Medieval Weaponry

The Middle Ages were a time of great unrest and war. The hunger for power and status ruled their lives more than the want for peace and prosperity. This drove people into building great castles which acted as their power base. These tall structures would often start as a small house on the top of a hill, but then as the lord got richer, he would build it as big and as strong as his money would go. All lands during the medieval periods would be subject to invasion at any point without any notice. Due to this, many ordinary people had to train in the arts of war and learn how to use some common weapons.

Knights, who were higher up on the feudal system, were dedicated warriors. These horse mounted people used more expensive weapons rather than the crude, often makeshift, weapons of the lower classes. These consisted of the traditional swords, the lance and different daggers. Knights trained all their lives for the moment of the battle.

More common, are the foot soldiers which consisted of the pike men, archers, the crossbow men and civilians who wielded cheap weaponry. The importance of the footmen were high because they were so large in numbers therefore, without the footmen, the army would be outnumbered. A large portion of the army consisted of pike men. Pike men used extremely long pikes which were similar to the spear.

Another common footman was an archer. These two types of soldier would have a devastating impact on the outcome of the battle, because an archer’s arrow could piece knight’s mail from 250 meters away and there was nothing the knight could do. A good example of this is that in the Battle of Crecy. Nearly 2000 Knights and soldiers were killed just by the longbow men, whilst the English only suffered a meager 50...

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...nders often found difficulty gathering the amount of resources needed to build the number of weapons which were required.

Trebuchets were used to attack enemy walls or the people within the enemy walls. It worked by putting a projectile into the trebuchet and then pulling the counterweight down to fling the item. Trebuchets were generally more accurate than other siege weapons, because they are much larger and stable.

Perhaps one of the most famous pieces of Medieval weaponry is the battering ram. These were used batter down, dent, damage and pound the walls of a castle in order to frighten the enemy, or gain access to the castle.
All battering rams consisted of a long wooden pole (sometimes tipped with iron) and most of the time consisted of a wooden casing to prevent arrows and projectiles hitting the ram. The ram required many people to lift and operate.