Storm money

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Storming a City (detail of an engraving from the late 15th century)

As a storm of money were referred to a form of Soldes in military affairs of the early modern period . It served as additional remuneration for soldiers who ended a siege by an assault.

As a rule, fortified cities, fortresses and castles were conquered through a protracted siege that starved the occupation and eventually had to surrender. However, it was logistically difficult for the besiegers to supply their troops in the open country around the village, so that the besiegers themselves often suffered from hunger and at some point broke off their operation. In such a case, or when a relief army approached to help the besieged, a siege could only be ended by a successful assault on the part of the attackers. In most of all cases, however, this was only a stopgap solution, because the disadvantages were serious. On the one hand, a storm attack cost the attacker high losses, on the other hand, an informal surrender almost inevitably led to fighting in the city, massacres of the civilian population and destruction. During these battles and the looting that followed, the general lost control of his troops, whose discipline suffered. Ordering an assault without allowing the troops a few days of looting was almost impossible , because the mercenary troops did not take the high risks of an assault without the prospect of material compensation.

If the war chest allowed it, a general could in such a case pay out a "storm money" to the mercenaries. On the one hand, he was able to encourage them to risk a storm attack at all, on the other hand, he could use the money as compensation for an escaped plundering of the enemy village. Because the most intact conquest of a fortress, castle or town was in the interests of the general's reputation, the accommodation of his own troops and the intended maintenance and management of this place. This practice was not only to the European mercenary troops as mercenaries limited but was used at that time in the Turkish army.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jan N. Lorenzen: The great battles - myths, people, fates , Campus-Verlag, Frankfurt / Main 2006, p. 46.

literature