Women warriors of the 13 century

They cut their hair and bound their breasts and fought along side men. please cease your veiled propaganda about no woman who fought in the 13th century if you only knew, one might be standing next to you in battle.
and so I implore you to see for your self look up women warriors of the 13th century. Men do not hold an exclusive right to battle. 1383 pope Boniface viii Wrote several letters mentioning geneoese Ladies who were crusaders .1353-1411 Margaret of Denmark Was a female warrior. Letters from petrrarch to cardanil giovani colona 23 nov 1343 ā€¦Maria of Pozzuoli mighty women of pozzouli sturdy in body and soul, with merit of virginity . Though she is constantly among men , usually soliders, The general opinion holds that she has never suffered any attaint to here chastity, whether in jest or ernest. Men are put off, they say,more by fear than respect Her body is military rather then maidenly, her strength is such as any hardened solider might wish for ,her skill and deftness unusual , her age at its prime, her appearance and endeavor That of a strong man. She care not for charms but for arms; not for arts and crafts but for darts and shafts;Her face bears no trace of kisses and lascivious carreses, but is ennobled by wounds and scars.Her first love is for weapons, her soul defys death and the sword.She helps wage an inherited local war.

This game takes place in the 15th century.

11 Likes

Lel. That ended quickly.

1 Like

please just stop.
If you want to complain about history, start out by learning the very basics.
the 13th century cover the years that start out with 12xx.

The women you mention lived in the 14th century. (and into the 15th in case of Margrethe I)
This Game takes place in Bohemia in the very early 15th century, making everything you wrote sort of irrelevant.
(wrong time wrong place)

Being a crusader do not make you a warrior. There is zero evidence that Margaret I of Denmark ever used a sword for anything.

Yes there where many cases of women leading their political faction. Some in the own right, most on behalf of underaged sons or imprisoned husbands. (and some who just ruled their husbands and keeped control of their sons)

We also know of a few exceptional women who lead troops in the field, like Joanna of Flanders. And she did likely carry weapons and armor. According to Froissart she even fought in person during a battle at seaā€¦
but even in this case there is no evidence that she was trained as a man-at.arms.

And in any case she did not get to do the things she did because she was a warrior,
but because she was the mother of the a boy who held claim to the Duchy of Brittanyā€¦ and her husband was imprisoned by the french.

Did some women dress as men and fight and succeed as men-at.-arms? properly, but we donā€™t have any sources about it. And their number would properly be so low to make them irrelevant. And since they dresses as men, why would we even know? making the hole point irrelevant.

I also find it very likely that some of the women, where it was known during their childhood that they would end up in a ruling position, would have been thought something about arms and military matters. At least among the Normans in the late 10th and early 11th century it was expected that a Norman wife knew how to run the estate and if needed defend the castleā€¦ so some sort of training in siege craft and the use of arms would make senseā€¦ but we are still lacking information on any of them actually going out to fight as a man-at-armsā€¦

Now IF later part of the story actually gets to the Hussite wars, I would agree that we would need to see women fightingā€¦ since It is my understanding that this actually happened.

And before you just claim this is male biasā€¦ Iam a strong supporter of women in the modern day military, and some of the best soldiers I served happen to be women. And I would love it if we one day found real evidence of women who was trained as man-at-arms and fought as suchā€¦

But as an historian, I do need to actually see proper sources on thisā€¦ and not just wishful thinking.

8 Likes

There is a whole tradition of maritial disputes solved by trial by combat (eg pits & sticks vs rock in a bag), also some examples of women fighting in traditional duels with swords, in harness.

Most of the named female war leaders did have harness and wore it during battles/sieges, but military administration/planning/leading the fight seem to be commonly described. Deliberately fighting in the front lines is rarer - I am aware of only a handful of the women at arms who are definitely noted as ā€˜fightingā€™ as opposed to ā€˜leading the defenceā€™ or ā€˜rallying troopsā€™.

As noted, the hussite wars saw a wider scale participation of common women in the armed and frontline forces (as opposed to merely being in the baggage train - partly at least because of the defence of the ā€œwar wagonsā€ in the line of battle, but also because this was a holy war). It was noted with distate from their opponents - suggesting that such participation was truly uncommon.

the men are also shown to be placed in a pit with head about the womans knee level to ā€œbalance out the fightā€

At least for some types of judicial duel. Iā€™m not sure that is very much advantage to the standing fighter though - though the combination of pitted man with club and mobile woman with rock in sack is an intriguing variation on the family court system, and one that should make a comebackā€¦ I do think that chivalry needs to be raised back to itā€™s proper place.

Much hilarityā€¦ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uH9Eqzcejws

Ironically, that would actually put the one outside the pit at something of a disadvantage. This is because the woman would have to swing low to attack, whereas her opponent can swing level (at the legs) or high (at the lower torso). As a result, the woman would have reduced range and have to get closer than her opponent does because you have better reach attacking high than you do low.

You see this in longsword fencing: Attacks to a low opening such as the legs are countered by stepping out and cutting to the head or shoulders.

By putting the man in the pit, he can actually strike his opponent well before sheā€™s in range to strike HIM. The only real advantage she gains is in mobility and the ability to control distance.

