, with a sheen around his edges, I thought he was a cutout graphic. Then all of a sudden, woah!
Man, this was seriously super fascinating like modern reenactment and archeology. I'm glad that your 'scholar' in this case I believe was comfortable with your horse. I would have been terrified, but he knew the script and interpretation well. He saw how the horse reacted under very slow speeds. Obviously, the cacophony of noise wouldn't bother a warhorse in the thousands as it did singly for an off-shoot warhorse breed. Super cool!
Warlord is truly a steed befitting a knight - he shows his quality beyond measure!
As a Fioreist this is great to watch. Equestrian HEMA is just too expensive for me to experiment with so it's great to watch someone else who can do it.
Love the way Warlord is always part of the conversation
I have to say I really love how well you treat Warlord and make his safety a priority. Really fascinating exploration, it turns out the manual is near me (at the Getty) and I can’t wait to check it out.
*It should be mandatory for Hollywood directors to watch this video!*
I can see so many things that need to be changed in movies.
REAL combat, I think, would look much more interesting than movie nonsense.
There is a lot to learn here!
while interesting, i think that we have been trained in Holywood fights/"martial arts" so seeing something accurate and realistic would, in fact, look weird instead
IMO the problem is real combat does not look good on camera. My experience is that 1) it is so fast that only those of us with training know what happened; and we're only a small segment of the movie watching population so we don't make Hollywood enough money. 2) Real combat is brutal, again the majority of the money contributing population would not likely enjoy watching fast, technical fights resulting in truly traumatic, often disgusting injuries.
@@RodneyConroy All my friends who actually trained prefer Bruce Lee. I respect him but I like watching Shaw Brothers movies way more.
Jason: "Right, we're going to invite this chap over to VERY GENTLY show him how we fought back in the day."
Warlord: "Master COME ON, we could kill this clown ten times over with THIS VERY STICK if you'd just let me go a bit faster. Oh ALL RIGHT I'll behave, I'll behave."
Squire: My Lord, it seems you and your horse have created quite the bond. When will I get to do that?
Jason: When you're ready, my squire. Go to the mead hall and buy yourself a drink will you?
Squire: My Lord.
Underrated comment alert!
This sort of content is severely lacking in other youtube channels. Seeing the process of working out the techniques from original source material and then the discussion that comes from actually performing it is amazing. Warlord and the other horses are fantastic and it is wonderful seeing them work. I hope to see more in depth discussion and demonstrations of combat in the future. Overall this channel is fantastic and I hope to see these videos continue for a very long time
Fun fact: He's a CEO of a company that created the game Elite Sniper and also other things like movies.
Had no idea why I loved this guy- now it makes even more sense!
Expert on medieval life. Makes games about modern day snipers. -_-
Elite Cavalry: Slow motion image of a lance skewering a testicle. Kickstarter!?!? >XD
@@Tom_Quixote are you annoyed he does what he wants? You're pathetic
Amazing. What a guy.
Warlord is amazing! And this video is really informative. 👌
It's a great film. Feels true to life.
Did he say what breed he is?
“I don’t want to run you over because you’d clog my horse’s feet.” Ouch 😣🤣
I mean if you're talking about some peasant levy, the knight's warhorse is literally worth more than the man...
"gentle contact"
DOINK!!!!!!!
PLEASE hold lessons or experience days! I would love to come and live in the middle ages for a day, cooking, learning to fight, hopefully pet a lovely horse! I bet millions of people would love that
My favorite part: "Get out of the way, you stupid man!" Good advice from the war masters of ages past :)
Gorgeous work. Just gorgeous. I would most definitely agree that standing against a charging steed, with armored knight, steel tipped lance, and murder in their eyes....would take balls of steel. Or at the VERY least, years of training and a huge dose of confidence IN one's training. Not to mention needing to be quite smart about your battlefield decisions - split second reactions would be absolutely necessary at full speed, wouldn't it?
