Draft Proposal: New list – Habsburg-Burgundian Netherlands 1478-1506
Author: Duncan Head
Synopsis:
Proposes a new list for the rump Burgundian state in the Netherlands
under Maximilian of Habsburg.
* Introduction
* Proposal
* Justification
* Impact on Other Lists
* References
Introduction:
The published Mediaeval German list (IV/13) has several options
intended for Maximilian's army at Guinegatte (1479). The DBM lists
treats this army as "German": while the Low Countries list ends in
1478 specifically with Maximilian's assumption of power in the
Netherlands, the Mediaeval German list allows for Burgundian
knights, Low Countries Pk and a Pk C-in-c after 1478 specifically to
cater for this battle.
I suggest that in fact this army, and in general the Low Countries
remnant of the Burgundian state, should not be treated as a German
army. Ideally it should have its own list; if this does not prove
practical it should be covered by an extension of either the Low
Countries or the Burgundian Ordonnance list, perhaps until the death
of Philip the Fair in 1506, rather than by any "German" list. The
army that won at Guinegatte was fighting for Maximilian as husband
of the heiress to Charles the Bold, not as a German ruler (until
acquiring the Tirol in 1490 Maximilian had no power-base in
Germany); its generals were veterans of the Burgundian service, its
cavalry were a revival of the Burgundian Ordonnance companies, most
of its infantry were Flemish levies, and it was financed by the
towns of Flanders.
The main problems that I see with this list – although, as ever,
more information on just about everything would be nice – are how,
if at all, to distinguish the Flemish militia pikes from the
landsknecht mercenaries that replaced them; and the treatment of the
dismounted nobles used to stiffen those pikes.
Proposed list:
Habsburg-Burgundian Netherlands 1478-1506 AD
Cold {DBMM Cool}.
Ag 1.
{DBM:} WW, Rv, H(G), Wd, E, RGo, M, _Rd_, BUA
{DBMM:} S, WW, Rv, GH, Wd, E, BF, M, _Rd_or_PRd_, BUA
Nominal list scale: One element = 250 foot or 200 mounted (normal
scale)
C-in-c - Reg Kn (S) or Reg Kn (O) 1
Sub-generals - Reg Kn (O) 0-2
Ducal household men-at-arms – Reg Kn (S) 0-1
Ordonnance men-at-arms and coustilliers – Reg Kn (O) 3-10
Ordonnance mounted archers – Reg Mtd Bw (S) 1 per ordonnance Kn
Downgrade mounted archers as crossbowmen – Reg Mtd Bw (O) 0-1/3
Ordonnance foot archers – Reg Bw (O) 0-1 per 2 ordonnance Kn
Militia pikemen – Reg Pk (I) 32-60
Militia or mercenary crossbowmen – Reg Bw (O) 2-6
Militia or mercenary handgunners – Reg Art (X)/Reg Sh (I) or Reg Ps (S) 1-2 per crossbowmen
Siege artillery – Reg Art (S) 0-2
Field-guns on wheeled carriages – Reg Art (O) 1-4
Organ-guns or other light pieces – Reg Art (I) 0-3
Wagon-laager to protect camp – TF @ 1 AP 0-12
{DBMM only:} Archers' stakes – PO to protect front of Ordonnance
mounted Bw (S), ordonnance foot archers, or English longbowmen – PO @ 1 AP any
Ships – Irr Shp (S) {Any infantry – DBMM "any foot"} 0-2
Only in 1478-1479:
English longbowmen – Reg Bw (S) 0-2
Swiss mercenaries – Reg Pk (S) 0-8
Only in 1479:
Replace Kn generals with generals on foot – Reg Pk (O) 1-2
Upgrade militia pikemen as stiffened by dismounted nobles – Reg Pk (O) all
Only in 1480-1481:
English longbowmen – Reg Bw (S) 0-6
Only from 1480:
Replace generals with mercenary generals on foot – Reg Pk (O) 0-2
Replace militia pikemen with mercenary landsknecht pikemen and halberdiers – Reg Pk (O) 16-32
Verlorene haufe detached halberdiers – Reg Bd (F) 0-1 per 16 mercenary pikes
Rules considerations:
