Favorite Historical Battle?

[Throndor]

I'm not sure if this has been done before, I haven't been here for that long but I have checked the recent posts in Medieval Life without finding it, so I figured I'd try it. What is your favorite Medieval battle? I'm putting the cap of "Medieval" on anything post-Roman but pre-hand cannon. Personally, I'm a fan of Agincourt. Little-known fact about Agincourt: Some French Cavalry rode around Agincourt to the South and raided the King's tent, making it the only French success of the battle. Knowledgable fun!

[Karrde]

Probably the Battle of Stamford Bridge - I just love the idea of a single Viking holding the bridge until the crafty English slew him from below.

[Frank_Lloyd_Knight]

For me: the Battle of Hastings.

I don't know if the battle itself was particularly remarkable, but it was a definite turning point in history. And I just find the Bayeux Tapestry an incredibly fascinating piece of work.

[Redbullgivesuwind]

@Karrde as lovely as this image is its very unlikely to have happened, but i am with you its one of my favourite battles

[Left4bricks]

@Frank_Lloyd_Knight : I'm not sure, but i thinks that the battle of Hastings is particular because of the tactical use of the cavalry by William against the heavy spearmen of Harold. That was some of a "caricatural" battle, normans where famous for their heavy cavalry at that time, when Saxons where strong in infantry spear units. Initially, cavalry was losing, because their charge weren't efficient against "close formation" of spearmen. But William (or a general of him) had the idea to simulate a flee, so spearmen ran after cavalry and so, they were in "loose formation". At this moment, cavalry went back, charged and crushed the Saxons.

My prefered battle, it's hard to say, but the first one I'm thinkins is Hattin, because Saladin made a very smart tactical choice and Guy de Lusignan made eactly the opposite (a stupid choicie) which results in a decisive victory for Saladin.

[Teherean]

It was a tough call, but the battle of Agincourt has to be my favorite. It proved the power of light infantry with over heavy infantry, and shows a great tactical use of terrain by the English.

In the battle, king Henry V of England (who participated in the hand-to-hand fighting) led an army concisting mainly of welsh and english longbowmen against a numerically superior french army led by Constable Charles d'Albret. The French suffered a great defeat, mostly due to the fact that their armor was too heavy for the muddy terain, slowing them down or even incapacitating them at some times. The archers on the flanks shreded the French until their arrows ran out, after which they drew swords and joined the melee.

after the battle, Henry V killed presumably severeal thousands of French soldiers, fearing they would rearm themselves with the weapons strewn across the field. Only the most illustrious were left alive.

[richardanthonyc]

The Third siege of Vienna does it for me. It was a miracle that 150000 turks where defeated by the heroic Polish heavy cavalry charge and Austrians and Germans. It changed the course of history in the balkans and europe!

[Elderon]

Probably the Battle of Stamford Bridge - I just love the idea of a single Viking holding the bridge until the crafty English slew him from below.

Yeah I read about that in an article labeled ´The 7 most Bad-Ass last stands in history'. Although painful how the viking died...

It was a tough call, but the battle of Agincourt has to be my favorite. It proved the power of light infantry with over heavy infantry, and shows a great tactical use of terrain by the English.

In the battle, king Henry V of England (who participated in the hand-to-hand fighting) led an army concisting mainly of welsh and english longbowmen against a numerically superior french army led by Constable Charles d'Albret. The French suffered a great defeat, mostly due to the fact that their armor was too heavy for the muddy terain, slowing them down or even incapacitating them at some times. The archers on the flanks shreded the French until their arrows ran out, after which they drew swords and joined the melee.

after the battle, Henry V killed presumably severeal thousands of French soldiers, fearing they would rearm themselves with the weapons strewn across the field. Only the most illustrious were left alive.

Ah, the battle that ended chivalry. Until then archers where there just to fire arrows, but when king Henry V saw the sheer numbers the French had he knew the archers would have to fight as well. It was custom for knights to fight knights and it was unheard of that a mere archers would take up arms againt a knight. Though this is what happened and gave victory to Henry V.


One of my favourite battles must be the battle of Stirling Bridge. A good example how stratgey and discipline wins most often from just sheer numbers. And ofcours it feautures William Wallace (he wants his freedom!)

[Hayden.]

Mine would probably be the Battle of Crécy, where mere nine thousands English and welsh longbowmen caught, trapped and slaughtered one hundred thousand heavily armoured French knights.
This was main due to the spectacular English use of the wet, sticky, muddy terrain, to trap the heavy knights horse's, so they couldn't charge, then shoot them down.
This may seem cowardly, but they did kill over double their own number, before the knights even got to the mud.

[WvdP]

I think you put it a little bit oversimplified. You've taken the lowest estimations for the strength of the English army and the highest for the strength of the French army. Do it the other way round, and you have an English army of about 15,000 men vs a French army of 35,000 men. Then the English are still outnumbered, but not by a ratio of 1:11

At Wikipedia, you'll find many different numbers:
English Wikipedia: ca 16,000 vs ca 40,000 ((deaths: several hundres vs 1553 noblemen and knights, 2300 Genoese mercenaries and several thousands infantry)
French Wikipedia: 20,000 vs 50,000 (deaths: 100-300 vs 1553 noblemen and knights, 2300 Genoese mercenaries and an unknown number of infantry)
German Wikipedia: 9-12,000 vs 27-30,000 (deaths: 150-1000 killed or wounded vs 6-20,000 killed or wounded)

The problem is off course that medieval sources concerning the strength of armies are quite unreliable. That the English were heavily outnumbered is no point of discussion, but with which number can only be estimated and will probably always be unknown.

[Hayden.]

Yes but while I have simplified it, the deaths however are mostly similar, so we can till deduct that many French were slaughtered.]
Also while fighting outnumbered, both Wikipedias state that the English force used superior methods and fire power, Such as the en masse technique that devastated the French charge, which combined with bad terrain and impertinent knights, lost the French the battle and some northern territories.

[WvdP]

Still, that's somewhat different from your earlier claim that the English "caught, trapped and slaughtered one hundred thousand heavily armoured French knights. Besides the fact that the majority of the French army was light-armoured (if armoured at all) infantry, only 1553 knights and noblemen were killed

But I totally agree with you that in this battle the English did use their brains a lot more than the French

[krzyzak]

Really, all battles are bad, but the most interesting one would be the battle in Russia with the Teutonic Order vs the Russians over a frozen lake.The Teutonic Order fell in the ice as it cracked. Poor guys. I bet hot cocoa would have been good then.

[HeidiBurns]

I'm not very original but to me the best battle is that in Troy. Troyan horse is one of the best tactic idea in history, these guys were really smart.

[Tria]

For me its the Siege of Constantinople (Byzantine Empire) in 1453 from The Ottomans.
Also, because of the previous Game of thrones episode, I reminded the first battle where the real "greek fire" (ygro pyr in greek) were used from Byzantines (and Lord Tyrion ) against the Arabs (and Stanis Baratheon ) in the Siege of Constantinople (Westeros) around 670 A.D.