Compagnie d'ordonnance

The lowest unit, equivalent to a squad, was the lance fournie. These would range between 3 and 12 men depending on the time and place. But the Duke of Burgundy, Charles the Bold, set a formalized size for those he called. They had 9 men each. There was one knight operating as heavy cavalry and one traditional light cavalry person. A non-combatant page was the main support staff. Lastly, there were three mounted archers, a crossbowman, handgunner, and pike man. The idea is that each one would be able to provide all the needed unit types for combined arms tactics. But as guns have not been invented yet in Middle Earth, I would imagine that the dismounted infantry would all be pike men or spear men. The exact weapon would change based on the particular fiefdom.   The compagnie d'ordonnance forerunner of the modern company. Each compagnie consisted of 100 Lances fournies, which was built around and under the command of their heavy cavalryman. With all their assisting pages and squires, archers and men-at-arms, the company totaled 600 men. Generally there was one support person for every two soldiers. The compagnies d'ordonnance peaked at 58 compagnies of 4,000 lances and 24,000 men in 1483.   What does this translate to for Gondor? Well, 2,800 of these were sent to Minas Tirith in the books. Based on comments made in Return of the King, this represents 10% of the strength available. So 28,000 total. 24,889 would be combatants and the rest the support staff. The combatants would include 3,111 each for knights and light cavalry. 9,333 would be mounted archers. The same amount would be the infantry.

So, we have to recognize that outside the knights here, practically everyone would be peasant conscripts. It would be unlikely that they would have gone through something comparable to what we would call basic training. Also, they would be the poorest and most exploited demographic in the medieval world. This has important implications. First, pole arms - like spears - and axes would be the most common weapon. These would already be available to peasants, the most intuitive to use and cheapest. This also means likely gambesons and/or leather armor and shields made of the simplest woods and wicker.   Nobles could theoretically give out better equipment to their troops but this is unlikely. First, this is expensive.But more importantly is the risks involved. A peasant conscript army is going to be poorly motivated and disciplined as well as poorly trained. Which is understandable. Why would a peasant want to risk their lives for the internal squabbles of distant and alien nobles? This means that the troops are more likely to be routed or captured. This then means the expensive equipment would be captured or abandoned. The worst case scenario would be the newly armed peasants then exploit their relative increase in power to rebel against their lords.   Now, the knight himself would be primarily in mail in the poorer fiefs and full plate in the richer ones. I would imagine that a collection of mail, scale, brigandine and gambeson would make up the rest of the army.   Now, I am not entirely sure what medieval infantry normally used outside the British fondness for the longbow during the Hundred Years War. But, the Macedonian and Greek light infantry from the ancient period could provide a solid starting point for Gondor, given the Byzantine influences. These troops had a short spear and one handed slashing sword. Slings were popular in this group as well. For protection, they had linen cuirasses, small shields called a pelta, a full helmet and shin protection. Given that the medieval armies tended to require their troops cover the cost of their own equipment, this seems like something that could be within reach for a peasant army. The spear was essential for infantry in a cavalry dominated military order.   The total armor and rider for a knight could reach 130 pounds resulted to compensate for the threats coming from crossbows and longbows. This led to problems with heat for the knight and endurance for the horse. Slow trots were the best that could be mustered in some cases, which was practically useless. This heavier equipment saw some knights drowning or being trampled at Agincourt. While the transition took a long time to complete, it proved to be irreversible.   This armor was impressive though, and its quality was part of the longevity of the knight in European warfare. The over 200 pieces of solid plate armor used towards the end were rounded to deflect sword blows and arrow shots. The dispersal of weight meant that the knight was not as encumbered as the weight would be in say a backpack. It did limit them, but not near as much as one would expect. Their interlocking joins meant that knights could even get on horses unaided.   The archers would often fight as mounted infantry - simply riding into battle then dismounting to fight.

Now, the archers we have covered elsewhere. But for melee soldiers, wood spears were actually preferred to swords due to its reach. Because soldiers were responsible for providing their own equipment, the normal foot soldier had cloth and leather based armor. Richer areas would have better supplies to arm their troops. But these areas would most likely also suffer less actual fighting, which means less skill per soldier.   Now, due to the same economic considerations limiting equipment and training, weaponry would probably not be standardized outside Gondor's professional forces. This means that a victory by the feudal forces could provide a powerful shift in the balance of power. Not only would victories cost the enemy lost troops and possibly their castle, but there is the captured weapons.

