In an effort to steer this forum toward the topic of Historical combat, I thought I would post this tantalizing and important (I think) bit of evidence that I came across the other day regarding the relaying of orders on the battlefield.

I found this in Volume two of Isabelle Cazeaux's translation of de Commynes "Memoirs" (University of South Carolina Press, 1973). To set the scene, it is immeadiatly following the Battle of Fornovo (1495), and the French army is bivouaced in a state of exhaustion... "The King woke up early, and mounted on horseback one hour before daybreak. A trumpet sounded _Faites bon Guet_ [be on the watch], but nothing else signaled the decampment..."

Here is a clear reference to a recognised trumpet call, and it's particular name - I got excited (I don't know if it interests anybody else). This took place 20 years after the Burgundian wars, de Commynes doesn't refer to it as a novelty, and the last action I am aware he had been involved in was during Louis XI's conflict with Maximillian over the Duchy of Burgundy in the 1479/82. Perhaps this can be taken for some evidence of recogniseable set calls being used in the last quarter of the 15th c.

Any thoughts on this one?

I've spent a fair amount of time looking for decent references to military signals. Unfortunately the almost universal sound is silence from the records. There are a few allusions to the signals and some not unreasonable suppositions which can be made.

The first thing is that almost without exception, in c15th England at least, when battlefield commands are being relayed they are in the most simple terms and involve the Standards and trumpets.

To paraphrase 'they sounded their trumpets and advanced the standards'

This fits exactly with the equipment lists I've seen.

So the first point is (in England) that I believe that the trumpet is the primary martialing vehicle. I need to go back and look at the Ordinances for Edward's army as I'm sure these do make further references to commands being issued.

The second is the ommission of drums. A contrast to later periods and I have a suspicion indicative of the difference of in the field moves & oganisation ... drums=beat=rhythum=marching etc. A (for want of a better phrase)far more regimental process (note the contrast to Swiss illustrations, like those of Schilling, of 'bill blocks' where drums DO appear ... )

Third ... any possible precedents elsewhere ?? Surprising enough quite a lot!
There are numerous Medieval books on Hunting (Gaston Phoebus and The Master of Game being only two). Most of these detail very specific trumpet calls to signal the different stages of the hunt (chase, recall, the kill etc. etc.) Most are variations on a theme and work like a morse code (using patterns of long and short beats rather than varying the pitch of the note).

As Hunting was seen by many as a peace-time preparation for war and the skills and requirements of the hunt (e.g. to direct disparate groups at speed and at distance) closely mirror the battlefield requirements it seems likely (but it is only a suposition) that the same, or at least similar, techniques were used, especially as the officers in an army would typically be of the social group who knew these calls as they were the very same people who would hunt.

Any throughts ...

Interestingly enough, de Commynes makes multiple references to the Swiss contingent in the French army drumming. His comments on the Swiss drumming are much on the order of English explorers of the 19th c. commenting on aboriginal ceremonies.

I am of the same opinon as yourself regarding the origin of the calls. In a society where 90% of the Military high command were nobility, and nearly 100 % of the nobility were avid sportsmen, the hunting calls seem logical. They were certainly well developed enough to transmit basic commands. I just wish that there were more solid leads, and that somebody of a musical bent had been kind enough to write down their obsevations of same, and provided some sheet music for us!

Oh yes, lest I forget, the same source is constantly mentioning trumpeters (during the Burgundian wars as well as I recall), and he is detailed enough in his explanations of the Italian campaign that he makes it quite clear that anybody (including himself) in command of a unit of any size had one or two trumpeters with him - used them as messengers as well. I would theorise that it was common practise in England, France Burgundy, Italy, and the rest of Northern Europe. We also know the Swiss used their peculiar horns to relay signals.

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Bob R.

You'll love this then ... several of the Medieval Hunting books do have the equivilant of sheet music for the calls. I've only seen these in transcribed to a modern format for printing but they are all based on grouping of long and short beats ... either shown as dots and dashes or a troorororot troot ... type phonetic notation.

