King Arthur preferred the spear I heard, he didn’t like Lancelot.

The horse is like, "I prepared my entire life for this moment."

I was looking for a tutorial on how to use the Jousting Lance in Mount & Blade Warband. This video just popped out in "recommended" section and i stayed until the end. Now i can use both, in the game and real life. Thanks.

Love this channel. Came across it a few days ago with the peasant diet vid!

I hope the developers of the new Mount and Blade game are watching this series.

I don't know much about horses, but I think Gossamer has a very striking and refined figure, her head in particular seems quite elegant. Though Warlord is a handsome horse as well!

First of all, awesome video. After that: It's about who you are up against. Spear vs enemy infantry and lance vs enemy cavalry, because your primary goal is to dismount your opponent. That goes along with the historical development because in the 11th century basically everybody was using cavalry.

This has become one of my favourite channels. Great work you're doing!

This is a television show broken down in parts isn’t it? It’s got to be, it’s way to well made. I love it!

Love it when he keep saying I'll show you in a moment. His horses probably saying "show it to them already";

The use of the spear in the higher up position seems to me to be most useful in the kind of situation after the charge, or when charging cannot be used; it seems like it would be absolutely most useful for stabbing - as you say - over the tops of the shields, harrying and hurting the enemy foot; perhaps as a way of using mounted fighters to supplement pike men? Or in some kind of chaotic melee where the horse and foot troops are together - maybe as part of a failed maneuver, where you have to do your best to survive long enough to pull back and regroup? The lance, just as you point out, is kind of one shot - you can't really couch twice! Now my familiarity with lance is purely from fantasy works and RPGs such as tabletop D&D - hardly the most accurate of sources. But, in them, the lance as an attack is generally set up to be a single, potentially *devastating* attack, designed to strike terror into the enemy and obliterate the target. In a way similar to the science fictional concept of a "kinetic weapon" that uses the mass of the weapon combined with the momentum and speed of the thing carrying the weapon to the target.

What a good horse ❤️ you trained her well!

I always wondered how they withdrew the lance or spear after hitting a target, especially when it pierced shields, armor and bodies. I think it is very difficult to not loose grip of the lance and loosing the whole weapon in the process...

2:32 Love that, the horse was ready to charge into the battlefield.

Denethor shows his skill with the lance xD

So: "Spears are for stabbing" "Lances are for 'Ramming' with a weapon" The spear part is obvious, the lance part maybe slightly less; But since you are effectively (trying) to link; The lance, You Body & The Horse *together* by pouching the Lance, it really is more akin to a Ram than stabbing.

I like that you credit the horse

If you can keep yourself on the horseback while lancing someone you're basically stabbing someone with the combined mass of you and the horse, i.e. extremely heavy impact. With a spear you're only getting the benefit of additional impact velocity but because the spear is quite light it doesn't add much to the impact energy (which is what does the damage). Here's some amateur math for you (with assumed weights and velocities): (Energy = 0.5 * mass * velocity^2 = 0.5 * m * v^2) *Spear:* _0.5 * 2 kg * (10 m/s + 20 m/s)^2 = 0.9 kJ_ (Horse velocity 10 m/s + spear strike velocity 20 m/s, spear weight 2 kg) *Lance:* _0.5 * 1000kg * (10 m/s)^2 = 50 kJ_ (Horse velocity 10 m/s, knight + horse + lance + armour mass 1000kg) So with this calculation you would get roughly 50 times stronger impact with the lance (assuming you don't fall off the horse due to the counter force if the lance doesn't impale the target). I am aware that this calculation isn't accurate because it assumes the spear is thrown at the target and that the knight with the lance doesn't move an inch backwards when hitting the target. It was mostly just for fun.

Very interesting indeed I learned a thing or two I do agree that the use of spear and lance is different, love the choice of music something about this song goes so well with medieval videos in my humble opinion.

Thanks so much for this series. I've been looking for something like this because I love horses and history and because I write medieval fantasies. It's so cool to finally see how and why things were done in the Middle Ages, especially with horses.

Jason , Absolutely LOVE your Channel ! The Love you show all your horses is so very refreshing to watch , coming from someone who has had horses for most of my life! I know how that SPECIAL bond can be. PLEASE do a video on Warlord !! The Love and Trust is so obvious between the 2 of you ! Would be so AWESOME to know your twos story , from the first day you got him all the way threw his training and the shows you do together !

Thank you so much for all these videos, they are so informative and at the same time presented in an extremely natural and enjoyable way besides showing your huge appreciation and respect for animals. If only more people/you tube channels/television/films could follow your example! Working through all the playlists from the beginning.

