shields apparently work quite well in stopping soundwaves

You would make a great history teacher

The preview pic for this video is Lindy being attacked by a tiny UFO.

Can you do 'a point about' army recruitment in medieval times? What types of people would be obligated to fight (upper class/landowners?) and how did it change from the early medieval to late medieval period and were there any very peculiar recruiting systems in feudal Europe?

By the thumbnail I thought you were going to talk about flying saucers

You can never watch too much lindybiege

it's a hat it's a portable basin for shaving and give water to horse it's a scud it's a helmet

"The Romans weren't perticually archery specialists but they did terribly well in the ancient world" I think that's a bit of an understatement Lindy.

The image of Jeor Mormont among all those beatiful pictures of nature gets at least a grin out of me. every. single. time.

I swear to god,I have watched the first 5 seconds like 4 times and every time I hear: "take this one here, it's a little butt plug"

I appreciate that picture of Jeor Mormont in the background, surrounded by animals.

I usually really enjoy your trains of thought, but in this case you are quite wrong, at least in regards to the buckler. If you hold it the way you showed you are diminishing your control over the shield greatly and every strike will make it swing like your hand is a hinge. In addition if you let yourself be struck dead on the edge of the buckler there is a high chance the blade could go over and strike you. What you want to do is to hold it perpendicular to your fist, trying to catch the blows with the dome by boxing with it and keeping the handle as much as possible in parallel with the incoming blade. That way you will minimize the chance your buckler swivels within you hand and you allow the blow to glance over the dome and away from you. And last, but probably most important, the buckler should always follow your sword. This way you create a two point system of stability which is a lot easier to control then a one point one. Sorry for the long post, cheers. Alex

Love your outro. I know it is far from new or anything, just something that has to be said.

that moment when you're late to work but you must finish this lindybeige video.

Back when I was in the Legions, our thrown spears would strike the shield and penetrate. That was intended to penetrate to get the guy behind it, or to make his shield useless or even a hindrance. That is why our thrown spears had small heads and a long shank (and occasionally a weight on them).

Before watching the video: You're absolutely right. the shield is about deflecting a blow, not absorbing it. if angled properly, a millimeter of copper will do the job. It's about the training, not the equipment. After the video: I honestly didn't expect to see any thoughtful explanations about old weaponry from the guy who taught me about british accents, but now i'll have to subscribe. Well played, sir.

But if you have a thick shield you show that you are more of a man. Obviously. Plus there is more of it to bite.

Love your videos. Discussing things I didn't even know I was interested in

Hands down, one of the BEST channels out there.

A thick shield would also weight a ton. Mine is about 36" across and it's quite heavy (which to be fair I used too much glue when laminating it) but my friend has a 30" shield that is much lighter and I find it's way more maneuverable and easier to defend with

The video thumbnail looks like you're debunking UFO hoaxes.

this is why a metal rim for a shield is so important.

Hey Lindybeige! I enormously enjoy your Videos. Always clever, in 90% of the cases new ideas i never had and great humour! I would love to see some Video by you on important battles. You know like Cannae, Thermopylae, Marathon etc. I am sure you would have a lot of interesting Things to say on those!

Your videos are always so interesting and educational. Thank you.

Ever increasingly becoming my favourite channel. Also the thumbnail resembles a ufo/saucer.

you crack me up man. love your vids.

I live in America so whenever you say missile I just imagine you blocking a nuke with a wooden shield

*Great video, Lindy...👍*

Wow, fascinating thoughts. I like the examples it puts a lot into perspective.

only source creator i trust since he makes sense of what he's talking

Cool! a new lindybeige video

I love the pictures in the background, you are very funny.

I like that the thumbnail makes it look like he's biting the edge of his shield. #berserker

The quotes on the end are always the best.