1. Household Kn (S) may only be used if the C-in-c is Kn (S), and must be in his command.
2. Kn generals may dismount at any time as Pk (O) if their command contains any Pk.
3. Otherwise Kn may dismount only when specified in the main rules, as Bd (S).
4. Siege artillery may only be used to defend PF, or if the enemy has PF.
This list covers the Low Countries from the establishment of new
ordonnance companies to the death of Philip the Fair. After the
death of Charles the Bold at Nancy in January 1477, the fractious
Low Countries held out against attacks from Louis XI of France in
the name of Charles' daughter Marie, who married Maximilian, the
Habsburg Archduke of Austria, in that year. During 1477 this defence
was carried out by militia armies best represented by the Low
Countries list. But from 1478 militia infantry were supplemented by
ordonnance companies similar to Charles'. The ordonnance of November
1477 that set them up called for 800 lances. Numbers varied
thereafter, to a maximum of 1200 lances. Each lance contained a man-
at-arms, a coustillier, an unarmed page, two mounted archers, and an
archer on foot – though these last were not a success and gradually
disappeared. At first most of the army's infantry were still Flemish
and other militia pikemen, supplemented by smaller numbers of Swiss
and German mercenaries (mostly pikemen and handgunners,
respectively?) and English archers. The militias were sometimes
competent on the battlefield – especially at Maximilian's victory
over Louis at Guinegatte in 1479, when their confidence was
stiffened by their generals and several hundred other nobles
fighting alongside them on foot. Hence two generals in 1479 can be
represented as pikemen, for the counts of Nassau and Romont. A Pk c-
in-c would represent one of those, treating the young Maximilian as
a figurehead; a Kn c-in-c would represent Maximilian, who at first
fought mounted but joined his infantry after the defeat of his
horse. But the militias were unreliable; for example they disbanded
soon after Guinegatte, preventing any gains from the victory.
Therefore, from 1480 Maximilian gradually replaced them with German
mercenaries, known from c.1486 as landsknechts, though the militia
remained available for emergencies and for defence of their own
towns. Flanders in particular was often rebellious, especially after the death of Marie in 1482 when it championed the cause of hers and Maximilian's son Philip, as the true Burgundian heir, against his father: Maximilian was even held prisoner in Bruges in 1488. In such cases I assume
that ordonnance lances, or equivalent troops, may have been seen on
both sides of struggles which in any case rarely came to open battle.
Justification:
Aggression –
The "Burgundian" Netherlands were largely on the defensive during
this period against France (French Ordonnance list, Ag. 2). So Ag 1 seems
suitable.
Terrain –
In DBMM "WW" has been split into Waterways, Sea and Lakes; the Low
Countries can definitely justify Sea, and WW should probably stay
for the Lower Rhine, though whether it is part of the core area of
the state might be debatable.
Scale and army size –
Sablon (2003) suggests Maximilian fielded about 30,000 men in 1478.
The next year, Monstrelet claims his army was 60,000 strong at
Guinegatte; but Sablon's 27,000 is far more likely (and matches
Commynes' 20,000-plus). Richert suggests only 19,000. These may have
been the largest armies assembled during the period, others being
the mere 5,000 Maximilian could send against the Luxemburg revolt of
1480 (Sablon 2003) or the 12,000 men besieging Utrecht in 1483
(Ward). This all fits reasonably well into the "normal scale" of the
rules.
Generals –
It was noteworthy that at Guinegatte several of the commanders
fought on foot with the Flemish pikes. Engelbert Count of Nassau,
and Jacques de Savoie, Count of Romont – both veterans of Charles
the Bold's service – seem to have deployed with and commanded the
infantry from the start. However, this does not seem to have been
the universal practice – though it may have inspired the later
willlingness of generals to dismount to encourage their landsknecht
mercenaries.
