A Distant Mirror_ The Calamitous 14th Century - Barbara W. Tuchman [56]
To raise an army for a second assault after being bankrupted by the first would have been impossible without the consent of the three estates represented in Parliament. Money was the crux. Raising money to pay the cost of war was to cause more damage to 14th century society than the physical destruction of war itself. The governing fact was that medieval organization by this time had passed to a predominantly money economy. Armed forces were no longer primarily feudal levies serving under a vassal’s obligation who went home after forty days; they were recruited bodies who served for pay. The added expense of a paid army raised the cost of war beyond the ordinary means of the sovereign. Without losing its appetite for war, the inchoate state had not yet devised a regular method to pay for it. When he overspent, the sovereign resorted to loans from bankers, towns, and businesses which he might not be able to repay, and to the even more disruptive measures of arbitrary taxation and devaluation of the coinage.
Above all, war was made to pay for itself through pillage. Booty and ransom were not just a bonus, but a necessity to take the place of arrears in pay and to induce enlistment. The taking of prisoners for ransom became a commercial enterprise. Since kings could rarely raise sufficient funds in advance, and collection of taxes was slow, troops in the field were always ahead of their pay. Loot on campaign took the place of the paymaster. Chivalric war, like chivalric love, was, as Michelet said of the whole epoch, double et louche (a provocative phrase which could mean “double and squinting” or “equivocal” or “shady” in the sense of disreputable). The aim was one thing and the practice another. Knights pursued war for glory and practiced it for gain.
In 1344 the three estates in Parliament were informed by Edward of a breach of the truce by the King of France and asked to “show their opinion.” The advice of Lords and Commons was “to end the war either by battle or honorable peace,” and, once attempted, not to abandon the effort at letters or requests of the Pope or anyone else, “but to end the same by dint of the Sword.” Clergy and Commons voted subsidies, and in 1345 Parliament authorized the King to require all landowners to serve in person or supply a substitute or a monetary equivalent. A man with £5 of income from land or rents was to supply an archer, a £10 income supplied a mounted spearman, £20 supplied two of these, income over £25 supplied a man-at-arms, meaning usually a squire or knight. Towns and shires were required to raise a given number of archers, and the system as a whole was to be administered by sheriffs and county officials.
Ships had to be requisitioned to carry men and horses and initial food for both. They also carried millstones and bake ovens, armorers and their forges, and extra materials to keep the bowmen supplied with arrows. Most ships were small, averaging 30 to 50 tons, with one large mast and a rectangular sail, although some ranged up to 200 tons. A medium-sized ship carried 100 to 200 men and 80 to 100 horses.
To fill out the ranks of “arrayed” or drafted foot soldiers, men were recruited by promise of loot, by pardons of those under sentence of outlawry, and by promoting anti-French feeling already aroused by French raids on Southampton, Portsmouth, and other south-coast towns. King Edward’s assumption of the title of King of France was proclaimed to the people along with his messages on the justice of his cause and the wickedness of France. Under the ever-present fear of French invasion, warning beacons were planted along the coast, bodies of armed men and horses stationed at intervals, stores laid by, and small ships drawn close in to land or onto the beach—not without economic disruption.
In July 1346 the King was ready for his renewed attempt. Accompanied by his eldest son, fifteen-year-old Edward, Prince of Wales, he set sail for Normandy with 4,000 men-at-arms and 10,000 archers plus a number of Irish and Welsh foot soldiers. (Another force, sent