Warlord was indeed a very, very good boy in this endeavor. He did NOT like that noise right beside his head, certainly, but he also didn't react half as badly as he could have. I can't imagine poor Talos would have been able to deal with this experiment quite so handily. He's just not used to that kind of thing, yet! I was also impressed that Warlord did not - well, lose his temper I guess? That might not be the correct term. I've heard stories once or twice, about war horses getting upset in a different way - most horses flee, but there are those times when "flight" seems not an option for whatever reason to them, and then things go pretty badly for someone. Maybe the horse, but more often the humans; the specific stories I'm recalling involved a particular stallion who tended to bite when he was upset. Perhaps of use on a real battlefield, not very helpful in training or re-enactment! Though I will note, this animal was also not of "standard" stock, he was technically a Quarter Horse, with a lot of Mustang in there; and he had a temper to begin with. I believe his owner always said training with that horse was "lively." Knowing more about this than I used to - I no longer think he meant lively in an amusing way!!
Wonderful video - thank you so much for continuing to share your experiments and experiences with us!
Doesn't Warlord look particularly handsome today! Such a beautiful bit and bridle today.
What a beautiful calm horse,he seemed to be hanging on your every word when you was sat at the beginning.I can't imagine how long it took to get him to this stage,very well done.
Warlord is the star of this piece, you guys are the stunt men.
that horse looks quite fun to keep around
I love this kind of video where you (especially with a friend) are just messing around figuring things out.
It was so cool to see you guys working it out. I appreciate that you left in so much of the discussion.
Concerning the "horseman without armour": I think this might be relevant in case it is not an anticipated battle, but more a surprise skirmish. It would take too long to get into armour, but it only takes a few seconds to grab a lance/spear ... assuming one still wants to fights and not flee (or maybe retreat and regroup is not a viable option).
Or things like scouts or raiding parties, or bandits etc. No armour might also not mean no armour at all, just nothing that will stop a spear, and so not plate. I honestly think there are so many minor gaps in our understanding of life in the middle ages, that little questions like (So you can afford a horse, but not armor? If you are going to be fighting, why wouldn't you wear armor, if you could afford it?) leave us scratching our heads, but must have very simple answers that don't come up in any of the material we have. I just imagine all the context and nuance of our time, and all the things we don't write down or really go into detail about, and then I imagine trying to piece together our society from some materials we have, and it leaves me assuming we are way off about very simple things about the world at that time.
Maybe there was a whole regional culture/group of lightly armored (as in just layers of clothes) horse fighters, that we just weren't aware of. Or maybe some felt just being mounted and armed, while lightly protected was enough for non military escort duty. I don't know, do we have a lot of info about what a minor mounted guard in a security capacity for say a party of merchants, or travelers would wear?
Lurklen the thing about lightly armored horsemen is that they wouldn’t survive particularly long, especially because of bows. Cross bows and long bows aren’t effective against plate, but can punch right through mail and gambeson
@@Specter_1125 As usual I suspect that depends on context. I have a feeling that mounted crossbowmen were not very heavily armoured, and light cavalry has been a thing for ages, though the question of exactly how armoured up those individuals were is something that I would guess depends on the context of their use, and the time in which they existed.
The context of my comment was in small group mounted combat. I'm wondering what it wss like outside of the major battles, and outside of a full scale conflict. Were there riders who forsook armour (or at least were armoured very lightly) but were still forming a mounted guard? The examples I used were scouts, mounted guard for a something like a merchant caravan, or possibly raiding parties getting provisions as part of a larger army.
Other examples of lightly armoured riding parties now that I've thought on it more, could be many of the light cavalry used in desert countries, mounted messengers going through enemy territory, or lower end freelancers. (Again, when I say no armour, I generally mean no heavy armour, so likely layers of cloth, or padded coats and the like.)
I'm also fairly sure muc of the cavalry of the Roman era (earlier than later) were pretty lightly armored, and they were dealing bows, and some weapons not too dissimilar from crossbows, so I think it's more about application of horse riding fighting men to the right task, rather than all fighting men on horseback were armored up.
(I mean no matter the era, unless you have your horse kitted out in full coverage armor, cavalry is never going to love being shot at by missile fire, because they can't do their job without their horse, and horses are not missile proof.)