I really love your channel unlike those other meddival historical channels who just talks and talks...

Great video, as always. Thank you!

this is a excellent series

My god that cocky rearing at 2:30, loved it. I have a question though, how hard is it to retrieve or keep your spear after the first target? Because flesh and clothe easily entangle a blade going through and you just can't put a foot on the poor sod's chest and wrench it out, or can you?

I love your channel. We see more technics in real life what we have shown in books. Massive thank you! 👍

What a great topic. Thanks for this.

thank you for another great and insightful video! :D

Awesome explanation.

Such great videos!!

Why do you only have 110K subscribers?! This is awesome!

This is like experimental archaeology. 👍

Awwwwwww, what a cute horsie! Yet another one of his I didn't see before.

A similar thing happened in WW1. When tanks first were created the techniques that were used for horse cavalry were adopted to the tanks. they used the exact same tactics. as tank technology changed, techniques and tactics specifically for tanks were developed.

I loved this channel. Thank you very much for creating it! I'm in Gippsland Australia and I'd love to know if you're coming to the World Jousting Championship here in June.

Thanks for the explanation, sounds very plausible. As an architect (and someone who understands forces and impacts) your explanation and try-outs do actually raise more questions to me: What about the impact in your hand (with the stabbing technique) (that adds to the speed of the horse)? >> Is there a limit the hand can take? Won't the hand and arm not go backwards a little bit, so that you actually loose impact speed? (I don't think the hand is made to sustain such a blow, especially not on an angle of almost 90 degrees) How firm is the grip in one hand? What is the chance of losing the spear? Or burning your hand because of the friction? Some further thoughts: with a lance locked underneath ones arm, I would assume that it's easier to contain the full power of the speed of the horse and transfer all the energy into the blow (no way to retract backwards). Thus actually gaining more impact power instead of losing some of it (because of a restricted grip in the hand). With a lance a knight can also use more mass of his body to sustain the blow on top of the impact forces being aligned (and thus stronger) instead of a force going from tip (of the spear) to shoulder over two sides of a triangle (spear& arm). In other words: a lance converts the impact of the blow to one line with mass, instead of a kind of hook, with the hand most likely to be more of a hinge than a constraint (because of the distance from the shoulder and the grip). So from a scientific point of view, the lance makes a lot more sense to withstand high impact blows. The extra length of course gives a lethal advantage because one can hit the enemy before they can reach onself, but there seems also to be less risk involved of losing ones lance that way. Eventually, with a balanced lance (counterweight) , the knights pose seems a bit more rigid and contained, which also involves less risk of reaching out over the side of the horse. This also holds the energy of the blow better together and thus the impact can be higher before one falls of (or breaks an arm, dislocates one shoulder etc.)

Watching closely the techniques using the lance I really didn't realize how much physics and engineering (developing weapons) were involved.😲😁

i read an account of an encounter, a skirmish between a small group of British cavalry and an equally small group of German lancers, at the very beginning of WWI. they actually had a melee, the British armed with sabres and pistols, the Germans armed with their lances and I presume pistols. The British cavalry whooped the lancers, but good, although the writer did say he thought the Germans were not very well trained. Oddly enough, none of them used their pistols in the short melee. So, it is a bad thing if your lance misses when charging a man with a sabre. It was a happy hurrah victory for the British cavalry, however, most of that unit were killed before the day was out when they attacked a a dug in enemy position that had a machine gun.

💜🦄 so well executed!

love this channel... on topic - couching (I hope that is how it is spelled) seems to lock the target area - that is, the enemy must be or be going to be in a predictable spot (such as another rider charging). Spearing would seem to be more effective in combating a more agile enemy - say a foot soldier who would (I assume) be more of an unpredictable target for "location at time of strike" (I hope that makes sense)

Great Work and reproduction. I feel the shorter lighter lances would have been more effective against foot. When it came to opposing heavy cavalry a longer heavier Lance provided greater range and lethality or damage potential through blunt force trauma, which is critical to beating knights and men at arms in thick plate armour. The final technic is great for that as it makes full use of the galloping horses momentum.

Jason, when are you going to get your company, Rebellion, to make a medieval sword fighting game? It would be awesome!

You are incredibly majestic.

Miss Gossamer is most lovely.

Good video

I am a huge fan of Polish Winged Hussars. Great feats of badassery no doubt. I am all on board for long pokey stabby things from horseback :)

Your love of animals is quite apparent in the horse you're riding. He loves you and working with you. You are a special person sir.

