Evolution of swords through the middle ages

greetings I'm shad and welcome to the evolution of the medieval sword now to most the medieval period begins around 500 AD and continues on till around 1500 AD so that is the sixth century to the sixteenth century now there is some room to move but generally though that's the time period that we'll be looking at in regards to the medieval period what needs to be understood as we start to look at the main evolutionary leaps in the swords design throughout the medieval period is that no one really knows the exact reason why these changes were adopted we can speculate we can make their most educated guesses we can but ultimately in the end we will never definitively know the exact reasons why these changes took place it's not to say that all our reasonings could be wrong indeed a lot of them could be right but we'll never really be able to do ultimately confirm all of our conclusions so I will share with you some of my own opinions and insights as to why these evolutions took place in saw design but please understand that I don't 100% know why each one of these changes did take place and I don't really think anyone does all we can do is make the most educated guesses that we can and indeed that's exactly what I will be doing now the most common type of sword at the very beginning of the medieval period is a sword that many people would call a Viking sword though there are many people who don't like that name because it's a bit inaccurate some people call it the Viking period sword or Scandinavian sword or early medieval sword personally I just like to call it sweared but what should be noted about this early period medieval sword is that it is a clear evolution from the Roman spatha and indeed not much in its overall shape and design has changed the garden pummel of this verad would be made out of steel but in contrast to the esparza they were more often made out of wood you will also find very distinct and wide Fuller's on the Viking period swords and that would make their weight distribution and mass quite different to a period style spatha which makes many people feel it should be given at own category separate to that type of sword now what you will notice about this varied is that it is clearly a sword that is meant to be used with a shield it doesn't have much hand protection and it isn't considered a fast weapon it's more top-heavy in regards to styles of swords and that very much complements sword in shield style combat but even those swords very much around in the very beginning of the medieval period they weren't that prominent swords very much symbols of status and prestige and only the more wealthy types of warriors would be ow to afford getting one of these weapons you see swords required more steel than the common types of weapons which are more axes and Spears and they required far more work in the terms of the forging and manufacturing to make a sword that was serviceable for the rigors of combat but what we will find is that sword started to become more popular from this point on and the techniques in forging and making swords were being refined even further making them more efficient and cost effective so this is where we really begin in regards to our journey with the medieval sword some of the first changes in this early type of sword that we will see as we go through the medieval period is changes in the size of the guard it gradually becomes bigger bit by bit indeed to the point where you would call it a cross guard the pummels also started to change indeed you will see that they started to become more rounded now why did the sword start to adopt these changes well like I said before ultimately I don't think we will ever definitively no but we could rightly assume that by increasing the length of the guard they were offering more protection to their hand so it's not unreasonable to assume that extra hand protection was a desired feature in the sword in this period but these changes continued until we reach the full cruciform style medieval sword and these swords have full length cross guards and the sword stayed in this shape for quite a while afterwards after the sword adopted its classic cruciform shape there was a very significant change in its design as you would go further down in history and that was increasing its size to the point where you needed two hands to use it thus came the longsword now many of the other design changes that happened to the sword happened both on the longsword and the one-handed arming sword together and a lot of the reasons were similar as to why they developed on both but the reason for why the two-handed sword was introduced well that one is a bit tricky to answer and indeed there's a lot of debate on this topic one of the more common reasons that people state helped facilitate the two-handed swords development was advances in armor where armor advanced the point where a shield was no longer essential it freed up the second hand which provided the opportunity to make a bigger sword and a bigger sword meant greater reach which was a very significant advantage as well as greater mass which meant more penetrating cuts and power behind each sword swinging so there are definite advantages to two-handed swords but as to the specific reasons to why they were developed well not everyone likes to accept the answer of the development of armor freeing up the second hand I don't personally have a problem with that I think it fits quite well and it makes logical sense and we certainly do not see two-handed swords before the period of more advanced armor the counter-argument is that long swords were indeed used quite a lot without armor for self defense by the noble elite and if they were so popular to be used without armor that does raise a legitimate question as to the reason of the long sword being developed thanks to the advancements in armor now there were some more extreme variations on the