Warfare and Military Organizations

Introduction

Throughout the period c. 1350–1650, warfare was endemic in European society, and most rulers and members of the political elite were deeply involved with the maintenance and use of armies and navies. Wars and the development of the “military art” (tactics, strategy, and other aspects of the conduct of war) are interesting subjects for historical inquiry in their own right. But since the mid–20th century students of warfare and military organizations, reflecting broader trends in the discipline of history, have tended to focus less on the details of fighting than on the social history of those who served in the armed forces (a large and relatively well-documented population). Archival studies, drawing on voluminous administrative records, have provided masses of information about topics such as recruitment, supply, soldiers’ living conditions and social backgrounds, and structures of command and control. Since 1956 much of this work has been tied in one way or another to a grand debate about a “Military Revolution” in the Reformation period. Some see this Military Revolution as resulting from technical-tactical change (particularly the rising importance of gunpowder weapons, both handguns and artillery, and then the new style of fortifications developed to resist cannon) and leading to major political and social changes, particularly linked to the rise of the modern state structure. This is true both of broad surveys and of the extensive literature on the development of the various national armed forces of Europe within the period.

General Overviews

There are number of good books giving overviews of the military history of the era. Arnold 2001 is a heavily illustrated, concise, accessible, and fairly up-to-date treatment by a well-regarded military historian. Hall 1997 and Tallet 1992 are fuller but still introductory surveys, the former focusing on technology, the latter with a more social and administrative emphasis. Corvisier 1979, a seminal work, is similar in coverage to Tallett 1992 and more concise (though now somewhat dated). Hale 1985 is a model of its genre. Black 2002, like the author’s other works, reflects his intelligence, exceptionally broad learning, and willingness to challenge received wisdom. The chronological and geographical range covered in this entry is too great for any one scholar to master completely, yet any given region or century is best understood with reference to neighboring ones. This problem has given rise to several collections of essays in which each chapter is written by a specialist expert, while the chapters collectively provide a rounded treatment of the military of our topic. The nicely complementary volumes of Mortimer 2004 and Tallett and Trim 2010 are both outstanding executions of this model, with contributions by rosters of distinguished historians. Black 1999 puts the European developments in their world context.

Arnold, Thomas F. The Renaissance at War. London: Cassell, 2001.
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An excellent first introduction to the subject, focusing on the long 16th century, by a specialist in 16th-century Italian warfare with a broad understanding of military history. Images are used effectively to support the well-written text.
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Black, Jeremy. European Warfare, 1494–1660. London: Routledge, 2002.
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A wide-ranging and well-informed synthesis of recent work that nicely balances “war and society” approaches with due regard to the traditional matter of military history (battles, sieges, military technology, etc.). Devotes substantial attention to situating European military developments in their global context. Emphasizes contingency over structuralist approaches.
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Black, Jeremy, ed. War in the Early Modern World, 1450–1815. London: UCL, 1999.
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This collection of essays includes surveys of “European” warfare and Ottoman warfare, warfare at sea (mainly from a European perspective), the influence of Europe on warfare in Atlantic Africa, and European warfare with Aztecs and in North America. It also provides context for European developments with overviews of warfare in Japan, China, and India.
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Corvisier, André. Armies and Societies in Europe, 1494–1789. Translated by Abigail T. Siddall. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1979.
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A wide-ranging but quite concise overview of the relationships among soldiers, the nations from which they came, and the states that they served. Deals with issues such as morale, discipline, ranks and promotion, civilians’ attitudes towards the military, and the social composition of armies. Translated from Armées et sociétés en Europe de 1494–1789 (Paris: P.U.F., 1976).
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Hale, J. R. War and Society in Renaissance Europe, 1450–1620. London: Fontana, 1985.
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One of the very best “war and society” surveys. Based on impressive learning and packed with information and insight into how war and military institutions related to sociopolitical structures and developments (downplaying the causative power of military innovation). Also excellent on the social history of soldiers. An interesting chapter describes developments in the art of war in terms of “Reformation” rather than “Revolution.”
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Hall, Bert S. Weapons and Warfare in Renaissance Europe. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.
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Combines technical analysis of how weapons changed over time with chapters relating technological changes to developments in the conduct of war, particularly on the battlefield. Especially good on the chemistry and physics of gunpowder and gunpowder weapons.
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Mortimer, Geoff, ed. Early Modern Military History, 1450–1815. London: Palgrave, 2004.
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An all-star team of early modern historians survey the field. Concise and accessible for undergraduates; documented. The most relevant contributions include Rhoads Murphey on Ottoman expansion in 1451–1556, Jan Glete on naval power in 1450–1650, Geoff Mortimer on the Thirty Years’ War, and a chapter on Spanish military power in the 16th century by Fernando González de León that calls for “substantial modification or total abandonment” of the Military Revolution model.
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Tallett, Frank. War and Society in Early-Modern Europe, 1495–1715. London: Routledge, 1992.
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Although it covers the art of war (with some emphasis on continuity over change), the strength of this book lies in the sections on the common soldiers and their experiences. The impact of war on the societies and economies of the period is also well summarized.
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Tallett, Frank, and D. J. B. Trim, eds. European Warfare, 1350–1750. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
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The conference this collection of essays is derived from was called “Crossing the Divide,” and the contributing historians have aimed to show continuity as well as change over the transition from medieval to modern. As with Mortimer 2004, the authors were invited to participate and given topics with the intent of collectively creating a comprehensive survey; of the two, this book is a more complete study and more thematically organized.
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Reference Resources

It is somewhat surprising, given the recent proliferation of topical encyclopedias and the number of scholars working in the area, that there are no serious encyclopedias focusing on Renaissance or early modern warfare, but the 14th and 15th centuries are now covered in the recently published three-volume Oxford Encyclopedia of Medieval Warfare and Military Technology (Rogers 2010). There are a respectable number of entries dealing with our period in the International Encyclopedia of Military History (Bradford 2006). The online Iter bibliography is comprehensive and can be searched for warfare-related works. More militarily focused are DeVries 2002–2006 and the well-produced atlases in the Cambridge Illustrated Atlases of Warfare series (Black 1996 and Hooper and Bennett 1996).

Black, Jeremy. The Cambridge Illustrated Atlas of Warfare. Vol. 2, Renaissance to Revolution, 1492–1792. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
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Takes a global rather than European approach to the subject, but the large majority of the maps nonetheless deal with warfare involving European states. Combines clear and useful maps (of which more than thirty deal with the topic of this entry) with short narrative histories of the main wars and operations.
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Bradford, James C., ed. The International Encyclopedia of Military History. 2 vols. New York: Routledge, 2006.
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The entries are generally of good quality (despite editorial errors such as including the entry for Edward the Black Prince under the heading “Edward IV”). However, many major Renaissance-Reformation military figures and events are omitted: for example, there are no entries for Marignano (1515), or for Charles the Bold, or for the Eighty Years’ War, and the only sieges for the Renaissance-Reformation with entries are Rhodes (1522) and Malta (1565).
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DeVries, Kelly. A Cumulative Bibliography of Medieval Military History and Technology. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2002–2006.
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Despite its title, DeVries’ valuable bibliography includes coverage of the full period to 1648. In addition to the relevant medieval topics, the initial volume has about a hundred pages of geographically divided listings for the 16th to mid-17th century period. Not annotated. The updates include older works omitted from previous volumes.
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Hooper, Nicholas, and Matthew Bennett. The Cambridge Illustrated Atlas of Warfare. Vol. 1, The Middle Ages, 768–1487. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
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Although only one chapter of this atlas deals with the period covered in this entry, those forty pages provide a substantial number of well-drawn and useful maps as well as a concise narrative summary of the Hundred Years’ War, the Hussite Wars, the Wars of the Roses, the Burgundian-Swiss War of 1465–1477, and other conflicts.
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International Medieval Bibliography.
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Comprehensive database of journal articles and chapters in conference proceedings, essay collections and Festschriften dealing with Europe, North Africa and the Near East from 400–1500, across the scholarly disciplines. Covers works written since 1967.
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Iter.
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A massive searchable bibliography of books, book chapters, journal articles, reviews, and dissertations dealing with all aspects of the period from 400–1700. Strongest on material published since 1980. Interface functionality is somewhat limited (e.g., cannot sort output by date). Requires subscription.
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Rogers, Clifford J., ed. Oxford Encyclopedia of Medieval Warfare and Military Technology. 3 vols. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
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A substantial reference work with more than a thousand entries by nearly two hundred international contributors. Coverage extends generally through the 15th century and emphasizes the 14th and 15th centuries. Includes entries on many individual sieges, battles, and military leaders. More important, most regions (e.g., Britain, Iberia, Italy) each have three large late-medieval overview entries: a narrative of military events and developments and essays on the sources and on modern historiography.
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Collections of Papers

The edited multi-authored volumes cited here were designed to give broad and comprehensive overviews. The single-authored volumes cited here also focus on Renaissance-Reformation period warfare and are transnational in subject matter, but the essays included were written as standalone works, mostly dealing with much narrower topics. The coverage of the topic they offer, even collectively, is geographically and chronologically uneven, just as the overall distribution of scholarly effort is. Nonetheless, they offer much of value for students and scholars of warfare and its impact on society in the mid-14th through mid-17th centuries.

Multi-author Collections

The articles reprinted in Hammer 2007 survey the field. The rest of the works in this section focus on western Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries, with Cauchies 1986 particularly significant for Burgundy and for gunpowder, Contamine 1991 for perceptions and experiences of war, and Contamine 1996 for the social impact of war. Villalon and Kagay 2005 and Villalon and Kagay 2008 address the Hundred Years’ War, and the conflicts related to it, from a broad variety of approaches.

