Military Equipment of the Anglo Saxons and Vikings
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- Опубликовано: 4 окт 2024
- Today we dive into the world of Early Medieval England to analyze the military equipment available to the warring Anglo Saxons and Vikings!
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Documentary Credits:
Research: Invicta
Script: Invicta
Artwork: Osprey Publishing
Game: Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia
Editing: Invicta
Music: Total War: Attila and Total War Battles: Kingdoms Soundtrack
Literary Sources
-Anglo-Saxon Thegn by Mark Harrison (Osprey Publishing)
-Viking Hersir 793-1066 AD by Mark Harrison (Osprey Publishing)
-Saxon, Viking and Norman by Terence Wise (Osprey Publishing)
With the upcoming release of Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia, I figured it would be handy to give some context for the soldiers we will be recruiting into our armies in the campaign. I've got a ton more content in the works including some more Viking age videos and some very interesting Moments episodes. You can check out the Facebook or Patreon pages for hints and announcements : )
Patreon: www.patreon.com/InvictaHistory
Facebook: facebook.com/InvictaHistory
Invicta I'm hyped for this, good to see Moments episodes on this as well
looking forward for more
@Invicta Helmets were, historically, cheaper than a suit of mail by about half. They were also your third priority, after weapon and shield. Body armour was fourth priority. Osprey books can often be misleading, so you need to take their writings with a grain of salt and look at other sources.
I feel that the language and presentation makes this video a bit hard for the typical person to understand. I know what an aventail is, but I'm not sure what percentage of the audience does.
Besides these two points, this was an interesting video. Looking forward to more like it.
Invicta I'm really psyched for this game
Invicta can you please please do german vs french or Italian this could be a great series
The armor and equipment, but mostly the armor, in the TV show Vikings. Makes me cry. They all look like a biker gang
Yeah, i felt like the early seasons at least tried..
But the latest seasons are unwatchable for me.
What about the renaissance-era helmets the anglo-saxons wore in 'Vikings'? Only about 600 years too soon. The irony is that if you like history and learn about it you might then want to watch historical shows but your immersion is buggered royally by the inaccuracies.
Most vikings didn't wear that much armor except the rich ones! Speed was their advantage, they did wear a lot armor made of leather. It wouldn't be that accurate when every viking would wear expensive chainmail in the series.
Uhtred’s sword, the Anglo Saxon shields, and a number of the Viking outfits in The Last Kingdom also make me want to cry
I wish they would use historically accurate armor. I think it is soooo underrated when it come to coolness.
After getting a shield, the first piece of armour one would don is a helmet. The head is much more exposed than the body when one is using a shield.
@Andy Holcroft helmet doesn't have to be solely from metal... besides, padded "armor" would be used practically by everybody anyway... or at least, multiple layers of linen worn together and fastened by belt..
@Andy Holcroft main problem is, that in combat where you use shield, most of hits will be directed on shield, and on anything that is not covered by it - head is the most exposed thing.... If you had to go into such combat, believe me, you would rather have a helmet on your head, than full plate armor on your body but exposed head.... its also reason why mail coif was seen as adequate addition to gambeson for ordinary soldiers as full mail coat was expensive
@RaijinFox not in formation, and once you rise shield to protect head, you open your body to attacks.. besides, with both sides having shields, these gets locked, and opponents would attack each other over their shields.. which makes head a prime target... hits to the head are deadly... more so than hits to the body...
I am sure that many combatants of the period would agree with you - however, the cost of a helmet was way beyond the means of the normal fighter of the period, as indeed was a sword (as mentioned in the video). The average fighter, aside from the lucky few, therefore had relatively little protection apart from his/her shield - a comparatively inexpensive piece of equipment to produce.
If im not mistaken, there has only one viking helmet been found so it must have been a veeeeery rear item. Hats similar to the ones of the mongols have been found tho
"LESS TALKING, MORE RAIDING"
''THE GODS WILL DECIDE YOUR FAITH''
That's a nice head you have on your shoulders
Your money, or your life
Its almost harvesting season my lord
"I WILL DRINK FROM YOUR SKULL"
The shields never had metal edges, they were actually tapered to be thinner at the edges so that they would trap an opponents sword or axe, you wouldn’t want it to just bounce off.
Interesting, and so they would twist the shield around and make a move
They were very fragile, light, and thin. It was pretty disposable.
@@WisdomPrevails369 ...no. What? This isn't a fucking movie.
You mean the ones that have metal rivets close to the rim of the shields? They’re just rivets, not all metal
@@walangchahangyelingden8252 Bro absolutely not, why do people think this?