Gossemer is so beautiful I just love that aquiline profile,

That’s a beautiful horse

Do have to say couching a lance looks really cool

So lances are a very well further developed spear, but single use. Very well demonstrated again!

Gossamer is gorgeous. I also want to see more of Mr Dibbs

Cool demonstration. I always wondered how the hand doesn't slide down or drop the spear upon impact or the couched lance doesn't push the lancer back violently. You're not even using gloves. Very interesting.

I've always wondered how medieval knights managed on Crusade in the middle East. I've grown up in South Africa with the summer temperatures regularly getting above 35 degrees C, so I'm about as accustomed to the heat as I can get (as someone of European ancestry who doesn't like the heat), and it's difficult enough to function out in the open in shorts and a T-shirt. How they fought in full armour in blazing sun with temperatures reaching 35 or even 40 degrees...even if the humidity was low, it must have been bloody crucifying. Particularly if water was in short supply. It makes me wonder if battles were ever called off because of the heat. Given that the commanders would often meet before battle commenced, I suppose it's plausible?

Great video, thanks! However, I was hoping to see technique how to release a lance after it stucks in the target. Are You considering making video about that or share some info about it?

Great video! The spear seems like it would be ideal for lightly armored and/or fleeing infantry. The lance would be better for harder targets like heavy infantry or other horsemen.

Okay well I already thought this man is charming and handsome, and now he is here being a knight and riding on a horse. Oh my god.

Have you done a segment on injuries as might be incurred in battle, or tournaments? We know a fair bit now on injuries from ACW, WWI ..due the weapons ...so much of medieval battle seems more bashing and slashing vs straight cuts..with dirt pressed into wounds

Gossamer is beautiful. I think I have a favourite. Is Kasumi the same person that helped you put your armour on?

When couching the lance, I believe you are lending some mass to the spear. The impact energy is greater when striking the target at the virtually the same speed. The spear is the same, the speed is the same. The only thing that is different appears to be the energy of the impact, so it seems that you have lent mass to the spear with that solid connection your body.

It's an old video but i think can be usefull to point out that if you thrust with the lance from your charging horse you're simply adding to the power of your thrust the speed of the horse, but when you couch the lance, you're removing the power of your thrust, but you're adding the whole mass of you and your horse, at the blow,and the speed of the horse, and that's why the couching tecnique has way more impact.

Idea for a video, what sort of cav charges or tactic were there for assaulting other units? In games its generally the cycle charge, but after watching some historical battle simulation tactics, one tactic i noticed was the French cav kinda trotting into the enemy lines and using the weight of the horse flesh to just push through and open a gap & trampled anyone underneath at a walk under a brigade of horses. You then think about Police horses on crowds off people and how the weight of the horse is just used to push through crowds and disperse them. I know one battle the French used armoured cav in a frontal charge with unarmoured at the back, was seemed less of a charge and more about using the combined weight of horses to push through the English lines, but the English Longbows peeled around the sides and shot into the unarmoured horses that created chaos and dead horses that blocked in the armoured horse riders and the thing quickly went south for the French. So if there were ton of dead horse corpses laying about, does cycle charging really seem like a valid tactic, and would you not instead just engage the line and attempt to use the weight of the horse to push a flank or centre through to be exploited instead? atleast until such a formation broke from which a charge/riding down a foe would be more useful? I mean the Norman couch lance would be the exception of a pure sledge hammer at a charge, but seems to be the common go to tactic when representing in computer games?

I generally call it a lance when couched & a spear when not couched, although of course both techniques are perfectly possible with the same weapon. From what I have heard in the middle ages a distinction was generally not made. The word "lance" is Romance while "spear" is Germanic so I expect it to be one of those things English has two words for because of its heterogeneity. Of the European languages with translations for both listed on Wiktionary, 14 have two separate words while 11 use the same word for both. The languages having 2 separate words are Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Faroese, Finnish, Galician, German, Hungarian, Italian, Latin, Romanian, Russian, Scots Gaelic and Turkish while those having only 1 are Asturian, Catalan, Estonian, French, Friulian, Macedonian, Portuguese, Sicilian, Spanish, Venetian and Welsh (a strong trend towards southern European languages having one word & northern ones having two). For this I have classified Georgian as an Asian language due to its relative isolation from linguistic influence from the rest of Europe. Greek is a complicated case & I'm not sure which category to place it in; Ancient Greek armies were largely infantry armed with spears & fighting in formation as the city-states' patriotism & the high ratio of population density to arable land meant men were in abundance while horse farms struggled to make a profit in peacetime.

Wonderful videos. Could the over head stab be an effective throw with a javelin?

