Battles Before the 17th Century

From the 11th to 15th centuries it is thought that the losing side in the average battle left from 20 to 50 percent of its men dead on the field. At Courtrai (1302) the French lost 40 percent of their army, the same figure for French losses at Poitiers (1356) and Agincourt (1415). This sort of encounter was, understandably, highly risky in the eyes of commanders. Not just the military outcome of a given battle, but the political stakes of the whole war were put in jeopardy by the vagaries of combat. Also, threat to life and limb of nobles was extremely high; even worse, destitution loomed possible if one was captured and had to pay a huge ransom to regain liberty. Field armies were also expensive and most of all, extremely hard to supply. Reserve armies were rare to nonexistent because it was just too expensive and inefficient to raise and billet an army and not use it.

A single defeat of a king’s field army might prove decisive, losing the war and with it much territory, titles, prestige, and wealth. In addition to the usual haphazards and chance outcomes of battle, field commanders could never be sure of the loyalty or fighting quality of the numerous mercenaries in their employ: would these men fight or run? And for whom would they fight? More than one commander rose on the morning of battle to observe that, during the night, a part of his army had gone over to the enemy and had lined up on the other side of the field, where the pay was better or the chance of survival deemed greater.

Mercenary captains made war as a game in which competitive positioning of field armies by each commander was designed to avoid more than to engage in battle, while gaining some slight advantage should battle nevertheless result. Both might then withdraw without offering combat, one giving an admiring salute to his opposite number in concession that he had been outmaneuvered and lost the advantage of topography or secure lines of supply. Given the contingency and risk of battle, wise commanders and monarchs usually preferred the controlled risks of a siege. Kingdoms could be, and were, made and unmade in battles that turned on some chance event or unpredictable act of heroism or cowardice by some underling.

An old English nursery rhyme captured this reality well: ”For want of a nail the shoe was lost, for want of a shoe the horse was lost; for want of a horse the battle was lost, for want of a battle the kingdom was lost.” In China also, commanders often tried to avoid battles, seeing them as too risky militarily and politically. Dynasties rose and fell as a result of battles, cities were saved or sacked, thousands lived or died. That meant those who had wealth and power usually hunkered down behind solid fortifications and fought to keep it at the least possible risk, while those who sought power or plunder employed ruses and stratagems of any and every kind to force a battle that might bring the chance to rise high in the world in the course of a single hour or day.