In real history, "odalbønder" isn't really a warrior type or class, it's just a term for free farmers, or more specifically, a farmer who lives and owns a farm with primogeniture rights (ie. not a serf or tenant). Yeoman might be the closest English medieval term, perhaps. I suppose it works as well as any other term for a generic Norse tier-1 unit, but it's not a military term like the fyrd. Just wanted to clarify that.
Nice edit man! Also I guess their economy was quite different between them, so I assume cost of armament and soldiers were something to take in consideration.
Thanks for adding this clarification in there. I know back at home they did have a levy that would be called up and might act like a fyrd butI was struggling a bit to find a catch all term for the low tier Viking warrior operating abroad.
Wow, thanks for the kudos, Invicta. I should say I liked the clip a lot, and especially that you pointed out that most northern European equipment was quite similar, and that spears were the most common weapon. By that point I knew you were going for historical realism and not rule-of-cool.
The main institution that existed in Scandinavia (mainly Norway, I don't know about Denmark and the countries that would eventually become Sweden) that was similar to the Fyrd was the Leidang, I believe. However, where the Fyrd was based around a conscripted land army, the Leidang seems to have been based more around a naval aspect. The Leidang was organized around units of "skipreide", a kind of fiscal-territorial unit where each skipreide had as their task to build and equip a certain number of ships, including manning them, for a certain number of days when called on. It's closest modern equivalent seems to have been as a kind of coast guard/militia, but apparently it was used offensively as well. It seems to have been instituted in Norway by Haakon the Good in the mid-900s, apparently being directly inspired by the Fyrd itself, as Haakon had been fostered by King Athelstan of England before returning home and taking the throne of Norway. This means that the Leidang proper is a later innovation than the period of time Thrones of Britannia is covering, I think.
The idea of free farmers owing their lord a certain period of military service was not new to Scandinavia, however, but sadly I can't find any actual names for the concept as a whole. In this light, as I said earlier, I'm sure odalbønder is a perfectly fine term to use (albeit admittedly a modern construct, but then so are a number of terms we associate with the middle ages today), I just wanted to point out that it's a social class rather than a military instititution.
Anyway, a great video, and I hope you make more.
Ledung existested in Sweden to but probobly not until abit later, mid 1100.
Oh, I totally forgot about the term fylking! That makes sense. I've mostly heard of it in relation to a combat formation, as you said, but given that it is cognate to "folk" (people), it wouldn't surprise me if it had wider meanings as well. Thanks for adding that. :D
Fun fact, the Saxons described the vikings as "effeminate" because of how much they liked to groom themselves.
@@georgeclarke4686 i'm not sure if they ever called them that but what i'm sure of is that "Vikings" really like to groom themselves. There are evidence of combs and such in Viking discovery.
No matter which time period it is, people who don't take care of their hygine think the people who do are feminine.
The fact they're wearing eyeliner in every show about them doesn't help either lol.
@@RexusprimeIX , yeah
Cleanliness is masculine!
Were Saxons unhygienic? I mean, not hard to believe.
6:01 "Some virgins even included eye guards that gave it a spectacled appearance"
So i'm not the only one who heard it like that
Wtf...
Fuck I can't stop hearing it now.
versions
Those wimpy simp virgins...
This is just funny. Just as i finished watching the Armies and Tactics from Kings and Generals, you release your video about Anglo Saxons and Vikings.
Nodosa ikr?
Lol. Talk about coincidence. Exactly same thing happened to me.
same too me
Nodosa same
Same
The vikings series made the saxons looks timid. Yet they were fearsome warriors with heavy armours.
Ya that really annoyed me about the show not to mention they had them wearing Renaissance helmets. Our warriors used similar tactics and were just as disciplined. Thank goodness the last kingdom does a better job at portraying them even though it has it's share of inaccuracies too.
Most of them had light leather armor
It dose annoy me that the vikings get all the credit for aspects of their culture that anglo saxons also had. The latter are barely even thought about by most people
I heard the writer was Irish so what do you expect
Did I just see Skallagrim? 4:21 😂😂
Joe there to end them rightly
Dr. Lex Winter ... are you ok?
@@dr.lexwinter8604 Dude.... Wtf?
I want to imagine a classical roman general observing the battle of stirling bridge and the subsequent battle of hastings. I wonder what he'd think of it...
The battle of Stirling bridge happened centuries after the battle of Hastings.
@@Matt_Alaric no
@@Matt_Alaricwait yeah you’re right
One quibble. Then, as today, the head would be the primary spot for armoring. One head shot, arrow, or even glancing blow to the head and one is out of action. I agree with your content, I just think headgear would be the first thing people would be worried about.
good point, this is something I should have clarified
You would think so, but hockey players all wore cups starting in the 1920s but did not start wearing helmets until the 1970s and it wasn't mandated until the 1979-1980 season.