The sizes and speeds of horses must have played a huge role in this. As we always say, medieval people weren't stupid. If they were fighting with spear from horseback in the 11th century, somebody would pretty quickly work out to couch the spear and use the momentum of the animal rather than more conventional spear techniques. Obviously it became more feasible as the middle ages progressed, and while the obvious answer is that battlefield tactics and the role of cavalry developed, I feel pretty confident that the foundational reason why it was better to use the spear as a spear in the early middle ages was down to the size and speed of the horses they had available.

I so need to find a place around here(NY) that would do this kind of thing! I've never been much interested in horseback riding but I now realize, it is just the "modern" styles (English mainly) I'm not into.

It's a bit like the variation between a shotgun and an assault rifle, both useful in their own right, but the shotgun has a much heavier impact

What about wielding with two hands on the horse back?

The overarm technique will lead to defernders raising their shields (more) to protect their heads and therefore not see the attacker. So they probably won't hit the horse but the impact will still push them back. Interessting thought.

Nice, btw i have question How to mount horse when we hold spear without assistant help or stairs ?

I could be totally wrong, but it looks like the downward stab with the spear might be better for weapon-retention (especially after penetrating an actual enemy person)

2:36 that hair! 👌

I mean essentially you put the impact of a horse running into someone into a fine point with couching while with stabbing it remains a separate force

The power is generated from resistance that you can put up. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. If you want to hit a target hard with a spear, that spear will also "bounce" back at you with an equal amount of force when it impacts. With just your arm and hand strength, a spear thrust goes forward, hits the target, but then when the spear bounces back, your grip strength + arm strength when extended out towards the target during the thrust motion isn't strong enough to withstand all that force. The spear hits the target, the force travels along the shaft of the spear, into your hand, then goes into your wrist and compresses the joint, then your forearm, then your elbow and compresses the joint, then your upper arm and finally its abosrbed into your shoulder and transferred to the rest of your body and the horse itself. You'll also flex the muscles in your arm to withstand more force that way too. The problem is by the time that impact force reaches your elbow, itll be too much for your body to handle and you'll intuitively feel it. You let the spear tip drop away and end the attack, otherwise you'll end up breaking your elbow or tearing a muscle in your shoulder. But when the spear is couched, all that force is directly and immediately transferred to your body and armpit through friction and the how tightly you couch the lance. Theres no energy travelling through your weak arm and joints, compressing and causing pain or the possibility of breaking bone. So you can hold it much firmer and "resist" the blowback from the impact. Because you can resist a greater amount of force, that also means you can put a greater amount of force into your target. Since the kinetic energy isn't being transferred through your arms. you can transfer more energy from the momentum of the horse into the target without breaking something. TLDR: If you can't withstand the blowback force, you'll get thrown off your horse. If you can't withstand the blowback, you can't make a strong strike. The change in holding the weapon allows you to transfer and "resist" the energy directly into your body rather than a weak and breakable arm which allows you to generate a stronger strike.

You should try using a long spear two handed, eastern tradition in particular classical Persians and romans used this technique.

Can you do one on cataphracts? Using a Lance in antiquity... Did they couch their lances?

I think you can still stab with the lance from couched position. You indeed do uncouch your lance but you add the power of your body to the stab rather than just the horse. Much like how you'd thrust a rapier. I think the only thing of concern would be accuracy loss, but because the stretch of the arm is so explosive the accuracy loss should be minimal.

When a Lance or Spear is couched, you are using the mass of the horse, rather than just their speed/momentum. An interesting experiment to try would be to look to the ancients (Sarmatians, Persians, and Romans) and compare couched lance against lance (Kontos) held underhand two-handed, and overhand two-handed, to compare relative impact energy. As for overhead one handed spear on horseback. Over a shield wall makes sense, but I believe its also been argued that on the Bayeux Tapestry, many but not all of these particular images are of warriors in various stages of throwing their spear (or javelin). Javelin from horseback was still a thing on the Continent in certain places at that time. Excellent series! SDLeary

I think overhand spears were often thrown, but at a really short distance.

Wow that's one dignified looking steed! What breed is it?

Your horses are beautiful and so loved. I would love to do reenactments with you.

This horse is a true beauty....

Nothing to do with history, but in the new game Mount & Blade II Bannerlord, I tend to like using couched when we do a first cav charge. After the infantry gets scared and starts running I pick them off using the overhead stab movement, it's a lot easier to control when your horse is going slower, trying to match the speed of people running on foot.