Or just youthful miscreant nobles going around causing trouble with each other!
@@Lurklen medieval 2 total war had hobilars/border horses and other light horses for western european factions, and we have information that French gendarme lances' have "Mounted Archers" that fight mounted with lesser armour as well. There seems to be less-armoured cavalry contingents in late medieval armies but not as celebrated as knights/man-at-arms and expensive crossbowmen/Longbowmen/pikemen
I greatly appreciate this 'just sitting on the side' watching you figure out and learn. You share valuable insights, and a lot of it is in your dialog, the way you debate and theorize and then give things a try. For me as a writer this is great to from a picture of how training people and horses for defense and combat situations might work. I am very thankful!
This was absolutely fascinating. Guy made a good point when he said it's easy to parry while using sticks at slow speeds. Swap the sticks out for deadly weapons and a 30mph armored charge, and I think he'd have much more difficulty surviving.
I never miss a video. The informality, but serious inquiry makes them all the more enjoyable. This is clearly one of the best you've done. Yea, yea...the horse did good too.
Warlord is embodiment of patience.
This is absolutely GREAT! Best channel on youtube at the moment!!!
thanks.
I own the Flower of Battle. A recommended read for anyone interested in Medieval combat, and those interested in HEMA.
This was mad! So cool to see two guys like "Wanna attack me on your horse now?" "Sure hang on I'll go get him!"
Also Warlord might be the best trained horse I have ever seen. Such a cool video.
Awesome video! I love how you both really break it down and brainstorm all the scenarios, angles, and possibilities. Not only is this extremely informative, but it's also great fun! Please keep videos like these coming! 👍🏼
That is a very good boy! Wow. The level of trust Warlord has in you is something special.
I wish I could “Like” this video more than once! I’ve long been a fan of Guy’s work, & it was great seeing you both work together on this.
Dr. Guy Windsor has my utmost respect for his ability to break down/read that manual.
It feels like a lot of techniques being shown would be in the post-charge melee where the horse's momentum would be a lot slower. I saw that some assumptions were being made that the rider would be able to be struck even at a higher speed but it doesn't *seem* likely.
While the manual is very dismounted combat orientated, it's almost certain that there are more mounted techniques to counter foot combatants.
It's all very interesting! Great video.
The thing is, once you've read that far in the manuscript you already know most of the principles of the system, just apply them on a horse. Look at the lanza vs lanza section, there's a sum total of 2 techniques (with one counter.) That's because once you get to that point you've already come through things like half-swording and pollaxe to deal with breaking weapons to the ground, or getting tangled up on the middle of the lanza.
The treatise is either 1. a presentation piece of 2. a study guide, not an exhaustive manual on each section's fullest extent of techniques.
Fiore dei Liberi was one the most important Italian Magister Rex in the late medieval period.
I'm very proud to live very near his birthcity and to have the opportunity to study from his Flos under the guidance of another Magister Rex.
Great to see Warlord again, I missed him.
He is such a good boy ❤
Aaaaaaand... Warlord steals the show! What a good boy!
Oh, and you humans were good too. It was very interesting to see how the illustrations and instructions played out in practice. I think that you were both insightful, from the two perspectives of the situation (in my totally amateur point of view anyway). And it looks like you both had a lot of fun! Great video!
I just took a fall going full speed on a horse in my light armor kit and separated my shoulder joint. I look up to you as a knight so very much and hope one day to be as skilled as you through training one day!
Guy freaking Windsor?!?! Omg thats awesomee
And its about mister Fiore :))) how can this be more awesome
Defenetly if you can do this more often it would be quite valuable learning experience for both of you and for us as well
The horsemanship in your videos is amazing!
You really need to do a collaboration with Matt Easton (Scholagladiatoria is his CZcams channel), it would be incredible.
I second this. Seeing as they’re playing a role playing game together with Shad, Lindybeige and Metatron, I hope they do a collaboration soon. Getting Matt to show Jason some long sword techniques would be great
16:36 "There are plenty horses who would've gone the other side of the county by now." Hehe yeah I know a couple of those.
