How An 11th Century Mounted Knight Shall Be Armed

Previously, we have looked at a Norman knight of the 11th century, and what arms and armour would have typically been worn by the Normans during the Battle of Hastings in 1066. In today's episode, we will be looking into Norman knights on horseback, and taking a look at what knights actually were in the 11th century, and what kind of battlefield tactics they were used for. In this video, we will be following the armouring process of Clive Hart. A well-respected re-enactor and professional jouster for English heritage. He is part of the Historic Equitation Group led by Dominic Sewell, another highly respected historical re-enactor, cavalry coach, and jouster. The Norman knight first wears an additional tunic over his base layer. As discussed before, this is likely a durable and hard-wearing tunic designed specifically to be worn under mail. However, no examples have survived to the modern day, so we don't know exactly how these were made and how thick they were. In previous centuries, we understand that barely any padding was worn under mail, other than a simple tunic. Which is also different to earlier periods where Romans and Romano-British soldiers would wear a padded garment called a subamalus underneath their mail or plate armour. Next, the knight dons his mail. The height of armour in the 11th century was a mail hauberk. Some may say hauberjon, but both hauberk and hauberjon is the same thing, loosely meaning shirt, but one is in German and the other one is in French. In English, you may simply call it a shirt or a bernie, but I like to use the term hauberk since it's a little better known. Mail armour would be highly tailored to the wearer and made with great skill and attention to detail. As far as we know, this is before the time when mail chaussers, mail that closely covers the legs, is worn. But there are a few artistic depictions from the 11th century that could show mail chaussers being worn. They are just not very common yet, however will become almost universal in just a few decades' time. The mail shirts tightly hug the knight, as loose flappy mail creates a lot of drag when the knight is in combat and could slow him down considerably. Since this Norman knight is mounted, his mail hauberk features a riding slit down the centre. This allows for the knight to sit on a horse, and the mail will drape over the thighs which are vulnerable areas when riding a horse. Since most incoming attacks that the knight will receive will be coming up from below, so the lower half of the body is at more of a risk. This is one of the reasons why later the knight will be wearing a classic Norman kite shield, which does a good job in protecting almost the entire body when sitting on a horse. Although mail certainly wasn't impenetrable, it greatly lowers the risk of receiving a fatal injury during combat. Sword strikes are much more likely to glance off and do little to no damage, and the tightly woven configuration of the mail links would do well to reduce the power of incoming arrows. Knights were always subject to the choice of protection versus mobility. They had to decide on a balance between how protected they could be on the battlefield versus how easily they wanted to move. As such, mail wouldn't fully protect you, but it would certainly be more beneficial to wear it rather than not. Over the next two centuries, mail armour would evolve in such a way that it would comprehensively cover the entire body. Fantastically well-tailored mail would become the pinnacle of knightly armour until plate armour began to be developed in the late 1200s. The Norman now wears his helmet. This is a conical nasal helmet typical of the 11th century. Not specifically Norman, as these were being worn by the militaries of many factions all over Europe during this period. The mail does feature a ventail, which is a face mask made of mail. However, the knight decides not to wear it so it stays down on the chest. While this was certainly a common style of helmet, it came in many different variants, including one-piece higher status helmets, Spangenhelm constructions, as well as blackened helmets with the use of burning linseed oil. Also, some spectacular alternative examples may have existed, such as the gilded Frisian helmet, which can often be seen depicted in contemporary artwork. After this, the Norman knight wears a belt which contains his sword and scabbard. Swords were a very useful weapon during the 11th century, as many soldiers were unarmoured in this period, often only equipped with a shield and spear. So, swords would cleave through opponents and stab deep into flesh. The kite shield is iconic to the Norman military. However, these types of shields were actually being used by many factions across Europe, including the Anglo-Saxons, the Franks, and the Vikings. They were evolved from the famous round shield, which was the previous staple shield type of the earlier medieval period in Europe. One idea is that these kite shields became popular due to the rise of mounted combat, since the bottom of the shield protected the rider's legs as he rode his horse. Round shields featured a central grip protected by a metal boss in the middle of the shield. But, kite shields had a system of straps as well as a long geish strap, which allowed the shield to be suspended off the neck or shoulder, so the knight had two arms free, one for his weapon, and one for the reins of the horse. In previous videos, we have discussed how heraldry wasn't yet uniform in the medieval period. And, of course, no original kite shield survived from the 11th century, so we cannot know exactly what may have been painted on the shields. However, we can look at contemporary artwork such as the Bayer tapestry, to see that images like dragons and crossers were painted on Norman shields. The knight mounts his horse, and receives his shield and spear from his squire. As mentioned, the Normans were pioneers of mounted combat in England, having learnt their trade from various conflicts all over mainland Europe. The Normans adopted mounted combat after border wars with the Franks and other neighbouring factions over the last 100 years, and by the time of the Battle of Hastings in 1066, the Norman cavalry were very well trained. Indeed, it is mounted Norman knights that helped win the day at Hastings, being able to suddenly turn round and flank the Saxons as they ran down the hill, following what they thought was a route by the Norman invaders. Mounted combat would evolve to become a staple in English warfare for 200 years, until the English army began experimenting with knightly foot combat in the early 1300s. At this point, I would like to thank the re-enactor featured in today's video. I have put his social media pages in the video description, and I ask that you follow him to show support for the high quality re-enactment that he provides. Supporting the re-enactors featured in these videos helps show our respects to the efforts in recreating authentic historical portrayals, which in turn helps us all to understand how warriors of various historical periods looked and how they fought. Supporting the re-enactors also helps me make more videos like this, and features new people on the channel who have highly authentic kit.