Since the French had many more men-at-arms than the English, they would accordingly be accompanied by a far greater number of servants. One of the most renowned. [128] The original play does not, however, feature any scenes of the actual battle itself, leading critic Rose Zimbardo to characterise it as "full of warfare, yet empty of conflict. Very quickly after the battle, the fragile truce between the Armagnac and Burgundian factions broke down. He claimed the title of King of France through his great-grandfather Edward III of England, although in practice the English kings were generally prepared to renounce this claim if the French would acknowledge the English claim on Aquitaine and other French lands (the terms of the Treaty of Brtigny). The version that I tell explains the specific British custom of elevating two fingers as a rude gesture. "[102], Estimates of the number of prisoners vary between 700 and 2,200, amongst them the dukes of Orlans and Bourbon, the counts of Eu, Vendme, Richemont (brother of the Duke of Brittany and stepbrother of Henry V) and Harcourt, and marshal Jean Le Maingre.[12]. In the song Hotel California, what does colitas mean? Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. [31] This entailed abandoning his chosen position and pulling out, advancing, and then re-installing the long sharpened wooden stakes pointed outwards toward the enemy, which helped protect the longbowmen from cavalry charges. [52] The dukes of Alenon and Bar led the main battle. [81] In any case, to protect themselves as much as possible from the arrows, the French had to lower their visors and bend their helmeted heads to avoid being shot in the face, as the eye- and air-holes in their helmets were among the weakest points in the armour. Bloomsbury Publishing. The English men-at-arms in plate and mail were placed shoulder to shoulder four deep. [8] These included the Duke of York, the young Earl of Suffolk and the Welsh esquire Dafydd ("Davy") Gam. The Battle of Agincourt was dramatised by William Shakespeare in Henry V featuring the battle in which Henry inspired his much-outnumbered English forces to fight the French through a St Crispin's Day Speech, saying "the fewer men, the greater share of honour". As the English were collecting prisoners, a band of French peasants led by local noblemen began plundering Henrys baggage behind the lines. [60][61], Accounts of the battle describe the French engaging the English men-at-arms before being rushed from the sides by the longbowmen as the mle developed. 1.3M views 4 months ago Medieval Battles - In chronological order The year 1415 was the first occasion since 1359 that an English king had invaded France in person. The English account in the Gesta Henrici says: "For when some of them, killed when battle was first joined, fall at the front, so great was the undisciplined violence and pressure of the mass of men behind them that the living fell on top of the dead, and others falling on top of the living were killed as well."[62]. It was a disastrous attempt. Contents. The king received an axe blow to the head, which knocked off a piece of the crown that formed part of his helmet. Barker, Sumption and Rogers all wrote that the English probably had 6,000 men, these being 5,000 archers and 9001,000 men-at-arms. The army was divided into three groups, with the right wing led by Edward, Duke of York, the centre led by the king himself, and the left wing under the old and experienced Baron Thomas Camoys. The English eyewitness account comes from the anonymous author of the Gesta Henrici Quinti, believed to have been written by a chaplain in the King's household who would have been in the baggage train at the battle. This battle concluded with King Harold of England dying at the hands of the Norman King William, which marked the beginning of a new era in England. Take on the burden and expense of caring for them? New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1991 ISBN 0-471-53672-5 (pp. With Toby Merrell, Ian Brooker, Philip Rosch, Brian Blessed. [26] He also intended the manoeuvre as a deliberate provocation to battle aimed at the dauphin, who had failed to respond to Henry's personal challenge to combat at Harfleur. England had been fraught with political discord since Henry IV of the house of Lancaster (father of Henry V) had usurped the throne from Richard II in 1399. This claim is false. The idea being that you need two fingers to draw a bow, which makes more sense, and thus links up a national custom with a triumphant moment in national history! They had been weakened by the siege at Harfleur and had marched over 200 miles (more than 320 km), and many among them were suffering from dysentery. He told his men that he would rather die in the coming battle than be captured and ransomed. On February 1, 1328, King Charles IV of France died without an heir. By 24 October, both armies faced each other for battle, but the French declined, hoping for the arrival of more troops. Made just prior to the invasion of Normandy, Olivier's rendition gives the battle what Sarah Hatchuel has termed an "exhilarating and heroic" tone, with an artificial, cinematic look to the battle scenes. Probably each man-at-arms would be accompanied by a gros valet (or varlet), an armed servant, adding