@@drevil0076 but in hockey you dont bash somebody with a stick commonly... in combat, where you hold shield in front of you, head is first thing you hit unprotected..
@@JaM-R2TR4 Have you ever watched hockey? Players get hit all the time, elbows, hands, fists, sticks, walls, etc.
@@drevil0076 i do.. anyway hockey sticks were flat in past so pucks were impossible to fly up... thats why they did not wear helmets... with curved sticks everything changed.. besides, if you hit your opponent on the head in hockey, you are crazy and should not be allowed to play anymore...
Range, aka the ability to stab while the other guy can't quite reach you may also be a reason why the spear was popular.
Alexander the great preferred using a spear , according to docu channel PBS America ,
I don't know much about the ATG , so I wouldn't argue about it, just what the documentary said,
I'm sure he used sword too depending on circumstances
@@kevwhufc8640 A sword was always a side weapen, everyone would have used a Spear and if you, for some reason, lost it, then you would use the sword.
I don't mean to be That Guy, but a "Seax" is pronounced "sax"
dang missed that one guess its the same way West Seax becomes West Sax
Also, thanks for making these videos, gives me an excuse to procrastinate (Uni of Guelph, ancient history student)
Sex
This was the first time I heard seax pronounced as "sikh". Heh. It's where the Saxons got their name, so should be easy to remember when keeping that in future mind.
It can also be pronounced as 'say-axe', depends on dialect/culture
Some other facts which you also might find interesting in the warrior cultural differences:
Another type of axe was the Francesca very commonly used by the franks from which their tribe was named after but was also commonly used by Anglo-Saxons. none have been found in Scandinavia so it's thought to be a west Germanic weapon not a north Germanic(Norse) weapon. Designed for throwing but does a good job as a hand held weapon also very similar to a tomahawk.
The seax was very highly thought of among the Saxons who's tribe was named after the weapon in a similar case with the franks as mentioned above. The seax with the clipped point(called the broken back style) was something that evolved in England due to their isolation from other Germanic tribes over time so is a distinctively Saxon feature. only a handful have been found in Scandinavia so it's thought that they were raid trophies. also this type was the inspiration for the modern Bowie-knife
Saxon shields were domed in shape making them stronger than the flat viking shields. So after some test were done even Dane axes were likely to bounce of the shield rather than cut through it.
The iron resources in England were a lot better quality England so Saxon weapons were of much better quality than average Norse weapons. So often Scandinavia imported their weapons from either England, Germany and France metallurgy tests have discovered.
Dude thanks for your content, Seriously its the best historically field lore channel I have encountered in the recent year
thanks for the support my man! I've got some new Moments episodes coming up which I am very excited for which cover Roman Medics and Legionnaire Cooking, stay tuned... : )
I agree, it’s excellent! Metatron, scholagladiatoria, and shadiversity are also excellent channels to check out for historical content!
I love having these regular snippets of history to watch. I rarely bother to go in depth on a subject on my own, so I'm glad you make these
Similar weapons, armour, culture, language, genetics. The Vikings raiding England came mostly from Denmark. The Jutes (one of the main tribes that invaded England and which is included in "Anglo-Saxons") also came from Denmark. The Angels and Saxons came from Northern Germany close to Denmark, the Netherlands, or Denmark itself. Really not very different
Cool! Just to imagine the change from imperial period to this time its amazing how the warfare changed! Ofcourse in the east there were still empires that used thousands of troops and profesional armies...
the whole transition from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages is such an interesting time of great changes that I would love to explore more
Invicta the thing that I cant understand is how romanization of all western europe dissapeared, what happened to all the legionaires, the equipment, technology and traditions that dissapeared so fast after central goverment colapsed.. I guess it is a combination of things but the comparison is tremendous!
How the most wealthy empire could not rise armies and defend itself from irregular invasions.. anyways its a very big topic.
Costas basically the transition is a gradual period that began in the later years of Antiquity. The basic idea is that the glorious organized Imperial Legions of the Pax Romana with their top quality weapons, armor, training, and organization became too expensive to maintain. The Roman state became increasingly unable to supply Legionaries with the same quality equipment, and manpower shortages from constant, incessant civil wars during the 3rd Century forced the Romans to start relying on levies and mercenaries from the neighboring barbarian kingdoms. It came to the point that the Romans were allowing entire Germanic confederations and tribes entry into Roman lands on condition that they fight for Rome. These barbarian auxiliaries and mercenaries brought their own equipment, and over time began to more or less replace the Roman legion. The Empire's inability to pay these mercenaries due to their collapsing economy basically led many of these barbarian armies to carve large swathes of the Empire out for themselves. By the time the Empire collapsed in the West, the only thing that was left were the barbarian armies.
al Mamlūk but after the third century crisis, during diocletian and constantine the army was the biggest that the empire ever had! I think it was mostly bad decisions of weak emperors and civil war that created the problems. But most important the change of the composition of the roman soul and the virtues of its people.
