After about 1450, Europe began to recover from its century of crisis, and the trends established since 1050 resumed. By the close of the fifteenth century, the dynamics of the western European sociomilitary system had resulted in significant developments in European warfare and civilization. Steady gains by governments in administrative ability and fiscal resources, interrupted only temporarily by the ravages of the Black Death, had shifted the balance of power somewhat away from aristocrats and their military expression as heavy cavalry, though both remained important in politics and warfare. The shift in the balance of power was even more notable in fortification, where the increasing cost of building again favored kings over their aristocrats; siege cannon furthered the trend. Fostered by stronger central authority and thriving urban economies, infantry forces played a steadily greater role throughout the period 1050-1500. Originally built around essentially Greek-style, communally based infantry, by the end of the period, significant traces of Roman-style infantry—a heterogeneous mass raised and trained by strong central authorities—were again visible in European warfare.
But the essential elements of military force and their relationship to political structures and power, while significantly transformed in every case, remained recognizable, and the lines of development established since 1050 would continue after 1500. Even more, the sociocultural matrix of European military power was firmly established. Thus, a series of events in the last decade of the fifteenth century are Janus-faced, standing as both culminations of medieval trends and harbingers of new developments. In 1492, Columbus unwittingly opened the door to the conquistadors’ conquest of the Americas. In 1494, Charles VIII of France invaded Italy as the first step in a planned crusade against the Ottoman Turks and set off an intense new period of innovative warfare. And, in 1498, Vasco da Gama sailed around Africa to India, opening a new route to lucrative Asian trade and empire. The already familiar pattern of European crusading mercantile expansion linked to governmental evolution and military competition was about to leap to a global stage.
Ayton, Andrew, and J. L. Price, eds. The Medieval Military Revolution. New York: I. B. Tauris, 1995. A good collection of articles examining critically the concept of a European Military Revolution (see Chapter 16) from a medieval perspective.
Bartlett, Robert. The Making of Europe. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993. An important study linking European social structure, law, and culture to conquest, colonization, and expansion.
Bradbury, Jim. The Medieval Siege. Woodbridge: Boydell, 1992. A wide-ranging introduction to the attack and defense of castles in medieval Europe.
Contamine, Philipe. War in the Middle Ages. See Chapter 7.
Curry, Anne, and M. Hughes, eds. Arms, Armies and Fortifications in the Hundred Years War. Woodbridge: Boydell, 1994. Brings together the latest research on the largest war in medieval Europe.
France, John. Western Warfare in the Age of the Crusades. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999. A fine study taking a social and cultural approach to the patterns of European warfare between 1000 and 1300.
Gillingham, John. Richard Coeur de Lion. London: Routledge, 1994. A collection of articles by a master of the new medieval military history. See also his Richard the Lionheart (London: Routledge, 1989) and The Wars of the Roses (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1981).
Hooper, Nicholas, and Matthew Bennett. The Cambridge Illustrated Atlas of Warfare: The Middle Ages, 768—1497. See Chapter 7.
Kaeuper, Richard. Chivalry and Violence in Medieval Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. An excellent examination of the culture of violence built into the aristocratic structure of medieval Europe.
Keen, Maurice, ed. Medieval Warfare. A History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. A solid edited collection providing a chronological survey and focused studies on particular aspects of warfare. See also Keen’s Chivalry (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984), a nuanced cultural history.
Morillo, Stephen. Warfare Under the Anglo-Norman Kings, 10661135. Woodbridge: Boydell, 1994. A readable study examining the patterns of warfare in their administrative and political contexts.
Prestwich, Michael. Armies and Warfare in the Middle Ages: The English Experience. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996. An excellent synthesis of much recent research; argues against a military revolution in the medieval or early modern periods.
Strickland, Matthew. War and Chivalry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. A superb study of the conduct and perception of warfare in England and Normandy from 1066 to 1216; examines the early influence of chivalry. See also his excellent edited collection, Anglo-Norman Warfare.
Vale, Malcolm. War and Chivalry. London: Routledge, 1981. An important examination of the culture and laws of war in the late Middle Ages.
Verbruggen, J. F. The Art of Warfare in Western Europe During the Middle Ages. Woodbridge: Boydell, 2002, reprint ed. Somewhat dated but still a valuable survey of strategy, tactics, and manpower in the central Middle Ages.