up to another 10,000 potential fighting men,[7] though some historians omit them from the number of combatants. Battles were observed and chronicled by heralds who were present at the scene and recorded what they saw, judged who won, and fixed names for the battles. The campaign season was coming to an end, and the English army had suffered many casualties through disease. New York: Penguin Books, 1978 ISBN 0-140-04897-9 (pp. [127], Shakespeare's play presented Henry as leading a truly English force into battle, playing on the importance of the link between the monarch and the common soldiers in the fight. Keegan, John. Didn't it originate at Agincourt? David Mikkelson Published Sep 29, 1999. It supposedly describes the origin of the middle-finger hand gesture and, by implication, the insult "fuck you". After the initial wave, the French would have had to fight over and on the bodies of those who had fallen before them. It may be difficult to pinpoint exactly when the middle finger gesture originated, but some historians trace its roots to ancient Rome. And for a variety of reasons, it made no military sense whatsoever for the French to capture English archers, then mutilate them by cutting off their fingers. Update [June 20, 2022]: Updated SEO/social. Henry threatened to hang whoever did not obey his orders. The battle remains an important symbol in popular culture. Early in the morning on October 25 (the feast day of St. Crispin), 1415, Henry positioned his army for battle on a recently plowed field bounded by woods. [54] To disperse the enemy archers, a cavalry force of 8001,200 picked men-at-arms,[55] led by Clignet de Brban and Louis de Bosredon, was distributed evenly between both flanks of the vanguard (standing slightly forward, like horns). The battle occurred on Friday, 25 October 1415 ( Saint Crispin's Day ), near modern-day Azincourt, in northern France. Contemporary chroniclers did not criticise him for it. It is unclear whether the delay occurred because the French were hoping the English would launch a frontal assault (and were surprised when the English instead started shooting from their new defensive position), or whether the French mounted knights instead did not react quickly enough to the English advance. The Roman gesturemadeby extending the third finger from a closed fist, thus made the same threat, by forming a similarly phallic shape. The 'middle finger salute' did not derive from the defiant gestures of English archers whose fingers had been severed at the Battle of Agincourt. The 'middle finger salute' is derived from the defiant gestures of English archers whose fingers had been severed by the French at the Battle of Agincourt. This symbol of rocking out is formed by tucking the middle and index finger and holding them in place with the thumb. Rather than retire directly to England for the winter, with his costly expedition resulting in the capture of only one town, Henry decided to march most of his army (roughly 9,000) through Normandy to the port of Calais, the English stronghold in northern France, to demonstrate by his presence in the territory at the head of an army that his right to rule in the duchy was more than a mere abstract legal and historical claim. The point is, the middle-finger/phallus equation goes back way before the Titanic, the Battle of Agincourt, or probably even that time Sextillus cut off Pylades with his chariot. Do you return these prisoners to your opponents in exchange for nothing, thereby providing them with trained soldiers who can fight against you another day? They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. His men-at-arms were stationed in the centre, flanked by wedges of archers who carried longbows that had an effective range of 250 yards (229 metres). Nicolle, D. (2004). This battle is notable for the use of the English longbow in very large numbers, with the English and Welsh archers comprising nearly 80 percent of Henry's army. Axtell, Roger E. Gestures: The Dos and Taboos of Body Language Around the World.New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1991 ISBN 0-471-53672-5 (pp. Increasingly, they had to walk around or over fallen comrades. There had even been a suggestion that the English would run away rather than give battle when they saw that they would be fighting so many French princes. The field that the French had to cross to meet their enemy was muddy after a week of rain and slowed their progress, during which time they endured casualties from English arrows. Subject: Truth About the Finger In the film Titanic the character Rose is shown giving the finger to Jack, another character. On the morning of 25 October, the French were still waiting for additional troops to arrive. Since then there had been tension between the nobility and the royal house, widespread lawlessness throughout the kingdom, and several attempts on Henry Vs life. There is no evidence that, when captured in any scenario,archers had their finger cut off by the enemy( bit.ly/3dP2PhP ). The Battle of Agincourt was another famous battle where longbowmen had a particularly important . Upon his death, a French assembly formed to appoint a male successor. Upon hearing that his youngest brother Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester had been wounded in the groin, Henry took his household guard and stood over his brother, in the front rank of the fighting, until Humphrey could be dragged to safety. Barker states that some knights, encumbered by their armour, actually drowned in their helmets.