Generally the knights commanded their specific squad in battle. Remember though that commanders were supposed to inspire their men by charging in ahead of the rank and file. Well, that was a major reason why medieval pitched battles were chaotic by modern standards. Yes, the lack of aerial reconnaissance and modern communications certainly did not help. But when the leader was more interested in leading a massed heavy cavalry charge instead of commanding the rest of the army, those modern technologies would not have helped them.   It must be noted that given the still feudal society that is Gondor and its overall poverty, the nobles will still have the disproportional power over the military. First, feudal societies rely on the mobilization of troops by nobles to produce most of the military. Second, even in the Napoleonic Era with its first real modern armies, wealth was key. Regiments were recruited, trained, fed and equipped by private citizens who would become their commander. Private citizens could afford to do this for the mounted and infantry regiments and they still provided the most opportunities for battlefield glory. As a result, they were dominated by nobles.   At the same time, this meant that officers were exclusively nobles and most often war fighting was primarily their domain. In the medieval period, there were no standing armies, so the nobles were not just commanders but the agents responsible for marshaling the entire military. Starting in the 1500’s nations began to develop standing armies, in which the nobles became the officer corps as we think of officers today. Lesser nobles exploited this, as I described above, to gain wealth and prestige. Status in the royal court was tied to military performance. Wealth and glory went to the victors – defeats earned nothing but disgrace. This noble officer model is likely to be the link that unites the weird mix of the feudal and professional military formations of Gondor.   Even going into the Early Modern Period, nobles were expected to buy their commission and pay some of the costs of the unit. The higher the command level the person wanted to have, the more they had to pay. The status and reputation of the unit to be led also upped the price. Thus, upper level command was a mark of wealth and prestige. Governments would cover basics, but the colonel was expected to recruit, train and equip their units. These costs were high as one might expect – leading to some nobles declaring bankruptcy as a result. Not all of these nobles could or would ensure their units were the proper strength or outfitted properly – sometimes they would start wars under strength and poorly equipped. Thus, monarchs created inspectorates to make sure such discrepancies did not occur and lieutenant-colonels were created to make sure colonels took their responsibilities seriously. At the same time, the desire to recoup losses financially led to the desire to take and hold territory as compensation. Many times, territory was taken just to get a better negotiating position after the war, so the more valuable areas could be kept.

Medieval wars as a result of the various logistics and recruitment issues were short, filled with temporary truces. The actual combat focused on sieges compared to open battle. These, in turn favored the defender, with attackers often relying on deception instead of starvation or assaults. Therefore, sneak attacks at night, scaling walls that were not properly guarded and finding secret entrances were more often to lead to success than normal assaults. However, bribes to guards, disguising attackers and friendly troops bringing in supplies and tricking the enemy into coming out of the walls were more successful than even sneak attacks. The power of catapults is often overstated. Their range was only 150 yards on average, which was shorter than that of a good bow. They were also only really impractical for attacking anything besides large and stationary targets.   In the Medieval period, knights were the center of combat. Battle was essentially a mounted melee, devoid of much real tactical thought once it started. Essentially, this charge was the focus and granted major benefits to the offensive. But in pitched battles, a single charge was all that could be counted on. It was almost impossible to reform the knights for a second. Thus, it was critical to identify the best possible time to charge. But given the right timing and enough space, it was difficult if not impossible to resist. As a result, this charge was the center point of medieval tactics.   These charges were quite powerful in context. Yes, it is true that well trained men and good enough morale meant a formation could withstand a charge. But peasant levies could not be expected to produce these reliably. Which then would produce a rout, which in turn led to the destruction or capture of the entire army. Hence the risky nature of pitched battles of the period.   The conservative and risk averse mentality that caused commanders to avoid battle also led to fewer deaths in pitched battles. In one case, a battle between 500 English knights and 400 French ones saw only 3 deaths even though the loss of the French was clear. The wealth of knights meant that even a poor noble could still be worth a lot if captured and ransomed. When knights met infantry, things were different. The infantry was more often masses of conscripted peasants. They had no wealth that could generate notable ransoms. The elites also looked down on the lower classes. Thus, the infantry were considered expendable in the extreme. Knights would even trample their own infantry if they got in the way. Such feelings were returned - soldiers would kill the wounded and captured.   But we must also recognize the overall poverty of the medieval world led to widespread uses of what we would consider war crimes and I see no evidence that Gondor would escape this curse. One common tactic going back to the ancient world is the use of intimidation to secure surrender. Those that surrendered would be given very generous terms. But those that didn’t and lost would be the victims of massacres.   Then we have to factor in the emotional impacts. Sieges are very unpleasant affairs for all sides. Should a side not surrender, that means more time on campaign. Then, more of the attacker’s friends and family are killed than if there was a surrender. Massacres and looting served as vengeance against a defender for lives lost for what the attacker feels is no reason.   However, the biggest impact of this sort of warfare would be the development of impressive siege equipment. After all, the defining element of Gondor is its forts and castles. Their construction skill would mean that siege towers can be expected in the arsenal of the central government and possibly the richer fiefs. Catapults are generally more mobile, given they are normally smaller and on wheels. However, they suffer from an average 150-200 yard range and average shot of 50 pounds. Trebuchets, which are much more complex and thus less common are vastly superior weapons. They are able to fire more accurately shots weighing 88 pounds at 20 minute intervals. Thus, I would expect Gondor to rely on them at the national level.