Cauchies, Jean-Marie, ed. Art de la guerre, technologie et tactique en Europe occidentale à la fin du Moyen Âge et à la Renaissance: Rencontre de Bruxelles (19 au 22 septembre 1985). Basel, Switzerland: Centre Européen d’études Bourguignonnes, 1986.
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Includes essays, mostly in French, on the Burgundian navy; also covers Burgundian armor and chivalric display, the role of gunpowder weapons in the battles and sieges of the late 15th through late 16th centuries (four articles), and on arms, ideology, and politics in 16th-century Venice. There is also an apologia for Charles the Bold at Morat.
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Contamine, Philippe, ed. La Guerre, la violence et les gens au Moyen Âge. 2 vols. Paris: Les éditions du CTHS, 1996.
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The majority of the essays deal with war and with the 14th and 15th centuries. Topics include the roles of women in war; French towns and monasteries and war; urban fortifications; English occupation of French territories; and war and brigandage. Most of the essays are in French; some are in English or Spanish.
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Contamine, Philippe, Maurice Hugh Keen, and Charles Giry-Deloison, eds. Guerre et société en France, en Angleterre et en Bourgogne: XIVe–XVe siècle. Lille, France: Centre d’histoire de la region du nord et de l’Europe du nord-ouest, 1991.
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Topics include campaign dispatches; contemporary French opinion regarding the Hundred Years’ War, soldiers, and the battle of Poitiers (1356); ransom brokerage; the court of chivalry; the Burgundian military at the 1436 siege of Calais; and chains as urban defenses. Essays in French and English.
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Hammer, Paul E. J., ed. Warfare in Early Modern Europe, 1450–1660. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2007.
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A well-chosen selection of seventeen previously published articles by various authors including Geoffrey Parker, Simon Pepper, and David Potter. Collectively they offer a good sampling of the best English-language scholarship in the field over the past several decades, enhanced by a good historiographical introduction and a useful index.
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Villalon, L. J. Andrew, and Donald J. Kagay, eds. The Hundred Years War: A Wider Focus. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2005.
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The focus is even wider than the title implies; some contributions are about contemporary military topics only tangentially connected to the Hundred Years’ War. Five studies deal with 14th-century Iberian warfare. One study looks at the White Company in Italy. Other studies deal with military activity by London and Toulouse, English strategy in 1415, and gunpowder artillery’s effectiveness.
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Villalon, L. J. Andrew, and Donald J. Kagay, eds. The Hundred Years War (Part II): Different Vistas. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2008.
DOI: 10.1163/ej.9789004168213.i-480Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Like its predecessor (Villalon and Kagay 2005), this volume includes material on warfare in the 14th and 15th centuries outside as well as inside the ambit of the Hundred Years’ War. Includes articles on the “War of the Two Pedros” between Castile and Aragon, the condottiere John Hawkwood, purveyance and war finance, and the efficacy of the longbow. Also covers Agincourt, the longbow, and historical memory (Agincourt, du Guesclin).
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Single-Author Collections

Several of the most important contributors to our understanding of Renaissance and Reformation warfare have been historians for whom military history is but one interest among several. However, there are a few single-authored collections of essays that focus on warfare in this period. DeVries 2002, focusing on the period 1337–1500, deals extensively with issues of military technology but is explicitly opposed to “technological determinism.” John Hale, one of the most influential historians of the subject, includes several of his most important articles in Hale 1983. Philippe Contamine, the dean of late-medieval military historians, has published several such collections, focusing on France; Contamine 1994 and Contamine 1981 are the most relevant. Thompson 1992 deals mainly with 16th-century Spain, while Rogers 2010 contains mostly studies on the 14th-century phase of the Hundred Years’ War.

Contamine, Philippe. La France aux XIVe et XVe siècles. Hommes, mentalités, guerre et paix. London: Variorum, 1981.
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Mostly in French, but includes a useful English-language study of the early military treatises of Robert de Balsac and Béraud Stuart. Other particularly important articles deal with garrisons’ profits from ransom and booty and with the mercenary Free Companies or compagnies d’aventure. Most of the book, including those two studies, relates to the Hundred Years’ War.
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Contamine, Philippe. De Jeanne d’Arc aux guerres d’Italie. Orléans, France: Paradigme, 1994.
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Among other essays, includes reflections on the nature of the Hundred Years’ War (feudal, dynastic, or national; just or unjust by contemporary standards) and studies addressing Joan of Arc as prophetess, myth, military figure, and in memory. Also covers Jean d’Estouteville, Grand Master of the Crossbowmen of France (d. 1494).
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DeVries, Kelly. Guns and Men in Medieval Europe. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate/Variorum, 2002.
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Although it includes studies of particular campaigns (e.g., the 1346–1347 siege of Calais and the 1396 battle of Nicopolis) the focus of the work is on the emergence of gunpowder weapons—both from a technological perspective and with regard to their impact on war and on society. Critiques the work of Geoffrey Parker, Clifford Rogers, and other “military revolution” advocates as “technological determinism.”
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Hale, John R. Renaissance War Studies. London: Hambledon, 1983.
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Reprints of articles dealing with late Renaissance-era Italy and England, including a key study of the development of the bastioned-trace (or trace italienne) fortress. Especially valuable on the development of fortifications but also deals with military theory, early Venetian military academies, galleys, and ideas about war.
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Rogers, Clifford J. Essays on Medieval Military History: Strategy, Military Revolutions, and the Hundred Years War. Farnham, UK: Ashgate/Variorum, 2010.
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Fifteen essays originally published between 1993 and 2005, mostly dealing with warfare from the mid-14th to the mid-15th century. Topics more specifically include generalship, the relationship between offense and defense in late-medieval warfare, the interaction of warfare and diplomacy in the Anglo-French peace negotiations of 1353–1360, the impact and strategic purposes of the devastation inflicted on France, and the efficacy of the longbow.
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Thompson, I. A. A. War and Society in Habsburg Spain. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 1992.
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A collection of previously published essays, the majority of which deal with the Spanish government’s response to the problems of conducting and preparing for war. Specific topics include the economic and fiscal costs of war, Spanish naval and military organization under Olivares, and (the subject of six studies) the Spanish Armada.
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The Military Revolutions

The existence, nature, duration, and timing of one or more military revolutions during the Renaissance-Reformation period have been hotly debated topics. The debate was launched by a brilliant inaugural lecture by Michael Roberts in 1955. It is reprinted, along with some of the more important responses and challenges to it, in Rogers 1995. That collection and Parker 1996 together provide a good understanding of the issues at stake and the range of scholarly opinion on the subject. Eltis 1995 looks at the question mainly from the perspective of 16th-century England. Black 1991 is the most sustained critique of the idea. A key idea in the Military Revolution literature is the connection between war and state formation (see War and State Formation).

Black, Jeremy. A Military Revolution? Military Change and European Society, 1550–1800. Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1991.
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An 18th-century specialist’s rebuttal to the Roberts and Parker formulations of the Military Revolution thesis, stressing aspects of continuity and concluding that there was no military revolution in Europe from 1560 to 1660. Argues the absolutist state was more the cause than the result of military change. Thought-provoking if sometimes unpersuasive.
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Eltis, David. The Military Revolution in Sixteenth-century Europe. London: I. B. Tauris, 1995.
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A good introduction to the developments in the art of war in the 16th century and, more particularly, to the contemporary treatises that described and discussed them. English texts, which can be particularly useful to historians because they were written for an audience that had relatively little personal contact with military professionals or active warfare, are emphasized. Short and well written.
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Parker, Geoffrey. The Military Revolution. Military Innovation and the Rise of the West, 1500–1800. 2d ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
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A truly seminal work, displaying exceptional breadth of vision and depth of scholarship. “Revisits” key aspects of the topic emphasizing the significance of the trace italienne fortress, then treats the costs and difficulties of supplying the new larger armies with men and materiel and the naval developments of the period. Sees the Military Revolution as crucial to Europe’s global rise. Concludes with Parker’s defense of his arguments against his critics.
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Rogers, Clifford J. The Military Revolution Debate: Readings on the Military Transformation of Early Modern Europe. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1995.
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Reprints eight articles tracing the evolution of thinking about the Military Revolution, complemented by three new pieces rounding out the picture with examinations of fortifications, early Western conquests on the global scale, and war finance and state formation. Chapters by Jeremy Black and Geoffrey Parker challenge and defend the Military Revolution thesis, respectively.
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War And State Formation

The literature on the military revolutions in Renaissance Europe (see The Military Revolutions) often posits a link between military change, the increasing scale and costliness of warfare (including the growth in size and permanence of armies), and the rise of the strong, centralized state in Europe (or even the rise of absolutism). Bean 1973 and Finer 1975 are early statements of this line of argument; Downing 1992 develops it most fully. Lynn 1993, looking mainly at France at the end of our period (and beyond), shows that warfare pulled state development, rather than state development pushing up the scale of war. The French case is explored more thoroughly in Lynn 1997 and Parrott 2001. Wheeler 1999 uses early 17th-century Britain as a case study of the phenomenon, with emphasis on the navy rather than the army. Yet Britain, Holland, and Sweden were all among the most successful yet least absolutist of the new fiscal-military states, as Glete 2002 points out. Recent work in the area, such as Gunn, et al. 2007, emphasizes the importance of noble cooperation with, rather than subjection to, the central state.

