@@ModernKnight She rode for years as a younger girl, but quickly got tired of taking care of the horses. Especially picking their hooves, and dealing with their "stubborn childishness." She says they're like giant toddlers :) She's a pretty good horsewoman, though. In English style.
@@henryjohnston6023 rather have them stick your face? At least it takes some of the force away. Also its hard to hit a target you can not see. (The arm behind the shield) While it may not protect the guy in the front rank from a volley of arrows, it will take more then one to knock him out, and so more men will reach the enemy. Archer ammo is finite, and archer fingers can only fire so many arrows before they bleed. So yeah, it does help.
In one of his experiments, Tod Cutler showed that an arrow can penetrate rather deep through the shield. Having a metal boss at the place where your forearm would now be located behind the shield would give you added protection.
Definitely. Another part of it may simply be cost. As armor improves and shields become less the main form of protection, you might simply want cheaper shields. The metal boss may have been a big source of expense.
I saw that video too, and thought that as well- at first. However, I think bossed shields fell out of favor long before properly powerful longbows were developed (just an assumption on my part, I could be wrong). Regardless, you would think one would develop a more oval shaped boss to cover the whole forearm if that were true. Either way, Tod's video killed my enthusiasm for shields being a good defense against longbow arrows.
Yes, but then why not to use a thin band of metal to protect the arm, instead of a half-sphere? Maybe those shields had a hand-grip in addition to the arm-straps? Looking at Tod's video, i know that i would like to hold the shield with one hand behind the boss, instead of strapped to my forearm, if there are arrows coming this way.
@@hardcode57 We do have burials of Anglo-Saxons with shields that have clearly been used. The boss is the only thing that survives usually and some of them have been damaged in combat. Source: I watch a lot of Time Team lol.
This was my thinking, maybe if you had one you'd put it on but if you didn't it wasn't worth the expense to get one; as time went on they became more rare.
It makes quite a lot of sense that the more conservative (or possibly sentimental!) warriors would prefer a boss - and as someone else pointed out, the boss might even have come from an older shield, being metal as it is, it is re-usable, no? As far as the accuracy or integrity of historical images - as you point out, illustration (and tapestry) was very serious business. The items that are being scrutinized for historical information are not little amateur works that went up in a farmer's house; most especially with enormous tapestries, they were very like the ancient world's use of stone monuments: display pieces. Works that were meant to show power and truth. Granted that a tapestry hanging in a lord's castle was likely to be showing a truth that was particularly flattering to the lord and his family - but in the case of illustrations being created by monks, tapestries being created or maintained or displayed by clergy - a more objective truth would have been expected on all sides. And in all cases, attention to detail would have been a point of pride, and one of the few ways that the artists could work bits and pieces of "real life" into these extremely important pieces. Much like with the letters of Paul - if you notice, there are a bunch of greetings in the beginnings of most of those, as if dozens of people are kind of leaning in and saying "oh tell them hi for me!" I think it's always been a very human thing to want to include at least small mentions of everyday life, little details or shout-outs, in a larger and more important work. The king is the important one, but hey, it doesn't hurt anything to make a likeness of one's favorite uncle there in the back of the crowd adoring the king, now does it? So the very "ordinary" details are quite likely to be really accurate, I think! They don't matter enough to spend extra energy on embellishment. The major figures - kings and knights and dragons - sure those are potentially going to be embroidered (pun intended), but the seventh footman on the left? Nah. Really nice video, thank you so much for working hard to share with us even in these trying times! And speaking of "leaning in to say hi" - hello to the Mule! I heard him giving his opinion a couple times, haha!
I don't agree i think a Boss on a Strapped Shield is offen more Extra protection for the forearm . If you trust historical Medieval artworks there are depiction off Shield bosses to the 15 .century . Its a Fact that strong attacks can go threw a wooden shield threw a iron or steel Boss not so easy .
I wholeheartedly disagree that at any point in the production of medieval art, objective truth is "expected from all sides". There is no such expectation. The person or institution paying for the project pretty much always decides what the truth is going to look like. Monks that wrote and illuminated chronicles, for example, naturally wrote in a way that flattered their home monastery. The images we encounter in the middle ages are only ever partial realities. Indeed, what image can really encapsulate the full story? People didn't make art to document reality, but to construct it.
Indeed, while the presentation of the truth is going to be skewed in one way or other even by clergy to support their point of view the little inconsequential details have to be correct - or at least right enough that the people of the day will find it believable/relatable. If all of King 's man at arms are equipped with main battle tanks its too incredulous, just giving 'em all full armour would be doubtful, but decent helm, shield and spear/bows is very much more relatable.. That said I'd not be surprised if the bossed shields were sometimes or maybe even always functional shield bosses - just because you strap you arm over the boss to use it frequently doesn't mean you won't want to fight with the hand in shieldboss style - especially if that is how you first trained - I imagine the freedom at the wrist lets you use the shield rim more aggressively for instance, also makes it easier to dump the damaged shield and pick up fresh, so for less regimented 1 on 1 fights its probably advantageous...
Kite shields with bosses reminds me of some of the early electric vehicles that had grilles. Radiator grilles serve to let air in to cool the fluids passing through the radiator . . . electric vehicles don't have radiators . . . but people expected/wanted cars to have a grille in the front. Even some of the early Tesla Model S cars had an area of black shading in a grille shape, until they revised the design to finally get rid of it. The boss does seem to be that sort of "give the customers what they want" vestige.
I don't know if this was a rumour or truth, but when electric cars first became a "thing" on the roads, I heard they had to put an artificial engine sound in them because they were actually quiet and people were getting knocked over because they didn't hear any sound that was recognisable as a car engine and crossed the road thinking it was safe. I mean, it shows that people were just listening out for cars when they crossed and not looking, but it's a further example of "sticking with what you're familiar with".. if it's actually true, that is..
It may not all be about old fashioned warriors, but also old fashioned craftsmen. "Sonny. I've been making shields since before you were a gleam in your daddy's eye and I'm telling you it ain't a proper shield unless it has a boss on it."
It has since occurred to me that shield were fairly short lived in use. Records mention warriors carrying more than one shield because if this. Which means they would get replaced often and the valuable bits would be scavenged to be used on the new shield. Maybe the straps, definitely the metal fittings. Could be that people moved to the "newer" shield shape and had to find something to do with the boss from the old shield, so just nailed it on because you wouldn't just throw valuable metal away and maybe didn't want to trade it, just in case they decided they needed it again.
@@Kizron_Kizronson I had the same thought. It seems very likely that old bosses would be reused on new shields, and that in some cases that means they'd end up on a new kite shield. I think it's more likely than adding new bosses to the design purely out of tradition
Someone had a hundred of them stacked up and the market changed. Convince everyone who passes that the boss is required, buy them back and smack them into a frying pan years later.
You have a legitimate argument regarding the Bayeux tapestry. The different details in it are most important because they wouldn't have included them unless they were integral to the story. Great food for thought!
I like where you are going with that. I would add, not just tradition, but material and cost. That boss, that crafted piece of steel, you did not just get-rid-of. That boss was an intimate part of your warcraft. So, with a new shield for a new battle front, new age, making it a part of your new shield was not just a sort-of nostalgia, but also the idea of...i'm not just going to toss this out quite yet, i paid too much for it when i was a teenager.
I believe that you’re absolutely right! It appears that the Bayeux Tapestry illustrates a transitional period of old and new. A shield boss was probably the most valuable part of a round shield and the ‘Old school’ warrior would have still regarded it as valuable. What a great insight into that era. Cheers for the great content! 👍
@@ModernKnight I can't pretend to know the details of history like you or your subscribers (which I am one). But I Mz is correct of course! FANTASTIC content and I'm so glad you are still making videos for us all, thank you!
Your argument about the rise of non-representational art coming to the forefront with the rise of photography as an intrinsically representational art form is spot on! I’ve been arguing that for years. But it is a total blind spot for some art historians. My art history professor failed to acknowledge photography at all. He even coerced his more modern ideas about artistic expression and artistic license onto historical artists, claiming key verifiable and replicable elements of Rembrandt’s lighting were just made up.
A little late to the party with this comment since the video is a over a year old but the first thought I had when Jason mentioned about the tapestry as art or not is pictographs and cave paintings. Humans have been illustrating for millennia and there is no reason to think that the medieval era was any different. Literacy was still low in medieval times and as the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words so it stands to reason that anything that could used to illustrate would be.
