I’m not picking out
specific films, just commenting on some historical inaccuracies which
are common. Some have a film-making excuse (such as the lighting
one), others are just plain wrong.
I’ve never used a
bow, but I know that the war bows used (most famously by the English
at Agincourt) in the medieval period were immensely powerful. So
powerful, in fact, that a huge amount of training was necessary not
merely for the skill aspect, but to have the physical strength
necessary to draw one back. If an average modern man tried it, their
skeleton would give way before the bow did.
Even if you were very
strong, you would draw back and either loose immediately (for a high
arc, aiming for a mass of men type shot) or pause very briefly to
target a specific individual. You most certainly would not hold it
whilst your buffoon of a commanding officer had hundreds of archers
in agonising exertion because he decided to leave a huge gap between
the words ‘draw’ and ‘fire’ [more on that below]. It’d be
physically impossible, as well as immensely stupid.
Whilst we’re on bows,
they aren’t ‘fired’. They aren’t firearms, there is literally
no fire involved (unlike guns). They’re loosed or shot. This is a
pet hate of mine (although it’s very easy to do it by accident, so
it’s a bit more forgiveable than the idiotic idea of having men’s
shoulders torn apart by needlessly holding back a fully drawn bow for
half a minute).
Scots and woad do not
mix. Woad was applied by Picts (the word is from the Roman name for
them, the same root as the word ‘picture’, because the Picts were
painted). The Scotti were a Hibernian (Irish) tribe that migrated to
Caledonia, killing and conquering the Picts. As an aside, woad was
antiseptic, and may’ve helped slightly with preventing wounds
becoming infected.
An understandable
inaccuracy relates to plate armour. Plate armour (beneath which would
be mail and a quilted jacket that was, by itself, strong enough to
sometimes prevent an arrow piercing the body) was bloody fantastic.
Medieval knights shifted from the sword and shield to the two-handed
sword because the armour was so good a shield was pretty much
superfluous. Curved metal plates with mail and gambeson underneath
rendered a knight almost impervious to attack (the longbow was
something of an exception to this, and one reason French knights
detested English archers). At Agincourt, an awful lot of French
knights either drowned in mud or were stabbed in the skull (either
through eye holes in helmets, or after having their helmets wrenched
off). Getting through plate is a devil of a job. Something like a
crow’s beak works relatively well but in a duel a sword would
outclass such a top-heavy weapon.
However, in films you
do have to kill and wound characters. Having everyone wander about in
surprising safety would rather kill dramatic tension, so this is the
most understandable inaccuracy. That said, stabbing’s the way to go
if you want to knock off a knight in armour. Slash at him with a
sword and you may annoy him by scratching his favourite breastplate,
but bruised pride is about as far as the wound will go.
Battles often
degenerate into
mêlées,
but this was generally not accurate. Whilst the medieval period
didn’t quite have the strategy of the Greek and Roman world,
tactics and battlefield deployments were not haphazard, nor did
warfare regress to pre-Roman Celtic mayhem. Being together in a unit
is advantageous. If you’re spearmen, you get a bristling hedge of
steel to face the enemy, and a shield wall to confront their attack.
If you’re archers, you get a cloud of arrows which is rather harder
to avoid than just the one. Not only that, foot soldiers who are
spread out are a horseman’s dream to destroy. In formation, foot
soldiers can fend off cavalry with relative ease. Routed, infantry
are target practice for horsemen.
There are also a number
of little everyday inaccuracies, some of which are understandable,
others of which are odd. Maps were pretty uncommon (there are some
famous examples, such as the old mappa mundi, but these were
exceptions rather than the rule). They can be useful for storytelling
purposes, but mostly they weren’t needed. A man from a village
would know the way to the nearest town. If he needed to go on from
then, he’d ask for directions. The absence of maps and
understanding of geography beyond the immediate vicinity did have
occasional perverse consequences, such as the horde of peasants that
followed the First Crusade asking if they were nearly at Jerusalem
after a few days of walking (they weren’t).
Clothes were not bland.
They were often bright colours, sometimes of differing hues.
Mud-stained peasant brown was not the extent of the 14th
century colour chart for poor people. (Some believe Robin Hood was
actually invented by dyers to advertise their wares).
Cartwheels have spokes.
This is not high technology, it’s common sense. A solid wheel
weighs a lot more, creating more work for your donkey and increasing
the risk of the cart sinking into mud.
Thatch has to be thick.
Several feet, at least. You can’t have a few layers of straw and
call that thatch because it won’t actually work.
In the modern world,
we’re used to constant and widespread light. But that just didn’t
happen in the medieval world. Yes, there were light sources,
including the hearth, candles, lamps and torches. But these things
aren’t free. The hearth devours wood, candles cost money, lamp oil
is expensive (which reminds me, boiling oil wasn’t used by those
defending sieges so much as boiling water or sand [much cheaper]) and
torches only last thirty minutes or so.
When an explorer enters
an ancient ruin and torches are burning, or a medieval clerk has
eight damned candles burning on his desk or scattered about for a
visually pleasing shot, it’s just plain wrong. There’s often
excessive lighting in films (in modern day settings, there are
sometimes half a dozen lamps in a room, or more) but it makes no
sense at all in a medieval setting.
Thaddeus
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