Maximilian himself apparently fought initially on horseback and then
dismounted to fight with his infantry (Benecke p.33, etc) once his
cavalry had been defeated – Molinet (cited by Rennoldson 2003) says
that Maximilian first broke his lance fighting a French man-at-arms,
then – probably by then fighting afoot – knocked over a franc-archer
and captured a Breton. Philip of Cleves-Ravenstein is identified as
the defeated commander of Maximilian's cavalry; but the maps
attached to Burke's article, at least, show cavalry on both wings of
the army, so it seems possible that Ravenstein commanded one cavalry
wing, Maximilian initially the other. (Alternatively, perhaps the 19-
year-old Maximilian should not be treated as a general at all in a
Guinegatte refight, but as a mere figurehead, Nassau or Romont being
in real command. Hence the option to class generals as pikemen in
1479 is not restricted to sub-generals; a Pk (O) c-in-c would
represent Nassau or Romont, while a Kn c-in-c who can dismount as Pk
would represent Maximilian.)
Maximilian dismounted and marched on foot with his pikemen on other
occasions, notably at the entry into Ghent after the defeat of its
rebellion in 1485 (Richards p,8). Willibrord von Schaumburg, Albert
of Saxony's general, and other officers dismounted and stood in the
front ranks of the landsknechts at a battle in the Netherlands in
1491 (Richards p.32; this is probably during the fighting against
peasant rebels in Holland mentioned by Ward). The Pfalzgraf
Friedrich led a group of noblemen coming to the aid of Philip the
Fair's war against Gelders in 1505, marching on foot with shouldered
pikes; he might have been another such pike general if this force
had actually fought, but they didn't in fact arrive in time to join
the army.
Household –
Sablon (2) mentions the ducal household as an element in the Low
Countries' military resources ("Même avec le renfort de l'hôtel
ducal…"), but how many and what sort of troops that entailed I do
not know. The two elements allowed here (two including the Kn (S) c-
in-c) are a guess following Charles' army. Allowing only the C-in-c
to be (S) would be a possible alternative.
Compagnies d'Ordonnance –
Maximilian's rump Burgundian state re-instituted a professional army
of Ordonnance companies on the model of Charles the Bold's. After
initial attempts to resist French advances with civic militias only,
the provinces' Estates agreed to fund a paid force which an
ordonnance of November 1477 established as 800 lances. Each lance
consisted of a man-at-arms with three horses, two mounted archers
rather than Charles' three, and one foot-archer (Sablon 2003). Since
the lance in 1547 still contained a man-at-arms riding a barded
horse, a coustillier also fighting as a heavy lancer and a non-
combatant page (see Heath), the meaning of "three horses" must be
the same three horsemen – man-at-arms, coustillier and page – as in
Charles' organisation.
Heath (p.127) says that four of Charles' original 12 companies
survived in the Netherlands as late as 1547. Although at least one
company was in the Netherlands at the time of the defeat at Nancy
(Jacques de Visque's company – see McGill p.44), and therefore could
have been available for re-organisation, it seems more likely that
the companies as re-established in November 1477 were completely new
units rather than survivors of Charles' organisation. The only two
captains I have seen mentioned – the Comte de Chimay and the Prince
of Orange (Sablon 2003) – do not seem to feature in the list of
Charles' ordonnance captains (in McGill), and Sablon mentions that
Orange's company was new in 1480. The low ebb that the army had
reached at the time of Marie's death in 1482 (Sablon 2) may also
have necessitated further re-organisations thereafter.
The ordonnance of November 1477 established 800 lances. Numbers
thereafter fluctuated considerably, Sablon (2) suggesting a minimum
of 300 lances and a maximum of 1200, though whether this many were
ever mobilised in one place seems unlikely so I allow a maximum
equiating to 1000 lances. Molinet suggests there were 825 lances at
Guinegatte (Richert), Sablon (2003) opts for 800. For convenience I
have assumed an element represents 200 men, that is the men-at-arms
and coustilliers of 100 lances.
I do not include pages in these calculations. The pages in Charles'
army sometimes rode with the men-at-arms and coustilliers, and
sometimes held the horses of the mounted archers (see Axworthy 105
p.14). Since they were not expected to be armed – they are the only
members of the lance for whom no arms are prescribed in any of
Charles' ordonnances – it is arguable that they should not be
included in any fighting element at all.