Training to become a knight started at age 7, where a boy was sent to live with a noble family connected to their family. At this point, they were pages, essentially glorified servants and waiters that were trained in basic weaponry and horsemanship at the same time. As pages, they learned more about social grace than war and served more under the lady of the family.   At 14, the page was "promoted" to squire. This meant a transition to being directly under the lord, serving them even out in the field. The nature of the service revolved more around caring for armor and the horse, and tending to wounds. Training was much more militarized. Here, the squire even took part in mock battles.   By 21 the squire could be promoted to knight if the master agreed. Once this happened, they were liable for military service. Should there be a period of peace, glory was found in tournaments, though these were not much safer. Nobles, which include knights, identified as a warrior class, The poet Bertran De Born stated "once he has started fighting, no noble knight thinks of anything but breaking heads and arms.....Barons, you should rather forfeit castles, towns and cities than give up going to war. By this, he meant pitched battles where the knight was expected to charge into the fray, leading by example.   The average peasant was a whole other ball game. They basically were totally untrained. Victory came mainly because they had better commanders and/or numbers. Even semi professional groups had an advantage. Hence the use of the notoriously unreliable mercenary troops of the medieval period. The rare fully professional armies - like the Byzantine Themes - pretty much dominated battles with the feudal levies. Though we have to remember that the ability to do better was pretty much reserved to the super powers of the day. Sometimes, the best training a solider got was actual war. This naturally is a little unsustainable due to the higher losses this would cause.   But this is another area in which there is a lot of variation. Frontier and border areas are naturally going to see more warfare than less exposed areas. Especially in areas with powerful neighbors. Hence why the Byzantines tended to rely on Armenian troops. People in these regions would naturally have to get better at fighting or risk literally getting wiped out. But yearly musters lead to economic hardship and are understandably unpopular. The result is the areas where there is not a need for constant war will see less fighting or revolts against their lords. But this then runs the risk of less quality troops when the need arises. This is why the low numbers of Vikings were able to rampage seemingly at will across Europe. The local troops were more often than not utter crap.   Thus we can assume that the Southern Fiefs nearer the border with the Southrons and most exposed to Corsair raids would be better troops. due to the constant fighting in these regions, I would assume that these would actually be the least populated. So those further inland would supply more men relative to geographic size, but be less skilled.

But the fact remains that there was a severe problem with communications and coordination. There was no standard organization above the regiment level and what did exist was ad hoc arrangements based on the needs of the campaign. Even when division sized units were formed, they often marched broken up and only united to fight battles. They even tried to eliminate supply trains so they could increase mobility and flexibility. Such innovations placed greater stress on the governments to secure training, arms, equipment, food and housing for the larger armies. The French, the first to use divisions, was only able to pull it off due to its early general staffs.   So, there really wasn't much of a logistics system in place during the medieval period. In order to supply troops, raiding was common. But there is only so much a given area can support in that time period. The result is a temptation to split larger armies into smaller groups and send them through separate areas. The idea is that they would be able to live off the land without interfering with their allies, then regroup where the intended big battle was meant to take place. But this was hugely problematic as it made defeat in detail so much easier to accomplish and scorched earth tactics much more effective. The result was a shrinking of attacking armies to a size they can live off the land without splitting up.   But raids were still essential in this. One could bait the enemy into battle outside a castle, which gives an advantage to the attackers. It also provides a way to feed and pay soldiers without breaking the banks of the attackers. Just as important, these provide combat experience prior to the sieges or set piece battles where the lack of combat experience could prove devastating. The result, as noted elsewhere, was raids and skirmishing being more common than either sieges or pitched battles.

Generally there was one support person for every two soldiers. The two pages per each Lance Fournie also tended to have short swords or daggers for personal defense. They were not expected to actually fight.   When large armies did exist, the noncombatants present would be much bigger, sometimes by an order of magnitude. This came from the fact that sometimes extended families marched with the troops. Nomadic people like the armies arriving from the eastern steppes were known for this. The result was a baggage train that not only supported the troops but this huge group of civilians. Not only did this present a tempting target for the enemy raiders, it also made retreats harder. Thus defeats were much more likely to be catastrophic. Which just added to the risks of pitched battles.

