Medieval Mercenaries: The Business of War [Hardcover]

William Urban (Author), Terry Jones (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 27, 2006

The Middle Ages were a turbulent and violent time, when the fate of nations was most often decided on the battlefield, and strength of arms was key to acquiring and maintaining power. Feudal oaths and local militias were more often than not incapable of providing the skilled and disciplined warriors necessary to keep the enemy at bay. It was the mercenary who stepped in to fill the ranks. In this benchmark work, William Urban explores the vital importance of the mercenary to the medieval power-broker, from the Byzantine Varangian Guard to fifteenth-century soldiers of fortune in the Baltic. Through contemporary chronicles and the most up-to-date scholarship, he presents an in-depth portrait of the mercenary across the Middle Ages. A mercenary was a professional soldier who took employment with minimum concern for the morals, ethics or cause of the paymaster. But within these confines we discover a surprising array of fighting-men, from the lowest-born foot soldier to the wealthiest aristocrat – the occasional clergyman, even. What united them all was a willingness, and often the desire, to fight for their supper. Shocking, informative and hugely entertaining, Medieval Mercenaries is a compelling account of the business of war in the age of chivalry.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

William Urban is the Lee L. Morgan Professor of History at Monmouth College, Illinois. He is the author of numerous works, including the highly acclaimed The Teutonic Knights.

Terry Jones, best known for his part in Monty Python's Flying Circus, is also a distinguished medieval historian.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Greenhill Books (November 27, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1853676977
• ISBN-13: 978-1853676970
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #645,773 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars The author should be ashamed, April 14, 2007

By 

Rudolf Schmidt (San Diego) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Medieval Mercenaries: The Business of War (Hardcover)

Perhaps the author was contractually obligated to deliver another book to the publisher; otherwise I see no reason for it to have been written. It reads like a junior's term paper, skimming over the period with the grossest of generalizations and no citations of sources. Because the sources are, in fact, inadequate to provide the depth and detail that the average reader would expect to find in a title like this, Urban pads them with fictional sources and tries to pass it off with the repeated excuse that fictional representations are at least as responsible as reality for forming modern notions of mercenaries. While this may be true, I picked up the book (for $10 from the History Book Club) expecting to get the straight dope; instead, I get quotations from Shakespeare. In short, if you want to know about medieval mercenaries, you'll learn practically nothing from this book.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Very poor, August 25, 2008

By 

Cutter - See all my reviews

This review is from: Medieval Mercenaries: The Business of War (Hardcover)

This book is one of the more disappointing purchases I've made, especially considering it was written by a professional historian. It is a very poor example of scholorship. I have read books written by journalists with no real historical training that were more professionally done. I have read introductory textbooks that were more in depth, better documented, and more interesting reads. There is not even the element of a good flow to the title that could up its value. Topics are disconnected and seemingly random with very little beyond surface definitions involved. You will find no detailed examination of anything at all, just a very shallow overview of the historical era. The author seems to spend most of his time trying to convince the reader of his own clever wit rather than anything else. Unfortunatly, he falls short there as well. After the first few instances of the authors "witty" comments you are wishing you were reading a Terry Pratchett novel or watching The Holy Grail. At least those were legitimately entertaining. Although judging by the amount of times the author stresses the validity of historcal novels and film as legitimate sources makes me wonder if he didn't use Monty Python as a source.

In all, I do not reccomend this book to anyone.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Academic Mercenaries - the business of writing poor books for money, December 1, 2008

By 

Christopher Lee "Kristof" (Brisbane, Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Medieval Mercenaries: The Business of War (Hardcover)

I wish that i had not paid money to read this book but had got it out of the library instead. This book is not up to the standard that would be acceptable in a third year university history degree. It is staggering how an author could take such a rich and fascinating topic and yet produce a book that is so lacking in energy, content and interest. The book waffles and wanders into innumerable irrelevant areas. There is an entire section upon Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Twain and Ellis Peters that is utterly irrelevant and, in discussing Chaucer, at any moment i expected him to reference the Heath Ledger film The Knights Tale. The treatment of the entire subject is superficial and trite with poor attempts at humor thrown in.

Judging by the space dedicated to it the author seems to think that the only place that mercenaries were used was in the Hundred Years War and the Baltic. However, even throughout the discussion of the hundred years war, more space is given over to irrelevant details, annecdotes and asides than the actual business of raising and fighting mercenary armies.

There is only a superficial and inadequate coverage of Hawkwood and the italian wars, the theatre in which mercenary generals and armies raised their practices to the highest point of professional venality. It is only finally on page 229 that we are given anything of substance about the Italian Wars (then only 30 pages of inadequate detail and asides), indeed, the word "Condottieri" only appears for the first time on page 219, with a mere three paragraphs devoted to the entire subject on page 231. In discussing the Battle of Fornovo in 1494 i am at a loss to explain the relevance of the following sentance from page 246: "Tourists ignore the statues of tough condottieri in Venice and Padua and never think of Sylvester Stallone in Rocky".

I would thoroughly recommend Frances Stonor Saunders book on Hawkwood over this twaddle any day. Basically i'm really annoyed that i bought this book, its an utter waste of time and money.