design of the sword once it reached it's more classic cruciform style and one of these more extreme deviations was in having a single edged and these swords came to be known as phocians now there are actually a lot of different styles of fashion and fashions continued on throughout the medieval period adopting two-handed variations as well as additional hand protection now again there's no real definitive answer as to why the faction was developed though there is some interesting thoughts that we can apply to this question and one of these interesting reasons is that the classic cruciform styled sword was not as often allowed to be used by civilians indeed in some cases it was illegal for civilians to use that style sword because this style sword was very much associated with the night it was the shape of a cross and represented knighthood in a large measure and so one of the answers as to why the function was developed was that it was a sword that was not in this Cruiser form style and thus the more noble elite did not have too much of an issue with civilians using them indeed the falchion was actually more of a common soldier weapon now that is a thought it is not a definitive answer and we probably will never know the exact reason why the fashion was developed but we can't assume in a broad sense that people want a greater cutting capacity as well as ease of use both things of which the fashion offers over other style swords now in regards to the one and two handed cruciform style swords the next kind of evolutions that we see as we continue on through the medieval period is not in regards to the guard or pummel but in regards to the dynamics and shape of the blade you see armor was also advancing and going through its own evolution as was the sword and armor started to get better and better and so instead of simply hacking at the parts of the body that people weren't wearing male like on the legs now people were wearing male on the legs and then metal plates were added to the armor first on the torso pauldrons were added gauntlets Greaves and these plates then started to cover more of the body than the male did to the point where full plate armor was introduced and the only areas to wear a sword could penetrate were the gaps that were left open so the person who was wearing the armor could still move easily now these gaps would usually have some type of protection like gambeson but more often it would have male and so the sword still needed to be at a penetrate male but it really had no chance of being outer penetrate these thick steel plates so it became more important for swords to adopt designs that could penetrate all this armor that more people were starting to wear so swords started to develop more acute points and on top of that there started to become more tapered towards that point this lower the center of balance on swords close to the hilt enabling quick control of the blade and beds of precision in aiming that point to the areas where they wanted to strike their opponents specifically the vulnerable areas to which these more acute points could penetrate that male and this emphasis on more acute points actually grew and grew to the points to get that they're to the point which is a little joke I'll give you time to laugh at it because I'm sure you're laughing your heads off done good let's continue to the extent where you see fully tapered blades so there's no more need for a curve at the tip near the end of the sword because the gradual tapering of the sides of the blade goes to a very fine acute point anyway not only did the tips of swords become more acute and tapered but their cross-sections changed to help the rigidity and stiffness of the sword so more force could be transferred directly into the thrust which of course made the sword far more efficient in slipping through the rings of male and bursting it up ah sorry I didn't mean to scare you nyeh I wasn't scared nah but you screamed no mm-hmm nah didn't I thought I heard a scream yeah yeah that was my um cat uh-huh well I guess your cat has some powerful lungs he won Olympic gold in the breaststroke so what are you doing here I just wanted to say that you're forgetting that the advancements in the armor eventually closed up all those major gaps and besides you interrupted my video on the evolution of armor so I figured it'd be very much fair to just do the same back to you oh so you're doing a video on the evolution of armor well I wasn't planning on interrupting that but I definitely will now get you back for scary or Anatomy huh you're right I haven't finished that yet how exactly did you interrupt it when I'm not even done with it I had a very specific and detailed answer for that wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey well I just wanted to say that for every step along the evolution of a sword armor kept pace in fact you see this go to a ridiculous extreme in the high middle ages as swords became primarily a thrusting weapon on the battlefield armor got to the point where it could even prevent the the slightest tip of the sword getting through the chinks in the armor you see this a lot in large pauldrons that cover large bits of the chest and in fact they created a special circular a piece of armor called the best you that actually covered your armpit area as you were to move just to make sure nothing could get in now of course bits of chainmail would be woven into gambeson x' that were worn under the armor to protect the very very vital spots but some armor got to a ridiculous extreme covering nearly the entire body in full plate armor and this got so ridiculous that there are suits of armor out there that legend says you can't even pass a needle through the gaps to me that suggests that well armor it kept pace and maybe even outpaced the sword you were very correct my friend though there were some sword designs adopted to try and combat such extensive levels of armor one of the best