Back when Warhorseā€™s website had a blog section they made a post acknowledging women warriors and blacksmiths from the time period and even included links to websites where you could read up on some of the better known ones. They wrote the story of Kingdom Come around a male protagonist however, and were too far into development to incorporate a female option.

female blacksmiths i can believe (wives xtarting as assistants id bet, probably took over after husband died or was a away of something)

female warriors on the other hand i cant believe as easily
the female body is not built for combat, or any muscle intensive things actually
men and women have different roles, equality is good, brainwashing people into thinking that women should do the exact same things as men is not
this is not to be sexist, women if not encouraged to choose jobs typically men would do do not choose those jobs

its 1:25 and im sleepy af
i think ill turn in for the night now

Yes, I agree 100%, or more!!!
ā€¦mmmh, butā€¦ maybe this general argumentation is not the bestā€¦ :smile:

A good idea! :wink:

Sexist BS.

Yes the average male body is stronger than the average female body. But soldiers, be that the men.at.arms in 1403 or modern day (NATO) infantry are not average persons.
And yes, the % of the female population that is fit for it is smaller than the % of the male population, but that donā€™t change the fact that there are women who can do the job.

Of cause it would have been possible to train some woman to be a man-at-arms back then, just as it is possible to train some women today to serve as infantry.

But gender roles made sure it was not done.

2 Likes

Women warriors in medieval? Simply answer: 0.

Wrong answer.

3 Likes

Unless Iā€™m mistaken women mainly took part in support operations and maybe in defence in times of siege. However women WARRIORS in the early 15th century? I donā€™t think so. In Hussite wars that is debatable I guess, there are some reports that they really took part in some battles (throwing stones etc) and they definitely took part in the assorted pillaging and burning out villages during the armed rebellion.

Well you are just as wrong with that statement, as anyone saying that there where many.

If you want to make black and white statements you really need to much more clear about where and when you mean.

In an European context the medieval period include what in some areas are called the viking age.
And the sagas tell us about female warriors. It can naturally be debated how much we can trust the sagas, but a lot of things in them, like the colonization of Iceland and Greenland and the discovery of North american have been confirmed by archaeology.

So even if the exact details canā€™t be trusted the general stories often can be.
This do indicate that female warriors was not unheard of in viking culture.

Also viking age graves do sometime hold females who where buried with swords and other weapons.
Do that prove they where warriors? no, just like a male with weapons donā€™t prove he was a warrior. But that is the classic interpretation. (weapons = warrior)

Naturally what happened in another culture in the 9th century is rather irrelevant to the question of Bohemia in 1403, but that is why you need to be much more clear about when and where you mean.

another issue is how we even define ā€œwarriorā€?

2 Likes

well my definition of warrior is a person trained to fight in battles
but by this definition anyone trained to ā€œstick em with the pointy endā€ would be warriors but we all know thats not it

yeah sure but what of the day to day rigors
it takes more time for a women to relieve herself, and as far as i know women dont stand when taking a piss which leaves them much more undefended
and women have periods and the such

and simply saying the % of women fit for combat dosent cut it, a man of average fitness if plopped on a battle field with basic training wouldnt fare too badly
a average woman in the same situation would not do as well
the % of women fit for battle is far lower than the % of men

it would be like 1% of the male population is fit for battle and like 0.01% of women would be fit for battle
this is without training

i am not denying that women can not be effective in combat but generally they are not as effective as men

this dosent mean women cant be in the army, im just saying that combat is not one of their functions- and for good reason

and modern war isnt even as punishing as war wouldve been back then, it was far more physical in the middle ages since (well apart from ranged obviously) soldiers would be at most 20 feet apart (pikes) and generally 10-15 feet apart (safe distance away from a long spear)
modern war almost never resorts to hand to hand since everyone has a gun and can simply aim and pull the trigger (the amount of humans in the modern day that can aim to kill or injure is debatable)

You clearly have no idea about the physical demands of modern soldiers.

When danish soldiers was still deployed to the Helman province in Afghanistan the average weight carried on patrol was about 35kgā€¦ that is more than the weight a 15th century plate armour and needed weapons. And the weight of plate armour is way better distributed on the body than modern body armour, gear and equipment carried on the back. and they walked foot patrols in 40+ degrees C (that is 100+ F in case you are american)

and doing that day after day is way more demanding than warfare in earlier periods. Be that 19th century or 15th.
Actual combat war rare back then, and large battles even rarer.

Sure females only make up a few % of the danish infantry force, but they are there because they can do the jobā€¦ and have done so in combat.

And you clearly donā€™t know any women who live active lives where they sometimes have to piss out in natureā€¦ they can manage it.

2 Likes

He never even mentioned the weight of armour in his post so Iā€™m not sure why youā€™re bringing that up. An average women is completely and totally physically out matched in fight with an average man, even a stronger than average women would be outmatched by a man of average strength.

Sorry if that hurts your pc feelings, but itā€™s a fact and thereā€™s nothing sexist about stating it. Your experiences in modern warfare have zero relevance, because you said yourself a modern solider almost never enters hand to hand combat.

1 Like