The White Council

Re: Everything you really didn't want to know about shields

Tolkien and Inklings Discussion

: Just a couple of points:

: Shields

: The kite shield was developed for cavalry use, it covers the vurlnerable thigh area of a man seated on a horse. This type of shield is first recorded in Byzantine sources, where it was probably developed - the very earliest were more almond shaped than kite. It probably moved west due to Byzantine involvement in Southern Italy and Venice, possibly also through Norse Varangians.

: As an infantry shield it is effective enough and was probably fashionable at the time of Hastings, though it does not offer the infantryman as much advantage over round or oval shields as it does a cavalryman.

It is rather hard to get around (I know from experience) but so is a large circular shield, and if you are fast and strong you will eventually outmaneuver him as his shield is heavier than your weapon.

: A kite shaped shield (or a long Roman scutum for that matter) is not needed to form a Shield Wall. All that is needed is that infantrymen stand close together - their shields will overlap whatever their shape as long as they are reasonably large. The Anglo-Saxon term scild-burh is the one most often used and it means "shield-fortress" rather than wall - but this is an aside. The Anglo-Saxons used this defensive formation at the time of Alfred the Great and earlier when only round shields were in use. The classical Greek hoplite with his round Argive shield used the same close-order formation. Indeed it was well known that a hoplite formation had a tendency to drift to the right as it advanced, as each man instinctively tried to get under the protection of his right-hand neighbour's shield-rim.

True for all infantry formations. Also, I have tried the shield wall on may occasions, it is rather effective for the first clash or for penetrating the enemy formation in a Pig Snout (wedge).

: The Dunedain are not described as having shields, but then again they are not described as wearing body armour, though the fact that the sons of Elrond accompanying them are armoured and that they themselves had helmets makes the assumption that they also wore some form of body armour a reasonable conclusion. Considering the Dunedain were travelling in the expectation that they would be involved in open battle, and that virtually every other soldier described in LOTR engaged in such a battle is shielded it is equally reasonable to conclude that the Dunedain had shields also. Besides, they had access to the armouries of Minas Tirith by this time and so could have made up any deficiencies in their equipment.

: Formations

: The shield-wall is not an immutable thing, the formation is one best suited for protection from missiles (arrows, javelins throwing axes etc) and from the enemy when the front ranks first clash, it is also intimidating to horses who will not approach a seemingly solid obstacle frontally (though they can be urged to move across the front of it close enough for weapon-reach).

: Once the enemy are at swords-length and the contest becomes individual the shield wall breaks up naturally. Indeed the huscarles with their Danish axes which can only be used to full effect with both hands, could not have maintained a shield to shield formation and used their weapons. After the threat of missiles had passed, and the opposing ranks had contacted the huscarles must have shifted their shields onto their backs using the guige-strap, and hefted their axes in both hands.

Very, very true, after first clash you move to "Closed formation" which leave you room to use your weapon and for twohanded spears and/or Daneaxes to support in a mixed formation. Again, I would not like to attack a line of heavily armoured men wielding Daneaxes, auch!

: The circular formation is the universal formation of last-resort, once in such a formation manoevring becomes almost impossible. It is a formation tantamount to admitting defeat - after the circle comes the diminishing down to a single point, then nothing. Tolkien probably instinctively knew this when he gave this formation to the Host of the West.

No, the rout is the universial formation when the formation breaks down, which it almost always will, either to losses or breaking of moral- even the circular one. How many large battles in history have ended in a last stand-circular formation? I think very few. However, they do speak to the heroic and romantic aspects of our nature (think of the pictures of Custer's last stand) and have sometimes been employed (Custer? Camerone? Alamo?), therefore they evoke powerful images and are thus used. NT