Lindybeige Thanks for the vid on that oh so very important, yet sadly frequently overlooked and underappreciated, weapon - the humble shield; quite fittingly on the day I get my first one! :D Thanks for the bash at the constantly overpraised archers too. They really should show the effectiveness of shields in media more - there are barely any shields used in Game of Thrones, except by nobodies in big battles, who are killed because they're nobodies, and pretty much only Sean Bean used it in LOTR - and we all know how well ditching something that stops arrows turned out for him - whilst oh-so-perfect Legolas shot straight through plate armoured Uruks like it was pancake batter.

So that's how flying saucers work!

Great video. There's a lot to be said about the angle of blows too. If an arrow comes in at some angle against say an inch thick wooden shield, it's actually trying to penetrate about an inch and a half sometimes, so curves and raised details greatly increase the effective thickness beyond the actual distance between the inside and outside.

Loving the pic of James Cosmo in the background! Met him at a convention, great guy!

Don't know if you're aware but all your old videos are popping up on my feed again. Not complaining at all just sharing an observation.

Another great and entertaining video, as always. I would love to see some more video's on armour, do you have any plans for that sort of thing?

Good job Lindy

most excellent point there you have sir.

Regarding archers, it's actually fairly well known historically that the limitation of archery is that it is difficult. There was a great quote from a Byzantine general in one of John Keegan's books that out of every 10 archers, one of them would be any good. The infamous English lowgbowmen were the product of laws in England mandating archery practice for every military age male. The infamous archers of the Mongols and other steppe cultures were the product of a life of mounted hunting and a culture of archery. Both examples dominated their contemporary battlefield. The French used Genoese crossbowmen, for the very good reason that crossbows were easy to use (and crossbowmen were therefore easy to replace). Militaries then switched to firearms, again for the very good reason that they were easy for conscripts to use, despite inferior range, rate of fire and accuracy to contemporary composite bows. Warbows were also infamously extremely difficult to draw, well in excess of 100 pounds, and your average person cannot draw a longbow comparable to the weight of surviving examples from the wreckage of the Mary Rose. Notably, when the English finally started taking heavy losses from a series of military disasters later in the Hundred Years War, they never recovered, despite inflicting similar losses on French armies in numerous comparable battles and failing to deliver an end to the war, even after ransoming the French king. A trained English longbowman was a very prized military asset - a mercenary with a crossbow, not so much.

This dude is great. Genius people always look disheveled. 😂 This channel has been in my daily rotation for a few weeks and should be in yours as well.

Oh... I just clicked when i looked at the thumbnail image on the You Tube page. I thought you were going to talk about flying saucers.

The arrow turns your shield, losing energy...and setting you up nicely for the next arrow.

You talk like an expert, and not some like GEEK I seen in YT. *subscribed

Lindybeige Excellent point, never thought of it that way. Of course a buckler is far more useful for an edge parry than Dura Europos-style scutum. As for arrows hitting the shield, brace the shield against your shoulder, elbow, and knee. Minimize points of contact, keeps it from banging around and breaking your nose when it gets hit.

This man must be an amazing DM...

I love how he says missile instead of projectile, I really like it. If I'm using a shield against MISSILES, oh you know, intercontinental ballistic explosive devices

Puts a whole new meaning to the expression "Shields up!"

A corollary, and probably worth noting is that in hand-to-hand combat, the point of a shield is to deflect; not to block. If you take a heavy blow head on to the shield, you're more likely to break your arm because eventually, you absorb the force of the blow yourself. If you take the blow at an angle, a lot of the attacker's momentum is retained, but in a harmless direction (and possibly causing them to fall off-balance, if you're lucky enough).

I also thought of flying saucers based on the thumbnail, and assumed you were going to give us a Sci-Fi nerd rant on the impracticability of heavy shielding on one's spacecraft.

lol the outro quote is great.

The fine line quote at the end is so true 😆😆😆

Great video as usual! Always thought provoking 👍 I was wondering about the jousts, where the attack would be frontal with a spear… would the thickness of the shield (such as in your first example, between index and thumb) in that case, be important?