{But if a mounted element is more like 150 men, the lower end of the
range now allowed in the DBMM rules, and if you include pages in the
element, as both the published Burgundian Ordonnance list and Luke's
alternative one do, then one Kn element could represent a mere 50
lances, and their numbers should be _doubled_. One would have to
make sure that the same arithmetic was applied to their French
counterparts if their numerical superiority at Guinegatte were not
to be lost.}
The DBR "Maximilian Imperial" list (I/9) implies that "Burgundian
and similar" men-at-arms fought in deep formations that might be
represented in DBM(M) by double basing; but it is not entirely clear
whether this is meant to apply to the "Burgundian" lances of the Low
Countries ordonnance, or to a force Maximilian tried to establish in
Germany on the Burgundian model: "Maximilian thought the existing
cavalry past redemption. Instead of seeking to improve it, he
recruited new gendarmes on the Burgundian model, but still fighting
in the old deep German formations. Accordingly, all lancers in this
list can have rear support, Burgundians only from other
Burgundians…". Not having found a source for applying deep
formations to the "genuine Burgundians" of the 1477 ordonnance, I
make no such provision here.
Ordonnance mounted archers -
Figures suggest that Charles' army had trouble maintaining the
establishment three mounted archers per lance. However without any
specific information on numbers in Maximilian and Marie's armies, I
suggest keeping to their lower establishment figure of two per
lance – Charles' strengths sometimes approximated to this ratio
anyway.
Charles' archers are classed as Bw (S) since they wore armour and
carried longbows and hand-and-a-half swords. At some stage,
certainly by 1547, their successors (though still two to a lance)
ceased to be real archers and became part-armoured lancers or
carabins (Heath). With no information on when this transformation
took place, I assume it was after 1506 and that until then
Maximilian's archers followed the earlier model.
Some of Charles' mounted "archers" were in fact crossbowmen – 600
out of 3,600 by the ordonnance of 1471. I allow an option for some
of Maximilian's archers being either crossbowmen or bowmen of lower
quality than desired, and hence Bw (O) – how many highly-trained
longbowmen the Netherlands could produce is unclear.
Ordonnance foot archers -
The revived lance of November 1477 included one infantry archer,
rather than the three infantrymen of Charles' lances. Perhaps
because so many infantry were available from other sources, these
gradually disappeared – hence are not compulsory in this suggested
list. Sablon (2003) implies that they fell out of use during the
period that article covers, that is by 1482; so Heath's suggestion
that the infantry of the lances may have disappeared in the 1520s
does not seem likely, unless they were not formally abolished until
that date.
Militia pikemen –
In spring 1477, after Charles' heiress Marie of Burgundy had been
obliged to confirm the rights and privileges of the various
provinces, they agreed to raise an army to resist French
advances: "In place of the ducal army which had ceased to exist,
100,000 men were to be levied, of whom Flanders contributed more
than one-third, and the rest in proportion. Raised by means of half-
obsolete feudal obligations, or as communal or rural militia, this
army, though its numbers were helped out by a system of substitutes,
proved inadequate to its purpose; but the fact of its levy not the
less shows that the mind of the Netherlands had been made up to
resist the French advance" (Ward). In fact 100,000 was a distant
target: the Estates of the Burgundian provinces voted to raise
34,000 men at once, increasing to 100,000 in due course; they were
to be composed as follows:
Flanders 12,000
Brabant 8,000
Holland and Zeeland 6,000
Hainault 3,000
Artois and Boulonnais 4,000
Namur 1,000
- and of these, only Flanders and Brabant provided many men to the
field army (Sablon 2003).
This mostly-Flemish army had some successes in 1478, retaking
Tournai (Ward) – though by now it should have been joined by the new
ordonnance lances. In 1479 Jan van Dadizeele, a Flemish noble, "so
effectively reorganised the Flemish forces, of which he was named
captain-general, that Olivier de la Marche describes these well-
disciplined levies as the largest army he ever saw put into the
field by Flanders. Town and country had combined to furnish it
forth; and not less than five hundred nobles served with it on foot"
(Ward).
Militia pikemen remained the mainstay of the army at Guinegatte in
1479. Commynes says there were 20,000 or more Flemings there, most
of whom would be pikemen; Molinet has 11,000 Flemish pike (Richert);
Monstrelet mentions 14-15,000 infantry under the Comte de Romont
(whom Commynes has as one of the two commanders of the infantry).
