Following Orders

[Femme Falchion]

Aye, the role of women is far too under appreciated. Particularly by they mostly infatuated with their own sword.

Hail all strong women, I salute thee!

Monk O' the Green...

On behalf of the Militissa and myself, we thank thee for your astute salutations!      And I must admit, I too am quite infatuated with my own falchion. 

[Sir William Marcus]

Mercy, we just hit 100 pages!

[Femme Falchion]

and as long as we're getting into the holiday spirit....



This was our local Christmas parade. (last weekend)  *any excuse to get in garb* 

[Monsignor de Beaumanoir]

A nice shot of a happier time for you. Looks a lot like gypsies.

[Richard de Graeme]

Aye, the role of women is far too under appreciated. Particularly by they mostly infatuated with their own sword.

Hail all strong women, I salute thee!

Monk O' the Green...

On behalf of the Militissa and myself, we thank thee for your astute salutations!      And I must admit, I too am quite infatuated with my own falchion. 

Your humble servant, Femme Falchion and the Militissa. Thy graciousness enhances thy strength and beauty. Just between thee and I thy green monk, must confess, is quite attached to his dirk.

By the way, who are ye calling a stute?

The best to all this Yule season.

All blessings be upon thee, thy kith and kin.

[Femme Falchion]

A nice shot of a happier time for you. Looks a lot like gypsies.

Warrior Monk....thanks for the reminder of the day. 

There's always room for joy. 


(p.s. Brother William, you're new avatar is a joy-bringer too  )

[Monsignor de Beaumanoir]

National Geographic TV just aired their 1 hr show on the Knights Templar.

On a 1 to 10 scale...it's a solid 5.

[Lady Christina de Pond]

glad i missed it then if it wasn't that Good

[Lady Mikayla of Phoenicia]

and as long as we're getting into the holiday spirit....



This was our local Christmas parade. (last weekend)  *any excuse to get in garb* 

Now this is a woman having fun!  Great pix of you Femme!

[Sir William Marcus]

I have to agree with you a 100% Lady Mikayla, and many thanks for visiting the thread.

[Lord Clisto of York]

Ok, what ever happened to the desert crusade weather?

[Monsignor de Beaumanoir]

Ok, what ever happened to the desert crusade weather?

Chronicles of the Crusades:

BOOK V.
CH. I.— IN the year 1192, not many days after the feast of the Epiphany, the councillors of the army, joining with them pome of the more discreet of the natives, again consulted about the march to Jerusalem. The Hospitallers, Templars, and Pisans, urged, as before, that the city of Ascalon should first be rebuilt as a check on the Turkish convoys between Babylonia and Jerusalem. To this the majority of the council gave their assent, that Ascalon should be rebuilt to check the arrogance and impede the free passage of the Turks in those parts. When the decision became known the army were much dejected, conceiving that their hopes of seeing the Lord's sepulchre would altogether be frustrated. Their former hilarity altogether disappeared, and was succeeded by despair at what they had just heard. They uttered imprecations on the authors of this counsel as destroyers of all their most ardent wishes. If, however, they had known the penury and destitution of those who dwelt in Jerusalem, they would have derived some little consolation from the tribulation of the enemy. For the Turks in Jerusalem were enduring many severe sufferings from the hail and snow, which, melting in the in the mountains, caused a flood of water to descend upon the city,
either drowning their cattle, or causing them to perish afterwards from the cold. So great were their sufferings from the state of the weather, that if the Christians had known of them they might certainly have taken the city; though they could not long have kept it, for the people would have returned home after fulfilling their von- of pilgrimage, and there could not have been a sufficient garrison left to defend it.

CM. II.—Of the despondency of the army at the abandonment of their enterprise, and of their return to Ramula.
THE feast of St. Hilary was now at hand, and so great was the disaffection and sorrow of the army that many of them abandoned their pilgrimage, cursing the day in which they were born to suffer such a disappointment. Some of them also were so worn down by their sufferings and by want, that they with difficulty could bear up against it. Their horses and beasts of burden, also, affected by the cold and rain, were unable to proceed through the mud, but fell famished and knocked up beneath their loads.



And we haven't even thought about the Teutonic's "Northern Crusades".

[Monsignor de Beaumanoir]

They said, "If you throw a Christmas party....they'll come".....




They were right. 

[Sir William Marcus]

And we haven't even thought about the Teutonic's "Northern Crusades".

One sad day for the Teutonics

One of the major defeats of the Teutonic Order happened because of the misunderstanding of their battle tactics. Generally speaking campaigns are fought in Summer and Spring because of the favourable conditions, but the Teutonic Order because of their campaigns in the North found that Winter campaigns when all the marshy areas were frozen was a better time to engage the enemy. Under orders from a commander used to fighting further South they engaged the Russians around Lake Peipus in April 1242. Thus loosing the battle because the ice would no longer support the weight of their cavalry charge!





Campaign Conditions

During the 'northern crusades' the winters could be so fierce that infantry died on the march, and snow so deep that cavalry rode single file through trenches where the snow had been cut away. At other times the snow was too thick to travel through at all.  Henry of Livonia wrote of winter in the region: 'snow covered the land and ice covered the waves... the waves were as hard as stone.

Source: David Nicolle

[Monsignor de Beaumanoir]

Not to negate the weather conditions the Brothers of the Teutonic Order operated in, but here's an alternate look at the same event:

A twist to the history......

The Battle of the Ice has been described as an event of major significance, especially by Russian historians. The knights' defeat at the hands of Alexander's forces prevented the crusaders from retaking Pskov, the linchpin of their eastern crusade. The Novgorodians succeeded in defending Russian territory, and the German crusaders never mounted another serious challenge eastward. Alexander was canonised as a saint in the Russian Orthodox Church in 1574.

More recently, historian John I. L. Fennell has called into question the focus on and glorification of the battle, arguing that it was not as important nor as large as has sometimes been portrayed. Most of the Teutonic Knights were engaged elsewhere in the Baltic, and the aforementioned Livonian Rhymed Chronicle gives the figure of only 20 knights killed, which Fennell argued was "hardly indicative of a major encounter even if we take into consideration epic minimalization of the home-team's side." Furthermore, the Russians had suffered a much more serious defeat and conquest at the hands of the Mongols in 1237-1240, and Alexander Nevsky's (and his father's) policy of accommodation or collaboration with the Mongols (or Tatars as they are known in Russia) did much more to harm Russia than his victories on the Neva and on Lake Peipus did to help it. His collaboration, while politically understandable given the power of the Mongols and Russia's relative weakness, was certainly not in keeping with the image he acquired as a brave protector of Russian freedom.

Recent archaeological evidence at the site lends to the now growing belief that the battle wasn't actually a battle at all. It was just a minor skirmish between opposing forces and in no way at all affected the Teutonic Knights future campaigns, as the actual casualties involved were so few. Many now believe that what was actually just a minor skirmish between a couple of hundred men was embellished for propaganda reasons by Alexander Nevsky and his supporters, and in reality there was no such thing as the Battle on the Ice or the Battle of Lake Peipus.