Bean, Richard. “War and the Birth of the Nation State.” Journal of Economic History 33 (1973): 203–221.
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Focusing on the period of 1400–1600, aims to account for the process whereby European state governments decreased in number but assumed more power over their respective societies. Argues that optimal state size depends on economics of scale versus costs of control, and that in this period changes in warfare (especially infantry and artillery) shifted that balance to favor larger states with greater revenues.
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Downing, Brian. The Military Revolution and Political Change. Origins of Democracy and Autocracy in Early Modern Europe. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992.
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A political scientist argues that the need to cope with the Military Revolution strengthened central monarchies (leading toward absolutism) in countries where military modernization was funded by domestic resources, whereas in other cases “medieval constitutionalism” could survive. Rests on outdated conception of medieval warfare for its baseline.
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Finer, Samuel E. “State and Nation-building in Europe: The Role of the Military.” In The Formation of National States in Western Europe. Edited by Charles Tilly, 84–163. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1975.
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Seminal article arguing for a “coercion-extraction cycle”: the development of standing armies gave rulers the ability to compel subjects to pay the heavy taxes necessary to support the armies. Laid important groundwork for Downing 1992 and more generally for work linking the Military Revolution to state formation.
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Glete, Jan. War and the State in Early Modern Europe: Spain, the Dutch Republic and Sweden as Fiscal-Military States, 1500–1660. London: Routledge, 2002.
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A valuable and challenging (if not always persuasive) comparison of how efficiently three states mobilized their resources for war and the business of “protection-selling,” mainly to their own populations. Makes heavy use of economics-based theoretical structures and emphasizes the value of elite cooperation with the central state (including military “entrepreneurship”), in opposition to the older stress on coercion.
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Gunn, Steven, David Grummitt, and Hans Cools. War, State, and Society in England and the Netherlands, 1477–1599. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
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An important, impressively researched, and well-contextualized comparison of how the relationships between rulers and ruled (particularly noble families and urban elites) were influenced by war in two polities. Sees war as strengthening the state overall, though with countervailing eddies and by means of cooperation and negotiation with local elites more than coercion of them.
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Lynn, John A. “How War Fed War: The Tax of Violence and Contributions during the Grand Siècle.” Journal of Modern History 655 (June 1993): 286–310.
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Argues that the growth of army sizes was more the cause than the result of state formation, as evidenced by the fact that armies were often too large for states to support even with desperate efforts, leading them to allow unfunded troops to plunder those they were supposed to protect. Important for conceptualization as well as implications.
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Lynn, John A. Giant of the Grand Siècle: The French Army 1610–1715. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
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Describing the intertwined evolutions of the French army and the French military bureaucracy. Expands themes set out earlier in Lynn 1993. Important chapters deal with numbers of effectives, financing, and logistics. Sees war driving state formation—often through desperate improvisation—but not driving it to absolutism.
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Parrott, David. Richelieu’s Army: War, Government, and Society in France, 1624–1642. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
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An important work based on extensive archival research that combines exploration of neglected topics with a revisionist stance on the importance of military change during the period. In contrast to some earlier state-formation literature, Parrott emphasizes the extent to which new, higher levels of war mobilization in France were accomplished by ad-hoc decentralization.
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Wheeler, James Scott. The Making of a World Power: War and the Military Revolution in Seventeenth-century England. Stroud, UK: Sutton, 1999.
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Focusing on the period of 1639–1674, shows how military pressures forced the British state to professionalize its army and (especially) navy, and to construct a fiscal-administrative apparatus to pay for it. The creation of the standing army and navy both built the state and made Britain one of the great European powers.
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Tactics And Strategy

During the 20th century tactics and strategy (referring, respectively, to how armies fought, and how generals and rulers planned to use military force to win wars and accomplish political objectives) were somewhat unfashionable as topics of scholarly inquiry. Hence, old works like Oman 1987 sometimes remain the best available.

Tactics

The subject of tactics remains somewhat understudied by modern academics. Roberts 1967 provides a baseline analysis of military change in the early 17th century against which later historians react. Strickland and Hardy 2005, Love 1991, and Lynn 1985 all have a particular national focus but also make reference to other areas; together these works give a good sense of the evolution of the battlefield. Parrott 1995 offers a useful and skeptical view of the relevance of tactical reform.

Love, Ronald S. “‘All the King’s Horsemen’: The Equestrian Army of Henri IV, 1585–1598.” Sixteenth Century Journal 22 (1991): 511–533.
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Explains the important but neglected tactical reforms that greatly improved the effectiveness of French cavalry (including dragoons) in the late 16th century. Henri IV’s use of deep formations of pistol-armed cavaliers enabled him to regularly beat larger and better-equipped enemy forces.
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Lynn, John A. “Tactical Evolution in the French Army, 1560–1660.” French Historical Studies 14 (1985): 176–191.
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Describes French infantry (and light artillery) tactics in the period of Michael Roberts’s Military Revolution, arguing that they were less backward than Roberts suggested and that their evolution (rather than revolution) in this timeframe was driven as much by internal considerations as by Dutch or Swedish influences. Notes that drill was a necessary precondition for the important later growth of army size.
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Oman, Charles. A History of the Art of War in the Sixteenth Century. London: Greenhill, 1987.
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Although dated in some of its interpretations and excessively focused on battle (as opposed to siege and other modes of warfare), this work remains useful for its broad overview of the development of armies and for its analyses of many of the major battles and some of the great sieges of the century. Also interesting for its early effort to probe the “military psychology” of the period. No bibliography, minimal notes. Originally published in 1937 (London: Methuen).
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Parrott, David A. “Strategy and Tactics in the Thirty Years’ War: The ‘Military Revolution.’” In The Military Revolution Debate. Edited by C. J. Rogers. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1995.
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Parrott, contrary to received wisdom, argues the significance of the major tactical changes of the period was not great and that other factors (such as morale) were more important in determining success or failure on the battlefield in the Thirty Years’ War. Also argues that strategy in the period was characterized by failure to meet the challenges posed by the overwhelming advantage of the defense and by the increasing scale and range of warfare and armies.
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Roberts, Michael. “Gustav Adolf and the Art of War.” In Essays in Swedish History. By Michael Roberts. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1967.
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An influential and informative (though now dated) study. Rightly emphasizes how Gustav Adolph’s tactical reforms were designed to favor the offensive but paints an overly negative picture of his predecessors and successors.
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Strickland, Matthew, and Robert Hardy. The Great Warbow. Stroud, UK: Sutton, 2005.
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In addition to analysis of the longbow, this book includes short, well-researched analytical narratives of virtually every battle involving English forces from the 14th through the early 16th century. These together provide a good basis for assessing tactics and tactical change over the period for England and France, with some reference also to Iberia and the Low Countries.
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Strategy

Recent works (e.g., Croxton 1998, Allen 2000) tend to have a more positive view of the good sense that lay behind much strategic decision making in the era than did older works. Rogers 2000 views Edward III as an excellent strategist, directly contrary to some older views. Parker 1998 is critical of Philip II as a strategist, but on particular grounds—particularly Philip’s failure to delegate and his “messianic imperialism”—rather than general ones. Wernham 1984 and Wernham 1994 are essentially strategic narratives of English strategy under Elizabeth I though not self-defined as such.

Allen, Paul. Philip III and the Pax Hispanica, 1598–1621: The Failure of Grand Strategy. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000.
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A sort of sequel to Parker 1998, exploring how Spanish military and diplomatic strategies were developed at the level of the royal council, and to what result. Examines questions of “strategic overstretch,” relations between military efforts and negotiations, and use of short-term peaces or truces as means to long-term military victories.
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Croxton, Derek. “A Territorial Imperative? The Military Revolution, Strategy, and Peacemaking in the Thirty Years War.” War in History 5 (1998): 253–279.
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An insightful article using French campaigns in Germany to challenge the idea that the logistics-driven strategies of occupation and raid that characterized the later Thirty Years’ War were sterile exercises in futility. Relevant by analogy to other Renaissance-Reformation period warfare.
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Parker, Geoffrey. Grand Strategy of Philip II. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998.
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Examines how an intelligent, hardworking Spanish king tried to use the resources (military and otherwise) of his empire to achieve his political goals, including prosecution of major wars in the Netherlands and the Mediterranean and a war against England. Explains his failures in terms of “messianic imperialism,” strategic overstretch, and also structural difficulties.
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Rogers, Clifford J. War Cruel and Sharp: English Strategy under Edward III, 1327–1360. Woodbridge, UK: Bodyell and Brewer, 2000.
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In opposition to earlier works, argues that Edward III consistently employed battle-seeking strategies (even when conducting sieges or devastating expeditions), and that his success in the first of the Hundred Years’ War reflects the general soundness of his strategic designs.
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Wernham, R. B. After the Armada: Elizabethan England and the Struggle for Western Europe, 1588–1595. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984.
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A detailed history of the naval, diplomatic, and military struggle between England and Spain (involving also France and the Netherlands), narrated almost entirely from the perspective of Queen Elizabeth and her advisers, explaining what they did and why. Puts more emphasis on the Continental operations than did earlier work. Also aims (secondarily) to show how these wars weakened the English social fabric.
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Wernham, R. B. The Return of the Armadas: The Last Years of the Elizabethan War against Spain, 1595–1603. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994.
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Continues the story of Wernham 1984 in the same style, from the same perspective, and with the same positive view of the queen’s handling of the war. Narrates strategic debates among Elizabeth’s advisers.
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Technology Of War On Land

Developments in weapons and other items of military technology have a substantial influence on tactics and strategy, and disputes about the patterns and significance of technological change are important in the arguments concerning the military revolutions. Hall 1997 is a broad overview that integrates all these themes, with emphasis on gunpowder weapons. The other studies listed in this section are focused on particular aspects the subject. Strickland and Hardy 2005 gives a detailed and contextualized analysis of the English longbow. Williams 2003 deals with the metallurgical improvements that were the single largest reason for the replacement of the bow by the handgun. Smith and DeVries 2005 and, more broadly, Schmidtchen 1977 study the evolution of gunpowder artillery during the most crucial period of its development. Pepper and Adams 1986 provides an in-depth case study of the evolution of the angle-bastion fortress, or trace italienne, developed in response to the new artillery.