As a medieval fencing student I can tell you fighting against a buckler user is a nightmare.

why do you have a picture of lord commander mormont hanging in your background, next to all those animals and plants?

great video...and thanks too for pointing out both the melee and missile arguments. Interestingly, the one culture that didn't get heavily into shields were the japanese, with arguably some of the most archer heavy forces unti the late 1500's.

Modern ballistic shields do exist, very useful in dynamic entry.

When looking at the screen grab for this video I thought it was going to be about the shield thickness of UFOs.

The one time where the quote seems rlly out of nowhere, still hilarious

Kinda explains why duelling daggers became so popular, allegedly almost totally replacing the buckler.

time for another lindybinge

Jeor, what are you doing on Lindy's wall? You aren't a flower or a bird, or even a fluffy mammal!

Lindybeige could you do a video on The Dacian Falx.

Saw you at Gotland hope you enjoyed it

This was something that kind of been in the back of my mind for a while. I felt that thickness of shields also very much depends on material. A wood shield would, quite a bit thicker than something made almost or entirely out of metal.

I have noticed that same flaw in tens of cases where someone is testing, for example, how an axe would go through a helmet. In many cases, the helmet is bolted solid somewhere. Whereas in reality, the head would give in, and noticeably soften the blow.

So you talk about Shields for 3 mins, but Ladders take damn near an hour?! This is my kind of of history teacher

For some reason, I'm now thinking of how unlucky you would be to take a crossbow bolt to the buckler, and have it pinned to your chest.

the 2 medieval chads of youtube: Skallagrim and Lindybeige

I do recall however a video about duels between norse cultures? Where they would go through several shields during the duel so they had spares lying around because the shields were hit so much they became ineffective.

did you notice the large shield affects the acoustics of your voice?

Did you add Jeor Mormont to your Wall? I notice the subtle humour there.

"Buffer Zone" I differentiate between Blocking, which is static, and Parrying, which is active. You Block an arrow barrage, but in addition to the stand-off (Not to mention some of the energy deflecting the shield) holding it out the way soldiers were trained to do also decreases the angle by which you can be hit by missiles. Therefore effectively increasing the area it protects. (Also, since slow missiles are lobbed more than direct fire on battlefields where you have massed shields at the ready, you hold it up, which also cuts off the angle more.)

Good points!

A couple of additional points about sheild "thickness" as it relates to thrusts and missiles 1) an angled sheild is effectively thicker, not just because the strike is from the edge, but because the point must travel through more material on a diagonal cross section. This also creates a propensity to deflect rather than block 2) Lloyd had a good point about the rocking motion. Obviously, this rocking motion would tend to also turn a perpendicular arrow strike into a glancing arrow strike as the shield rocks. Again this increases the chance of deflection and tends toward the diagonal cross section.

I thought this was a UFO video, judging by the thumbnail lol

This man is a genius.

Nice pictures in the back! I mean you have flowers, all sorts of beautiful wildlife and *Jeor foocking Mormont!*

Thumbnail gives the impression Lindy's going to be talking about energy shields on UFO's.

Lindybeige, as an enthusiast of Historical Warfare myself, I have a question for you, or rather a video suggestion. I'd like to know how common certain armor types would have been on the battlefields of medieval Europe. For instance, how many men would be clad in chain mail, plate or gambesons? I'm sure the commonality of armor types shifted over the ages. This is a topic that I've had a hard time finding any consistent answers to, and was wondering what you know about the topic. Thanks!

Nice. I’ve been interested in acquiring a targe. But I would like a nice metal piece. Tough to get locally.

Great video as usual What mic and camera do you use?

"If you have a choice between a sword and a shield, take the shield."

A point on the missile impact bit, a reason you might want to hold the shield closer to your body is if you're being attack from people spaced apart laterally. Holding your shield away from you may mean that blocking against one archer will fail to block against another. Of course, personal experience and knowledge of the opponent's missile weaponry would change the distance you hold your shield.

A question about the loose grip on the shield for arrows, won't the movement of the shield either to the right or left when struck reduce the overall "area of coverage" meaning that you're more likely to be hit then with a rigid hold?

