Medieval Weapons: An Illustrated History of Their Impact

Robert D. Smith · Kelly DeVries

Apr. 2007 · Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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This fascinating reference covers the weapons and armor used by warriors from the 4th to the 15th century and discusses how and why they changed over time.

In the Middle Ages, the lack of standardized weapons meant that one warrior's arms were often quite different from another's, even when they were fighting on the same side. And with few major technological advances in that period, the evolution of those weapons over the centuries was incremental. But evolve they ultimately did, bringing arms, armor, and siege weapons to the threshold of the modern era. From the fall of the Roman Empire to the beginnings of the Renaissance, Medieval Weapons: An Illustrated History of Their Impact covers the inexorable transformation from warrior in the mail shirt to fully armored knight, from the days of spears and swords to the large-scale adoption of the handgun.

Medieval Weapons covers this fascinating expanse of centuries in chapters devoted to the early medieval, Carolingian, Crusade, and late medieval periods. Within each period, the book details how weapons and armor were developed, what weapons were used for different types of battles, and how weapons and armor both influenced, and were influenced by, changing tactics in battles and sieges.

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Kelly DeVries, PhD, is a professor in the Department of History at Loyola College, Baltimore, MD.

Robert D. Smith is an Independent Museum Consultant who formerly worked at the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK.