How Much Do You Know About the Medieval Wars?

After invading England, William I of Normandy, aka William the Conqueror, was crowned king in 1066. He commissioned a massive fortress in London on the banks of the Thames as a symbol of Norman power and influence over England. In the centuries that followed, the tower was expanded into a compound called the Tower of London. Over the years it has served as a royal residence, an arms depot, and a prison.

Medieval castles were built as much for royal extravagance as for defense in battle, explaining famous features such as moats and turrets. Another key defensive tactic was the spiral staircase, designed so troops storming the castle from the ground couldn’t swing right-handed without exposing their bodies. Meanwhile, defenders used the staircase wall as a shield while swinging with their right arms.

A descendant of the famous House of Castile, El Cid was named standard-bearer (leader) of the Castilian army at the age of 22. But after fighting against the Moors in his youth, El Cid was exiled by King Alfonso XIII in 1081. He spent years as a mercenary for several Muslim kings until 1087, when Alfonso recalled him after a bad defeat in battle. El Cid went on to rule the coastal kingdom of Valencia.

During their early days in the 14th century, Janissaries were known for their combat ability and adherence to a strict code of discipline that prohibited marriage. Over the years, as they relaxed the standards for recruitment, the Janissary corps became a political faction as well, making deals with Ottoman sultans and others in the royal court for extra pay on top of their normal salary.

Beginning in the 12th century as an extension of the hauberk (a chainmail shirt that primarily protected a knight’s torso), gauntlets came into their own a century or two later. They also became gruesome weapons themselves in case a knight was ever forced into hand-to-hand combat, which is why the phrase to “throw down the gauntlet” means a general call to arms.

Designed in ancient Greece, ballistae were devastating siege weapons. The largest could throw 60-pound projectiles, or “bolts,” some 500 yards. With the fall of the Roman Empire, these machines became scarce because of their complex upkeep, but ballistae still played an important role in several battles during the Middle Ages, including a Viking horde’s attempted siege of Paris in 885.

The Battle of Agincourt proved a decisive victory for the English because of poor planning — and lots of longbows. A cocksure French army, around double the size of Henry V’s forces, took to the battlefield, but became bogged down in a rainy quagmire. English longbowmen, some 10 ranks deep, fired arrow after arrow, and soon French losses tallied in the thousands.

According to Arthurian lore, Lancelot was one of the strongest and most skilled knights in Arthur’s court. After Queen Guinevere was abducted, Lancelot came to her rescue and ended up falling in love with her. The actual existence of King Arthur is debated among historians, but his legend and associated stories established core themes of medieval literature, such as chivalry, romance, and knights battling evil.

At the Battle of Hattin, near Tiberias in present-day Israel, Sultan Saladin defeated the forces of the Crusader States in the Levant, making Saladin’s forces the major power in the Holy Land. Several cities fell after the battle, including the siege and eventual surrender of Jerusalem that October. The result of this crushing defeat eventually led to the Third Crusade two years later.

In 1214, England’s King John spent lavishly on a war to reclaim territory, which led to the Battle of the Bouvines. After his crushing defeat, a frustrated group of rebellious barons, no longer willing to finance the king’s foreign follies, created the Magna Carta. The charter stated that everyone was subject to the law, including the king, and that everyone had a right to a fair trial.

Arguably the most popular (and maybe the most inaccurate) film depicting medieval Scotland’s struggle for independence is “Braveheart” (1995). While the main narrative concerns Scottish hero William Wallace, it’s the supporting character, Robert the Bruce, who stormed the fields of Bannockburn in the film’s final moments — and in real life, earning one of Scotland’s greatest medieval victories.

The city of Constantinople was the crown jewel of the Byzantine Empire, which fought with the Ottoman Empire for centuries. Thanks to the development of massive iron cannons — sometimes weighing over 35,000 pounds and launching 1,500-pound stones — the Ottoman sultan Mehmed II destroyed the walls of Constantinople, took the city, and renamed it Istanbul, marking the end of the Byzantine Empire.

Viking raiders from Scandinavia were known for their horned helmets, longboats, and fierce attacks on cities of all sizes. Rowing up the river Seine to France’s capital, they attacked Paris multiple times in the second half of the ninth century, often receiving tribute payment to leave after sacking parts of the city. Vikings also attacked cities in Spain and England between the ninth and 11th centuries.

What began as a struggle over succession to the French throne snowballed into one of the major conflicts of medieval Europe, the Hundred Years’ War, which actually lasted from 1337 to 1453. Though France was the dominant power with more people and resources, England’s skilled troops made the conflict relatively even.

Before the strong Tudor monarchy, England was a country of constant instability as the houses of York and Lancaster fought for the crown during the Wars of the Roses. In the HBO series “Game of Thrones” (based on George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire”), the Starks and Lannisters engage in a similar power struggle. Many other characters throughout the fictional Westeros share similar traits with the major players in the real-life conflict.

Derived from the French word “esquier,” or “shield-bearer,” squires were usually adolescents who served knights in the hopes of one day becoming knights themselves. First serving as a page, a squire often took care of a knight’s armor and carried his banner into battle. Later, the word “esquire” came to mean a person of particular standing, usually landed gentry.

The Bayeux Tapestry is such a monumental historical artifact, it has its own museum in Normandy, France. This 230-foot-long embroidery tells the story of William the Conqueror, who, in 1066, crossed the English Channel and defeated King Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings. The tapestry was likely created soon after the Norman Conquest, which is why it remains an invaluable artifact.

Medieval knights were expected to be skilled in all forms of combat, but perhaps the most exciting was the jousting contest, a mock battle where two mounted knights would ride toward each other and attempt to knock the other off their horse. In Western Europe, jousting tournaments were massive spectacles that attracted huge audiences. The sport declined in the 17th century in favor of less violent competitions.

Despite its name, the Hundred Years’ War lasted for 116 years, beginning in 1337 and ending in 1453. The war arose from a disagreement over succession to the French crown.

Upon ascending the English throne in 1189, Richard I “the Lionheart” began selling off royal assets to fund arms for the Crusade. He fought bravely in battles with Muslim forces near present-day Jerusalem, but on his way home in 1192 he was shipwrecked and captured, eventually becoming a prisoner of the German King Henry VI. After attaining freedom in 1194 and briefly returning to England, he departed for France to retake Normandy.

After a 55-day siege, Sultan Mehmed II, also known as Mehmed the Conqueror, breached the walls of the mighty city of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire. Because the city could trace its founding to the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, some consider the fall of Constantinople to be the true end of the Roman Empire, a dynasty that lasted millennia.