I bought a National Geographic featuring the Bayeux Tapestry a couple of months ago...no regrets. I now have a link to my own heritage that I did not know much about before. 🥰 Thank you so much Jason for your passion and curiosity into Medieval life!😁👍❤🍻
Jason, i recommend you the video "Do shields stop arrows?" by Tod's Workshop, im sure you know Tod better than anyone probably even in person but after i saw it i started appreciating center grip bossed shields a lot more, seems like a much safer way to protect your hand with a piece of metal than just thin wood between the high-poundage bow arrows and your arm, quite terrifying what his "lockdown longbow" did to a shield
while the boss protects your hand, you cant protect yourself from arrows with it, if you just stretch your arm out. trust me, we tested "viking" shields vs slingers. you have to bring the shield closer to you and push with the other hand against it, so that the shield is hold in place against your shieldhand's forearm. you cant grip a center grip shield so hard, that it wont move on impact without aditional support. in fact, the most secure way i found while our 3 slingers had their fun was to hold my fist with the grip on chin level, the other fist on sholder level and lastly my forehead against the shield too. that day was the day i realised how scary slingers are and how heavily underrated those are in video games and movies.
@@wierdalien1 oh we were! 10 guys closely packed. and every one near wet and/or brown pants. Slingers are scary! i would rather deal with incoming long range arrows as long range slings. on close range, 20 meters or less, an arrow might poke through a shield deep enough to severely injure you, depending on the tip type. but on long range? more than 70 meters away it sounds like rainshower. But a slingshot? even on long range those impact very loud and hard. like hammers hitting your shield. And the most scary part? even on long ranges, they can pen and breake shields. we had to stop our little experiment when Mike's shield broke a board with the first impact, and the 2nd of the 3 shot salvo penetrated through it and hit him in the shoulder. Without his brigandine over his aketon he would have gotten seriously hurt. but seeing the small but visible dent in the brigandine, no one wanted to continue. and we all got a new sense of how threatening those slings really are. and our three slingers had smug grins for months afterwards, everytime we flinched when they took them out for target practise. No sir. i rather deal with a hail of arrows alone, than a group of slingers. even one good slinger would easily kill a knight in full plate with well placed shots and his dagger. one to the knee and you are sitting duck. one to the head and you lie flat on your back. and than its dagger time.
Perhaps the reason the Dragon that St. George is slaying looks small is perhaps the artist is really illustrating long forgotten eye-witness accounts of a Crocodile that they took to be as a Dragon. Then maybe the artists just added wings to make it more menacing.
There are several accounts that suggest dinosaur like creatures became smaller and rarer over time, which would suggest the largest ones remaining were quickly hunted to extinction thousands of years ago. The only reason things like Komodo dragons are still around was due to them living raw away from the center of human civilization.
That was a very insightful discussion about historical accuracy in medieval art. I had wondered about that in the past when you reverred to the bayeux tapestry.
When I made my first kite shield I used it the left over bits for testing against arrows. The arrows pierced through the material quite a good distance and I found that the boss actually protects the wrist of your shield arm. Arrows can still hit your arm at the elbow or the finger area, but I believe the wrist is a especially vital spot. This may be an additional reason for keeping the boss on a kite shield.
Thanks you for your videos and your investigations. So happy we can now reproduce these instruments and weapons and get more understanding of the past times.
Talking about the cost of a shield I saw one record of the cost of equipping a mounted fighter in the time of Charlemagne in modern day France and Germany. This was around 750 AD so 300 years before the Normans and it's debatable if you could call them knights yet but counting the full set of armor, warhorse and weapons it would cost about 40-42 cattle to kit them out. These fighters were essentially militia who had to pay for their own equipment. With the amount of land they had to be farming to qualify this was 12-15 years worth of surplus production so not cheap (though cattle raiding enemies might help with the cost). In any case the cost of a shield and spear on this list was 2 cattle while the cost of a basic sword was 7 cattle.
Jason, I am not a history buff and usually don't spend much time thinking about or studying it. However, there is something engaging and fulfilling about the information you provide and the way you go about it. Needless to say, you and your channel has made the subject interesting. I look forward to each episode.
What an interesting observation! I'll often dwell on a Medieval artwork simply because there is so much minutiae. I recall some time ago spending nearly half a day looking at the Cross of Bury St. Edmunds at The Cloisters. People would walk to the display and spend a few minutes marveling the workmanship, before moving on. It's natural to glance at art to take in the big picture but to do so often means missing the myriad obscure elements making up the whole. Yet it's these elements that offer a fascinating glimpse about the lives of the makers.
It stands to reason that the Bayeux Tapestry would be accurate in most details, given that it was intended to be both a historical record and a propaganda piece, used to help popularize the idea William's claim to England was by more than conquest, i.e., that Edward had promised William the throne and Harold had sworn on the bones of a saint to go along with that. I do spinning, weaving and such, so "old pieces of cloth" are rather interesting to me in more ways than one. :)
The same can often be said within the sciences. Theory is often assumption placed as "truth" until further clarification or more (subjectively) plausible theory takes its place. The error being that theory should never be taught as or even implied as being THE _truth_ .
Excellent points, well-made. I’m sure the embroiderers who actually had to do the tapestry would appreciate the sentiments as well. We truly are somewhat spoiled in the post-modern age.
Looking at as many pictures of the tapestry I can find, it appears nearly every mounted warrior has a boss on their kite shield, while it’s hit-or-miss for those on foot. A boss for a mounted warrior would make sense. Riding at even a trot provides a fair amount extra energy. Now, imagine someone with, say, a pike, spear, or perhaps with a lance on horseback, attacks. Where the boss is located is the “flattest” (relative to the rest) part of the shield. A polearm hitting that central point on a quickly-moving mounted warrior would either go through the shield and into the arm, or possibly just stick and throw the rider. Granted, that sticking is possible along any portion of the shield, but a trained mounted warrior would know how to maneuver the shield to most-effectively redirect. A trained warrior didn’t use their shield just to let someone hack at it until they wore out; the warrior used their shield to control the movement of their adversary to create an opening, so it was vital for the warrior to maneuver their shield to simultaneously allow for a counter-attack.
This is a fascinating point, and it's one of those things that makes an excellent observation of history with inferences to how people behave, and how some behavior just doesn't change. This is an unrelated point, but I don't think you've ever mentioned who makes all of your lovely gear. That sword in particular is gorgeous.
I think it’s quite possible that the metal bump (or whatever you called it) was placed on the shield to deflect a blow by a sword because it really deflected yours when you tried it. And I agree that younger generations are more open to trying new forms of warfare than the older generation. And I believe you’re right about the depiction in the Bayeaux tapestry. In the absence of a better medium, the embroiderers were trying to depict reality as closely as they humanly could, given their tools. It would be really fascinating to hear warriors of that time have a discussion about how well they thought a kite shield worked compared to another type of shield. Practical discussions like that were probably held all the time and would shed a lot of light on why new forms of protection were invented. Like, “Say, Sir Percevil, I believe my shield saved me from a disabling leg wound back there. How did yours do? “
So quite hilariously this brought me back to a LARP that I play. I was using a long two-handed axe and my sparring partner as this was during our training was using a kite shield and a sword. During the combat I was able to use the haft of my weapon to deflect some blows and opened him up a bit. Taking advantage of the momentary deflection I did a half swing in an attempt to hit him in the Torso he brought his shield to bear however all he really did since I hit him just hard enough while he was off-balance was create a perfect plain for my Blade 2 Glide upon directed at his jawline. suffice to say I connected squarely with his jaw and wear it real Combat I likely would have bisected him at that location. I realize after watching this that if he had a boss on his shield that blow would not have contacted. So I dare say there is plenty of practical evidence likely to be found in modern LARP and toornament communities of the boss being very boss.
Thank you for pointing out the thing about the dragon and St George. Have been saying this for years, but hearing a (closest to) actual real life knight saying it puts my mind at ease.
I love that both you and Shadiversity put out videos on the same day, multiple times mentioning the same things regarding shields and their uses. Things that the layman might not know concerning them. Love your content!
The variation of Lance and spear use is amazing too. There look to be three ways of using spears on horseback at least. One method is double handed! We can draw quite a few conclusion from that about the use of cavalry I think.
I am so thankful that i found this beautiful channel am a medieval freak and everytime i finish watching a video from this channel i end with a smile. 😊
Very interesting. I'm sure that when the young knights started wearing pointy shoes, the old geezers thought the world was going to hell in a handbasket. Btw, we have a statue of Saint George (or Sankt Göran in swedish) in Stockholm and the dragon is actually a decent size. A little bigger than the horse in fact. It's thought to have been made in the 1480's and is housed in Storkyrkan in the old city.