Absolutely. I once knew a horse who ripped itself open from shoulder to knee trying to escape an especially menacing leaf.
Excellent video, War Lord is one in a million. Truly a fine horse.
Really interesting to see you guys working through it all and getting the experience.
Wow, that was an enthralling video! I'm so impressed with how focused Warlord is. I think all the horses I've ridden (dressage) would've thrown me off and galloped away if there was swords being swung near them.
Warlord is a very good horse. I hope you gave him his favorite treat to reward him for such good work!
"Do you want to try it?"
*deep hesitant breath from both of them*
"OK."
Once a horse and rider, or in this case, knight. The horse will do what his master motions for him to do.
A well trained horse will respond quickly and move out of the way of any danger, as Warlord demonstrated.
He's been well trained and cared for.
This has been very interesting and I have always been fascinated with Medieval history.
Thank you. I love your videos.
Thank you very much for this interesting video, sir.
Warlord is so brave and beautiful.
Jason is displaying the enthusiasm of me testing out game strategy guide with friends.
Superb work and channel. Thank you
This was amazing! I would love to see an experiment that took the speed of the horse into consideration. The length of the lance with the speed of the horse could make these techniques extremely difficult. The time someone has to parry a lance decreases significantly as lances get shorter and/or horses get faster as the horses head creates an impediment to the parry and one would have to potentially parry a charging lance in a hundredth of a second at full speed which could prove detrimental to the foot soldier.
This was a fantastic video and I’d love to see more about the techniques used. Keep up the great work!
this is the absolute best medieval indoor riding arena I have ever seen!
This was fascinating, thank you so much for recording this!
That was great! You guys should do more of them medieval military doctrines
This is so fascinating, im so glad i found this channel
One of the greatest channels on YT. I am so happy I found this
Thank you for blessing us with another amazing video!
Love seeing the more historically accurate methods than what we see in movies, ect. Watching the conversation, love how Warlord @ 23:00 showing his sweet side...looks like he's grooming you.😁❤🐴
Beautiful horse, and great work at interpretation of this manual!
Fabulous practical research! Thanks to all three of you.
These longer videos are very insightful: show how much of a full-time job training with horses and weapons can be (and why there was a class dedicated to it in the middle ages).
Also it seems like the "obvious solution" of wounding the horse may actually not be such a good idea: the animal bolting and kicking might actually be more dangerous than the knight!
absolutely fascinating! you can imagine knights back in the day working on technique exactly like this and comparing notes.
I'm sensing a new category of HEMA coming soon, mounted fighter vs. person on foot. 😁
The equipment would cost a small fortune.
Warlord is a natural in front of the camera ❤️
You consistently provide enjoyable and informative content. This is easily one of my favorite channels. Thank you for your time and dedication.
Paulus Hector Mair also has a foot vs mounted section.
“just get out of the way and stab them in the face” hahaha I believe that is the English translation.
Amazing!! Looking forward to a part 2 of this! Well done!
Warlord is just awesome!!
I can’t get enough of these videos! Good on ya! Keep ‘em coming!
This whole Infantry vs Cavalry is interesting.
I had looked into some of this stuff briefly because of some games i played
and this small test show a few things i had read and thought about.
A big Cavarly charge is thought of as this kind of epitomy of medival war.
The winning move for the side with the horses. But the strenght of the Charge isnt in its damage potential.
It was probably more of a demoralizing attack. If the receivers arent diciplined enough and start to scatter and flee
the Riders can take full advantage of their mobility and ride down most of the enemys forces.
Somewhat ironically the best way for Infantry to receive a full-on charge was likely the balls-of-steel method.
So, there's horse armor, isn't it. So, can you now take a look at it, considering these learned technics? Pls? :)
Much love from germany for your great work!
Love how these guys are passionately discussing the topic
Thanks for another great video! It's fascinating to watch two enthusiasts talking about their favourite subject and working out the kinks. Kudos to Warlord, he's a real war horse.
It seems stepping toward the horse is just to avoid and parry the horse and spear, moving away from the horse allows to parry and strike. So all depends on the situation in the moment.