examples of this is the sword called the stock the ax stock is basically a very stiff metal bar with a very pointy end with their handle of a sword and it was designed primarily for thrusting and getting through heavily armored opponents but because of the continued advances in armor technology the sword became a very ineffective weapon against it and what we see are other weapons that were developed and emphasized to combat heavy armor and these are weapons like the pole axe the halberd the Warhammer the mace which are more specialized armor combating weapons and they became more prominent on the battlefield now were they more prominent than the sword well it depends in what context because the sword will always be extreme convenient to carry around it can hang at your hip without it getting in the way really at all and so what we find is that people were still carrying swords but not necessarily as primary battlefield weapons in contrast to the battlefield thanks to manufacturing cost and significant social changes the sword was becoming more of a civilian weapon but with the sword being used in a more civilian context now you would rightly expect that the sword would undergo through changes in evolutions to help assist it to make it a more effective weapon in that environment and so what is the difference between a civilian environment and the battlefield well one of the big differences his armor isn't it and the main evolutions that happen during this period was more hand protection it started with small ring guards that would protect the finger that people would often put over the front Quillen of their sword side rings were put on swords to protect the fists as well as additional sweepings that would go down in front of the fists beginning with a knuckle guard and then side guards and then that evolved into the fully swept hilt now what actually caused these changes and evolutions to take place well in a broad sense it was that the sword was being used in a more civilian context but as to the specifics of that those are more hard to pin down some people say that because gauntlets weren't used in a more civilian context more hand protection was needed another theory that people have was that swords being used in a civilian context were used more without shields and that brought the hand that used the sword more forward to their opponent and as they were presenting their hand more to their opponent they needed it to be more protection on the hand some people say that simply because more people were using the sword it became far more likely that people would think of little innovations and changes that would improve its design overall but whatever those specific reasons are what we can say is that these changes in this part of the swords evolution was most primarily due to the fact that more civilians were using a sword than ever before and the changes in the swords design most certainly suited a civilian style of combat now because the sword was being used in the civilian context so much more often than it ever was before there were some other distinct evolutions that happen in its design separate to changes around the garden handle and what we see here is the development of the rapier sword perfectly specialized for the one-on-one duel now what you might not have noticed here is that we've actually left the medieval period by this point the period where full swept hilts were used was actually more in the Renaissance period but the sword was still very prominent even in the early Renaissance which is why we're going to step over the medieval period just a little bit to look at some of the various unique and distinct evolutions in the sword during this time now the longsword wasn't dead it still evolved in conjunction with its one-handed cousin it also adopted side rings and more elaborate protection around the hands but then it's size was increased even further and this is where we step from longsword to the great sword now why was such a massive weapon invented in my opinion because it's awesome what is better than a two-handed sword a bigger two-handed sword and of course the great sword offers advantages that no other sword can bring purely because of its incredible size but in truth the great swords heyday was short-lived and this might be because the nature of the battlefield was about to undergo a severe change and that was the firearm guns now guns were around during the same period as great swords there was some overlap in the periods in which they were used but if we have learned anything about the evolution of the sword it would be that weapon evolution was a very prominent and real thing and of course the gun became more and more effective and with the growing use of firearms in both the battlefield and civilian life the swords prominence started to dwindle but it's not to say the swords disappeared altogether they still found a use in a military context for quite a while into the period in which guns were used and this was more predominantly by cavalry but I think we can all agree that guns spelled the end for the practical use of swords on the battlefield and in civilian life yeah the same thing happened to Armour well more or less and if you'd like to know more about the evolution of Armour throughout the Middle Ages and how it matched that of the sword click on this floating little box go on click it did you click on it well hurry up but in the mean time thank you for watching and farewell

Channel: Shadiversity

Views: 404,361

Rating: 4.9012651 out of 5

Keywords: sword, swords, evolution, change, design, changes, middle ages, medieval, knight, knight's, weapon, armor, armour, medieval review, shad, shadmbrooks, viking sword, sverd, arming sword, longsword, mail, chain, chainmail, full plate, greatsword, great, long, arming, spatha, viking, shield, blade

Id: xldqZDunfXo

Length: 18min 19sec (1099 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 28 2016