Well keep in mind, it might have been bigger but many of its soldiers remained foederati and mercenaries. And plus, while the Crisis didn't kill Rome, it certainly set it down the path to destruction. After Constantine, Rome saw a succession of weak emperors yet, but also saw many of its foederati revolting against. Alaric, for example, was originally in service to the Eastern Roman Empire. After Constantinople failed to pay him or note his services against Franks I believe (I forget which actual group of Germans he was fighting), he turned rogue. By the time Attila came and went, the Roman legions had basically been depleted thanks to repeated wars against barbarians, internal rebellions and just the general inability of the Roman state to pay for so many troops. And when the Empire collapsed, none of its successor kingdoms had the administrative machine or economic strength to field such large armies. Honestly, I consider the Dark Ages in the West to be a sort of post apocalyptic world. By 476, society essentially collapsed, at least in Western Europe, and the time between 476 and 1100 was essentially, in my view, a post apocalyptic world of warlords, chaos and decentralized, fluid polities. Granted, its not the most accurate depiction, especially with moments of relative stability such as the Carolingians in France or the Umayyads in Spain, but by and large, I see it as the chaotic aftermath of the collapse of Roman society, with Western Europe trying to reconstitute something resembling order and stability.
Anglo Saxons had some tough up and comings with The Celts, Normans, Vikings, Roman's, Greeks, And Slavs yeah
They were invited to Britain by the welsh celts to defend them from the Scottish and picts
That secondary weapon you mentioned, the Saex, is the namesake of the “Saxons.”
The sax was a secondary weapon carrien usualy at youre back belt
Anglo-Saxons and Vikings are all related people culturally and genetically. That’s why it was all so similar. A bunch of related people’s having a scrap over Britannia. They were all cool like an hour after the fight.
Along with the Normans, who were only a couple or three generations away from THEIR Northman roots
I'd just like to point out that most shields would have been rimmed by leather or rawhide, not metal fittings as you claimed.
PLS INVICTA DO A VIDEO ABOUT THE MIGHTY EASTERN ROMAN/BYZANTINE ARMY!!!
especially during Basil II reign
Emperor Demetrius that would be nice
+Apostolus ελληνας;
Ellinas nai!
ετσι!!! Ελλαδαρα ολε!!!
Etsi! Paizw rome toral war online kai anebazw maxes sto kanali mou sn 8es moes na tsekareis euxaristw!
5:32 That dude checking his spear... So derpy xD
Just a note! It's not Odalbönders with an s, the word is allready in plural through the suffix "er"'.
thanks for that heads up
Technically, the suffix is "r". "Odalbønd" would just be dialect.
The word bonder in odalbonder means farmers in norwegian
All Ubisoft had to do before making a video game was watching youtube medievalist community videos, instead of Michael Hirst's Vikings show. Sad.
Its irritating how the depiction of the norse and especially the anglos saxons is so completely wrong in films and series like Vikings.
They love to show the Saxons as timid and the vikings as ferocious warriors despite both sides being very similar. Especially the Saxons and Dane’s seeing as they pretty much came from similar areas of what was Germany and Denmark at the time. My family name is a cross of Germanic and Dane’s.
Amazing video! I started blacksmithing from this video!
Sick video, you're always real concise.
Glad you appreciated the script. I do take a fair amount of time to consolidate my sources and try to organize and simplify things as best I can.
Did you continue the History of the legions vid? If not, that should be your absolute priority my friend. Your work is awesome, I love to listen to them in the back ground while Im doing stuff, then re watch them properly after. Seriously need to finish that series though if you haven't you did a great job with it
I've got a bunch of stuff I want to get to before continuing that series. First will be to complete the Siege of Jerusalem and then I have 3 video topics requested by Patrons I need to complete.
One part I keep finding fascinating is this;
The decorations on the swords, axes, shield, and even spear heads sometimes that they crafted. I mean, that would take a fair amount of time.
Talk about your arts of war!
Great video! Not enough about dark age warfare in the world. The best thing about thrones of Britannia
Helmet would be the most common piece of armor
barring gambeson and tht sort ofc
well probably not for the chest if a larger target thats easier to hit. the heads important but if they could get one then yeah but most couldn't so a shield would do
It’s quite logical that the helmet would be the most common after the shield. The helmet would have been easier and cheaper to produce. There are however very few helmet fragments ever found from the Viking era; just pieces from three or four helmets if I remember correctly. Most helmets found are from the Vendel period, just before the the Vikings. I’m not sure this indicates that helmets were not common, that they were made from poor materials (perhaps bog iron) or if they were actually made from thick leather that has decomposed with time.