Hall, Bert S. Weapons and Warfare in Renaissance Europe. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.
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A broad survey. Contains good analytical narratives of campaigns that illustrate how changing military technology affected operations, but the greatest strength of the book is the analysis of the chemistry of gunpowder and the physics of early guns. Covers the period of 1325–1600.
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Pepper, Simon, and Nicholas Adams. Firearms and Fortifications: Military Architecture and Siege Warfare in Sixteenth-Century Siena. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986.
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A case study of the development and significance of trace italienne fortifications, mixing architectural, military, art, and urban history. Includes examinations of three major sieges. A good antidote to teleological approaches to technological history.
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Schmidtchen, Volker. Bombarden, Befestigungen, Büchsenmeister: von den ersten Mauerbrechern des Spätmittelalters zur Belagerungsartillerie der Renaissance; eine Studie zur Entwicklung der Militärtechnik. Dusseldorf, Germany: Droste Verlag, 1977.
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Drawing on extensive study of museum pieces as well as textual sources, gives an excellent treatment of the evolution of gunpowder artillery and related technologies (including bombs, hoisting cranes, powder mills, and bastioned anti-artillery fortifications), from the early 15th century through the 16th. Analyzes methods of using the developing technologies as well as the items themselves.
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Smith, Robert Douglas, and Kelly DeVries. Artillery of the Dukes of Burgundy, 1363–1477. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2005.
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The Valois dukes of Burgundy were leaders in the development and use of gunpowder artillery and kept good records relating to them. In addition to collecting and analyzing all the available data based on documents and surviving guns, this book offers a concise narrative military history of the Burgundian state. Also offers an overview of the development of gunpowder weapons in general during this period.
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Strickland, Matthew, and Robert Hardy. The Great Warbow. Stroud, UK: Sutton, 2005.
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Uses both traditional historical sources and experimental data to analyze the power, range, penetration ability, and practical effectiveness in battle of the English longbow, focusing on the 14th and 15th centuries. Also covers the place of the bow in English society and the reasons for its decline, including the rising cost of yew bowstaves. Richly illustrated.
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Williams, Alan R. The Knight and the Blast Furnace: A History of the Metallurgy of Armour in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2003.
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A dense book with much data from scientific metallurgical analysis of surviving arms and armor. Much past work on these topics has put too much emphasis on form and not enough on metallurgy. The development of techniques for making hardened-steel armor had a great influence on the tactics—and hence the recruitment and training—of armies in this period.
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Naval Forces And Warfare

Although the naval history of this period has tended to be somewhat neglected relative to the history of armies and warfare on land, the disparity of scholarly attention has lately been reduced. For up-to-date overviews, see Guilmartin 2002 (covering the whole period) and Glete 2000 (somewhat denser, covering only the period after 1500). Glete 2005 samples the articles written on the subject over four decades. Guilmartin 1974 and Martin and Parker 1999 give more detail on 16th-century naval history in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, respectively. For the use of naval forces as tools of strategy and diplomacy, a good case study is Stradling 1992.

Glete, Jan. Warfare at Sea, 1500–1650: Maritime Conflicts and the Transformation of Europe. London: Routledge, 2000.
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A broad, concise survey of naval conflicts and their economic and political implications (for example, with regard to state formation). Thematically organized and based mainly on an impressively polyglot array of secondary literature. Strong on the neglected Baltics. Emphasizes economic considerations and change over continuity. Does cover changes in technology, tactics, and strategy of naval warfare.
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Glete, Jan, ed. Naval History, 1500–1680. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2005.
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A selection of twenty-four articles originally published between 1959 and 1999, chosen by a leading expert in the field. The essays deal with administration, technology, tactics, operations and strategy, and also include privateering.
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Guilmartin, John F., Jr. Gunpowder and Galleys. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1974.
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An overview of Mediterranean naval warfare in the 16th century, focusing on the fleets of Spain, Venice, and the Ottomans. Explains galley construction, function, limitations, and tactics and how they affected strategy and were altered by gunpowder artillery. Also includes narrative of the main naval wars and battles, including Prevesa and Lepanto.
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Guilmartin, John F., Jr. Galleons and Galleys. London: Cassell, 2002.
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Like the other volumes of Cassell’s History of Warfare, a concise survey illustrated richly and usefully. Describes warfare at sea from 1300 to 1650 and the evolution of major ship types (including caravels and carracks as well as the ships mentioned in the title). Argues strongly for a “gunpowder revolution at sea” in the 16th century.
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Martin, Colin, and Geoffrey Parker. The Spanish Armada. Rev. ed. New York: Norton, 1999.
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An exceptionally well-written analytical narrative of the “Enterprise of England,” from both the Spanish and English perspectives. Enlivened by many illustrations and quotations from contemporary sources, especially official letters, though only lightly documented. Makes significant use of archaeological evidence. Revised from the 1988 edition to account for the many studies published for the Armada’s 400th anniversary.
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Stradling, R. A. The Armada of Flanders: Spanish Maritime Policy and European War, 1568–1668. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
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Well-researched study of the Spanish naval forces in the Netherlands, which were important to the wars and diplomacy of the Spanish monarchy but have been somewhat neglected by scholars. Emphasizes Dunkirk and the privateers based there. Complements Parker 2004 (cited under Armies, Warfare, and Society: Spain) and González de León 2009 (cited under The Ethos of the Martial Aristocracy) on the Spanish land forces.
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Armies, Warfare, And Society

Much of the literature on warfare and armies has been written in studies focused on the experience of particular nations, especially France, Spain, Britain, and Holland. Hence this broad heading is divided into appropriate national and regional subheadings.

France

France was involved in warfare almost continually throughout the Renaissance-Reformation period, and her rulers devoted much of their time, attention and resources to the military. Contamine 1972, looking at the period up to 1494, set a high standard for the study of French armies. Since the publication of that work, comparably high-quality work has carried the study of war and society in France forward chronologically, with the work of Potter 2003 (a focused monograph), Potter 2008 (a broad overview for the period up to 1560), Wood 1996 (for 1562–1576), Lynn 1997 (for 1610–1715), and Parrott 2001 (1624–1642). Much of the gap in the series between Wood 1996 and Lynn 1997 is filled respectably by the much older work of DuParcq 1864. For an overview in French of the entire period, see Contamine 1997.

Contamine, Philippe. Guerre, état, et société à la fin du Moyen Âge: Études sur les armées des rois de France, 1337–1494. Paris: Mouton, 1972.
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Extremely impressive work of scholarship about the structure and soldiers of the French armies of the 14th and 15th centuries. Covers soldiers’ social origins, wages, equipment, standard of living, rations, mounts, discipline, war cries, conceptions of duty, recruitment, among other subjects. Exhaustively researched.
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Contamine, Philippe, ed. Histoire militaire de la France. Vol. 1, Des origines à 1715. 2d ed. Edited by André Corvisier. Paris: Quadrige/PUF, 1997.
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A mix of narrative and more thematic analysis by a team of top historians, including Anne Blanchard and Michel Mollat du Jourdin as well as Contamine and Corvisier. Devotes around three hundred pages to the period of 1337–1659. Includes naval matters. Not documented.
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DuParcq, Edouard de la Barre. L’art militaire pendant les guerres de religion, 1562–1598. Paris, 1864.
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Despite its age, still useful on the evolution of tactics and on the contributions of the important military innovator Henri IV.
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Lynn, John A. Giant of the Grand Siècle: The French Army, 1610–1715. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
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A bulky tome describing the intertwined evolutions of the French army military bureaucracy. Deals with topics like drill, discipline, desertion, and soldier culture as well as fortress construction, weapons and tactics, and the art of high command. Important chapters deal with numbers of effectives, financing, and logistics.
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Parrot, David. Richelieu’s Army: War, Government, and Society in France, 1624–1642. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
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A major archival study that includes valuable sections on the “art of war” and the role of war in French policy, in addition to the more extensive treatment of the army itself and the military bureaucracy that recruited and sustained it. Rejects the traditional view that war built an absolutist military monarchy.
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Potter, David. War and Government in the French Provinces: Picardy, 1470–1560. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003.
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An excellent case study of how war molded the patterns of interaction among the crown, the nobility, and urban elites. Also shows the destructive effect of war on the region’s economy and countryside, as well as the strain it placed on governmental institutions.
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Potter, David. Renaissance France at War: Armies, Culture, and Society, c. 1480–1560. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell and Brewer, 2008.
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An admirably concise survey based on impressive research. Includes a structural analysis of the components of the French army (infantry, cavalry, artillery, etc.) combined with attention to the social history of the soldiers and to financial issues. Also analyzes the impact of war and military institutions on the development of the French political community, as well French rulers’ ideas about war and strategy.
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Wood, James B. The King’s Army: Warfare, Soldiers, and Society during the Wars of Religion in France, 1562–1576. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
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A first-rate study of the organization and campaigns of the royal armies during the Wars of Religion, well situated within their societal context. Includes much interesting quantitative data about army sizes and compositions, casualties, march rates, sources of war finance, etc. Valuable case studies of the battle of Dreux (1562) and the sieges of Chartres (1567–1578) and La Rochelle (1573).
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Britain

For British military history from 1337 to 1453, on which the literature is extensive, see the separate bibliography entry on the Hundred Years’ War. Warfare during the subsequent Wars of the Roses (1452–1495) is surveyed by Goodman 1981; Fissel 2001 takes up where Goodman 1981 leaves off and continues to the end of the period. For more detailed studies of Tudor armies and warfare on land, see Raymond 2007 for the reign of Henry VIII (1509–1547), and Cruickshank 1968 and Webb 1965 for organization and military tactics and ideas under Elizabeth I (1558–1603), respectively. Lloyd 1973 is a focused examination of a single campaign that allows readers to test the generalizations of the broader works. The mid-17th century is treated in a separate entry on the English civil wars.

Cruickshank, Charles Greig. Elizabeth’s Army. 2d ed. London: Oxford University Press, 1968.
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Much more comprehensively than the first edition, this monograph explains the structure and workings of the English army, with sections on recruitment, movement, communication, command, discipline and training, equipment, pay, and medicine. Detailed examinations of the campaigns of 1560, 1589, and 1596 in Scotland, France, and Spain provide concrete exemplifications of the generalizations.
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Fissel, Mark Charles. English Warfare, 1511–1642. London: Routledge, 2001.
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Part of the excellent Warfare and History series from Routledge. This fine study concentrates on warfare per se, including the structure and supply of armies and their actions on campaign—including Tudor forces in Ireland, the suppression of the Northern Rising of 1569–1570, and English interventions such as in the Netherlands and Portugal. Concludes that there was an English “art of war” deriving from a martial culture emphasizing flexibility in the face of unusually diverse challenges.
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Goodman, Anthony. The Wars of the Roses: Military Activity and English Society, 1452–97. London: Routledge, 1981.
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Still the best militarily oriented survey of the Wars of the Roses. Includes both a narrative and a set of thematic chapters treating recruitment, supply, billeting, the conduct of war, and the impact of the wars on society.
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Lloyd, Howell A. The Rouen Campaign, 1590–92: Politics, Warfare, and the Early-Modern State. Oxford: Clarendon, 1973.
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Detailed and rounded modern case studies of particular campaigns in this era are relatively rare. It is regrettable that this excellent example, which offers important insights into the nature of the early modern state as well as the purposes and conduct of war, has not inspired more emulation. Because of the nature of the sources, Howell emphasizes the English perspective, although not exclusively.
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Phillips, Gervase. The Anglo-Scots Wars, 1513–1550. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 1999.
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Despite introductory chapters establishing the European context and challenging the Military Revolution thesis, this is primarily a traditional narrative military history that analyzes the strategy, operations, and tactics of the Anglo-Scots wars. Views English and Scottish armies, arms, and methods as evolving steadily with input from, and not far behind, Continental military forces.
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Raymond, James. Henry VIII’s Military Revolution. The Armies of Sixteenth-Century Britain and Europe. London: Tauris, 2007.
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A lightly revised doctoral thesis arguing (as in Phillips 1999) that English military theory and practice were less backward, relative to Continental developments, than commonly thought. The focus is on the army itself; the navy is not considered, and little attention is given to military finance, fortifications and so on. Despite the title, the work questions the validity of the Military Revolution model.
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Webb, Henry J. Elizabethan Military Science: The Books and the Practice. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1965.
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A clear and useful guide to and synthesis of the rich military literature published in England roughly from 1540 to 1610. Because of England’s relative isolation from the Continental wars in this period, English books sometimes describe what French or Spanish authors took for granted, making them particularly valuable.
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Spain

Although the Spanish army was the premiere military organization of the 16th century, and Anglo-American historians have made distinguished contributions to the military history of Iberia in this period, the English-language literature on the subject is somewhat sparse compared to that on France or Britain. Stewart 1961 adequately covers the late 15th and early 16th centuries, but there is little on the late 14th to mid-15th centuries. In Spanish, Ladero Quesada 1967 offers a more detailed study of the conquest of Granada (1482–1491), and Quatrefagés 1996 surveys the Spanish military system of the following century. The same author has also written a more focused study of the Spanish infantry of the Army of Flanders during the first phase of the Dutch Revolt (Quatrefagés 1983). That conflict, narrated in Parker 1985, is well covered in English. Parker 2004 includes great detail on the logistics, administration, officer corps, and military effectiveness of Spain’s Army of Flanders. Kamen 2004 looks at an early phase of the Dutch Revolt in more detail—from the commander’s perspective. In Spanish, Mesa Gallego 2009 does the same for a later period.

De Mesa, Eduardo. La pacificación de Flandes: Spínola y las campañas de Frisia (1604–9). Madrid: Ministerio de Defensa, 2009.
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A detailed military history of the siege-dominated campaigns leading to the Twelve Years Truce of 1609, marking the recovery of the Army of Flanders after the defeat at the Battle of the Dunes in 1600. Challenges northern European–focused analyses of the Military Revolution, stressing the contribution of the Spanish to military modernization.
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García Hernán, Enrique, and Davide Maffi. Guerra y Socieded en la Monarquía Hispánica: Política, estrategia y cultura en la Europa moderna (1500–1700). 2 vols. Madrid: Ediciones del Labertino, 2006.
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At more than two thousand pages, this is a massive and impressive collection of seventy-three scholarly studies dealing with a broad array of war and society topics relating to the Spanish realms (including works focusing on Spain’s rivals) in the 16th and 17th centuries. The majority of the contributions are in Spanish, but some are in English or Italian.
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Kamen, Henry. The Duke of Alba. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004.
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A short and engaging biography of the foremost Spanish military figure from 1534 to 1582, with many quotations from his extensive correspondence. Based on solid scholarship but intended for the general reader. Offers much insight into the strategic conduct of Alba’s wars, mainly against the Dutch.
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Ladero Quesada, Miguel Ángel. Castilla y la conquista del Reino de Granada. Valladolid, Spain: Universidad de Valladolid, 1967.
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A data-rich study of the end of the Reconquista. Covers the strategy and narrative of the war, with emphasis on capitulation agreements, but the majority of the work is devoted to the structure, administration, and financing of the Castilian army that conquered and secured Granada between 1482 and 1491.
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Parker, Geoffrey. The Dutch Revolt. Rev. ed. London: Penguin, 1985.
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Outstanding narrative history of a complicated early modern war (or series of wars), nicely balancing Spanish and Dutch perspectives. Covers the period from 1549 to 1609. Rightly emphasizes the importance of finance.
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Parker, Geoffrey. The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road, 1567–1659: The Logistics of Victory and Defeat in the Low Countries’ Wars. 2d ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
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A lightly corrected version of Parker’s classic 1972 study. Aims to explain Spanish efforts to suppress the Dutch Revolt and why they failed, despite the expenditure of vast resources and the employment of excellent troops. The problems of distance, finance, and logistics are the basic answers. Also covers soldiers’ lives and mutinies.
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Quatrefages, René. Los Tercios. Madrid: Coleccion Ediciones Ejercito, 1983.
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An expanded Spanish translation (from French) of the author’s doctoral dissertation. Briefly treats the origins of the tercios but then focuses on the period of 1567–1577, when these Spanish infantry regiments were deployed to the Low Countries. Describes the organization of the tercios, the economic and financial contexts in which they operated, and the social existence of the soldiers.
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Quatrefages, René. La revolución militar moderna: El crisol Español. Madrid: Ministerio de Defensa, 1996.
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Based on reforming ordinances as well as voluminous archival material, aims to reconstruct and explain the organization of the Spanish military system from 1492 through 1592, with emphasis on the infantry tercios. Argues Spanish developments (largely driven by the need to compete with France) were the crucible of the “modern” army and the Military Revolution. Appendices include the texts of the main ordinances.
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Stewart, Paul James. “The Army of the Catholic Kings: Spanish Military Organization and Administration in the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, 1474–1516.” PhD diss., University of Illinois, 1961.
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Still the best work available in English on the subject of perhaps the most important transformational period of the Spanish army: from the final war of the Reconquista through the start of the Wars of Italy. In addition to providing details of military structures and operations, finance, and logistics, argues that the Catholic Monarchs harnessed the army to strengthen their domestic power.
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Italy

Mallett 1974 is an excellent overview of 14th- and 15th-century Italian armies and warfare. Chambers 2006, another very approachable survey, extends into (and focuses on) the 16th century. Pieri 1952 is the basic scholarly text for the period 1494–1530. Caferro 2006, a biography of one of the most successful condottiere, sheds more light on the warfare of the 14th century, including economic and structural aspects. Mallett and Hale 1984, Covini 1998, and Arafaoili 2005 deal with on particular northern Italian armies and their administrations, but much of what they have to say casts light on the Italian situation in general. The articles in Treppo 2001 show the range of recent work on Italian Renaissance warfare.

