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IN THIS ISSUE
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* Jean Froissart - Medieval War Correspondent?

* Ancient Battle Tanks

* Historical Quote

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JEAN FROISSART - MEDIEVAL WAR CORRESPONDENT?
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War correspondents are, according to ABCNews.com, "the grunts of the journalism world ... covering dangerous wars in obscure places for the world's media." From ancient times to World War II to the modern conflicts in the Middle East, journalists and scribes have taken calculated risks and put themselves in harms way to inform and to explain important historical events to the public.

One of the defining events of the Middle Ages was the Hundred Years War that lasted from 1337 to 1453. One of the most famous chroniclers of that period is Jean Froissart. Could he have been a medieval war correspondent gathering information, talking to combatants and talking notes during the fury of battle?

Froissart (c 1333 - c 1410) was born in France and traveled throughout Western Europe including England, Scotland, Italy and the Low Countries. He is best remembered for his books (referred collectively as the Chronicles of Jean Froissart) that covered events occurring in Western Europe between about 1325 and 1400.

Allegedly Froissart accompanied Edward the Black Prince during his campaign at Castile in Spain. (Edward was the first son of Edward III, King of England. His nickname is said to be either from the color of his armor or the ferocity of his temper.) In early 1367, Edward moved from his base in Southwestern France to help Pedro the Cruel recapture the throne of Castile in Spain. If Froissart had accompanied Edward he would have crossed the Pyrenees with Edward's army of about 24,000 men. On April 3, 1367 he would have watched Edward engage a combined French and Spanish army at Nájera. He might have seen the English longbowmen fire upon the Spanish light cavalry. He might have witnessed an attack led by the famous French leader Bertrand du Guesclin and the subsequent break out of grim hand-to-hand fighting. Finally he might have seen the English banners raised in victory.

Was Froissart with Edward at the battle of Nájera? "...the Englishmen and Gascons alighted off their horses and every man drew under their own banner and standard in array of battle ready to fight. It was great joy to see and consider the banners ..." from the Chronicles of Jean Froissart.

http://www.ehistory.com/middleages/booksandliterature/books.cfm

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ANCIENT BATTLE TANKS [By Preston Chesser ]
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One of the strangest innovations in warfare began around 4000 BC with the training of elephants in the Indus River Valley. Elephants were both an advantage and disadvantage for the armies that employed them up until the widespread use of gunpowder in the 16th Century. Sultans of India used them to fight Mongols. Alexander the Great, Carthaginians, Romans and several African civilizations all used war elephants at one time or another.

The potential advantages of war elephants are immediately obvious when considered from the point of the army facing them. Imagine a hundred or more elephants each weighing as much as five tons stampeding toward you. The shock effect alone would be staggering on both soldiers and their animals. Apparently, horses unaccustomed to elephants are frightened by the mere smell of the animals. Elephants were extremely difficult to kill and once charging they were difficult to stop. Armies using Asian elephants placed fighting towers on their backs. Usually the towers held an officer, archer and an infantryman with a lance. Outfitted with such a shielding tower, the elephants were used in much the same manner as latter day tanks. Traveling armies took advantage of the elephant's enormous strength by carrying heavy loads of equipment and supplies.

But elephants did not insure invincibility and were often a disadvantage. Only the larger Asian elephants or African plains elephants were able to maintain towers on their backs. The smaller African forest elephants (now extinct) usually only carried a single rider. Iron spikes in heavy wooden frames or wound through chains could be used against the elephants. Severely wounded or otherwise repulsed elephants tended to run amok. Similarly the loss of the elephant's driver would cause the elephants to charge about indiscriminately.

The most famous use of war elephants would have to be that of Hannibal and his armies crossing the Alps to attack the Romans. In reality, most of Hannibal's elephants died in that crossing or shortly thereafter. He did manage to replace many of them but they only played a pivotal role in one battle -- Trebia River. By the time Hannibal met the Romans at the last battle of Zama they had learned to create formations to "herd" the elephants through their ranks. The elephants that didn't pass through were as much a danger to their own army as to the enemy.

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HISTORICAL QUOTE
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"History goes out of control almost as often as nature does."
Mason Cooley (1927 -- ), U.S. aphorist

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Thanks to this weeks contributor(s):
Preston Chesser

Larry Gormley, Editor
historyexplorer@ehistory.com

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