Medieval Warfare Feb/Mar 2020

MEDIEVAL Warfare magazine has returned to having themes, so I bought issue 6 of volume 9 and was generally pleased with it.

Medieval Warfare … striking cover

True, it gets off to a bad start when the first two articles on Iceland basically repeat each other in giving background information on Norse sagas.
And, in a non-themed article, we are given an account of the Battle of Grandson that is big on colourful, but misleading illustrations, while at the same time not having space for a single map of the battlefield.
But overall I found the magazine an interesting read, and might be tempted to buy future copies.

Medieval Warfare Volume IX Issue 2

I SUSPECT this will be the last edition of Medieval Warfare I buy for quite some time.
These may be "famous last words," but I found this issue particularly unsatisfying, despite covering a wide range of interesting topics. Perhaps that is the problem - too much, too shallow.
The main article, The Rise And Fall Of The Assassins, was fine, if lacking in detail.

Medieval Warfare … striking cover

However The Battle Of Jargeau managed to cover a battle from the 100 Years War without a single battle map, and a piece on Hussite war wagons was so incomplete it would barely merit a Wikipedia "stub" label.
Some of the writing is rather lazy and needs stricter editing.
For example, a piece on Genghis Khan includes the sentence: "After climbing a scared mountain and communing with Tengri, the god of the limitless blue sky, he learned the heavens wished him to conquer the world."
Now, it may be Genghis Khan claimed this happened, or some of his followers believed it happened, but to state it as a fact in a magazine devoted to history is ridiculous.
The article on the Hussites starts: "After several years of mounting tension, Hus was arrested, and in 1415 he was executed. Hus's followers were outraged and a rebellion took off, lasting from 1419 to 1434 …"
This rather prompts the question: if Hus's followers were so "outraged," how come it took them four years to rebel?
Another piece states that an Italian condottieri was paid "the incredible sum of 60,000 ducats a year."
This may or may not be "incredible," but since we are given no reference point for what 60,000 ducats represents, it is hard to tell.
If Medieval Warfare were a specialist magazine for hardcore historians, readers might be expected to have a good idea what 60,000 ducats were worth, but the magazine is clearly being aimed at general readers - very general readers.
I certainly do not wish the magazine ill, but I have much better ways to spend the £5.99 cost of each copy.

Double Delight

I BOUGHT the Jan/Feb issue of Medieval Warfare and the Dec/Jan issue of Ancient Warfare on the same day early last month.

Two of the best

My late-posting has nothing to do with disappointment at the magazines' qualities - indeed these are two of the best issues of these magazines I have read in a long while.
Medieval Warfare (vol VIII, issue 6) concentrates on France's Louis IX and the Seventh Crusade. Since I knew little about the king or the crusade, I found just about every article fascinating.
Ancient Warfare (vol XII, issue 4) is themed around naval warfare, particularly that of the Macedonian Successor kingdoms. I cannot say this is a subject that normally grips me, but again I found the articles to be very readable.

Medieval Warfare: Sep/Oct 2018

ISSUE 4 of volume VIII of Medieval Warfare magazine concentrates on 12th century Norway.


12th-century Norway is the them but it also has interesting articles on the Black Death and Abbasid soldiers

I found it fascinating, mainly, no doubt, because almost all of it was unfamiliar territory to me.
The issue is marred by what seems to be some careless editing, eg on page 8 we are told Sverrir Sigurdsson, "the Birkebeiner contender to the Norwegian throne," defeated King Magnus's "superior royal force" in a naval battle, while on the very next page we are told "the Birkebeiner had the larger ships and more numerous force."
Also, very unfortunately for a magazine dedicated to warfare, we learn about several battles but are not treated to even one battle map.

Medieval Warfare - Jul/Aug 2018

I FOUND this issue of the magazine Medieval Warfare particularly interesting - mainly, I think, because I knew very little about the issue's theme, war between the Ottonian Germans and the Frisians in the 11th century.

Cover of Medieval Warfare volume VIII, issue 3

I especially liked the articles on the pivotal 1018 Battle of Vlaardingen and on the origin of the Ottonians.

Two More Mags

I FINISHED reading the Feb/Mar issue of Medieval Warfare a couple of days before the April/May edition of Toy Soldier Collector arrived in the post.

Medieval Warfare volume VIII, issue 1 and Toy Soldier Collector issue 81

I am usually a big fan of Medieval Warfare, and especially of its sister magazine Ancient Warfare. But I felt this issue, themed around 14th-century mercenary John Hawkwood, was lacking in telling me anything I did not already know.
Toy Soldier Collector has, as always, loads of lovely-to-look-at glossy pix, even if the models are way out of my spending league (I am definitely not going to pay more than 200 US dollars - almost £150 - for a single Mamluk cavalryman).

Medieval Warfare - Dec/Jan

THE turn-of-the-year issue of the sister publication to Ancient Warfare is themed around the Spanish warrior El Cid (Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar ).
My knowledge of this 11th century hero was more-or-less limited to the 1961 Charlton Heston film, which comes in for something of a panning from contributors to the magazine.

El Cid...lived by the sword, died by the arrow (according to the film, anyway)

I read all the themed articles from start to finish, as I did with all the issue's non-themed articles (excepting the reproduction of a rather tedious, boastful letter by Leonardo da Vinci).
My only criticisms of the El Cid material are that there is some repetition (caused, I believe, by the format of the Editor announcing a theme and then awaiting contributions, rather than commissioning specific articles) and that not one battle is covered in anything like the detail required for reproducing it on the tabletop.
Still, these are minor matters when compared with the magazine's overall informative readability.