Lets look at knights in particular here for a second. Heavy cavalry proved quite effective in Medieval Western Europe, but were expensive due to the costs of their heavier armor, weapons and horses. This forced the beginnings of feudalism to be adopted. Hence the start of land grants to the cavalry in exchange for service.   The The Duchy of Brittany specified 600-700 livres per band. As I was not able to find a specific time period, I would assume that would be for the whole campaign. Their amazing rations were 2 pounds of bread, 1 pound of meat or 1.5 pounds of fish, 10 ounces of soup and a full gallon of ale. Yeah, living the high life there guys. So, a daily wage was provided, though not good.   Ordonnance du Duc Pierre pour faire armer la Noblesse & les Archers des Paroisses : "Preuves" de Dom Morice, Tome II, colonnes 1555-1557. Publié ez plaids generaux de Rennes le 29. jour de Mars 1450. Tiré des Archives du Présidial de Rennes.   The financial concerns led to other important elements of war at the time as well. First, battles were more expensive due to the lost equipment and men, so they were still avoided. Attrition was substituted in place, with sides trying to deplete the other states resources as a way to force them to come to terms. Devastating the rural areas was done for this reason. But also, this devastation helped feed invading troops. Hungry armies lose discipline and cohesion. Too little pay or infrequent pay is a nice way to get a mutiny. Desertion was a huge problem that led to harsh discipline. Prussian soldiers were said to be more afraid of their sergeant than the enemy as a result of the measures used to compensate for these problems.   However, pitched battles were normally quite risky and unpredictable. Instead, sieges were preferred. Here, the commanders could better control events. The Chevauchee, or mounted raid, was also much less risky and more profitable. Here, villages were burned, crops and livestock were looted and civilians killed. Any moral concerns knights were supposed to have were conveniently forgotten.   Pillaging was common in these contexts as well. After all, the nobles would not be able to pay their troops regular salaries, so loot was seen as a tool to compensate them for their service. Killing and ransom had an economic dimension as well. If a noble couldn’t pay his own troops and risks calling off attacks due to low supplies, there is no way the noble would have the resources to feed prisoners of war. This means many potential POWs were massacred as a result. Ransom was also used for the same reason. If you are short of funds, why not turn your prisoners into a potential payout? Though it must be stated that escape and letting people go intentionally were things that happened – while massacres and looting were more common than today, they were not factors of every engagement.

Generally Feudal lords would go into battle with a haphazard mix of mercenaries, volunteers and levies of men from ages 15 to 60. The militias that often provided archers were also very uneven in terms of equipment and training. Normal foot soldiers were drawn from the landless peasants and urban workers. This recruitment method led to a sort of grab bag of units. Granted, once the general staff and academy system became more widespread, it was less of a problem.   It must be noted that this system tends to rely heavily on the rural population, which does not always go over well. Even by World War One, 65% of German conscripts were rural. Volunteers were often students, tradesmen and businessmen – those who joined out of a conservative sense of patriotism and duty. Meanwhile, the French peasants more often saw military service as a disruption of their family’s finances and thus were more likely to resist. In normal conditions only 1.3% of French conscripts would not report each year. But in times of crisis it could get as high as 36% and be combined with riots.   Allmand, C.T., ed. War, Literature, and Politics in the Late Middle Ages/ Liverpool, University of Liverpool Press, 1976   Burne, Alfred H. The Agincourt War. London, 1956   Preston, Richard; Wise, Sydney F.; Werner, Herman O. (1991). Men in arms: a history of warfare and its interrelationships with Western society. 5th Edition. Beverley MA: Wadsworth Publishing Co Inc. ISBN 0-03-033428-4.   Again, things can vary quite a bit. A popular commander can get more men than otherwise one would expect. Those fighting at home could see the same boost. However, the only time truly large armes could be expected was in the summer time, when the most people were not needed in farming. And again, no previous wars being conducted in the area means more troops. But these are likely to be not as experienced. And again, these recruits are more likely to all to be poorly trained, motivated, paid, equipped and disciplined. More importantly, only available in the summer. Otherwise, everyone starves.   The people who were available in the winters and autumn months were much more likely to be the professionals and mercenaries. So those with the budget could extend the campaigning season later to when they would have the advantage. The result is an army that is much smaller, but made up of much higher quality troops. Even in winter, hardly anyone could scrape together an army. But those who could had a huge advantage over their feudal foes. These factors meant that fighting power declined less rapidly than the numbers in the army because the increased proportion of professionals. The enemy would also likely decline in combat power later in the season faster than a "winter army" would. Thus the further into autumn and winter a feudal army could push the campaign, the more likely it was to win.