Watching your entire profession slowly become decorative

    by Kapanash

    36 Comments

    1. Gullible_Classroom71 on

      Agincourt was a strategic failing and I’m tired of people acting like it “ended” mounted warfare. Mounted cavalry was still very prevalent even 300 years after the battle. The winged hussars didn’t have their famous charge until 200 years after agincourt.

    2. I mean that noble status still conferred elite abilities of governance and rule in their time.

      you have to remember else all things nobles stripped of their lands and titles are still trained from birth to fulfil their roles within society which at minimum would make them more suited to administration and governance then anyone else at the time.

    3. Lovablemiranda03 on

      Just wait until the 1700s, when your primary weapon is a powdered wig and a very expensive toothpick.

    4. Agincourt was essentially the moment knights realized they were the main characters in a show that just got canceled

    5. monstrolegume90 on

      Samurai went a similar path through the ages, becomingol a bureaucratic duty and a social position

    6. Ok_Firefighter_3090 on

      Most armchair historians somehow forget that England lost that war in the end and that French cavalry pummeled the English at Patay. Cavalry was far from outdone, but the days of mindless charging to win were gone with the infantry revolution which was gradual.

    7. chilling_hedgehog on

      Man this post hurts. Welcome to history memes on reddit, where 14yo’s watched a ridley scott quality movie and post their thoughts about it

    8. PadishaEmperor on

      We also shouldn’t act like a Norman knight was the same as a Teutonic order knight or a Castilian knight. Culture, social status, class, armor and weapon usage differed greatly.

    9. Sugar_Kowalczyk on

      Knighthood 2026 – Status symbol that is regularly turned down by actors and others (John Oliver, for one) because it’s actually sort of an embarassment to be associated with the Monarchy. 

    10. YandereTeemo on

      It was a combination of events and the sudden and drastic changes of military doctrine and technology that shaped knighthood as it is.

      1. Gunpowder weapons: bombards smashed castles and arquebuses/muskets were more efficient units than knights ever were. Even if gunpowder did not exist, knights would simply phase out of combat simply because the time, effort, and resources it takes to train one simply isn’t cost effective. It’s better to use a mercenary, a militiaman with a pike or a crossbow, a man-at-arms, or lighter horsemen at half the efficiency but a lower cost. Pike and shot was king.
      2. The Battle of Grunwald (1410): It was where the teutonic knights faced off against Poland and Lithuania. The knights lost so badly that it started their pivotal moment to change from a military to and administrative force. It was one of the moments in history that shattered the classical image of the knight, especially the warrior knight.
      3. The Destruction of the Knights Templar (1314): King Philip IV was in debt to the Knights Templar after paying them to fight in the crusades. Instead of paying them, he accused the order of heresy and sodomy, by which the Catholic Church and the Knights Templar rounded up the Templar including Grandmaster Jacques de Molay, and burnt all of them at the stake.

      There might be other factors here, but my point is that gunpowder was not the only thing that reduced the image of a knight from a warrior clad in steel into a ceremonial role.

    11. This also applies to the samurai as well I think

      Though I think by the end they were more of a warrior bureaucracy

    12. MikaelAdolfsson on

      By the time of the roman republic, Togas were only worn specifically in the senate and senators hated wearing it since it was impractical AF.

    13. This is just straight up wrong. Knights were still very much a thing throughout the 1400s and into the early 1500s

    14. Separate-Courage9235 on

      Fun fact, even in 1300s, people were larping 1100s knights, saying that knighthood was dying and not honorable enough. Kings started to create knight orders to “revive” knighthood.

    15. Knighthood was earned by monetary ability to afford the elite gear and training. It was always a wealth based class, even in other cultures.

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