The helmet with eye guards would actually be Vendel period and not Viking period, even though the Vendel helmets or helmet style would have still been considered valuable and used as a status symbol. Looking at rune stones with helmets depicted, they seem to be more of the conical nose guard type and the same goes for helmets on statuettes and similar.
@@Jonsson474 It's also possible that helmets that managed to survive mostly intact got passed down the family line, right?
@@filthycasual8187 Yes, it’s probable that helmets got passed down the line. We know that the ornate helmets for the Vendel period did as they were considered status symbols rather than armour to be used in battle. But even though Viking helmets that were actually used survived and got passed down through generations, it’s likely that they eventually got destroyed. Either in battle or since they went out of fashion and were not needed.
04:20 Lol. That "Viking compass" on the guy's shield was created in the 1860s.
Best time period
I doubt the English thought so.
Ogier the Dane even though they won
The only real losers were the Welsh.
And the Picts I guess, but are they even real?
Higly debatable.
Yeah in ur alt right wet dream maybe...
Just a minor constructive criticism: you stated that their shields were covered in leather. They were, in fact, covered in rawhide, which, though also animal skin, is compostionally and structurally different than tanned leather (as tannins change the skin pretty drastically on a chemical level). Rawhide has the advantage of shrinking when drying. This allowed the construction of the skjoldr (shield) with wet rawhide, which then shrank while drying, providing a much more structurally sound final product, and also sort of "gluing" itself together with the mucilage and sticky substances in the collagen of the skin.
Swadians vs Nords
Mount and Blade Warband refrence
Butter lords vs. Sea raiders
Great video! the animation and information is first class.
As an Englishman, I consider my ancestors, the Anglo Saxons, more than worthy!
Detailed.This is why I focus hard.
Proud Saxon checking in.
You're not a Saxon, maybe a far descendant of one. The Saxons are long gone
Defronnie lol maybe hes from the three provinces of Germany named Saxony
Defronnie If he's English he has a good chance of being mostly Anglo Saxon. And before you mention the Normans, they had.a massive cultural impact but quite a small genetic one, since the aristocratic Norman ruling class didn't tend to mix with the Anglo Saxon peasantry.
Same here
Isn't it quite hard to identify "Anglo-Saxon" though? Since England had all kinds of Germanic tribes coming through, like the Jutes, Geats, Danes, Saxons, Angles and others....surely they're all pretty similar in looks and culture? Or is that wrong?
Excellent presentation
Hey please make a video on the evolution of war elephants osprey publishing ( from carthage to the modern war elephants of india) and samurai warfare ( they used shields) and please make more videos like this . I love your channel and please also mention the books you refer to make a documentary ! Thank you.....
I'll definitely be loading up a bibliography here soon. Also I have always wanted to do something on War Elephants! I already have the Osprey book on them
The Norse and Anglo-Saxons didn't have lamellar armor. To my knowledge, the only Viking Age lamellar fragments found so far in Northwestern/Northern Europe was in Birka, Sweden. Even then, they're not sure if it belonged to a Norseman. It could've belonged to a Rus'/Slavic mercenary or pirate, who were more likely to have access to armor of that type.
A point not mentioned is that from young, the Anglo-Saxon Housecarls were trained to wield their long-axes left handed, as to impact the unshielded side of the enemy.
The housecarls were a type of household soldier introduced by king Canute after he invaded England. Even for centuries after this might have been ethnically Danish. So calling housecarls Anglo-Saxon is a stretch.
@@reed3249 So after the Anglo saxons retook England they still used "ethnic danes"?
Very well summarized!
Cool visuals, showing, what you are talking about.
Nice video!
Awesome! I only wish you also talk about how expensive was all this equipment and the campaigns in themselves, in terms of course of their own singular economy.
But I guess that is just to much to investigate, edit, etc; so thank you for these type of vids and carry on. New subscriber here!
Welcome aboard! I agree it would have been cool to discuss more in depth costs but I never ran into that information in my sources. I think it will be hard to get any hard numbers on this and instead its a bit easier talk about their relative costs and abundance.
First of all, sorry about my english. Time ago i read an article talking about how expensive could it be equip a professional elite soldier. Focusing on viking elite troops, like the houscarles (Old Norse: húskarlar) or the knigths from late 10th century tipically includes a chain mail, linen gambeson, helmet with or without mail face protector, a gambeson hat's type, the clothing, leather strips for secure the armor, chainmail pants (optionally), leather boots and gloves. Depends on the quality and the renown of the artisans, translating a today's price, we talking just ir armor from 35.000 to 150.000 $(king's elite guard). Weaponry commnly includes swords, spear, knife or seax, hand axe or mace, wooden and metal shield. That takes another's 5.000-50.000$. Now, a squire or slave and the horse, 10.000-30.000 $.