Thereafter they were replaced by mercenaries, because of the
unreliability the militia had often displayed – though off the
battlefield more than on it. I am not quite sure how to represent
this change: both Flemish pikes and landsknecht pikes-and-halberds
are normally represented as Reg Pk (O): the Flemings are praised in
contemporary sources as good pikemen and certainly fought well at
Guinegatte; the defeats inflicted on Flemish militia pikemen by the
French in 1477 may have been caused by other factors, such as their
lack of cavalry support. But making the militia Pk (I), as being of
uncertain and fluctuating loyalties (given the intermittent
rebellions in Flanders and elsewhere) and of varying levels of
training and experience, also seems justifiable. At Guinegatte,
their greatest success, the militia were reinforced by some hundreds
of dismounted nobles and gentlemen – 200 (Commynes) or 500 (Ward,
probably from Olivier de la Marche), including their generals Nassau
and Romont. The best way to represent this, particularly since the
army of 1479 seems to have been regarded as better than in 1478, is
probably to allow all the pikes, in that year only, to be upgraded
from (I) to (O) as being "stiffened" by the nobles fighting
alongside them. They can then later be replaced with (O)
mercenaries.
In his Burgundian Ordonnance list Luke suggested representing large
Flemish militia forces as allied contingents; but that does not seem
an appropriate solution in this later period, when the militia were
not generalled by their own leaders – although these did command at
lower ranks, Jan van Dadizeele for instance leading a Ghent
contingent of 1,600 men - but by ducal officers such as Nassau and
Romont. (Though admittedly Romont later commanded the Flemings in
rebellion against Maximilian, in the name of his son Philip, in
1484: his loyalties were to the house of Burgundy rather than
Habsburg.)
After 1480, the local troops were less important but do not seem to
have fallen entirely out of use. While Flanders was often
rebellious, Brabant was more loyal partly because of Maximilian's
championing of the commercial interests of Antwerp (Benecke p33;
Ward refers to the joint armies of the Emperor and Maximilian in
1488 as "Germans and Walloons" indicating Maximilian's continuing
support in Brabant). German mercenaries formed only about a quarter
of armies levied in 1480 and 1483. However the militia remained
available for use in emergencies and to defend their own towns –
"Ausi l'arrière-ban roturier n'est-il plus utilisé après 1480 que
pour la garde des villes et des passages, ou en cas d'extrême
urgence" (Sablon 2). They may have been fielded more rarely after
the death of Marie in 1482.
Crossbowmen, handgunners –
Molinet has 3,000 bowmen, crossbowmen, and handgunners to 11,000
pike at Guinegatte (Richert) – roughly one "shot" to four pike
(whether or not the 500 English are included), though 800 or so of
these were (or at least should have been) the ordonnance lances'
foot archers. Burke went for 2,000 German handgunners (perhaps
Commynes' "some few Germans"), without mentioning crossbowmen.
Sablon (2003) says there were 4,000 Swiss and German mercenaries in
the army in 1478, which may have included many handgunners though
the Swiss would have been mostly pikes. In pictures of this battle
from the "Weisskunig", Maximilian's autobiography begun about 35
years later, reproduced in Arquebusier XXVI/VI, archers are quite
prominently shown flanking and occasionally deployed in front of
pike-blocks (in both the French and Flemish-Burgundian armies) while
crossbowmen are entirely absent and handgunners very rare.
I see no need to distinguish between militia and German mercenary
missile-troops.
Archers' stakes –
Burgundian archers were using stakes as least as early as Montl'héry
in 1465 – "all the archers with their boots off and with a stake
driven into the ground before them" (Commynes p70) – and stakes are
illustrated in the prints of Master WA, while the lead mallet
carried by Charles' ordonnance foot-archers was probably intended to
drive in stakes (Axworthy, etc). I exclude stakes from ordonnance
mounted Bw (O), who are intended to be crossbowmen. The English
archers may not have used stakes as regularly as they did during the
Hundred Years' War, but they are frequently mentioned throughout the
first half of the 16th century (Heath p.48) so were clearly still in
the repertoire if required.
Artillery –
I have no numbers for artillery. I assume a mixture of field
guns on Burgundian-style wheeled and elevating carriages, and
smaller pieces. A siege train existed (mentioned by Burke) but I
assume it was not used in the open field.
Camp TF –
Wagon-laagers were a standard north-European tactic by now.
