Susiron

theaudientvoid:

youcantseebutimmakingaface:

sunderlorn:

rhube:

Suddenly all those Hinterlands quests to go round up a random farmer’s druffalo don’t  seem so silly.

Dragon Age Inquisition – doing something right.

(source)

#war in pre-industrial societies was *very different* from what many people imagine#i keep seeing calls for ‘realistic medieval huge military battles’ and im like#yon average feif could maybe afford like 10 guys tops

YES. This whole thread is the best thing and betterbemeta’s tags (above) are on point. I would love actual ‘realistic ancient battles’ where like ten actual fighters and whatever serfs they can persuade to accompany them posture and try to intimidate each other, or have an Official Scrum on a mutually beneficial day. That and just…cattle raiding.

I guess in post-collapse terms it’s theoretically different because your whole raider gang exists to nick other people’s shit so doesn’t need to cultivate or craft much except perhaps to make them more self-sufficient in weaponry, armaments, and other logistical things that’ll enable them to raid harder and more often. That’s exactly why, on the other side of things, as many citizen’s as possible in your vulnerable good-guy farming commune might need to be militia members to protect themselves from people who can dedicate their full-time everyday energy to Being Raiders.

I say in theory because, even if you’re nicking other people’s shit, why not treat that as a bonus? Why not look to history’s peoples who placed a particular import on raiding as a way of life, and notice that none of them were just straight-up predators. They had enough agricultural or pastoral or pescatoral (is that a word?) infrastructure to subsist, and then the luxury, the surplus, came from attacking other people part-time, very occasionally. Look at norse folks going viking; look at the invasive pastoralists of the Eurasian steppe. Just in terms of the caloric requirements and risks inherent in combat, you’re not gonna want to do that full-time. Training to do it well will take more calories and they need to come from somewhere. You pick your battles. You take without fighting at all where you can – so intimidation and making enemies surrender without having to fight is important here; c.f. pirates of the Golden Age – and you fight rarely and only when you know you can a) win, b) benefit hugely from it.

THANK YOU

Back in Anglo-Saxon England, land was measured in units known as hides, the exact acreage of which varied depending on how fertile that land was. A general rule seems to be that Anglo-Saxon kings seemed to expect every five hides had to provide one warrior (thegn) for the king’s army. Each hide was divided into four virgates or yardlands, the exact size of which varied, but was was typically about 30 acres. Half a virgate was considered enough to support a peasant family, with particularly wealthy peasants potentially having a full virgate or more (though in that case, they would likely have to employ hired hands, as that would be too much for one family to farm on their own). Small holders with less than a fourth of a virgate would have to either practice a trade of some kind, or else work on someone else’s land to make ends meet. On average, though, you had about two families per virgate. That’s 8 families per hide, and 40 per thegn, or between 150-200 people needed to support one warrior. Now, that warrior probably wouldn’t go into battle alone. He’d probably bring an entourage of between 2 and 5 people with him, some of whom would be non-combatant servants, but at least a few of whom would be expected to fight. This entourage would likely be drawn directly from the thegn’s personal household, which would be expected to take up arms and follow their master to war. This system of thegns and hides eventually evolved into the complex system of manors and knight’s fees seen in the high middle ages and later. Additionally, each unit of 5 hides was expected to provide one sailor for the king’s navy.