Arafaoili, Maurizio. The Black Bands of Giovanni: Infantry and Diplomacy during the Italian Wars. Pisa, Italy: Pisa University Press, 2005.
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Studies the first high-prestige Italian infantry force of the pike-and-shot era, starting with the death of their much mythologized organizer, Giovanni de’ Medici, in 1526, continuing through the siege of Naples in 1528 to their disbandment later that year. A valuable archival case study of a segment of the Wars of Italy.
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Caferro, William. John Hawkwood: An English Mercenary in Fourteenth-Century Italy. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006.
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A prize-winning biography of a key military figure from the age of the condottieri by a diligent archival historian. Treats Hawkwood’s career as a window into 14th-century Italian warfare and society. Blazes a trail into areas of military history that remain badly understudied, especially in English-language works.
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Chambers, D. S. Popes, Cardinals, and War. The Military Church in Renaissance and Early Modern Europe. London: I. B. Tauris, 2006.
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After an introductory survey of the medieval prelude to the topic, concentrates on the wars of the Papal States in the 15th and 16th centuries. Chambers, a well-known scholar of the church in Renaissance Italy, presents his material in the form of a lively narrative of high politics and warfare. The main title is more apt than the more expansive subtitle.
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Covini, Maria Nadia. L’esercito del Duca: organizzazione militare e istituzioni al tempo del Sforza, 1450–1480. Rome: Instituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, 1998.
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Includes both narratives of Milanese wars of the late 1400s and structural analysis of the army of Sforza, which (like the Milanese state) was transitioning from medieval to “modern” forms. Places the army in its sociopolitical context (for example, dealing with issues of clientage and with military-civilian conflict). Covers recruitment, equipment, administration and supply as well as operations.
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Del Treppo, Mario. Mario del Condottieri e uomini d’arme nell’Italia del Rinascimento. Naples, Italy: Liguori Editore, 2001.
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An important collection of twenty scholarly essays treating individual condottiere (e.g., Pandolfo Malatesta), their campaigns, their libraries, their deaths, their images in literature, and their piety. Other topics include aristocratic military careers and the structures of military companies. All essays are in Italian except one in English on the defense of the Papal States. More on war and society than on the conduct of war.
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Mallett, Michael. Mercenaries and their Masters: Warfare in Renaissance Italy. Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1974.
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Despite its lack of scholarly documentation, by far the best treatment of 14th and (especially) 15th-century Italian military history available in English. Aims to put the condottieri into their institutional and societal contexts.
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Mallett, Michael, and J. R. Hale. The Military Organization of a Renaissance State: Venice, c. 1400 to 1617. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1984.
DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511562686Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This classic study describes the structure, functioning, and role of the Venetian army in a period when Venice was a leader in the development of standing forces. Includes good short summaries of Venice’s wars.
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Pieri, Piero. Il Rinascimento e la crisi militare italiana. 2d. ed. Turin, Italy: Giulio Einaudi, 1952.
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Against the hypothesis that Italy fell under French and Spanish domination after 1494 because of economic decline, military backwardness, and lack of martial spirit, argues that a peninsula-wide sociopolitical “constitutional crisis” was the key problem, with a lack of good Italian heavy infantry also being a major disadvantage. Includes the best overall treatment of the Wars of Italy from 1494 to 1530.
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Germany

Although it was studied fairly intensively before World War II, especially in German-language works, the military history of Germany in the Renaissance-Reformation period is, except for the Thirty Years’ War, ill-developed compared to the work on France, Britain, Spain, and even Italy. The available literature on Germany is almost entirely in German, with the notable exception of Redlich 1964, which should be the starting point for those who do not read German. Schmidtchen 1990, which is not limited to Germany (though it draws much of its material from German sources), provides an overview for the period through the early 16th century, with emphasis on technology, tactics, and military treatises. Fiedler 1985, though not of equal quality, offers a more narrative approach and extends to the end of the period. Tracy 2002, though much narrower chronologically and broader geographically, is a more approachable introduction. Tresp 2004 provides a detailed case study from the late 15th century. The German wars against the Hussites are covered under Renaissance Wars of Religion.

Fiedler, Siegfried. Kriegswesen und Kriegführung im Zeitalter der Landsknechte. Koblenz, Germany: Bernard and Graefe Verlag, 1985.
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Mostly a distillation of 19th- and early 20th-century German scholarship by Delbrück, Köhler, Frauenholz, Daniels, and others, although with some reference to more recent work. Illustrated with many contemporary woodcuts and provided with sketch maps of numerous battles. Covers Swiss Eidgenossen, urban military organization, German imperial armies, the reforms of Maurice of Nassau, and the armies of the Thirty Years’ War.
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Redlich, Fritz. The German Military Enterpriser and his Work Force. Vol. 1. Wiesbaden, Germany: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1964.
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An economic historian’s perspective on the German mercenary soldiers of the period and the entrepreneur officers who recruited, paid, managed, and led them as a form of business enterprise from 1350 to 1650 (mainly 1600–1650). Addresses the relationships among pay, credit, and discipline; logistics and the exaction of “contributions” for the support of the troops; opportunities for profit and increases in social status; and the living conditions of soldiers and officers.
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Schmidtchen, Volker. Kriegswesen im späten Mittelalter: Technik, Taktik, Theorie. Weinheim, Germany: VCH, 1990.
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Aims to show how, at the turn of the 16th century, the original military treatises of Phillip von Seldenek and Philipp von Cleve reflected the authors’ experience of the interactions among new weapons, new tactics, and new military techniques. Deals mainly with the empire and mainly with the 15th century, though the Hundred Years’ War also figures prominently in its analysis of military change.
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Tracy, James D. Emperor Charles V, Impresario of War: Campaign Strategy, International Finance, and Domestic Politics. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
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A balanced military biography. Employs the nine campaigns from 1529 to 1552, which Charles V personally directed as “grandmaster of the arts of war” as windows into his use of war as a tool of policy. Includes both (understudied) Schmalkaldic Wars. Devotes substantial attention to finance as well as strategy. Not limited to Germany.
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Tresp, Uwe. Söldner aus Böhmen, Im Dienst deutscher Fürsten: Kriegsgeschäft und Heeresorganisation im 15. Jahrhundert. Paderborn, Germany: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2004.
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A prize-winning, focused study of post-Hussite Bohemian mercenary forces in the service of German nobles, mainly in 1447 and 1459–1462. Drawing from rich documentary sources, looks at the background, recruitment, leadership, equipment, and organizational structure of these effective soldiers. Illuminates a period and region of warfare on which there is relatively little modern scholarship.
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Switzerland and the Burgundian State

Winkler 1982 and Vaughan 1975 provide good overviews of (respectively) Swiss and Burgundian military history of, mainly, the 15th century. Schaufelberger 1987 contains rich information on the social history of the Swiss army in the 15th century. Reichel 1976, on the key Swiss-Burgundian battle of Grandson, and Kohler 1896, on the Swiss in the early 16th century Italian Wars, are narrower but full of rewarding detail.

Kohler, C. Les Suisses dans les guerres d’Italie de 1503 à 1512. Geneva, Switzerland: Julien, 1896.
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Since the Swiss were at the height of their martial renown and significance at the start of the 16th century, this study of their role in the Wars of Italy serves as a diplomatic-military history of those wars from 1503 to 1512. Publishes documents from numerous archives in 130 pages of pièces justificatives.
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Reichel, Daniel, ed. Grandson, 1476: Essai d’approche pluridisciplinaire d’une action militaire du XVe siècle. Lausanne, Switzerland: Centre d’Historie, 1976.
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The most valuable contribution to this collection is probably Charles Brusten’s study of the Burgundian compagnies d’ordonnance. Other topics include the disputed causes of the Swiss-Burgundian wars, arms and armor, and the battle itself. Essays in French.
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Schaufelberger, Walter. Der Alte Schweizer und sein Krieg: Studien zur Kriegfühurung vornehmlich im 15. Jahrhundert. Frauenfeld, Switzerland: Huber, 1987.
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Covers the mobilization, equipment, training, supply, morale, and war experience of Swiss soldiers, mainly in the 15th century. Based largely on thousands of letters written from armies in the field. First published in 1952 (Zurich: Europa Verlag).
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Vaughan, Richard. Valois Burgundy. Hamden, CT: Archon, 1975.
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Chapter 7, “Military Power,” is an excellent summary of the military structures of the Burgundian duchy and state, by the author of a series of biographies of the Valois dukes of Burgundy (1364–1477).
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Winkler, Albert L. “The Swiss and War: The Impact of Society on the Swiss Military in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries.” PhD diss., Brigham Young University, 1982.
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The Swiss wars of the late Middle Ages ultimately had great influence on the Renaissance-Reformation art of war, but the secondary literature on the subject, especially in English, is limited. Winkler’s dissertation is solidly researched in the printed primary sources and in the German-language historiography. Aims mainly to address “war and society” issues but also contains a good deal of traditional military history.
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Low Countries

The Low Countries were the site of much warfare during the Renaissance-Reformation period. They were periodically heavily involved with the Hundred Years’ War, with conflicts between the various principalities that comprised the area (particularly in the period covered by Boffa 2004), the wars of the Valois dukes of Burgundy, and in the Eighty Years’ War that secured Dutch independence from Spain, which is narrated by Parker 1985. The military reforms of Maurice of Nassau, which were in part emulated by Gustavus Adolphus, have been given a significant place in the literature on the Military Revolutions (see The Military Revolutions), but the literature on them in English is limited. Feld 1975 gives some basics. Van der Hoeven 1997 provides more up-to-date detail on some aspects. In Dutch, Ten Raa and De Bas 1911–1918 provides a detailed military history. Van Nimwegen 2006 provides citations to other literature, not included here, that deals with the reforms of the Nassau cousins at the end of the 16th century.

