WEAPONS. A Pictorial history

In our day the first interest of most men is business and after that sports; in medieval times the dominant interest was war and after that sports, but there was not too much difference since sports were warlike too. Nearly all of them were some form of combat or a contest of skill which prepared the players for combat. As now, those who didn't enter the game personally thronged to watch.

Knights jousting in tournament

The most spectacular and exciting of all contests was the tournament or, as it was often called at the time, the "hastilude," which meant a game of spear-play. The first tournament was held in France the same year the Normans invaded England. The idea was enthusiastically imitated and, though often condemned by kings and priests, tournaments flourished all through the Middle Ages. Weak kings, fearful of the power of their nobles, were against tournaments; strong kings encouraged them and even rode in them.

The earliest of these entertainments were not child's play. The knights armed themselves exactly as if for war and went at one another with everything they had, no rules and no holds barred. Considerable blood was spilled, and occasionally one side or the other would talk back to the umpire; then everybody present mixed it up in a free-for-all, the spectators adding to the fun by throwing stones. It was found that this sort of thing was reducing the strength of the army; so rules were made and the holding of tournaments was restricted to five localities in England. Kenilworth Castle was one of these, and its level, green tiltyard still exists.

The rules divided the hastilude into three types. The first and most important was the joust, which was singles—one against one. The joust almost always began with the familiar tilt or charge. From his own end of the field each man ran his horse at the other at full tilt, gripping the shaft of his spear under his right arm and seeking with it to unhorse his opponent, that is, knock him out of his saddle and over his horse's stern. To oppose this the backs of the saddles were made very high and there are records of knights being tied in place.

Ordinarily three of these "courses" were run. Then, if both men were still upright, they'd meet in the center of the field and exchange three blows with the mace or the battle-ax. Surviving this, and miraculously they often did, they'd exchange three sword slashes, either from the saddle or dismounted. If one champion was knocked out at any point there wasn't any doubt about the winner; otherwise, the judges decided the match on points.

The next hastilude in importance after the joust, and less technical but even more exciting, was the tourney. In this the knights drew up sides and fought a miniature battle, though still under rules; the chances for fouling were wonderful. The tourney created a terrific uproar and the spectators loved it.

The last of the three forms of the hastilude is something of a mystery. It was called the behourd and was some sort of exercise with spear and target, but exactly what kind isn't known. (In Maryland and Virginia something called a "tournament" is still held; in it the "knights" attempt to impale a small suspended ring on the point of a lance while riding at full gallop. It is interesting to wonder if this may be a descendant of the behourd.)

Everybody turned out for a tournament. There was a canopied gallery for the queen and her ladies and another for the king and his nobles. The commoners crowded the barriers around the lists and the boys unquestionably climbed trees. It was more than a mere "passage of arms"; it was a pageant, and as time went on it became less and less a combat and more and more a show, until it finally reached a pitch of silliness which the human race didn't exceed until it thought of flagpole sitting.

Since only knights could enter tournaments, the commoners staged their own games and combats. Individual bouts with the quarterstaff and with sword-and-buckler were common producers of cracked heads and minor scars. Tilting at the quintain was favored by those who could afford a horse or borrow one. To tilt at the quintain the contestant, riding at a gallop, aimed a blunt spear at a shield-shaped target which was hung at one end of a horizontal beam. The beam was pivoted on top of an upright post and at its other end hung a sandbag or a pail of water. The object was not so much to hit the target, which was large, as to avoid being slugged or drenched after hitting it.

At Easter the younger London set went in for tilting from boats on the Thames. This was the same game which is now played at summer camps with canoes, except that the boats were heavier and each was rowed by several oarsmen. A single combatant managed the padded lance in the bow, and the object was simply to push the opposing boat's lancer into the drink; sometimes they were a little rough about it. In the winter "jousts" were staged on ice, the charges being made on bone skates.

Tilting at the quintain

The quarterstaff was named from the way it was handled, not from its six-and-a-half-foot length which might well qualify it as a whole staff. It was straight and just under two inches thick for most of its length. The ends were a little thicker and were usually loaded with iron.

In operation the quarterstaff was held in the middle in one hand while the other grasped it about a quarter of the way from one end, hence the name. The trick was to spin the staff this way and that, shifting the grip of the hands from quarter to quarter, thus delivering blows from unexpected angles and, at the same time, using the staff to ward off attack. It was quite a rugged sport. In Ivanhoe, the swineherd, Gurth, ended his bout with the miller by sliding his right hand from the middle of the staff down to his left at the quarter and delivering a haymaker.

The "Exercise of the Sword-and-Buckler" was a fencing match with slashing swords. The buckler was a small round shield of the type sometimes called a "target." It was about a foot in diameter and was provided with a handle on its back by which it was held in the left hand. The sword used was straight, tapered and double-edged, much like the knights' swords but shorter, about three feet overall.

For a couple of men thus equipped to stand slashing away at each other seems a strange amusement for a Sunday in the park, but that is what it was. Spectators placed bets and championship bouts were held. Boys practised with sticks and homemade shields. The sport remained popular for several centuries. Archery contests were frequent, and were usually held after mass on Sunday in every country churchyard, but we'll wait to a later time to examine them, when the record is less dimmed with age.