A quick approach let us a 200.000 $ soldier equipment. It could change barely cause in this time period, factory dissapears and just the craftmans can do this job.
Hope my response helps u. Regards from an spanish vikingr ;9
My favourite Viking (and Saxon) warrior is the huskarl because of how effective and brave they were. An example of that bravery was shown at the battle of Hastings, when the Saxon army fled the field, Harold Godwinsons house Carl’s stood their ground to defend the body of their king and fulfilling their oaths, they fought for so long that even after the battle the normans described them as the bravest warriors they had ever seen
I really love that anglo saxon full face style of helmet, i work quite close to the British museum and I go in there because its free after work some times, and the anglo saxon helmet is always my favorite piece to look at, I dont know why there is something so atheistic about it.
Its a germanic style. Vendel helmets are almost identical in style
well Saxons are germanic
Its not Saxon but Anglian.
lol. Yes it was buried in East Anglia, but everyone just says anglo-saxon.... you people are pedantic
Free Man he knows exactly what you mean.
I agree, absolutely beautiful helmets. Probably the most beautiful tbh
I just discovered your videos today,and absolutely love them!Thanks so much for all the amazing info about varying subjects.
Please do a video regarding formations that were used in this time period.
Already got something like that in the works on the shield wall and the boar's head
Invicta Jack said shieldwall should not work as one and not push, I want to see your documentary.
I love you Invicta.
Is the rarity and status of swords one of the reason for their importance in Germanic folklore & mythology?
What mytholohy do you mean? Odin has a Spear and Thor has a Hammer. Tyr is the only god i can think of right now using a sword
But did any of the Norse gods have a sickle, HMM? Maybe urge the proletariat to revolt against the bourgeoisie, HMM?
Odin had a sword called 'Gramr' which gets passed down :)
Part of the status of swords was indeed that they were rare and were passed from generations to another, it was the 'age' of the swords (I.e father wielded it, his father before him, etc.) as well as who owned them before that lent a kind of importance to them
Yep. Damn things were a bastard to make in the time of coal and straw. If memory serves, when a sword maker was commissioned to make a sword, the orders usually took a fair bit of time. Around about maybe month or so if you wanted a basic sword. Stuff like axes and spears were pretty easy to make, even the local blacksmith could forge a new spearhead or axehead in a relatively short time frame. But swords....you need to go to good smith for one of those things.
I think its more likely that swords back then were just not very good weapons. And there are not any schools of swordsmanship or documentation about how to wield them effectively like you start to see in the 1300 and 1400s. Where people would go to universtiy to study the use of a sword, only then did it show its superiority to every other weapon type. If you arent going to do any cuts, slashes or stabs and just beat at your enemies shield like the sword is just a club, then an axe or mace would be better. Also Smithing was not very advanced. Most of the Roman knowledge was lost after the empire fell.
Loving the illustrations from osprey publishing books
Norse culture and tradition is very interesting.
Moron
@@garrygilmoreseyes486 Why?
Same. I see a lot similarities between all the Germanic people of Europe.
@@garrygilmoreseyes486 What the hell
Nice narration.
Fascinating :)
Great work. I really like learning about the quality of the Anglo Saxon and Viking armies' equipment, as it gives clear insights into the two cultures' heavy reliance on militia forces, a dramatic change from the professional changes in the Roman military begun by Consul Marius.
Greetings! Very nice and informative video! However, I have one point of correction - first choice of protective gear after the shield was the helmet, and only then the mail.
DwarfInBlues All these armchair experts...
this is definitely a point I should have clarified
That last summation was both spot-on accurate and rather sad.
Seax in the Anglo-Saxon period was pronounced as “say-ox”, now it’s “sax”. Proto-Germanic *sihs (seax) is closest to what you’re saying, but I don’t believe this pronunciation existed in many dialects.
Fyrd (also fierd, /fi͜yrd/) has that weird /y/ sound but you’re basically on the money
Huscarl is hOOScarl, though
Haven’t heard of leather on shields before.
The jacket is a gambeson :D
(4:19) - Galdrastafur on his shield is from 1860.
Very good video. Would you ever consider doing video on army from the Renaissance days.
I'd like to but will probably wait for a more modern total war game or mod to be able to show off the unit models
Stunning video once again! Well done! :)
What’s the point of equip two type of weapons.There is neither no weapon change system or weapon drop animations in Attila.And the army is separated into only axe or only sword.
In case you lose one weapon you have a back up.