Anyone else now also feeling kinda sorry for the dragon... poor little fella :c btw, I absolutely love your content, this channel is really entertaining, educational and creative (and the horses are just the best!) To actually get on horseback and test some stuff.. I'm really amazed by your work here and grateful for discovering Modern History TV! Keep up the good work! I just finished a game, Kingdome: Come Deliverance, don't know if you've heard of it, but it's the most historically accurate video game I've ever seen and the story takes place in the early 15th century in medieval Bohemia, the armors, weapons, villages, castels.. everything's made as accurate as possible. And I was often thinking of this channel while playing, cause I could clearly see you helping to develop such a game to get it as accurate as possible! Since you're clearly also involved and interested in game design as you said in the behind the scenes video and I loved the short film... I'm really intrigued now for this channels future projects! :D
What you say about the shield boss reminds me of how the radio antennae on modern battleships is shaped like the sails and masts of old ships. An older tradition being kept but only in form, not in function.
I'm pretty sure kite shields with bosses were used alongside those without over 100 years after the Conquest, so I'm leaning towards a functionality argument and/or it being a status symbol to be able to afford an extra bit of metal on ones shield.
In archeology you could call the boss of a kite shield perhaps a “typological rudiment”...a leftover from the round shields (Oscar Montelius for example used the concept as a necessary criterium for his “typological method” when establishing a relative chronology for the Nordic Bronze Age...a typological rudiment is in essence an ornamentalised feature of an artefact that harks back to previous forms when that feature still had functional use). Or not if the boss still has more than ornamental use.
The piece at the end about whether medieval artists depict fantasy or reality was thought-provoking. There is a parallel in music: we assume today that music written before 1800 expresses the composer's feelings (like stormy passages in Beethoven), but in reality, most composers were craftsmen producing a workman-like product. They were mostly servants -- Mozart even complains in the 1770s of how far down the servants' table he was seated at dinner.
@@bo_392 I mean that's literally his job. he is a co founder & CEO of Rebellion. He can pursue his hobbies like this from producing games. It make total sense to combine his love for medieval history & game company by making a medieval game or an Arthurian game (based off of the concept teaser video too).
"I allways feel sorry for the dragon, actually"! Finally, someone who cares about the dragon! Thank you, Sire! These poor creatures were hunted to extinction and are still treated like monsters in literature! Great video, by the way!
I've tended to associate round shields with Saxons and kite shields with Normans, but I understand the kite was being used by the Saxons too. Question, of the three kinds of shields in the tapestry (round with boss, kite with boss, kite without boss), are all three being used by both sides and in equal measure? Were the styles more popular on one side or other?
I think the early kite had a centre grip based on the earlier round shield as its the immediate precursor. And as the kite shield became the main shield type, we see the strap design coming into play before we see the heater shield in the late 12th century.
I enjoy the Norman content alot! Got to get the full mail kit going. Good work as always. It is a great point medieval art is not always fantasy. They lived the life and made art in relation to what they saw.
One of the great “What ifs?” of history. What if Hardrada’s Norwegians hadn’t invaded when they did, so that the fight between Harold and William was more of a “square go”? Do you think the outcome would have been different?
Yes, most probably. It was a very close battle despite Harold's army having forced marched the length of England. Harold would have been able to attack them as they were landing or still organising after landing. He'd been camped on the south coast exactly for that reason.
Also, defeating one of the most famous generals of the time (he had been a Byzantine Strategos/actual general by rank) got Harold Godwinson’s troops over-confident, so when the Normans retreated from the shield wall some English chased them, and could be defeated in detail.
...Or, what if Harold had ceded land to his brother Tostig and Harald Hadrada in the North then marched South with his own army plus however many thousand of Hadrada's Vikings/Danes!?!
The discussion of "illustrations: realistic or not" comes up in clothing history too. Theres a tendency to dismiss something that hasn't been successfully recreated yet as just artists making things up, but often the garment/accessory/design feature can be recreated if you actually put the effort into doing so.
I think your ideas about the shields make sense. I was trying to come up with a modern day equivalent of continuing with an old feature that may no longer be useful. How about the little extra pocket on most jeans? They were originally for holding pocket watches. Most people no longer have pocket watches, yet the extra pocket continues to be added. Thank you for sharing what you learn in your research into the lives of our ancestors.
They hold coins nicely. Ignoring the silly idea of a pocket watch in jeans (usually worn by people who would not need expensive watches), they would not have held my grandfather’s pocket watch as it is too wide. If you can demonstrate that they have shrunk over the years, I might check further.
I rather agree with you. Back when I was in school, I associated kite shields that have boss with eastern europe, since a lot of the times I saw art depicting slav warriors and be it old art or more modern ones - they had kite shields with boss, rather than without. My explanation at the time was that Normans had a lot of influence on that whole region due to abundance of big rivers and they were reluctant to get rid of the thing. My memory about all of that is quite fuzzy, but that's where my belief started for sure.
I completely agree with your train of thoughts in the end of the video. I'm often baffled how many historians discredit medieval ilustrations/paintings etc. Sometimes they even attribute some malicious intent to the painter if what they see somehow doesn't fit their worldview. I simply just cannot understand this logic. Especially if we consider, often these books/codexes were paid and ordered by a lord or a king because they wanted to keep record of their lands, stocks, cultures etc. So it usually wasn't some abstract mind-play, they needed accurate details.
Just tossing this idea out there. Perhaps the tapestry took so long to create that different people worked on it while shields were changing. Love watching these. Thank you for doing them.
Just recently found your chanel & im loving every second of every topic. Can't wait to tell my son about you. Every year he was 1 out of 2 boys at pony club camp. He wanted to become a stunt horse rider after finishing Eglinton games team. His Autism stopped him realising his goal which is a shame, but him & his 3 sisters all had a day jousting a few years ago & they all loved it, but he was especially good at it. He'll enjoy watching!! Ps your horses are just lovely. In all ways. And your mule.
Yet another great video Jason, always informative and a pleasure to watch. I think maybe the kite shield was preferred by the Normans as they relied on cavalry more in warfare than a lot of their early opposition, so a kite shield would protect the mounted Normans thighs and calfs in combat against a dismounted foot soldier. The Army faced at Hastings was a strong shield wall of dismounted Saxons with probably a majority of round shields for their style if combat.
@@ModernKnight Yes, both mounted and dismounted Normans have them. I think the tapestry is amazing, such detail. Maybe the kite shield was a proven piece of equipment for the Norman way of warfare, and possibly was just an ease of production, as in William the bastard ordered a large amount for his force so every soldier kind of had a uniformed set of marching order. Ease of training, ease of supply. In the same way the current regular soldiers of the British army has the same model of personal weapon, and a standard kit issue. But i totally agree with you that it was a revolutionary change in shield use.
I've just discovered your channel & have immediately subscribed. Some excellent discussion & demonstrations. Just on the Kite shield theory: I was always under the impression that the Kite shield was long to be used on horseback where it would help cover the leg . The shorter shield, or Teardrop, was used on foot; hence, you see it more on the Saxon side. I once saw a great video by the historian Mike Loades where he theorises that the Kite shield could be used on the back of the horsemen to deflect strikes as he pulled away from a shieldwall of foot soldiers i.e. the Norman retreats at Hastings was a deliberate tactic. The lance would be used overarm in this scenario.
Even if the boss was intended as completely ornamental, someone would have found a use for it. Besides we all know the smooth kite shield is for when a knight needs an improvised toboggan for winter battlefield hijinks.
Very interesting video reading the shields and I think that you have made very good observations regarding the Bayeux Tapestry that is virtually a series of time photographs depicting what equipment the troops wearing in that period. I can only agree with you that whoever did this Tapestry invented absolutely nothing but only what they saw and is notable that they depicted the two types of shields, with and without the boss but also the type of armour they were wearing and including the different styles of haircut with or without the mustaches. Old and New indeed... Good job again and I liked very much this video...
What I couldn't believe was the amount of details on the Bayeux Tapestry. I was stunned. I especially was drawn to the bottom have of the Tapestry where the soldiers where disrobing the dead soldiers of their clothing, and helmets, and swords. I could of spent hours looking at it all. It took my breath away. The time it took to make this I can't even imagine.
I can imagine superstition could come into it aswell. As the boss was probably reused on successive shields after each battle, it was probably momento of those battles aswell as something that had literally guarded a warriors life repeatedly. A lucky talisman perhaps. Love the videos.
I believe the "boss?" WOULD be useful as an effective bludgeoning point when you're in a shield wall and moving forward; as it keeps that buffer point between actually damaging your shield, having that recoil hitting the shield, rather than directly into your arm. Just as a point to make compared to your experience fighting, which I assume was more 1 on 1, compared to the larger scale that I imagine most these common soldiers would have been experienced to. I love your channel! Keep it up mate!
About the shield you mentioned as targe, shield for jousting, it did was used for battlefield especially in like Eastern Europe until like the early 17th century, it kind of looked like a kite shield upside down, it known as Hussar Shield.
I have no experience with shapr sword, but nearly 20 years of experience fighting and training with both blunt, wooden or padded (realisticly heavy) swords. If you strike from you right side to the shield, you can bind your cut to the oponents shield, which than gives you (sometimes) an oportunity to continue with a slicing motion somewhere around the edge of the shield. This is way harder if your oponent has got a boss on his shield, since those tends to deflect the cut away from the shield. It is not a huge advantage, yet I do believe this would explain why there are people who likes bosses on thei shields.
Even today we have leftover bits of things in military traditions. Uniforms have epaulettes. Why? Yes, infantrymen still wear backpacks, but epaulettes are there to strap everything to your shoulders so you can walk without your musket or backpack straps slipping off. Some epaulettes don't even open up anymore and are sewed to the shoulder.
The one thing we have as humans is the ability to think about things. If some kite shields had a boss and some did not, then we can ask why. A few things come to mind; Economics, Status, Superstition, and Efficacy (how beneficial it was). Economics: It would be cheaper to buy a shield without a boss. Status: Adding a boss would show wealth (or maybe rank) Superstition: My father used this boss in his days and it kept him alive, so I'll use it too in hopes I survive. Efficacy: It's actually useful enough to justify it being on the shield (this would require further testing) I'm sure we can think of many reasons why or why not.
I imagine where your wrist is placed in a kite sheild. Where the boss is looks like its right infront where your wrist would be. Tod's workshop has a set of films/ videos of sheilds versus arrows. The boss would protect and deflect arrowheads away from the wrist so the fighter can pickup a new shield. Making bosses are time consuming. Forging metal into a hardened boss takes time and money. Rather than making the shape and reinforcing striking edges or just general protecting as stated before sheilds were disposable and just pickup or make another on. I guess kites with bosses where for fighters who knew they'd get more arrow fighter than the regular small foot soldiers.
Jason and the modern history crew thanks so much for experimenting history you really see this point of time in a different perspective this way. But I must say I miss that no name mule.I always hope to see him in one of your videos❤
Interesting video, as you said the shields have changed through time. People don't like change and try to hold on to the old style things longer. The round shield had a boss were it was held. The kite shield had has lashings that wrapped around the arm also with a boss. Do you think at some point the kite shield was originally held in the centre like the round shield. Later young soldiers would be issued with a kite shield with arm lashings and no boss and that's what they learnt to fight with. Would be interesting to find out if the first type of kite shield was held with a centre grip.
Using the boss to catch the blade reminds me of the Highland target, which, 700 years later, had a small boss, and even sometimes a spike, that was used when deflecting to catch and divert the opponent's weapon.
@@JohnyG29 Autocorrect is a hell of a drug. But for what it’s worth, the Gaelic is targaid (tar-gutch), which preserves the original final sound from the loan word more than the English term for this specific shield form.
@@Robobagpiper I suspected it was the dreaded autocorrect. Seeing as I neither know or care about any Gaelic I'll take your word for it! Have a nice life old chap.
I'll tell you exactly what the boss is good for: protecting the user's arm against penetration by arrows. You can track an arrow's path in flight, and position your shield to take the hit. And instinctively you are going to try to position it so it will strike directly in front of your forearm. This, of course, is a Bad Thing if the arrow gets through even partially. The boss would thus prevent it from going through, as well as hold additional padding to stop it in case it made it through the metal and cushion blows against the shield to your arm.
Been watching your channel for a while. Just had a assignment at uni to find game development companies we would consider applying for. I never knew you was a founder of Rebellion!
About the round shields, it is said that at least the Viking's were made of soft wood, so that when stricken the opponent's weapon would be likely to stay stuck in it. You didn't go to war often, so the longevity of a shield beyond one battle was not really important. The paint hid the wood grain direction. From the opponent's point of view, in the absence of a symbol painted on the shield, they could be fooled by the shield bearer, unable to know where the weak-point was. For the shield boss, I assume, it made the production of the shields more expensive to produce, so some might not have had any out of cost-saving reasons.
If you imagine takeing away the pointy bit of the kite shield you can nearly see a round shield. I think the kite shield has developed from the round shield and therefore the early versions visually also resembled the round shields more.
The boss does put a large bit of metal in the center and where it needed most to protect your arm. If you look at tod's tests with the long bow you can see how you might still want a boss to keep arrows out of that vital area.
0:53 He's torturing the French captives again.
Someone's got to do it...
wtf was that?!
fuuk, bwest coment ewer
I have a bad feeling about this...
@@Tekvorian His mule probably
I was telling my high-schooler daughter about your channel, and she was already a fan. Told me "His name is Jason. Yeah, I watch his channel!"
that's great
@@ModernKnight She rode for years as a younger girl, but quickly got tired of taking care of the horses. Especially picking their hooves, and dealing with their "stubborn childishness." She says they're like giant toddlers :) She's a pretty good horsewoman, though. In English style.
Could it be to help protect from arrows? Arrows would go in a few inches and stick your arm.
@@henryjohnston6023 rather have them stick your face? At least it takes some of the force away. Also its hard to hit a target you can not see. (The arm behind the shield)
While it may not protect the guy in the front rank from a volley of arrows, it will take more then one to knock him out, and so more men will reach the enemy. Archer ammo is finite, and archer fingers can only fire so many arrows before they bleed. So yeah, it does help.
Bet
In one of his experiments, Tod Cutler showed that an arrow can penetrate rather deep through the shield. Having a metal boss at the place where your forearm would now be located behind the shield would give you added protection.
I had that thought too. Boss might be nice when you might end up with an arrow through your forearm.
Not to mention that if an arrow or anything else hits the boss then naturally the shield will deteriorate less quickly.
Definitely.
Another part of it may simply be cost. As armor improves and shields become less the main form of protection, you might simply want cheaper shields. The metal boss may have been a big source of expense.
I saw that video too, and thought that as well- at first. However, I think bossed shields fell out of favor long before properly powerful longbows were developed (just an assumption on my part, I could be wrong). Regardless, you would think one would develop a more oval shaped boss to cover the whole forearm if that were true. Either way, Tod's video killed my enthusiasm for shields being a good defense against longbow arrows.
Yes, but then why not to use a thin band of metal to protect the arm, instead of a half-sphere?
Maybe those shields had a hand-grip in addition to the arm-straps? Looking at Tod's video, i know that i would like to hold the shield with one hand behind the boss, instead of strapped to my forearm, if there are arrows coming this way.
Have you ever considered doing a podcast? Could listen to you speak about these topics for hours!
maybe one day!
Without the guy getting slain in the background at 0:53
I'd definitely prefer videos like this to have a visual demonstration.
But a podcast wouldn't be a bad idea.
YES!!! PODCAST!! Please do!!
Perhaps a podcast going deeper into depth on a battle or a particular subject matter?
Bosses may have been recycled from "personal/favourite" broken shields and put back on the new shields as a distinction (old guard thingy).
They surely would have been recycled: the steel would have been valuable. Perhaps they became heirlooms? My shield carries my grandfather's boss?
@@hardcode57 We do have burials of Anglo-Saxons with shields that have clearly been used. The boss is the only thing that survives usually and some of them have been damaged in combat. Source: I watch a lot of Time Team lol.
I mean, the buckler is basically a boss that lost the rest of the shield. lol
This was my thinking, maybe if you had one you'd put it on but if you didn't it wasn't worth the expense to get one; as time went on they became more rare.
@@soupordave as should everybody
It makes quite a lot of sense that the more conservative (or possibly sentimental!) warriors would prefer a boss - and as someone else pointed out, the boss might even have come from an older shield, being metal as it is, it is re-usable, no?