[64]. [72], The French cavalry, despite being disorganised and not at full numbers, charged towards the longbowmen. The English army, led by King Henry V, famously achieved victory in spite of the numerical superiority of its opponent. The French knights were unable to outflank the longbowmen (because of the encroaching woodland) and unable to charge through the array of sharpened stakes that protected the archers. Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say (like "pleasant mother pheasant plucker", which is who you had to go to for the feathers used on the arrows), the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative 'f', and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute are mistakenly thought to have something to do with an intimate encounter. Over the years some 'folk etymologies' have grown up around this symbolic gesture. [84] The exhausted French men-at-arms were unable to get up after being knocked to the ground by the English. [139] The museum lists the names of combatants of both sides who died in the battle. The battlefield was a freshly plowed field, and at the time of the battle, it had been raining continuously for several days. I admit that I bring this story up when I talk about the Hundred Years War only to debunk it. [46] Many lords and gentlemen demanded and got places in the front lines, where they would have a higher chance to acquire glory and valuable ransoms; this resulted in the bulk of the men-at-arms being massed in the front lines and the other troops, for which there was no remaining space, to be placed behind. These heralds were not part of the participating armies, but were, as military expert John Keegan describes, members of an "international corporation of experts who regulated civilized warfare." Osprey Publishing. You would think that anything English predating 1607, such as the language, Protestantism, or the Common Law, would have been a part of Americas patrimony. Theodore Beck also suggests that among Henry's army was "the king's physician and a little band of surgeons". It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows that the gesture is known as giving the bird. And yew all thought yew knew everything! [89] A slaughter of the French prisoners ensued. In Gestures: Their Origins and Distribution, Desmond Morris and colleagues note that the digitus infamis or digitus impudicus (infamous or indecent finger) is mentioned several times in the literature of ancient Rome. So they were already overcome with fatigue even before they advanced against the enemy". [33], Early on the 25th, Henry deployed his army (approximately 1,500 men-at-arms and 7,000 longbowmen) across a 750-yard (690m) part of the defile. The two armies spent the night of 24 October on open ground. The one-finger salute, or at any rate sexual gestures involving the middle finger, are thousands of years old. [23] Thomas Morstede, Henry V's royal surgeon,[24] had previously been contracted by the king to supply a team of surgeons and makers of surgical instruments to take part in the Agincourt campaign. [88], Regardless of when the baggage assault happened, at some point after the initial English victory, Henry became alarmed that the French were regrouping for another attack. Its not known whether one displayed the digitus infamis in the same manner that we (well, you) flip the bird today. Im even more suspicious of the alleged transformation of p to f. The Battle of Agincourt is well documented by at least seven contemporary accounts, three from eyewitnesses. [21] On 19 April 1415, Henry again asked the Great Council to sanction war with France, and this time they agreed. Clip from the 1944 movie "Henry V" (137 min). Contemporary accounts [ edit] As the mle developed, the French second line also joined the attack, but they too were swallowed up, with the narrow terrain meaning the extra numbers could not be used effectively. [51] Albret, Boucicaut and almost all the leading noblemen were assigned stations in the vanguard. [56] Some 200 mounted men-at-arms would attack the English rear. The French were commanded by Constable Charles d'Albret and various prominent French noblemen of the Armagnac party. . By 1415, negotiations had ground to a halt, with the English claiming that the French had mocked their claims and ridiculed Henry himself. [31], The precise location of the battle is not known. According to research, heres the true story: Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. The Battle of Agincourt took place on October 25, 1415. [citation needed], The French responded with what they considered the generous terms of marriage with Catherine, a dowry of 600,000 crowns, and an enlarged Aquitaine. In his 2007 film adaptation, director Peter Babakitis uses digital effects to exaggerate realist features during the battle scenes, producing a more avant-garde interpretation of the fighting at Agincourt. The body part which the French proposed to cut off of the English after defeating them was, of course, the middle finger, without which it is impossible to draw the renowned English longbow. [104] Henry returned a conquering hero, seen as blessed by God in the eyes of his subjects and European powers outside France. Several heralds, both French and English, were present at the battle of Agincourt, and not one of them (or any later chroniclers of Agincourt) mentioned anything about the French having cut off the fingers of captured English bowman. They might also have deployed some archers in the centre of the line. [96] Of the great royal office holders, France lost its constable (Albret), an admiral (the lord of Dampierre), the Master of Crossbowmen (David de Rambures, dead along with three sons), Master of the Royal Household (Guichard Dauphin) and prvt of the marshals. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). The number is supported by many other contemporary accounts. [68], Henry's men were already very weary from hunger, illness and retreat. . This moment of the battle is portrayed both as a break with the traditions of chivalry and as a key example of the paradox of kingship. [44] There was a special, elite cavalry force whose purpose was to break the formation of the English archers and thus clear the way for the infantry to advance. However, a need to reassert his authority at home (as well as his own ambition and a sense of justice) led Henry V to renew English claims in France. Winston Churchhill can be seen using the V as a rallying call. [39] Curry, Rogers[118] and Mortimer[42] all agree the French had 4 to 5 thousand missile troops. [25] The siege took longer than expected. Julia Martinez was an Editorial Intern at Encyclopaedia Britannica. Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French,anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. This famous weapon was made of the native English yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as plucking the yew. Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French, saying, See, we can still pluck yew! Over the years some folk etymologies have grown up around this symbolic gesture. First of all, the word pluck begins with the blend pl, which would logically become fl if the voiceless bilabial plosive p has actually transformed into the labiodentalfricative f, which is by no means certain. An account purporting to offer the historical origins of the obscene middle-finger extended hand gesture (varously known as "flipping the bird," "flipping someone off," or the "one-finger salute") is silly, and so obviously a joke that shouldn't need any debunking. [113] Barker opined that "if the differential really was as low as three to four then this makes a nonsense of the course of the battle as described by eyewitnesses and contemporaries".[110]. ), And even if killing prisoners of war did not violate the moral code of the times, what would be the purpose of taking archers captive, cutting off their fingers, and then executing them? The Agincourt Carol, dating from around this time and possibly written for Henrys reception in London, is a rousing celebration of the might of the English. The . Barker, following the Gesta Henrici, believed to have been written by an English chaplain who was actually in the baggage train, concluded that the attack happened at the start of the battle. Some historians trace its origins to ancient Rome. The Battle of Agincourt was a major English victory in the Hundred Years' War.The battle took place on Friday, 25 October 1415 (Saint Crispin's Day) in the County of Saint-Pol, Artois, some. This head-lowered position restricted their breathing and their vision. The Face of Battle.New York: Penguin Books, 1978 ISBN 0-140-04897-9 (pp. [22], Henry's army landed in northern France on 13 August 1415, carried by a vast fleet. Whether this was true is open to question and continues to be debated to this day; however, it seems likely that death was the normal fate of any soldier who could not be ransomed. Thepostalleges that the Frenchhad planned to cut offthe middle fingers ofall captured English soldiers,to inhibit them fromdrawingtheir longbowsin futurebattles. When that campaign took place, it was made easier by the damage done to the political and military structures of Normandy by the battle. In the ensuing campaign, many soldiers died from disease, and the English numbers dwindled; they tried to withdraw to English-held Calais but found their path blocked by a considerably larger French army. After several decades of relative peace, the English had resumed the war in 1415 amid the failure of negotiations with the French. The puzzler was: What was this body part? After the battle, the English taunted the survivors by showing off what wasn't cut off. The French hoped to raise 9,000 troops, but the army was not ready in time to relieve Harfleur. Many people who have seen the film question whether giving the finger was done around the time of the Titanic disaster, or was it a more recent gesture invented by some defiant seventh-grader. The image makes the claim that the gesture derives from English soldiers at the Battle of Agincourt, France in 1415. Humble English archers defeated the armoured elite of French chivalry, enshrining both the longbow and the battle in English national legend.
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