The latest Robin Hood movie depicts a French invasion of England using amphibious landing craft that are suspiciously like World War II landing craft. This of course has aroused a certain amount of negative comment. but no one doubts that medieval armies transported warhorses by sea. What did the ships that accomplished this task look like?
Will McLean at A Commonplace Book offers us these two intriguing quotations from primary sources, from only a few years after the supposed landing shown in Robin Hood.
I quote from Will:
[Source quote 1]
Will, can you provide a more complete citation on the matter of terminology?
Updated bibliography from various readers:
Martin, Lillian Ray. 2007. Horse and cargo handling on Medieval Mediterranean ships. International Journal of Nautical Archaeology. Volume 31 Issue 2, Pages 237 - 241.
Bernard S. Bachrach, "On the Origins of William the Conqueror's Horse Transports," Technology and Culture, Vol. 26, No. 3 (July 1985), pp. 505–531.
See also comments to this post.
Will McLean at A Commonplace Book offers us these two intriguing quotations from primary sources, from only a few years after the supposed landing shown in Robin Hood.
I quote from Will:
[Source quote 1]
Then began the mariners to open the ports of the transports, and let down the bridges, and take out the horses; and the knights began to mount, and they began to marshal the divisions of the host in due order.[Source quote 2]
Geoffrey de Villehardouin [b.c.1160-d.c.1213]: Memoirs or Chronicle of The Fourth Crusade and The Conquest of Constantinople, trans. Frank T. Marzials, (London: J.M. Dent, 1908)
So the fleet came to land, and when they were landed, forth came the knights out of the transports, all mounted; for the transports were built in such fashion that they had doors, which were easily opened, and a bridge was thrust out whereby the knights could come forth to land all mounted.
Robert of Clari's account of the Fourth Crusade[Will himself]
Those sources called the horse transports uissiers. Other names included chelandium, tarida and dromon. They were big galleys capable of carrying 12-30 horses. The big thirty horse taride of Charles I of Sicily shipped 108-110 oars. The doors and ramps were at the stern between two sternposts, so the vessels backed onto the beach to unload and load. They were shallow draft: in Villehardouin's account the knights jumped from the transports into waist-deep water.Does anyone have more information, textual or graphic, that would shed light on this question?
Will, can you provide a more complete citation on the matter of terminology?
Updated bibliography from various readers:
Martin, Lillian Ray. 2007. Horse and cargo handling on Medieval Mediterranean ships. International Journal of Nautical Archaeology. Volume 31 Issue 2, Pages 237 - 241.
Bernard S. Bachrach, "On the Origins of William the Conqueror's Horse Transports," Technology and Culture, Vol. 26, No. 3 (July 1985), pp. 505–531.
See also comments to this post.
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