As far as the accuracy or integrity of historical images - as you point out, illustration (and tapestry) was very serious business. The items that are being scrutinized for historical information are not little amateur works that went up in a farmer's house; most especially with enormous tapestries, they were very like the ancient world's use of stone monuments: display pieces. Works that were meant to show power and truth. Granted that a tapestry hanging in a lord's castle was likely to be showing a truth that was particularly flattering to the lord and his family - but in the case of illustrations being created by monks, tapestries being created or maintained or displayed by clergy - a more objective truth would have been expected on all sides.
And in all cases, attention to detail would have been a point of pride, and one of the few ways that the artists could work bits and pieces of "real life" into these extremely important pieces. Much like with the letters of Paul - if you notice, there are a bunch of greetings in the beginnings of most of those, as if dozens of people are kind of leaning in and saying "oh tell them hi for me!" I think it's always been a very human thing to want to include at least small mentions of everyday life, little details or shout-outs, in a larger and more important work. The king is the important one, but hey, it doesn't hurt anything to make a likeness of one's favorite uncle there in the back of the crowd adoring the king, now does it?
So the very "ordinary" details are quite likely to be really accurate, I think! They don't matter enough to spend extra energy on embellishment. The major figures - kings and knights and dragons - sure those are potentially going to be embroidered (pun intended), but the seventh footman on the left? Nah.
Really nice video, thank you so much for working hard to share with us even in these trying times!
And speaking of "leaning in to say hi" - hello to the Mule! I heard him giving his opinion a couple times, haha!
thanks for your feedback, i agree with what you said.
this makes a lot of sense
I don't agree i think a Boss on a Strapped Shield is offen more Extra protection for the forearm .
If you trust historical Medieval artworks there are depiction off Shield bosses to the 15 .century .
Its a Fact that strong attacks can go threw a wooden shield threw a iron or steel Boss not so easy .
I wholeheartedly disagree that at any point in the production of medieval art, objective truth is "expected from all sides". There is no such expectation. The person or institution paying for the project pretty much always decides what the truth is going to look like. Monks that wrote and illuminated chronicles, for example, naturally wrote in a way that flattered their home monastery. The images we encounter in the middle ages are only ever partial realities. Indeed, what image can really encapsulate the full story? People didn't make art to document reality, but to construct it.
Indeed, while the presentation of the truth is going to be skewed in one way or other even by clergy to support their point of view the little inconsequential details have to be correct - or at least right enough that the people of the day will find it believable/relatable. If all of King 's man at arms are equipped with main battle tanks its too incredulous, just giving 'em all full armour would be doubtful, but decent helm, shield and spear/bows is very much more relatable..
That said I'd not be surprised if the bossed shields were sometimes or maybe even always functional shield bosses - just because you strap you arm over the boss to use it frequently doesn't mean you won't want to fight with the hand in shieldboss style - especially if that is how you first trained - I imagine the freedom at the wrist lets you use the shield rim more aggressively for instance, also makes it easier to dump the damaged shield and pick up fresh, so for less regimented 1 on 1 fights its probably advantageous...
Kite shields with bosses reminds me of some of the early electric vehicles that had grilles. Radiator grilles serve to let air in to cool the fluids passing through the radiator . . . electric vehicles don't have radiators . . . but people expected/wanted cars to have a grille in the front. Even some of the early Tesla Model S cars had an area of black shading in a grille shape, until they revised the design to finally get rid of it.
The boss does seem to be that sort of "give the customers what they want" vestige.
They actually do have radiators, to cool the batteries. They can get pretty hot and running too hot ruins their life time
Likely there was some type of "thats not a shield thats a plank, a REAL shield had a boss!
I don't know if this was a rumour or truth, but when electric cars first became a "thing" on the roads, I heard they had to put an artificial engine sound in them because they were actually quiet and people were getting knocked over because they didn't hear any sound that was recognisable as a car engine and crossed the road thinking it was safe. I mean, it shows that people were just listening out for cars when they crossed and not looking, but it's a further example of "sticking with what you're familiar with".. if it's actually true, that is..
It may not all be about old fashioned warriors, but also old fashioned craftsmen. "Sonny. I've been making shields since before you were a gleam in your daddy's eye and I'm telling you it ain't a proper shield unless it has a boss on it."
lol, yes probably.
Earliest recorded instance of up selling. More. Like "Of course, you'll need a Boss on that...so that'll be another two shillings" 😂
It has since occurred to me that shield were fairly short lived in use. Records mention warriors carrying more than one shield because if this. Which means they would get replaced often and the valuable bits would be scavenged to be used on the new shield. Maybe the straps, definitely the metal fittings. Could be that people moved to the "newer" shield shape and had to find something to do with the boss from the old shield, so just nailed it on because you wouldn't just throw valuable metal away and maybe didn't want to trade it, just in case they decided they needed it again.
@@Kizron_Kizronson I had the same thought. It seems very likely that old bosses would be reused on new shields, and that in some cases that means they'd end up on a new kite shield. I think it's more likely than adding new bosses to the design purely out of tradition
Someone had a hundred of them stacked up and the market changed. Convince everyone who passes that the boss is required, buy them back and smack them into a frying pan years later.
You have a legitimate argument regarding the Bayeux tapestry. The different details in it are most important because they wouldn't have included them unless they were integral to the story. Great food for thought!
I like where you are going with that. I would add, not just tradition, but material and cost. That boss, that crafted piece of steel, you did not just get-rid-of. That boss was an intimate part of your warcraft. So, with a new shield for a new battle front, new age, making it a part of your new shield was not just a sort-of nostalgia, but also the idea of...i'm not just going to toss this out quite yet, i paid too much for it when i was a teenager.
I believe that you’re absolutely right! It appears that the Bayeux Tapestry illustrates a transitional period of old and new. A shield boss was probably the most valuable part of a round shield and the ‘Old school’ warrior would have still regarded it as valuable. What a great insight into that era. Cheers for the great content! 👍
You never fail to surprise me with detailed info.I can't get enough of your videos. Beautiful hay stacks. Thank you Jason
Glad you like them!
@@ModernKnight I can't pretend to know the details of history like you or your subscribers (which I am one). But I Mz is correct of course! FANTASTIC content and I'm so glad you are still making videos for us all, thank you!
Your argument about the rise of non-representational art coming to the forefront with the rise of photography as an intrinsically representational art form is spot on! I’ve been arguing that for years. But it is a total blind spot for some art historians.
My art history professor failed to acknowledge photography at all. He even coerced his more modern ideas about artistic expression and artistic license onto historical artists, claiming key verifiable and replicable elements of Rembrandt’s lighting were just made up.
A little late to the party with this comment since the video is a over a year old but the first thought I had when Jason mentioned about the tapestry as art or not is pictographs and cave paintings. Humans have been illustrating for millennia and there is no reason to think that the medieval era was any different. Literacy was still low in medieval times and as the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words so it stands to reason that anything that could used to illustrate would be.
Ugh! I HATE when people force modern viewpoints into historical periods or, in your art rofessor’s case, historical art!
I bought a National Geographic featuring the Bayeux Tapestry a couple of months ago...no regrets. I now have a link to my own heritage that I did not know much about before. 🥰 Thank you so much Jason for your passion and curiosity into Medieval life!😁👍❤🍻
Jason, i recommend you the video "Do shields stop arrows?" by Tod's Workshop, im sure you know Tod better than anyone probably even in person but after i saw it i started appreciating center grip bossed shields a lot more, seems like a much safer way to protect your hand with a piece of metal than just thin wood between the high-poundage bow arrows and your arm, quite terrifying what his "lockdown longbow" did to a shield
i know him well, and its a great video. Of course he's simulating a much later strength of bow than was likely in use at Hastings
while the boss protects your hand, you cant protect yourself from arrows with it, if you just stretch your arm out. trust me, we tested "viking" shields vs slingers. you have to bring the shield closer to you and push with the other hand against it, so that the shield is hold in place against your shieldhand's forearm. you cant grip a center grip shield so hard, that it wont move on impact without aditional support. in fact, the most secure way i found while our 3 slingers had their fun was to hold my fist with the grip on chin level, the other fist on sholder level and lastly my forehead against the shield too.
that day was the day i realised how scary slingers are and how heavily underrated those are in video games and movies.
@@ricwalker6600 dont forget that youd usually be part of a wall though
@@wierdalien1 oh we were! 10 guys closely packed. and every one near wet and/or brown pants. Slingers are scary! i would rather deal with incoming long range arrows as long range slings. on close range, 20 meters or less, an arrow might poke through a shield deep enough to severely injure you, depending on the tip type. but on long range? more than 70 meters away it sounds like rainshower.