I must re-look at de Commynes to see these comments as they sound interesting, thanks for pointing them out!

pg. 390

You have come up with an excellent example of the classic command and control problem when an officers commands were only effective as far as his shout would carry. Hence the advancinf, waving, and retreating of standards and banners.

A good deal too would depend on an armies level of drill - not as impossible as it sounds. The Dutch town millitias were frightened by the English advancing in step at Browerhaven - which indicates a basic drill employed. We also know for a fact that Burgundian companies of the ordinances drilled, with the manouvers expected of them listed, but no clue as to how they executed their drill. The Swiss also drilled by files in their cantons as weekly or monthly training (else they would not have been nearly so effective). Unfortunately, to my knowledge the earliest explanation oif drill we have is past the mid point of the 16th century.

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Surprising enough quite a lot!
There are numerous Medieval books on Hunting (Gaston Phoebus and The Master of Game being only two). Most of these detail very specific trumpet calls to signal the different stages of the hunt (chase, recall, the kill etc. etc.) Most are variations on a theme and work like a morse code (using patterns of long and short beats rather than varying the pitch of the note).

As Hunting was seen by many as a peace-time preparation for war and the skills and requirements of the hunt (e.g. to direct disparate groups at speed and at distance) closely mirror the battlefield requirements it seems likely (but it is only a suposition) that the same, or at least similar, techniques were used, especially as the officers in an army would typically be of the social group who knew these calls as they were the very same people who would hunt.

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That was exactly what I thought when I read this thread. As a modern foxhunter, I have been heavily steeped in the sometimes insane traditions and protocols of the hunt.

French horn calls and hunting tradition is even more convoluted than the English one I was brought up in. I will have to put my hands on it but I do have a listing of French 16th century horn calls. They are noted in a style similar to modern Morse code as a series of long or short notes. I know that's a century later or so than most people's interest lies but it has been my personal experience that hunting traditions are honored and not subject to rapid change.

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I am of the same opinon as yourself regarding the origin of the calls. In a society where 90% of the Military high command were nobility, and nearly 100 % of the nobility were avid sportsmen, the hunting calls seem logical. They were certainly well developed enough to transmit basic commands. I just wish that there were more solid leads, and that somebody of a musical bent had been kind enough to write down their obsevations of same, and provided some sheet music for us!

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It does seem logical, I'm looking forward to this discussion.

Brenna

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Originally posted by Gen d'Arme:
I know that that singing marching songs has nothing to do with relaying commands. I just thought I would point it out as something I believe was probably done. As far as relaying commands are concened - Between horns, trumpetts and drums it makes sense to use the horn or trumpet as a drum does not carrey over noise as well as a trumpett.

Pieter.

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Ok I mnew to this forum, but posted a very similar thread to this on another forum and was recomended to check this one out, so Im reviving this thread.
My main interst lies in the Compagnies d'Ordonnance of Charles the Bold, around 1473.

I have been doing a lot of research into drill and battle commands, coming up with lots of references again to commands being used for lots of different (and logical) things. And the use of Trumpets, Drums, Banners and voice commands. But again only very tantilising evedince for the actuall trumpet blasts, drum beats, or vocal commands. I do agree that the trumpet calls from hunting may well have been used for battle, if so we have some surviving notation for them, however could anyone give suggestion of how to corralate a hunting command to battle command? Form up, March, Charge, Retreat, Re form what are these likely to be in hunting terminology?

Also, marching songs, does anyone know of any sources for possible Burgundian marching songs?

Cheers
Joram van Essen

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I haven't seen any evidence outside of Germans using it to specificaly signal commands prior to the date you mention. Various drums are of course mentioned in Froissart, but no evidence for using them for signaling - in almost every case I've sen it mentioned using an instrument to relay simple commands in a French/Flemish/Buirgundian/English context in the late 15th century, it seems to invariably be with trumpets.

I have speculated that the German troops in the Burgundian army may have brought the custom with them, but this is speculaion, and no based on any direct evidence.