If I am not mistaken, the switch to a heavy lance from a light spear occurred because of the stirrup. To couch a heavy lance, you need a platform to hold you in place instead of getting knocked off your mount. Light spears on horseback were used to chase down enemy soldiers after their formations broke, basically stab them in the back as they ran. With stirrups you can lean into your strike and create a far heavier impact. You also see this in the evolution of the saddle for horsemen. Light spears were fine for killing fleeing enemies, but the stirrup/saddle combination allowed the war horse to be used more like a tank to break enemy formations in the first place.

I am curious if the development of the heavier couched lance was a response to better protected footsoldiers, and cavalry with the introduction of plate armour. A spear would seem effective against chain mail, but not so much against heavier plate.

Thats very interesting. I knew that lance has greater impat when couched and would be great at knocking people of their feet and horses. But could the stab actually be better at piercing armor? Thengthrand tested the spear with one and two handed, and he found out that two handed full body push doesn't pierce the armor as far as a stap with one hand sliding on the shaft, aiming the spear and the back hand doing the stabbing, that way the spear tip was travelling faster but had no body weight behind it and it was more succesfull in penetrating armor, where the slover full body weight stab only pushed the target. I wonder could the same thing happen here? The stabbing motion and horses speed are faster than the horses speed alone when the lance is couched. The couched spear pushed more but when having sharp spear against armor, could the stab actually penetrate more? This test left out the most important thing of the spear, the spearhead, so no penetration was tested. Skallagrim has a video where he shoots medieval repro helmets with modern guns, and the 45 caliber (12mm) 1911 colt pistol only hugely dented it, but the 7,62mm tokarev did go right trough, despite beeing much lighter than the 45 caliber bullet, but having higher speed. I would like to see you do the same test with real spear against a breastplate (or atleast 2mm thick piece of steel) on similar target.

Interesting, I think Dan Jones in one of his History Extra talks mentions the theory that the evolution of a horse rider with a spear to a mounted lancer with a more supporting saddle and stirrups which was supposedly far more effective led to the rise of the knights and the feudal system. Since it was obviously expensive for the training, the horse and the equipment needed a certain amount of productive land had to pay for it. The knights in turn pledged fealty to a higher lord or king and thus were able to provide an army when it was needed.

Are couch lance suppose to break in war? Could you use multiple times? If penetrating the target on full gallop and doesn’t break, do you let go or pull out of the target

Just looking at it from basic (very basic) physics, when you thrust, you add your thrusting velocity to the horse/rider velocity. You are basically doubling, possibly tripling the polearm velocity. With the polearm couched, you are increasing the mass (and momentum) by two orders of magnitude. You are adding the weight of the horse/rider to the spear and the horse/rider is at hundreds of times heavier than a spear.

Didn't see Ghost for a time now though.

There is also the Footman's Lance, which seems to be a large-bladed spear. As far as I can work out, the distinction is that a spear (technically) can be thrown, whereas throwing a lance is pointless. Lances tend to be heavier spears.

2:31 Nice.

I see a difference in target, one for heavily armoured bodies where you want to knock them over and allow ground troups to overtake them and one where theyre troups en masse and you are riding in to make multiple hits on relatively un armoured targets

I reckon the couched technique would be much more effective against a mounted enemy but the stabbing technique better for killing Foot soldiers+if you charged a formation of foot soldiers(once in the melee) it would be very difficult to attack/defend yourself with a couched weapon.

7:05 I feel like this position would make it harder to keep the spear in hand after the head penetrates its target and gets embedded in there. Were lances designed to break off at the tip like in jousting so you could keep riding through?

Question. I have had this discussion many times. Jousting as a sport.The lances look very long and heavy. I understand they were all right handed. So would your lance and shield be on the right, or just the lance. If the lance is much bigger and heavier would the horse head be in the way? So would you joust on the right or left? We drive on the left. But Hollywood always show jousting on the right.

Jason Love this series!I have a question for you that I hope you can address. I am a Law enforcement officer in the U.S. and due to the possibly of being severely injured in the field we go through a lot of medical training to enhance our Survivability. What kind of medical assistance did the Medieval Knight have available to him? I do understand that the obvious lance through the chest would result in death, however what about broken bones, severe lacerations etc? I do understand it would be primitive compared to modern times, however I assume some sort of measures may have been in place. Am I wrong in this assumption? Thanks again for a fantastic look at the Medieval Knight!

When doing this generally the lance or spear stays in the body. Or do u keep a hold of it which in my mind make me think i would go off the horse

There are references that the buzantines and the persians used lances in this way, but with a major difference:the lance was tied to the horses ankles(front and back)with chains or leather rope to tranfer the force of the gallop into the lance and stab "with the horse"in a way.