(Commynes mentions baggage-wagons being looted at Guinegatte but
doesn't mention any laagering.) However in the absence of specific
evidence I have not included fortifications other than for the camp,
despite Charles' frequent use of fieldworks.
Ships –
In the militia army to be raised in 1477, the 6,000 men initially
required of Holland and Zeeland were to be replaced by a fleet of 36
ships crewed by 5,000 men (Sablon 2003). How much use they saw I do
not know, but some ships were available to the provincial
authorities in Holland in 1490 to defeat the revolt of the Hoek
faction in a naval battle at Brouwershaven (Ward) so some naval
resources were presumably available throughout the period. Two
elements, however, seems enough as long as there is no good account
of their operating along with land forces.
Swiss –
Swiss mercenaries reinforced the Flemish army in 1478 (numbers
unspecified by Ward, while Sablon (2003) says there were 4,000
taking Swiss and German mercenaries together). I assume about half
of these may have been Swiss pikes, half German missile-men. This
would be too few Swiss to be an allied contingent, and no separate
leadership is mentioned for them.
English –
English archers reinforced the Flemish army in 1478 (Ward). Some
fought at Guinegatte - 300 according to Commynes, 500 according to
Molinet (Richert) – under Sir Thomas Everingham (see Meek; "Abrigen"
in Commynes). A larger force of 1,500 English archers served in 1480-
1481 (Sablon 2003).
Mercenary pikes -
Faced with the unreliability of his militia infantry, shown by their
disbanding after the victory of Guinegatte, Maximilian responded by
hiring mercenaries. The Estates voted 500,000 écus for the hiring of
mercenaries in 1480 and 1,000 German mercenaries were included in
the small army of 5,000 sent against the revolt of Luxemburg in that
year, while 1,500-2,000 served in an army of about 6,000 against
Liègois rebels in 1483 (Sablon 2003). "In 1485 5,000 Germans marched
eight abreast into Ghent, on foot `in very fine order' " (Gravett
p.22). By 1486, when he was elected King of the Romans (and also the
year when the word "landsknecht" is said to be first documented for
such troops), he had two armies of 3-4,000 mercenary infantry each
(Richards p7). They were training in Bruges in 1487 and the
mercenary `Black Guard' which fought in Danish service from 1488,
until defeated by the Dithmarschen at Hemmingstedt in 1500, was
apparently recruited by Maximilian in Friesland originally for use
in the Netherlands (Richards p7) – though much of Friesland was not
yet under his effective control.
Landsknechts are classed as Reg Pk (O) in existing lists, the
halberdiers being subsumed in the pike-blocks. Richards p7 suggests
that some of Maximilian's first mercenary units, raised before 1486,
were "of dubious quality", but whether this justifies a downgrade I
am not sure.
I have allowed for 4-8,000 mercenary pikes, based on Richards'
suggestion of two forces of 3-4,000 each; the smaller contingents of
1480 and 1483 are in turn part of armies too small to be reflected
at normal scale. The verlorene haufe "forlorn hope", a detached body
used as an advanced guard, was a standard landsknecht tactic,
certainly in the early 16th century. Two-handed swords do not yet
seem to have been a common weapon, so the forlorn were probably most
or all halberdiers.
Impact on the main Medieval German list, IV/13 (or its replacements):
- Delete:
Only after 1478 AD:
Regrade C-in-c as Reg Pk (O) @ 24 AP 0-1
Ex-Burgundian compagnies d'ordonnance – Reg Kn (O) @ 12 AP 0-6
…
Regrade city militia Bd (I) and Pk (I) as Low Countries Reg Pk (O) @ 4 AP Any
These entries are now covered by this Netherlands list.
- Replace with:
Only from 1486 AD:
Regrade C-in-c as Reg Pk (O) @ 24 AP 0-1
While the provision for a Kn c-in-c to dismount as Pk may be
inspired by Maximilian at Guinegatte, an incident now covered by the
Netherlands list, it can stay in the German list as well since he
marched on foot with his pikemen on other occasions when Emperor,
notably at Cologne in 1505 and Milan in 1516 (Richards p8) and other
nobles are often recorded doing the same. However it should probably
be re-dated to Maximilian's accession as King of the Romans in 1486,
his first real political power in Germany.