Boffa, Sergio. Warfare in Medieval Brabant, 1356–1406. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2004.
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In addition to a military narrative and a chapter on the art of war, covers the leadership, combatants, and organization of Brabant’s military forces. Since Brabant’s wars in this period also involved Jülich, Liège, and Guelders, Boffa’s book provides a good general sense of the nature of war and military structures for the whole region.
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Feld, M. D. “Middle-Class Society and the Rise of Military Professionalism: The Dutch Army, 1589–1609.” Armed Forces and Society 1 (1975):419–442.
DOI: 10.1177/0095327X7500100404Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Argues that Maurice of Nassau and his colleagues created the first “modern” standing army and rationalized military bureaucracy in Europe. Deals with issues of training and drill, development of a contractual and technocratic rather than aristocratic military ethos, and civilian control of the military
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Parker, Geoffrey. The Dutch Revolt. Rev. ed. London: Penguin, 1985.
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Outstanding narrative history of a complicated early modern war (or series of wars), with Dutch and Spanish perspectives given roughly equal weight. Covers the period from 1549 to 1609.
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Ten Raa, F. J. G., and François de Bas. Het Staatsche Leger, 1568–1795. Vols. 1–4. Breda, The Netherlands: Koninklijke Militaire Academie, 1911–1918.
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The first four volumes of this detailed history of the Dutch army, prepared for the Dutch General Staff, cover, respectively, 1568–1588, 1588–1609, 1609–1625, and 1625–1648.
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Van der Hoeven, Marco. Exercise of Arms: Warfare in the Netherlands, 1568–1648. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 1997.
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Eleven Dutch military historians collectively provide a good overview of the military developments of the Eighty Years’ War, including the Dutch army, the navy, the use of privateering, war financing and war industry, Maurice of Nassau’s sieges, and the battles of Nieuwpoort and Heiligerlee.
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Van Nimwegen, Olaf. “The Dutch Army and the Military Revolutions (1588–1688).” Militär und Gesellschaft in der frühen Neuzeit 10 (2006).
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Summarizes (and provides references to) the Dutch and German historiography regarding the role of Maurice and William Louis of Nassau in the creation of a new-model Dutch army and spurring the Military Revolution, proceeding to argue that while the Nassau cousins did bring about a tactical revolution based on drill and volley fire, their organizational and structural contributions were less significant than usually believed. Available online.
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Eastern Europe

Partly because the sources are generally thinner, the scholarship on eastern and east-central European military history before the Hussite Wars of the 15th century is not well developed, and what has been done is mostly in languages inaccessible to most Western readers. Somewhat of an exception are the wars involving the Teutonic Knights, to which Urban 2003 provides an introduction. The Hussite Wars are relatively well studied; see Renaissance Wars of Religion. Articles in Bak and Király 1982, along with Perjés 1989, provide a Hungarian perspective on the region in the late 14th through early 16th centuries. During the last century of this period, the literature was richer. Frost 2000 is an excellent overview, useful for its geographic range (the northeast). Keep 1985 gives a different perspective (more oriented on the sociopolitical role of the army) on Russia. Paul 2004 explicitly assesses Russian developments in terms of the Military Revolution.

Bak, János M., and Béla K. Király. From Hunyadi to Rákóczi: War and Society in Late Medieval and Early Modern Hungary. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982.
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Of the twenty-nine papers in the volume, mostly by Hungarian scholars, eighteen deal mainly with the period covered in this entry. Topics include the service of peasants and mercenaries in Hungarian armies from 1397 to 1526, Hunyadi, Matthias Corvinus’s mercenary army, Hungarian castles and fortresses, the battle of Mohács, and the siege of Szigetvár in 1566. Notes are mostly to Hungarian-language scholarship.
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Frost, Robert I. The Northern Wars: War, State, and Society in Northeastern Europe, 1558–1721. London: Longman, 2000.
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In their various conflicts in this period, Russia, Prussia, Poland-Lithuania, Denmark, and Sweden turned northeast Europe into the most thoroughly militarized part of the Continent. This excellent, impressively researched survey covers the wars and military developments of the region, arguing that the northeastern states (not only Sweden) modernized effectively in the military sphere, and that deviations from the Western model were usually for good reason, not the result of backwardness.
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Keep, John L. Soldiers of the Tsar: Army and Society in Russia, 1462–1874. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985.
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Devotes about eighty pages to the early development of the Russian (Muscovite) army, from 1462 to 1689. Focuses on the army’s role in sustaining the autocratic authority of the Tsarist “service state,” its impact on society, and the experiences and internal life of the soldiers, rather than the conduct of war.
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Paul, Michael C. “The Military Revolution in Russia, 1550–1682.” Journal of Military History 68 (2004): 9–45.
DOI: 10.1353/jmh.2003.0401Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Explores the changes in military-social organization, weapons, fortifications, and tactics, in Russia prior to the time of Peter the Great. Argues that, as in the West, these changes did amount to a Military Revolution, although the Russian army remained mostly medieval until Peter’s day. Analyzes reasons for Russia’s delay in joining the Military Revolution.
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Perjés, Géza. The Fall of the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary: Mohács 1526–Buda 1541. Translated by Márió D. Fenyő. New York: Columbia University Press, 1989.
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Perjés’s argument that the Ottomans in the 1520s were willing to let Hungary survive as a dependent satellite, rather than being bent on its conquest, is controversial. His military analysis of Hungary’s army and strategy in the period are nonetheless valuable, as is his treatment of the campaign and battle of Mohács (amounting to more than one-third of the book).
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Urban, William. The Teutonic Knights: A Military History. London: Greenhill, 2003.
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A popular history narrating the wars in which the Teutonic Knights participated, mainly in northeast Europe, and especially Prussia, Livonia, Poland, and Lithuania. Focuses on politics, strategy and tactics; includes relatively little information on logistics or military organization and administration. The author has written extensively on related topics and uses a good base of printed source material and scholarly work in several languages. Lightly documented.
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Mediterranean and Ottoman Warfare and Armies

The scope of this bibliographic entry is generally limited to warfare within Europe, but during the Reformation the Ottomans played a large role in the wars of the European states. Murphey 1999 (an overview) and Finkel 1988 (a case study) are the key works for appreciating their military system and capabilities in this period. Guilmartin 1974, an analysis of 16th-century galley warfare, does much to explain the dynamics of Mediterranean warfare in the period generally. To appreciate European martial developments (including the Military Revolution) in comparison to non-Western developments is important. The Ottomans, who shared in some but not all of the main changes of the Military Revolution, are commonly used for that purpose; Cook 1994 offers another useful measuring stick.

Cook, Weston F., Jr. The Hundred Years War for Morocco, 1465–1580: Gunpowder and the Military Revolution in the Early Modern Muslim World. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1994.
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Applies the Military Revolution/state formation nexus to an extra-European case study. Argues that institutionalized war, shaped by the need to adapt to Portuguese, Spanish, and Ottoman gunpowder weaponry, drove political and social change in early modern Morocco, including creation of a stronger, military-based central state, followed by collapse in a “gunpowder counter-revolution” by gun-wielding substate actors.
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Finkel, Caroline. The Administration of Warfare: The Ottoman Military Campaigns in Hungary, 1593–1606. Vienna: VWGÖ, 1988.
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A pathbreaking study of the mobilization, supply, financing, and administration of Ottoman campaigns against the Hapsburgs, focusing on the stipendiary kapukulu ocaklari troops, since records dealing with the more numerous provincial cavalry forces are scarce. Also examines the impact of the campaigns on the Ottoman state and its fiscal structures and more broadly on the Ottoman economy.
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Guilmartin, John F. Jr. Gunpowder and Galleys. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1974.
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An overview of Mediterranean naval warfare in the 16th century, focusing on the fleets of Spain, Venice, and the Ottomans. Explains galley construction, function, limitations, and tactics, and how they affected strategy and were altered by gunpowder artillery. Also includes narrative of the main naval wars and battles, including Prevesa and Lepanto.
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Murphey, Rhoads. Ottoman Warfare, 1500–1700. London: Routledge, 1999.
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Although not limited to Ottoman warfare against European states, this survey text does emphasize that topic, especially the wars on the Austro-Hungarian front. Depicts the Ottoman war machine as more constrained (especially in the 16th century), less expansionist, and less “backwards” (especially in the 17th century) than many earlier works. Naval history is largely omitted; the 17th century is emphasized.
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Renaissance Wars of Religion

Religious wars within Europe neither began with nor were limited to the great Catholic-Protestant struggles of the Reformation. The papacy generally stood ready to give official support to attacks on heretics, pagans, and Muslims by designating the offensives as “crusades.” Housley 1992 surveys these wars in a largely narrative manner. Heymann 1955 is a good introduction to the crusades with the most significance for the development of the art of war (that is, the wars against the Hussites) but does not cover the later operations of that conflict. For those, the best available works are Lützow 1914 (a narrative) and Durdík 1961 (more analytical).

Durdík, Jan. Hussitisches Heerwesen. Translated by Eberhard Wolfgramm. Berlin: Deutscher Militärverlag, 1961.
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Useful study of the Hussite military system and wars, despite its overtly class-conscious Marxist-Leninist slant; based on both German and Czech sources. Includes maps and descriptions of battles and sieges. Translated from Husitské vojenství (2d ed., Prague: Nase Vojsko, 1954).
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Heymann, Frederick Gotthold. John Žižka and the Hussite Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1955.
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Heymann argues that Žižka, the military leader who led the Hussites in their struggle against the empire between 1420 and 1424, “really revolutionized warfare” with his wagon-fortresses and emphasis on gunpowder weapons. To support this claim he offers a relatively detailed narrative of the Hussites’ early military operations, based on Czech as well as Latin sources.
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Housley, Norman. The Later Crusades: From Lyons to Alcazar, 1274–1580. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.
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An impressive, though regrettably almost undocumented, survey of the relatively neglected later Crusades, including the late Reconquista, the Baltic crusades, crusades against heretics, and crusades against the Ottomans. Covers conquest and settlement as well as crusading expeditions.
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Lützow, Francis von. The Hussite Wars. London: J. M. Dent, 1914.
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A solid narrative history. Lightly documented, but based on the full range of contemporary chronicle and published documentary sources as well as Czech- and German-language scholarship. Incorporates some substantial quotations from the sources (translated into English).
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Thirty Years’ War

The literature on the Thirty Years’ War is extensive: This entry is therefore limited to a few key works of broad coverage. Wedgwood 2005 remains the best starting point for the narrative of the war, though Parker 1988 and Wilson 2009 are each superior in some ways.