Finnaly good video keep it up
100's of metal rings? 1000s
Excellent Documentary.. As usual!
The fact that people believe vikings wore leather armor and no headgear because "only rich ones wore mail" is redicilous. The poor vikings went on hit and run tactics while raiding, but dont tell me it was poor peasants sieging york, cities in england and paris, give me a break
The majority of them, yeah lmao.
LOVE this video! Subscribed. Thanks!
Anglo Saxons and Vikings🙏✝️
The intro animation to this was amazing would love to see more!
It's the Total War: Thrones of Britannia intro
A Seax is pronounced as Sax as that is where the Anglo Saxons got their name.
@Anglia Alba Not quite, Angles were called Angles because they came from the Angeln Peninsula. It is supposed that Angle means 'Angling folk' as they fished on their boats in the North Sea.
Thank you so much for sharing your talent with us. My kid learns and is inspired to make his own short stories.
Where did you get your books? I'm looking for a book that shows examples of the arrows, arrowheads, bows , swords and armor
Check in the description.
Thank you so much man! Keep up the good work!
Gonna do one for the Irish?
I haven't done the research for it but that could certainly be interesting. Maybe more so to talk about their tactics and wins/losses vs the Vikings
Yes please cheers!
Potato slingshots.
@@camper1749 They have potatoes back then. They are from the New World.
@@logipi79 Yeah yeah I know they didn't have potatoes back then, but what am I not allowed to joke?
Really awesome video Oakley, your hisotric content is always top notch!
One great mystery about the Anglo-Saxons - which you don't touch on - is why they never (or almost never) fielded cavalry. It's understandable that the Danes would've found large numbers of horses difficult to transport in longships, but the Anglo-Saxon omission seems puzzling in retrospect.
During the reign of Edward the Confessor (1042 - 1066) - a man half-Norman by ancestry and almost totally Norman by up-bringing - some attempt was made to adopt Norman-style cavalry in battle. It did not go well. In one encounter with the Welsh, the ill-at-ease English cavalry fled the field in confusion - earning their leader the soubriquet Ralph the Timid.
Actually none of the Germanic tribes really fielded cavalry, probably because they lived in huge forested areas, unlike the steppe people like the Persians, the Scythians, and the Tyrks.
The Thuringians, Goths and eventually the Franks are an exception to this. I do believe that the the Select-Fyrd weren't infantry, but mounted infantry (they had horses, but only for transport and logistics).
Also Julius Caesar had a very famous and effective retinue of Germanic mercenary horsemen.
@ Hersir Ivarr - Oh, undoubtedly those Anglo-Saxons who could afford horses used them to get from A to B. Indeed, Viking raiders often used stolen horses to mount lightning raids inland. But when it came to actual battle, both left their horses in the rear and fought on foot.
lomax343 Only light cavalry existed at the time (within the North-Sea region). And the English (both Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Danish) had armies of spear armed heavy and light infantry trained in tight formation fighting, who also doubled as effective skirmishes. The cavalry of the time were effectively hard-countered by the baseline infantry.
It does makes me wonder how the winner of a fight would slaughter the enemy as they routed.
@ Hersir Ivarr - True up to a point, but not the whole story. It's not as if no-one had ever heard of cavalry. It's easy to see why the Danes didn't employ cavalry - the problem of transporting them by ship. But for the Anglo-Saxons this is a puzzle. The Franks were also troubled by Viking raids, and they responded by building up their cavalry. And indeed, the Norse happily followed their example. Within two generations of settling in Normandy, they turned themselves into the finest cavalry in Europe. One might argue that the Franks had more of a mounted tradition to draw upon, but again there must be some other factor. I think it must come down to some innate conservatism amongst the Anglo-Saxons which made them reject the idea of mounted warfare - right up to the time of Hastings, which saw cavalry pitted against disciplined heavy infantry. And look how that turned out.
We need more videos like this!
It is a total misconception that the Fyrd was a peasant or low-tier Militia. The Fyrd was composed largely of Thanes of varying class(as it could indeed be quite varied) and their retainers, and it was required to have a horse for service. The Fyrd and Thanes are one and the same, the fyrd merely being the gathering of the Thanes, and it is a historical innacuracy to portray them as Elite Infantry vs Lower tier infantry. It'd be like seperating Knights and Men at Arms, they are the same thing at heart*.
*All Knights when they went to war were Men at Arms but all Men at Arms were not necessarily knights
It might be true that the fyrd was lead by thanes, but it is important to keep the ratio of wealthy thanes and free farmers in mind when talking about it, which is around 5-95%. Especially, following Alfred the Great's reforms, when every village had to contribute people to defend the freshly erected burhs. Those members of the fyrd only posessed basic training and weaponry closer to their everyday tools, and were by no means professional warriors.
