This is a comparative study of how the societies of late-medieval England and France reacted to the long period of conflict between them commonly known as the Hundred Years War. Beginning with an outline of the events of the war, the book continues with an analysis of contemporary views regarding the war. Two chapters follow that describe the military aim of the protagonists, military and naval organization, recruitment, and the raising of taxes. The remainder of the book describes and analyzes some of the main social and economic effects of war upon society, the growth of a sense of national...

War's impact on two societies, England and France, in the late middle ages is fully explored through the evidence and commentary presented here, showing how they reacted to the conflict between them. The Hundred Years War forms the framework for the chosen documents, all from the fourteenth and fifteenth century; extracts show how men thought about war and how they faced up to these ideas in practice; the problems of manpower; and the effects of the military needs of the day on society. The importance of economic motives for going to war is considered, together with the changing methods used...

Vegetius' late Roman text became a well known and highly respected 'classic' in the Middle Ages, transformed by its readers into the authority on the waging of war. Christopher Allmand analyses the medieval afterlife of the De Re Militari, tracing the growing interest in the text from the Carolingian world to the late Middle Ages, suggesting how the written word may have influenced the development of military practice in that period. While emphasising that success depended on a commander's ability to outwit the enemy with a carefully selected, well trained and disciplined army, the De Re...