Brabant Zones

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Brabancons ( French brabançon "people of Brabant ") were wandering mercenaries who originally came from Brabant, in the Middle Ages, an area in Lower Lorraine between the rivers Scheldt to the north, Dilöe ( Dyle ) to the east and groves in the south.

origin

In the 12th and 13th centuries, the rich cities of northern Italy and Lower Lorraine produced a steady surplus of unemployed craftspeople, landless peasant sons, traveling people, runaway monks and descendants of the urban nobility who wandered around in Germany , Italy and France in search of employers . In contrast to the poorly armed and poorly trained peasant warriors from the poorer and rural regions of Europe - including above all Wales , Cornwall , Brittany , Gascony , Navarra , Aragon , the Basque Country and Bohemia - the Brabant Zones were professional, with helmets, chain mail or iron- shod leather doublet armored and armed with the "Goedendag" (the "good dagger", a long spear) or the crossbow .

Soon the catchment area of ​​these mercenary troops was no longer limited to the Lower Rhine . Mercenaries from Geldern ("Geldoni"), Genoese crossbowmen , Saracen archers from Sicily and all kinds of adventurous people, including many criminals and violent criminals, poured in from all areas of Europe to find pay and quick booty on military campaigns. There is always a clear distinction between the Brabant Zones and the many different war travelers, referred to in the sources as "coterelli, ruptuarii, triaverdini, stipendiarii, vastatores, guladana (gelduni), berroerii, mainardieri, forusciti, banditi, banderii, ribaldi, satellites" less possible. These gangs of mercenaries were not only available at any time for combat operations against payment, but also feared because of their brutality. After their release, these mercenary troops became independent and continued to roam as feared gangs, robbing and murdering. In addition to the sold knights who were also emerging, they served as simple foot soldiers, were not bound by the knightly code of honor and were trained in the use of "dishonorable" ranged weapons such as longbows and crossbows.

Use and campaigns

Brabant zones were first recruited by the Norman- English kings , later also by the French Plantagenêts , and to a lesser extent also by the Capetians and the Hohenstaufen . On his third march to Italy, for example, Emperor Barbarossa had around 1,500 Brabant Zones in his armed force, led by the former clergyman Wilhelm von Cambrai . These hordes did not march in the wake of the emperor, but roamed themselves outside the empire through Burgundy , feeding themselves . In a letter to the French king in 1166, the abbot Stephan von Cluny complained that, on top of all the misery, “the Germans who are called the Brabant Zones are also coming like a terrible epidemic. With iron and blood they permeate all places and nothing can protect against them. "

Since there was a lack of pay, the Brabanzones snatched the entire booty of armor, horses and money after the battle. After their release, these mercenaries became independent and, as feared gangs, continued to rob and murder as far as the southwest of France . Constantly gaining popularity, they crushed any local resistance from knights or peasants and looked for new clients in these areas, which were disputed between France and England. The English King Henry II recruited the unemployed veterans of the Italian campaign for his army, used them to crush the uprisings in Normandy and Brittany in 1173 , shipped them to England to be used against rebellious barons , and finally transported them back to England Normandy, where in the meantime their appearance alone was enough to force the enemy to negotiate peace.

In the meantime, Barbarossa was preparing his next march in Italy and again took the Brabant Zones under his command under the leadership of Archbishop Christian von Mainz . After they had plundered the rich Italian provinces of Lombardy and Tuscany , the "Routiers" (cf. French "route" = country road, or German "Rotte") again turned to south-west France , just in time to take part in the campaign this time of the Duke of Angoulême and in the sack of Richard the Lionheart 's possessions in Poitou . Then they settled in Beaufort Castle in the Limousin , from where they undertook extensive raids. It was not until 1177 that a regular army opposed them under Count Ademar and the Bishop of Limoges . Several thousand Brabanzones were slain, including probably the leader William of Cambrai. In 1183 the so-called "Friedensbund", a war band under the leadership of the carpenter Durand, destroyed a large band of Brabant Zones near Charenton ; however, when Durand's armed forces later became too rebellious themselves, they were crushed by the noble lords.

Nevertheless, the Brabant Zones filled their gaps again, this time with an abundant influx of Basques , Navarrese and Gascogners , and found time and again in the ongoing small wars between the English King Henry, his rebellious sons and France.

In 1214 the French army finally met the combined forces of the English King Johann Ohneland and the German Emperor Otto IV in the Battle of Bouvines . After their Brabanzones had routed the French infantry, the French knights did not dare to take the firmly closed and join them Long-spear to attack defensively spiked block of the Brabant Zones. Instead, the French directed their attack on the knights on the wings of the German-English army, smashed their order of battle, then took the Brabanzones from all sides in pincer and cut them down.

Decline and end

Visitation and terror through the Brabant Zones were worse for the affected areas than the passage of a knight army. Devastation and pillage of enemy lands often did more damage to the enemy than defeat on the battlefield. This warfare included the burning of villages and fields, the destruction of fruit trees and vines, the slaughter of cattle and the driving off or massacre of the population.

Emperor Frederick and Louis VII of France had already contractually decided in 1171 not to tolerate the “nefarious people, who are called Brabanzones or Coterelli, anywhere in their realms. Nor should any vassal tolerate her, unless a man in his country has come to a woman or has been permanently in his service. Anyone who does so should be banned and interdict by the bishops, he should compensate for all damage, and the neighbors should force him to do so. If the vassal is too powerful to be defeated by the neighbors, the emperor himself will carry out the punishment. "

Since the Brabanzones did not stop at church goods and were guilty of particularly despicable outrages such as looting of cemeteries and graves, church robbery, pillaging of monasteries or desecration of nuns, the third Lateran Council in 1179 documented the warfare by means of "Brabanzonen, Aragonese, Ravarresen, Basques, Triaverdienern "with the excommunication and extended the ban against those who refused to take up arms against them. In 1215 Pope Innocent III banned ecclesiastical authorities "to associate with robber mercenary gangs , crossbowmen or similar blood people in church". and called for a crusade against the dreaded mercenaries. In the same year Johann Ohneland was forced by the English barons to dismiss his mercenary army.

The phenomenon of the Brabant Zones largely disappeared. Nevertheless, the victory of the Milanese in 1176 against a German army of knights at Legnano , that of the Scots against the English army of knights at Stirling , that of the Flemish civic militias in 1302 at Courtray and that of the Swiss in 1315 against the army of knights of the Habsburgs at Morgarten showed that decisive and tactically good led foot soldiers could sometimes win against heavily armored armies of knights.

The use of hired soldiers also continued: In Italy, mercenary troops fought under the Condottieri , France was afflicted by the notorious Armagnaks in the 14th century, Bohemian Hussite warriors spread fear and terror in the 15th century, and finally Swiss rice paddlers and Germans until the 16th century Landsknechte finally replaced the system of knightly feudal warriors.

literature

evaluated

not evaluated

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ In the Latin original, quoted by Stefanie Rüther: The violence of others. For the rhetorical positioning of mercenaries in the political-religious semantics of the Middle Ages. In: Georg Strack, Julia Knödler (Hrsg.): Rhetoric in the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Concepts - Practice - Diversity. Utz, Munich 2011, pp. 191–212, here p. 195, note 13 .
  2. ↑ Hans Delbrück: History of the art of war. 3rd book: The high Middle Ages. In: Digital Library. Volume 72: History of the Art of War.
  3. ↑ Georg love: Soldier and weapon craft. Leipzig 1899.