Parker, Geoffrey, et al. The Thirty Years War. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1988.
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Relatively short (at 340 pages) but still an impressively broad overview of the war. The main narrative is written by Parker, supplemented by sections emphasizing Danish, Spanish, French, Swedish, and other perspectives by J. H. Elliot, Michael Roberts, R. J. Bonney, and others. The best choice for those who plan to read only one book on the subject.
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Wedgwood, C. V. The Thirty Years War. New York: New York Review of Books, 2005.
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Elegant prose and excellent character portraits make this book the best introduction to the complex story of the war. Based on published primary source material and earlier scholarly work in numerous languages. Deftly blends political, military, and social history, with substantial attention to the victims as well as the protagonists of war. Originally published in 1938 (London: Jonathan Cape).
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Wilson, Peter H. The Thirty Years War: Europe’s Tragedy. Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2009.
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An impressive, sweeping history. Substantially fuller than Wedgwood 2005 or Parker 1988 on the causes and the effects of the war, though by no means stinting the conflict itself. Argues that the war was avoidable and that its religious aspect has been overemphasized. The most detailed coverage of the three books, especially for the period after 1636. Underplays the significance of Gustavus’s military reforms.
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The Ethos of the Martial Aristocracy

As the essays in Trim 2003 point out, the rise of “military professionalism” in the Renaissance-Reformation period was both founded on and greatly influenced by the aristocratic ideas of martial service summarized by the word “chivalry.” Vale 1981 provides an excellent starting point for understanding how chivalric ideas influenced and adjusted to changing military realities in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. González de Léon 1996 and Puddu 1982 debate how two sometimes-conflicting strands of the martial-aristocratic ethos (the focus on honor and the high value placed on military effectiveness and competence) affected 16th-century Spanish officers, while Hanlon 1998 examines the Italian gentleman-officers who often served alongside the Spaniards. González de León 2009 treats both the rise and the decline of Spanish officers’ military professionalism.

González de Léon, Ferdinand. “‘Doctors of the Military Discipline’: Technical Expertise and the Paradigm of the Spanish Soldier in the Early Modern Period.” Sixteenth Century Journal 27 (1996): 61–85.
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Uses military treatises of the “perfect officer” genre written by Spanish authors of the 16th and early 17th centuries to argue that Spain—contrary to the views of Roberts (in Rogers 1995, cited under The Military Revolutions), Puddu 1982, and others—was not “backwards” in appreciating the implications of the “Military Revolution,” or “burdened” by a chivalric “hidalgo tradition.” Complements Eltis 1995 (cited under The Military Revolutions) and González de Léon 2009.
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González de León, Fernando. The Road to Rocroi: Class, Culture, and Command in the Spanish Army of Flanders, 1567–1659. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2009.
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Describes the decline in military effectiveness of the Spanish Army of Flanders as a result of the qualitative deterioration of the officer corps. Attributes the fall in officer professionalism, especially after 1621, largely to a movement away from promotion by merit toward a patronage-dominated system of appointments.
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Hanlon, Gregory. The Twilight of a Military Tradition: Italian Aristocrats and European Conflicts, 1560–1800. New York: Holmes and Meier, 1998.
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Chapters 1–3 are essentially a narrative of the European wars of Michael Roberts’s Military Revolution period (1560–1660), highlighting the substantial contributions made by Italian nobles, especially in Habsburg service. Based on biographical data of some four thousand military figures (the majority serving before 1644), chapter 6 discusses the backgrounds and careers of the Italian martial aristocrats. Chapter 9 surveys possible explanations for the decline in their military participation.
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Puddu, Raffaele. Il soldato gentiluomo: autoritratto d’una società guerriera; la Spagna del Cinquecento. Bologna, Italy: Il Mulino, 1982.
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Argues that the Spanish noble officers of the 16th century were bound by tradition, contemptuous of firearms, and more concerned with honor than with military proficiency. Puddu’s conclusions are disputed by González de Léon 1996.
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Trim, David, ed. The Chivalric Ethos and the Development of Military Professionalism. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2003.
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Top-notch contributors including Michael Mallett and Simon Pepper on Italy, David Potter on France, Luke MacMahon and Martyn Bennett on Britain, David Trim on the Netherlands, and Fernando González de León on Spain offer valuable case studies on continuity and change in aristocratic ideas and expectations regarding military service. Ten of the twelve essays deal with the period examined here.
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Vale, Malcolm. War and Chivalry: War and Aristocratic Culture in England, France, and Burgundy at the End of the Middle Ages. London: Duckworth, 1981.
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An excellent short book arguing against the idea that 15th-century chivalry was decadent or militarily irrelevant. Deals with chivalric literature, orders, and display. The chapters on the techniques of war in the 15th century and on the changes of the 1450–1530 period are outstanding.
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The Experience of War

The line can be a fine one between a study of an army and a study of its soldiers. Many of the books listed under the various national subheadings of Armies, Warfare, and Society devote much attention to the social history of the soldiers who made up those forces. The studies in this section are especially firmly devoted to the human experience of soldiering. Goodman 2005 and Boardman 1998 deal with 15th-century England, while Schaufelberger 1987 focuses on Swiss soldiers of the same century. Harari 2004 explores the perception and depiction of war by those warriors who left the most detailed accounts of their experiences. Lynn 2008 enriches the social history of the Reformation-era soldier with his study of the (mostly) noncombatant women camp followers with whom soldiers interacted on a daily basis. Those interactions were a major element of the experience of campaigning in the period.

Boardman, A. W. The Medieval Soldier in the Wars of the Roses. Stroud, UK: Sutton, 1998.
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Aims to show how soldiers in the Wars of the Roses were recruited, supplied, billeted and led, and how they marched and fought in battle. Provides plenty of interesting information. Concludes (questionably) that 15th century soldiers were “little different from the man of today.”
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Goodman, Anthony. The Wars of the Roses: The Soldiers’ Experience. Stroud, UK: Tempus, 2005.
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The author of a broader military history of the wars (Goodman 1981, cited under Armies, Warfare, and Society: Britain) here aims to give a bottom-up impression of soldiering and the soldiers’ mentalité in the late 15th century. Provides many interesting details. Chapters include “Attitudes to War,” “Hopes and Fears,” and “Memories.”
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Harari, Yuval Noah. Renaissance Military Memoirs: War History and Identity, 1450–1600. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2004.
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An interesting inquiry into the characteristics of the “memoirs” written by Renaissance military men (English, German, French, and Iberian) and the reasons for those characteristics. Sees the exercise of memoir writing as reflecting and serving a strong class consciousness of the fighting nobility. Both for its analysis and for the anecdotes it incorporates, it is a valuable contribution to the study of martial mentalité.
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Lynn, John A., II. Women, Armies, and Warfare in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
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Although it also deals with the women who disguised themselves as men and entered military service, the main topic of this book is the far more numerous camp followers. Especially up to around 1650, the service of these women as cooks, laundresses, nurses, and (especially) participants in the “economy of plunder” was crucial to the effective functioning, and even survival, of armies.
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Schaufelberger, Walter. Der Alte Schweizer und sein Krieg: Studien zur Kriegfühurung vornehmlich im 15. Jahrhundert. Frauenfeld, Switzerland: Huber, 1987.
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Examines the experience of war mainly from the soldier’s perspective, based largely on thousands of letters written from armies in the field. Equipment, training, and mobilization are covered, but the emphases are on supply and morale. First published in 1952 (Zurich: Europa Verlag).
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War and the Arts

Focused study of the relationship between war and the literature and art of the Renaissance-Reformation period is a relatively new phenomenon, despite the relatively full scholarship on both of the component elements of that pairing. For the visual arts, Hale 1990 is a good starting point, though it has been criticized for taking images too much at face value. The essays in Cuneo 2002 are mostly the work of art historians and bring that discipline’s expertise more fully to bear on the question. Murrin 1994 is better informed than most literary scholarship regarding the historical background of that particular subject matter, and although the book focuses on epics, it is a good starting point for the interplay of military history and war literature in the period. Much the same could be said for Hebron 1997.

Cuneo, Pia F., ed. Artful Armies, Beautiful Battles: Art and Warfare in Early Modern Europe. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2002.
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Nine studies address the interface between warfare and cultural production. Mostly written by art historians, these essays caution historians regarding issues of audience and symbolism in artists’ depictions of warfare. Two essays treat the impact of war on art relatively broadly: one on Italy around 1494, and the other on Germany in the Thirty Years’ War. Another deals with depictions of Landsknechts and their families. The rest are narrower.
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Hale, J. R. Artists and Warfare in the Renaissance. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990.
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An introductory reconnaissance of an understudied topic. Collects and analyzes a large number of images. Explores the interaction of simultaneous changes in warfare and in ideas about government and the visual arts, combined with the impact of the printing press. Contributes both to understanding of warfare and of art. Stresses differences between Italian and German artists’ responses to war.
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Hebron, Malcolm. The Medieval Siege: Romance, Theme, and Image in Middle English Romance. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997.
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Studies literary depictions of sieges (historical and invented) to illuminate contemporary (mainly late 14th- and 15th-century) ideas about the ethics of war, the role of the commander, and the nature of military heroism. Shows some works were quite realistic; their intentional verisimilitude means they can be used to understand contemporary expectations of real warfare.
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Murrin, Michael. History and Warfare in Renaissance Epic‎. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
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A study of epic narratives written between the late 15th and mid-17th centuries in Italy, France, England, and Iberia. Explores the impact of the Gunpowder Revolution on literary depictions of war, including poetic works on Lepanto and the Spanish conquests in the New World as well as Ariosto, Malory, and so forth. Deals with changes in the ideas of heroism, chivalry, and command as well as “total war,” among other topics.
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