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I know that the Landsknects are a little later then the period your interested in, but they appear to use drums and not trumpets. At least I haven't read anything about trumpets being used in Landsknecht armies. There is a lot of evidence that they used pipes and bagpipes. Maybe the pipes could be heard above the din of battle, like what was suggested above. You can see a lot of woodcuts with either drummers with the standard bearer, pipers with the standard bearer, or all three. What we might be seeing is a communications center that relays information by sight and sound? I know the standard bearer was considered to be very high in the command structure. Just some random thoughts, hope they help.

Jason
Veltin Grimm

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Originally posted by Peder:
Question,

Does anyone have any actual evidence of anyone other than the Swiss using drums before say 1480?

Brent

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In Medieval Dutch Armies at least both drums and bagpipes were used, no reference to them being speciffically used for signalling, may simple have been there as a morale thing, same with singing.

See Verbruggen, The Art of Warefare in western Europe.

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Yes, with a but....

THe question is relating directly to 15th century armies. We have references to the Swiss in the mid-1490's using drums for signaling, and this is noted as an oddity by the observer reporting it, who is Franco-Burgundian, and at the time has 30 years of occassional military experience in at least two large campaigns. This is good evidence that it is a novelty at this time.

The Landesknechts were directly imitative of the Swiss, and so would copy the custom (and of course they are German, from the area where the custom originates), and so have no bearing on the question regarding the rest of Europe.

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To the best of my (admitedly limited) knowledge, most surviving 15th century music is religious rather than secular in nature. The musical notations are primitive, and open to a wide interpretation, and the secular music we have tends to be in the form of verse to songs that we have no known tunes for, in most part.

My best hope would be to find one or two popular songs known to be from mid 15th century Burgundy (hopefully with musical notation), with a tempo that could be marched to if necessary. I think the odds of finding a specific martial air, from the reign of Philip le Bon or Charles the Bold to be on the odds of winning the Irish sweepstakes grand prize 5 years running. I am inclined to think that soldiers would probably sing popular tavern songs as likely as anything else on a route-march.

If you find any Flemish or Burgundian secular music that isn't court music for formal dance, I would be delighted to see it. Perhaps we should start a post with the intent of listing known 15th century secular music?

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Yes Im on a full scale search at the moment for 15 C secular songs (particularily Burgundian) I'll keep you posted with what I find.

BTW Im starting up a Re-enactment group here in Holland on the Ordonnance of St Maximim des Treves, october 1473. 6th Company, 1st Escadre, 4th chambre. which was intitially recruited in 1472 from Holland, Zeeland and Guelres, current conducteur Bernard van Ravenstein, although he will die at Neuss next year...
Which is one of the reasons Im trying to find reccords of actuall commands used and songs.
Hopefully I'll have a functionng website up soon Http://www.geocities.com/compagnie_de_ordonnance

Cheers
Joram

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The man, the man, the armed manThe armed man is to be feared.Everywhere it has been proclaimed That everyone should arm himself with an iron coat of mail.

THis is from a 13th C French song, though seems to have stayed popular at least in France for quite while.

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Very good news - the Burgundian companies of the Ordonnance seem to be reconstituting themselves - we represent the third chambre of the tenth (Baudoin de Lannoy during your chosen era).

It would be very interesting if we could have an event together at some point (maybe camp outside Neuss? I'm sure the chamber of commerce would love that ), but we would have to leave our horses at home, too expensive to ship to Europe - never mind he quarentine....

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I know this is a LONG time after your posting, but my group was just discussing when approximately the use of marching in step became general, and you had posted this above:

"The Dutch town militias were frightened by the English advancing in step at Browerhaven - which indicates a basic drill employed."

Do you have the specific date on that? I would be most happy to learn this, and report back.

Per trumpet calls, the earliest WRITTEN call specific to the military that I've been able to track down is from 1632, the "Schwedischen Reitersignal", but I should LOVE to find earlier ones... specifically 16th Century. But 15th would do fine!

Thanks,

Gordon

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Haven't the Washington Irving 'translations' been discredited?

The whole description of the Grenada Campaign was fiction yes?

Dave drop me a line when you have time.

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