But a slingshot? even on long range those impact very loud and hard. like hammers hitting your shield. And the most scary part? even on long ranges, they can pen and breake shields. we had to stop our little experiment when Mike's shield broke a board with the first impact, and the 2nd of the 3 shot salvo penetrated through it and hit him in the shoulder. Without his brigandine over his aketon he would have gotten seriously hurt. but seeing the small but visible dent in the brigandine, no one wanted to continue. and we all got a new sense of how threatening those slings really are. and our three slingers had smug grins for months afterwards, everytime we flinched when they took them out for target practise.
No sir. i rather deal with a hail of arrows alone, than a group of slingers. even one good slinger would easily kill a knight in full plate with well placed shots and his dagger. one to the knee and you are sitting duck. one to the head and you lie flat on your back. and than its dagger time.
Perhaps the reason the Dragon that St. George is slaying looks small is perhaps the artist is really illustrating long forgotten eye-witness accounts of a Crocodile that they took to be as a Dragon. Then maybe the artists just added wings to make it more menacing.
@ceiling fan St. George or the crocodile?
There are several accounts that suggest dinosaur like creatures became smaller and rarer over time, which would suggest the largest ones remaining were quickly hunted to extinction thousands of years ago. The only reason things like Komodo dragons are still around was due to them living raw away from the center of human civilization.
Finding the humanity in history. Fascinating thoughts on those small things that make the individuals involved in great events
That was a very insightful discussion about historical accuracy in medieval art. I had wondered about that in the past when you reverred to the bayeux tapestry.
THIS!.. I always wondered why this shape of shield!! Thank you!
When I made my first kite shield I used it the left over bits for testing against arrows.
The arrows pierced through the material quite a good distance and I found that the boss actually protects the wrist of your shield arm.
Arrows can still hit your arm at the elbow or the finger area, but I believe the wrist is a especially vital spot.
This may be an additional reason for keeping the boss on a kite shield.
You usualy have a thick padding on the shield over your lower arm holding it. For comfort, but more importantly for protection against penetration.
Thanks you for your videos and your investigations. So happy we can now reproduce these instruments and weapons and get more understanding of the past times.
Talking about the cost of a shield I saw one record of the cost of equipping a mounted fighter in the time of Charlemagne in modern day France and Germany. This was around 750 AD so 300 years before the Normans and it's debatable if you could call them knights yet but counting the full set of armor, warhorse and weapons it would cost about 40-42 cattle to kit them out. These fighters were essentially militia who had to pay for their own equipment. With the amount of land they had to be farming to qualify this was 12-15 years worth of surplus production so not cheap (though cattle raiding enemies might help with the cost).
In any case the cost of a shield and spear on this list was 2 cattle while the cost of a basic sword was 7 cattle.
0:54 Mulie being a banshee again. He's a good boy, but good Lord that neigh/bray is a terrifying sound.
I AM MULIE AND I MUST S C R E A M
Jason, I am not a history buff and usually don't spend much time thinking about or studying it. However, there is something engaging and fulfilling about the information you provide and the way you go about it. Needless to say, you and your channel has made the subject interesting. I look forward to each episode.
great, thanks for watching.
What an interesting observation! I'll often dwell on a Medieval artwork simply because there is so much minutiae. I recall some time ago spending nearly half a day looking at the Cross of Bury St. Edmunds at The Cloisters. People would walk to the display and spend a few minutes marveling the workmanship, before moving on. It's natural to glance at art to take in the big picture but to do so often means missing the myriad obscure elements making up the whole. Yet it's these elements that offer a fascinating glimpse about the lives of the makers.
Sword check. Shield check. Armor check. Shield check. Horses check check check . My good Sir. By this point. All you need is a castle. 😄
Wheres Shadiversity XD
knighthood check also
Most knights lived on a group of farms surrounded by some fencing or a low wall.
@@henkfraser1316 Near a castle.
Thank you for these videos. I think your approach to history and way of thinking is not only practical, but very easy to understand.
It's impressive how imaginative historians can be extracting so much knowledge out of an old peace of cloth! Such as archeologists do with pottery.
i mean, you have to. would be hard to piece together broken pots without imagination
@@Wolvenworks so true
It's definitely for ritual purposes
It stands to reason that the Bayeux Tapestry would be accurate in most details, given that it was intended to be both a historical record and a propaganda piece, used to help popularize the idea William's claim to England was by more than conquest, i.e., that Edward had promised William the throne and Harold had sworn on the bones of a saint to go along with that.
I do spinning, weaving and such, so "old pieces of cloth" are rather interesting to me in more ways than one. :)
The same can often be said within the sciences.
Theory is often assumption placed as "truth" until further clarification or more (subjectively) plausible theory takes its place.
The error being that theory should never be taught as or even implied as being THE _truth_ .
I’ve just been binge watching this since last night
great!
I love these kind of videos. Looking at small details and speculating what it could have meant.
Excellent points, well-made. I’m sure the embroiderers who actually had to do the tapestry would appreciate the sentiments as well. We truly are somewhat spoiled in the post-modern age.
Looking at as many pictures of the tapestry I can find, it appears nearly every mounted warrior has a boss on their kite shield, while it’s hit-or-miss for those on foot. A boss for a mounted warrior would make sense. Riding at even a trot provides a fair amount extra energy. Now, imagine someone with, say, a pike, spear, or perhaps with a lance on horseback, attacks. Where the boss is located is the “flattest” (relative to the rest) part of the shield. A polearm hitting that central point on a quickly-moving mounted warrior would either go through the shield and into the arm, or possibly just stick and throw the rider. Granted, that sticking is possible along any portion of the shield, but a trained mounted warrior would know how to maneuver the shield to most-effectively redirect. A trained warrior didn’t use their shield just to let someone hack at it until they wore out; the warrior used their shield to control the movement of their adversary to create an opening, so it was vital for the warrior to maneuver their shield to simultaneously allow for a counter-attack.
This is a fascinating point, and it's one of those things that makes an excellent observation of history with inferences to how people behave, and how some behavior just doesn't change.
This is an unrelated point, but I don't think you've ever mentioned who makes all of your lovely gear. That sword in particular is gorgeous.
Agree with most. Might argue with some. Excellent contribution. Thank you for the video.
Regarding Dragons & St George: Paolo Uccello's dragon is a scary one, and also one of the first paintings with correct perspective drawn into it.
I think it’s quite possible that the metal bump (or whatever you called it) was placed on the shield to deflect a blow by a sword because it really deflected yours when you tried it. And I agree that younger generations are more open to trying new forms of warfare than the older generation.
And I believe you’re right about the depiction in the Bayeaux tapestry. In the absence of a better medium, the embroiderers were trying to depict reality as closely as they humanly could, given their tools.
It would be really fascinating to hear warriors of that time have a discussion about how well they thought a kite shield worked compared to another type of shield. Practical discussions like that were probably held all the time and would shed a lot of light on why new forms of protection were invented. Like, “Say, Sir Percevil, I believe my shield saved me from a disabling leg wound back there. How did yours do? “
So quite hilariously this brought me back to a LARP that I play. I was using a long two-handed axe and my sparring partner as this was during our training was using a kite shield and a sword.
During the combat I was able to use the haft of my weapon to deflect some blows and opened him up a bit. Taking advantage of the momentary deflection I did a half swing in an attempt to hit him in the Torso he brought his shield to bear however all he really did since I hit him just hard enough while he was off-balance was create a perfect plain for my Blade 2 Glide upon directed at his jawline.
suffice to say I connected squarely with his jaw and wear it real Combat I likely would have bisected him at that location.
I realize after watching this that if he had a boss on his shield that blow would not have contacted. So I dare say there is plenty of practical evidence likely to be found in modern LARP and toornament communities of the boss being very boss.
Thank you for pointing out the thing about the dragon and St George. Have been saying this for years, but hearing a (closest to) actual real life knight saying it puts my mind at ease.
I love that both you and Shadiversity put out videos on the same day, multiple times mentioning the same things regarding shields and their uses. Things that the layman might not know concerning them. Love your content!
I know, that's a bit weird, but fun.
The variation of Lance and spear use is amazing too. There look to be three ways of using spears on horseback at least. One method is double handed! We can draw quite a few conclusion from that about the use of cavalry I think.
I am so thankful that i found this beautiful channel am a medieval freak and everytime i finish watching a video from this channel i end with a smile. 😊
Welcome aboard!
Very interesting. I'm sure that when the young knights started wearing pointy shoes, the old geezers thought the world was going to hell in a handbasket.
Btw, we have a statue of Saint George (or Sankt Göran in swedish) in Stockholm and the dragon is actually a decent size. A little bigger than the horse in fact. It's thought to have been made in the 1480's and is housed in Storkyrkan in the old city.
interesting, i'll have to look that up.
0:52 uhmmm... Is everyone alright in there?
Dont worry it's just his his kids he keeps in the basement
Think it was a happy mule.
He said his kids live in there.
It was a captured Frenchman being tortured.
Frau Blücher!!!
This is a different and interesting twist on what others have talked about. I like this other hypothesis being added to the mix.
Get with the times granpa! Get your self a proper boss free shield!
Shut up Timmy! Back in the days we had good shields! Round with a center grip! How can you younglings fight with these bossles nonsense?
You young people think you know everything!
We didn't need swords back in my day, only a good axe.
I'll show you who's boss.
🤣🤣🤣
Was that scream near the beginning a fortuitous battle sound to go with the subject, or that mule again?
Anyone else now also feeling kinda sorry for the dragon... poor little fella :c
btw, I absolutely love your content, this channel is really entertaining, educational and creative (and the horses are just the best!) To actually get on horseback and test some stuff.. I'm really amazed by your work here and grateful for discovering Modern History TV! Keep up the good work!
I just finished a game, Kingdome: Come Deliverance, don't know if you've heard of it, but it's the most historically accurate video game I've ever seen and the story takes place in the early 15th century in medieval Bohemia, the armors, weapons, villages, castels.. everything's made as accurate as possible. And I was often thinking of this channel while playing, cause I could clearly see you helping to develop such a game to get it as accurate as possible! Since you're clearly also involved and interested in game design as you said in the behind the scenes video and I loved the short film... I'm really intrigued now for this channels future projects! :D
What you say about the shield boss reminds me of how the radio antennae on modern battleships is shaped like the sails and masts of old ships. An older tradition being kept but only in form, not in function.
I'm pretty sure kite shields with bosses were used alongside those without over 100 years after the Conquest, so I'm leaning towards a functionality argument and/or it being a status symbol to be able to afford an extra bit of metal on ones shield.
In archeology you could call the boss of a kite shield perhaps a “typological rudiment”...a leftover from the round shields (Oscar Montelius for example used the concept as a necessary criterium for his “typological method” when establishing a relative chronology for the Nordic Bronze Age...a typological rudiment is in essence an ornamentalised feature of an artefact that harks back to previous forms when that feature still had functional use).
Or not if the boss still has more than ornamental use.
Thank you --- your hypotheses are so stimulating.
Glad you like them!
The piece at the end about whether medieval artists depict fantasy or reality was thought-provoking. There is a parallel in music: we assume today that music written before 1800 expresses the composer's feelings (like stormy passages in Beethoven), but in reality, most composers were craftsmen producing a workman-like product. They were mostly servants -- Mozart even complains in the 1770s of how far down the servants' table he was seated at dinner.
I really hope your game company make a medieval game on the future. It's about time tbh LOL
i'd prefer him to continue making videos, riding horses, and enjoying the good life.
game development is hell.
ya'll are so thoughtlessly selfish.
@@bo_392 I mean that's literally his job. he is a co founder & CEO of Rebellion. He can pursue his hobbies like this from producing games. It make total sense to combine his love for medieval history & game company by making a medieval game or an Arthurian game (based off of the concept teaser video too).
00:54 the pained cry of a Celt, to add some context
lol, I think that was the mule O'War!
@@ModernKnight ah, that'll be it, must prefer a parma to a scutum. Cavalry-minded chap, and whatnot ;-P
I thought it was a laugh track
We hear about ghouls and banshees, but maybe they were all just mules.
@@ModernKnight Mule O'War... Is that his official name?
"I allways feel sorry for the dragon, actually"! Finally, someone who cares about the dragon! Thank you, Sire! These poor creatures were hunted to extinction and are still treated like monsters in literature!
Great video, by the way!
I've tended to associate round shields with Saxons and kite shields with Normans, but I understand the kite was being used by the Saxons too.
Question, of the three kinds of shields in the tapestry (round with boss, kite with boss, kite without boss), are all three being used by both sides and in equal measure? Were the styles more popular on one side or other?
All but two or three are clearly kite shields, and from memory about a third that can be seen don't habe bosses at all.
I agree with your assessment of young vs veteran knights.
I gasp whenever I see a new video from you Sir Knight!
Love everything you do!
I think the early kite had a centre grip based on the earlier round shield as its the immediate precursor. And as the kite shield became the main shield type, we see the strap design coming into play before we see the heater shield in the late 12th century.
I enjoy the Norman content alot! Got to get the full mail kit going. Good work as always. It is a great point medieval art is not always fantasy. They lived the life and made art in relation to what they saw.
One of the great “What ifs?” of history. What if Hardrada’s Norwegians hadn’t invaded when they did, so that the fight between Harold and William was more of a “square go”? Do you think the outcome would have been different?
Yes, most probably. It was a very close battle despite Harold's army having forced marched the length of England. Harold would have been able to attack them as they were landing or still organising after landing. He'd been camped on the south coast exactly for that reason.
Yes. A shield wall is basically invulnerable to a cavalry charge
Also, defeating one of the most famous generals of the time (he had been a Byzantine Strategos/actual general by rank) got Harold Godwinson’s troops over-confident, so when the Normans retreated from the shield wall some English chased them, and could be defeated in detail.
...Or, what if Harold had ceded land to his brother Tostig and Harald Hadrada in the North then marched South with his own army plus however many thousand of Hadrada's Vikings/Danes!?!
The discussion of "illustrations: realistic or not" comes up in clothing history too. Theres a tendency to dismiss something that hasn't been successfully recreated yet as just artists making things up, but often the garment/accessory/design feature can be recreated if you actually put the effort into doing so.
Like what?
@@talknight2 pin.it/6giGnUe this blog post is a good example (of actually doing the work)
I think your ideas about the shields make sense.
I was trying to come up with a modern day equivalent of continuing with an old feature that may no longer be useful. How about the little extra pocket on most jeans? They were originally for holding pocket watches. Most people no longer have pocket watches, yet the extra pocket continues to be added.
Thank you for sharing what you learn in your research into the lives of our ancestors.
They hold coins nicely. Ignoring the silly idea of a pocket watch in jeans (usually worn by people who would not need expensive watches), they would not have held my grandfather’s pocket watch as it is too wide. If you can demonstrate that they have shrunk over the years, I might check further.
@@Egilhelmson That's fair. www.levistrauss.com/2014/05/01/throwback-thursday-501-jean-trivia-on-its-namesake-day-501/
I rather agree with you. Back when I was in school, I associated kite shields that have boss with eastern europe, since a lot of the times I saw art depicting slav warriors and be it old art or more modern ones - they had kite shields with boss, rather than without. My explanation at the time was that Normans had a lot of influence on that whole region due to abundance of big rivers and they were reluctant to get rid of the thing. My memory about all of that is quite fuzzy, but that's where my belief started for sure.
I completely agree with your train of thoughts in the end of the video. I'm often baffled how many historians discredit medieval ilustrations/paintings etc. Sometimes they even attribute some malicious intent to the painter if what they see somehow doesn't fit their worldview. I simply just cannot understand this logic. Especially if we consider, often these books/codexes were paid and ordered by a lord or a king because they wanted to keep record of their lands, stocks, cultures etc. So it usually wasn't some abstract mind-play, they needed accurate details.
Just tossing this idea out there. Perhaps the tapestry took so long to create that different people worked on it while shields were changing. Love watching these. Thank you for doing them.
Just recently found your chanel & im loving every second of every topic. Can't wait to tell my son about you. Every year he was 1 out of 2 boys at pony club camp. He wanted to become a stunt horse rider after finishing Eglinton games team. His Autism stopped him realising his goal which is a shame, but him & his 3 sisters all had a day jousting a few years ago & they all loved it, but he was especially good at it. He'll enjoy watching!! Ps your horses are just lovely. In all ways. And your mule.
Nobody:
0:53 Mule with no name in the distance: AAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!
wonderful insight. Thank you very much for an enlightening experience.
Our pleasure!
Fascinating dissertation. What’s funny is in my mind the boss shield says “I’m a shield” more than the slick shield.