Beauty is skin deep, ugly is to the bone. Beauty fades with age, ugly holds it's own.

My experience is sword&buckler, Viking roundshield and Norman kite (Both on horseback and infantry). So my bit of info: you do not get hits on the rim of your shields that much. you never use the shield as "static" defence, you Move it to parry an attack, glance off a swordblow. The buckler is also used for attacs, using Both the Boss and the edge to hit someone. Only in a shieldwall your shield is static. On horseback however, we were taught (training for the Hastings 2000 event) to use the kiteshield as An offensive weapon, pointing the Lower edge forward when charging. That went quiet well. Most of the shields I owned have seen some rough combat (OK, not with Sharp edged weapons) but most damage is not on the edges, but on the bosses and the top half. That's because the parrying, the Active use. About shield thickness: I Make my helmets (I used to Be An Armourer) and armour usually of 1,5 mm mild steel. also my bucklers Are 1,5mm. that will do. 1 mm sucks, 2 mm is too heavy. kite shields: 3 layers of glued plywood, makes a curved shield of 10 - 12 mm with An outer later covered with glued linnen. Can take a lot of punishment without breaking, splitsing etc. Just sewn rawhid for the edge.

OK, so explain the length of the rivets on shield fittings. Your rotation idea countering arrows is interesting but how does this rotation of the shield works with the gauge strap shown on Saxon kite shields and how does it happen with cavalry kite shields - with or without gauge strap. Oh, yeah and the heavy aspis (ἀσπίς) of the hoplite only works that way when your arm is vertical - though it might have applied with the lighter shield of of open order troops

This dude is great

STRICTLY! No Revising!

What about formations in shields are more or less locked forward as in a Saxon/Dane/Nord-of-the-Week, shield wall. Your shield had to cover the the man to the side and they test the entire wall before impact to made sure it was more or less rigid. I think in such circumstances, the shield did take most of the impact perpendicular to its forward surface. If nothing else, we read of the shields shattering and being considered expendable. However, I think the fact that both sides where likely fighting behind a shield wall, seriously decreased their leverage and striking force because to hit the other guy's shield you had to first reach around your own. That might have been the real effectiveness of the Berserker and other unshielded, largely solitary, axe wielders. If they could close with a shield wall and survive, they could smash a few shields opening a gap that the following shield wall could push through. The Spanish used solitary men armed with a buckler and short chopping blade to break up pike formations. Latter the Landsknecht would use a solitary fighter with a two handed sword against the same formations. Seems like any formation that provides defense by locking individuals in place, protects them from a mass attack but leaves them vulnerable to just one crazy guy. I suppose the modern equivalent would be the necessity of massively armored tanks having to have infantry always around so some more balls than brains individuals doesn't run out of the brush and pour gasoline down the air intake. Rock, paper, scissors, never seems to end. P.S. You might want to look into the, to me at least, counter-intutive level of protect provided by vertical pikes against heavy volley's of arrows. Seems like most would get through but apparently, most did not.

Lindybeige! The answer to "Whatever happened to Jethro Tull?"!

I read someplace that roman arrows were very small and light, made more to maim and demoralize than straight up kill. with the added benefit of being able to fire them very quickly

Do a piece on blade resistant gloves!!! Please

Thank you very much! As a proponent of sword and buckler fighting, I'm getting sick and tired of regular folks scoffing that "that little shield won't help you at all-it's going to get smashed!" I think I'll just show them this video as a counter point :P

Archers weren't the only missile troops. Javelins were very widespread in the ancient roman times. The Romans were quite good with javelins, and all of their swordsmen would carry them. This way all of their troops were ranged. Their javelins were meant to pierce the shield and make them unwieldy and must be discarded in melee, giving the Romans an advantage in the following melee.

DARN.......I WANTED TO SEE HOW YOU GOT THAT UFO IN THE THUMBNAIL TO LAND ON YOUR HAND?!?!?