Ugh, the fyrd is not the early medieval form for men at arms. The fyrd is by definition a levy consisted of normal citizens, aka peasants and freeholders
Only one thing I noticed, not even a mistake per se, more of a mixed priority. The first thing, the very FIRST thing you want to protect is your head. So if you had a bit of money, you wouldn't go for body armor, as your body is already pretty well protected by your shield, you buy a helmet.
Cultural connections? They're the same blood, the exact same haplogroup genetically.
Being the same blood doesn't mean you share the same culture.
I've been waiting to learn more on this for so long thank you
Saxons were being Vikings for 400 years before the Vikings existed as pirates crossing the channel.
The saxons were raiding Britain in Roman times
After the romans army left Britain the saxons raids ended up in then settling in Britain.
100s of years later the Vikings copied what the saxons had done.
Christianity had made the saxons weaker than when they were pagans ..
Poxy christianity....
It wasn't just saxons either. Angles/ jutes/frisians. That is how England got it's name due to the angles
Weak? Are you high?
Saxons were still quite powerful even during the 9th and 10th century.
Kev Caratacus Lol weak? Last I checked the Saxons and their descendants are the domains group in the British Isles, not the Northmen.
Lol the anglo Saxons were extremely respected within Nordic society. If you were killed by an Anglo-Saxon, you was not shamed upon because they were respected warriors.
@@elgranlugus7267 ok weak is a bit harsh.
But Danes never stood in front of their warriors praying for angels to come down and smite the heathen.
Or claim the destruction and devastation of the Norse on places like lindisfarne on god being unhappy because they were sinners who deserved it.
The A/S chronicles actually have pages about the monks seeing dragons and other demons in the sky just before the destruction of lindisfarne.
The Danes never carried corpes ( claimed to be saints) into battle ahead of their army's.
Or spend hours praying which the Norse took full advantage of several times catching them out defeating them knowing the saxons would be in church celebrating Xmas Easter & other saint days .
Kings listening to the advice of bishops , abbots regarding when to fight .
I love reading the Anglo Saxons chronicles, but I do cringe whenever I read about that side of things.
That's what I meant by weak
Not that the saxon warriors inc the fyrd themselves were weak or bad soldiers.
But because they listened to priests & etc as i said above.
Love the Art in this video.
Foolish primatives. Fighting on foot with wood and basic metals. Why field a few hundred nerds when you can save up all your resources and field one main battle tank encased in advanced alloys and ceramic armor.
It's almost like they were not even trying to win ;D
the technolgy didn't exist then dumbass.
Adam Baker Holy shit the guy couldn't be more sarcastic if he tried and it still went over your head
Adam Baker Woooooooooooooosh
I actually don't understand the "they were not even trying to win part".
Akios Eres ha ha
You should of mentioned on how norse shields were extremely thin at the tips, around 1mm. It seems they wanted bladed weapons to bite into their shields to trap them, yet it still works very well as a shield.
The time that a single roman legion could conquer all of britannia...
Orestis Georgiou the celts where an easy push over
Orestis Georgiou. Actually the Romans maintained 3 legions in Britannia to contain the rebellious Brits, whereas only 2 legions were considered enough to control the whole of Gaul with a much bigger population and bigger area. The Roman invasion of Britannia was only possible because the British chieftains goofed up pretty badly by taking the day off during the invasion. There was no Internet or radio in those days so finding out what was going on was not so easy. The Romans employed Batavians from Holland and Frieslanders to man Hadrians wall to protect their stolen territories from the undefeatable Scottish Celtic tribes. A fat lot of use that was because there was considerable cross border trade, friendship, and marriage between the Batavians and the Scots. The Romans were only considered as an impediment to civilised life.
What.
Caesar got repulsed by the Celts, and the Romans literally didn't attempt another invasion until a century later. It then took 40 years of hard fighting to take only half of Britain, after which they realised they couldn't advanced further into Scotland, and pretty much gave up completely on Ireland. The Vikings also literally conquered more of the British Isles than the Romans did.
I like this channel great show not boring keep it up
WOW !! CA are promoting a crappy M&B : Viking Conquest knock-off .. and Oakley suddenly comes up with a Dark Ages report .... hmmmmmmmmmmmm
Enjoy your bannerlord! Oh nvm
More please as we approach release. Fascinating stuff
Very enjoyable and informative thanks
seriously good video, epic artwork
I only remenber the Amon Amarth song "Saxons and Vikings " and the mutual insults of this two
Interesting video. Good historical background and research.
⭐️ Nice presentation and helpful information ⭐️ Thankyou 👍
You earned yourself a subscriber, m8