- Allow the following allies:
Only Imperial C-in-c from 1486:**
Habsburg Netherlands allies: List - Habsburg-Burgundian Netherlands
In May 1488, Maximilian, with troops from those provinces still
loyal to him, assisted his father, the Emperor Frederick, in a
campaign against the Flemish rebels – "Maximilian, as a prince of
the Empire (not "for his own quarrel"), felt himself compelled to
take part in the punitive campaign against Flanders" (Ward) –
although the Flemings claimed to be fighting for Maximilian's son
Philip. This command should count as being commanded by a sub-
general rather than an ally, on the model of the Polish-Lithuanian
alliance: Maximilian was the Emperor's son, after all.
So far I haven't found any instances of the opposite alliance –
German allies in the Netherlands list. The Imperial Diet of 1489
granted Maximilian 6,000 men to campaign in the Netherlands for six
months; but he later commuted this to funds enabling him to hire
2,000 landsknechts. Even if those troops did actually serve in the
Netherlands, they can be counted among the existing mercenary
infantry.
Impact on the Low Countries list, IV/57:
- Change the end date from 1478 to 1477.
The armies that fought to defend the Burgundian inheritance in the
Low Countries in 1477 were composed of militia, mostly from Flanders
with smaller contributions from Brabant and the other provinces.
From 1478, professional lances set up by the ordonnance of November
1477 were available and the Habsburg-Burgundian Netherlands list is
appropriate.
References:
Axworthy, Michael, "Je l`ay Emprins – The Burgundian Armies of 1476"
(Slingshot 104/Nov. 1982 – 106/March 1983)
Benecke, Gerhard, "Maximilian I (1459-1519): an analytical
biography" (Routledge Kegan Paul 1982)
Burke, Brian, "Guinegatte 1479" (Arquebusier XXVI/VI, 2003)
Commynes, Philippe de, "Memoirs" (trans. Michael Jones, Penguin
1972). Also online at
http://www.r3.org/bookcase/de_commynes/index.html and see Rennoldson
for another translation
Gravett, Christopher, "German Medieval Armies 1300–1500" (Osprey
1985)
Heath, Ian, "Armies of the Sixteenth Century: The Armies of England,
Scotland, Ireland, the United Provinces and the Spanish Netherlands
1497-1609" (Foundry Books, 1997)
McGill, Pat, Armand Pacou & Rod Erskine Riddell, "The Burgundian
Army of Charles the Bold – the Ordonnance Companies and their
Captains" (Freezywater Publications, 2001)
Meek, Edward L, – summary of "The career of Sir Thomas
Everingham, `Knight of the North' in the service of Maximilian, duke
of Austria, 1477-81" ("Historical Research" v.74 issue 184, 2001)
online at http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/links/doi/10.1111/1468-2281.00126
Rennoldson, Neil, "Two Contemporary Accounts of Guinegatte"
(Arquebusier XXVI/VI, 2003 – Commynes and Monstrelet)
Richards, John, "Landsknecht Soldier 1486-1560" (Osprey Warrior
series, 2002)
Richert, Ernst, "Schlacht bei Guinegate", (Berlin, 1907) – haven't
read this myself, but I have some troop numbers courtesy of Daniel
Sodders in message 12922 on the REMPAS Yahoo list
Sablon du Corail, Amable, "L'armée, le Prince et ses sujets: le
financement de la guerre aux Pays-Bas bourguignons après la mort de
Charles Le Téméraire, 1477-1482" (Revue Internationale d'Histoire
Militaire 83, 2003); online at
http://www.stratisc.org/partenaires/cfhm/rihm/83/RIHM_83_20.htm
- (2) "Aspects militaires de la guerre pour la succession de
Bourgogne, de Nancy au traité d'Arras (5 janvier 1477 – 23 décembre
1482": précis of this thesis online at
http://theses.enc.sorbonne.fr/document66.html
Ueda-Sarson, Luke, "Burgundian Ordonnance 1471 AD - 1477 AD" –
alternative DBM army list at http://www.ne.jp/asahi/luke/ueda-sarson/BurgOrdDBM.html
Ward, A W, "The Netherlands", Chapter XIII of "The Cambridge Modern
History, volume 1" (1903) at
http://www.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenaref/cmh/cmh113.html
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