Yet another great video Jason, always informative and a pleasure to watch. I think maybe the kite shield was preferred by the Normans as they relied on cavalry more in warfare than a lot of their early opposition, so a kite shield would protect the mounted Normans thighs and calfs in combat against a dismounted foot soldier. The Army faced at Hastings was a strong shield wall of dismounted Saxons with probably a majority of round shields for their style if combat.
the tapestry itself shows all the foot using kite sields as well, with one or two possibly round shields.
@@ModernKnight Yes, both mounted and dismounted Normans have them. I think the tapestry is amazing, such detail. Maybe the kite shield was a proven piece of equipment for the Norman way of warfare, and possibly was just an ease of production, as in William the bastard ordered a large amount for his force so every soldier kind of had a uniformed set of marching order. Ease of training, ease of supply. In the same way the current regular soldiers of the British army has the same model of personal weapon, and a standard kit issue. But i totally agree with you that it was a revolutionary change in shield use.
My 7 year old is obsessed with the legend of Zelda, which has shields, swords and horses. Now he loves watching your videos hahah. Thanks!
Great game, and I'm pleased he's found our work!
I've just discovered your channel & have immediately subscribed. Some excellent discussion & demonstrations.
Just on the Kite shield theory: I was always under the impression that the Kite shield was long to be used on horseback where it would help cover the leg . The shorter shield, or Teardrop, was used on foot; hence, you see it more on the Saxon side.
I once saw a great video by the historian Mike Loades where he theorises that the Kite shield could be used on the back of the horsemen to deflect strikes as he pulled away from a shieldwall of foot soldiers i.e. the Norman retreats at Hastings was a deliberate tactic. The lance would be used overarm in this scenario.
Thanks for watching, and yes there's a lot to learn about kite shields and their uses.
Even if the boss was intended as completely ornamental, someone would have found a use for it.
Besides we all know the smooth kite shield is for when a knight needs an improvised toboggan for winter battlefield hijinks.
Dressing up as a knight and living a modern medieval life you have the best job.
Very interesting video reading the shields and I think that you have made very good observations regarding the Bayeux Tapestry that is virtually a series of time photographs depicting what equipment the troops wearing in that period. I can only agree with you that whoever did this Tapestry invented absolutely nothing but only what they saw and is notable that they depicted the two types of shields, with and without the boss but also the type of armour they were wearing and including the different styles of haircut with or without the mustaches. Old and New indeed...
Good job again and I liked very much this video...
Another great episode, loved the idea!
What I couldn't believe was the amount of details on the Bayeux Tapestry. I was stunned. I especially was drawn to the bottom have of the Tapestry where the soldiers where disrobing the dead soldiers of their clothing, and helmets, and swords. I could of spent hours looking at it all. It took my breath away. The time it took to make this I can't even imagine.
But who was Aelfgyva?
I can imagine superstition could come into it aswell. As the boss was probably reused on successive shields after each battle, it was probably momento of those battles aswell as something that had literally guarded a warriors life repeatedly. A lucky talisman perhaps. Love the videos.
Very interesting view! Great video again.
Thanks for watching
I believe the "boss?" WOULD be useful as an effective bludgeoning point when you're in a shield wall and moving forward; as it keeps that buffer point between actually damaging your shield, having that recoil hitting the shield, rather than directly into your arm. Just as a point to make compared to your experience fighting, which I assume was more 1 on 1, compared to the larger scale that I imagine most these common soldiers would have been experienced to.
I love your channel! Keep it up mate!
About the shield you mentioned as targe, shield for jousting, it did was used for battlefield especially in like Eastern Europe until like the early 17th century, it kind of looked like a kite shield upside down, it known as Hussar Shield.
I have no experience with shapr sword, but nearly 20 years of experience fighting and training with both blunt, wooden or padded (realisticly heavy) swords.
If you strike from you right side to the shield, you can bind your cut to the oponents shield, which than gives you (sometimes) an oportunity to continue with a slicing motion somewhere around the edge of the shield. This is way harder if your oponent has got a boss on his shield, since those tends to deflect the cut away from the shield.
It is not a huge advantage, yet I do believe this would explain why there are people who likes bosses on thei shields.
Even today we have leftover bits of things in military traditions. Uniforms have epaulettes. Why? Yes, infantrymen still wear backpacks, but epaulettes are there to strap everything to your shoulders so you can walk without your musket or backpack straps slipping off. Some epaulettes don't even open up anymore and are sewed to the shoulder.
I've heard St. George was apparently in Libya when he slayed the "dragon", which in fact was probably a Nile Monitor, hence why it's small.
The one thing we have as humans is the ability to think about things. If some kite shields had a boss and some did not, then we can ask why. A few things come to mind; Economics, Status, Superstition, and Efficacy (how beneficial it was).
Economics: It would be cheaper to buy a shield without a boss.
Status: Adding a boss would show wealth (or maybe rank)
Superstition: My father used this boss in his days and it kept him alive, so I'll use it too in hopes I survive.
Efficacy: It's actually useful enough to justify it being on the shield (this would require further testing)
I'm sure we can think of many reasons why or why not.
I imagine where your wrist is placed in a kite sheild. Where the boss is looks like its right infront where your wrist would be.
Tod's workshop has a set of films/ videos of sheilds versus arrows.
The boss would protect and deflect arrowheads away from the wrist so the fighter can pickup a new shield. Making bosses are time consuming. Forging metal into a hardened boss takes time and money. Rather than making the shape and reinforcing striking edges or just general protecting as stated before sheilds were disposable and just pickup or make another on.
I guess kites with bosses where for fighters who knew they'd get more arrow fighter than the regular small foot soldiers.
Jason and the modern history crew thanks so much for experimenting history you really see this point of time in a different perspective this way. But I must say I miss that no name mule.I always hope to see him in one of your videos❤
I think the kyte sheald was used for 2 purposes: protecting the riders leg and horse, also to plant in the ground for infantry in case of a charge
From your explanation it came to my mind that no-boss is like a Ferrari and the bossed one like more all-purpose land-rover
Interesting video, as you said the shields have changed through time. People don't like change and try to hold on to the old style things longer. The round shield had a boss were it was held. The kite shield had has lashings that wrapped around the arm also with a boss. Do you think at some point the kite shield was originally held in the centre like the round shield.
Later young soldiers would be issued with a kite shield with arm lashings and no boss and that's what they learnt to fight with.
Would be interesting to find out if the first type of kite shield was held with a centre grip.
I like your point on art and photography.
Using the boss to catch the blade reminds me of the Highland target, which, 700 years later, had a small boss, and even sometimes a spike, that was used when deflecting to catch and divert the opponent's weapon.
targe*
@@JohnyG29 Autocorrect is a hell of a drug.
But for what it’s worth, the Gaelic is targaid (tar-gutch), which preserves the original final sound from the loan word more than the English term for this specific shield form.
I think autocorrect was a bit overenthusiastic and added a “t” at the end of “targe”
@@Robobagpiper I suspected it was the dreaded autocorrect.
Seeing as I neither know or care about any Gaelic I'll take your word for it! Have a nice life old chap.
@@JohnyG29 The aforementioned Highlanders who wielded the targe cared about the Gaelic quite a bit, though!
Cheers!
I'll tell you exactly what the boss is good for: protecting the user's arm against penetration by arrows. You can track an arrow's path in flight, and position your shield to take the hit. And instinctively you are going to try to position it so it will strike directly in front of your forearm. This, of course, is a Bad Thing if the arrow gets through even partially. The boss would thus prevent it from going through, as well as hold additional padding to stop it in case it made it through the metal and cushion blows against the shield to your arm.
Really like you thoughts on the shield boss never thought about it like that
Been watching your channel for a while. Just had a assignment at uni to find game development companies we would consider applying for. I never knew you was a founder of Rebellion!
lol!
Love that sword.
About the round shields, it is said that at least the Viking's were made of soft wood, so that when stricken the opponent's weapon would be likely to stay stuck in it. You didn't go to war often, so the longevity of a shield beyond one battle was not really important. The paint hid the wood grain direction. From the opponent's point of view, in the absence of a symbol painted on the shield, they could be fooled by the shield bearer, unable to know where the weak-point was.
For the shield boss, I assume, it made the production of the shields more expensive to produce, so some might not have had any out of cost-saving reasons.
If you imagine takeing away the pointy bit of the kite shield you can nearly see a round shield. I think the kite shield has developed from the round shield and therefore the early versions visually also resembled the round shields more.
The boss does put a large bit of metal in the center and where it needed most to protect your arm.
If you look at tod's tests with the long bow you can see how you might still want a boss to keep arrows out of that vital area.