Wonderful article, worth the read.

In George's defense, at some time in the early 90's this man thought to himself, I want to see ice zombies attacking a gigantic medieval fortress with dragons overhead. I'll always love him for that.

Excellent summary. One question, why couldn’t he pay them lika an ordrinary army? Or wouldn’t there be a money issue with an ordinary army as well?

Your answer was terrific. One minor note: if sieges weapons or mines are being used, then you’d prob need engineers, possibly blacksmiths, possibly sappers, etc whom all require upfront payment. Especially during the latter of the medieval age and gunpowder revolution, such was the case.

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Yeah, afaik those sickle type blades were used against cavalry, not by them

It was also the thing that made them victorious in battle.

Same with the Sessanid empires horse troops.

Instead dothraki had those stupid sickle things. The fight scene with Jonah Mormont in full armor just not even having to try to trap the guys sickle and easily kill him is it's own demonstration for how useless those are.

And that's key... because they aren't envisioned as having enemies they face in battle that would define their own tactics weapons etc in reaponse to them.

I mean.... It is a work of fiction after all. Why should we judge the historical accuracy of a story about dragons, undeads and magic ?

Lol the crusades is one of the worst understood parts of history. If you want to understand, start reading a lot of books on it. The pop culture history is very inaccurate and in many cases the exact opposite of the truth

I don’t know why this popped up in my feed but holy crap I’m happy it did. This is a fascinating read.

Yeah. The difference is we barely seen horse archers in the show which was the horse nomad specialty.

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>List of conflicts in Europe

Are you joking? Arabs had a different take on the feudal system (Itqa) that was less centralized. The had multiple heads of faith, mostly terrestrial kings an emperors claiming the titles. They had a different marital structure leading to more pretenders to claims. They had a different succession system, often favoring the bold and ruthless. They lived on totally different lands with different forms of sustenance gathering. If you buy into Marx's substructure and superstructure, their dominant economic activities were different, changing every fabric of their society when compared to Europeans. Their armies were drafted differently, paid differently, drilled differently, comprised of different types of units, with different oaths to their lords, and with religion playing a different role.

You can't just wave that away with a chronological list of wars. It's not even relevant! Army cohesion is an internal affair. War is an external affair. What you've said is the worst type of history. It sounds plausible at first blush, but could not misrepresent the situation more if you had tried.

Excellent response. Thank you !

This was quite a good read. Thanks :)

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This isn't really the case, its more that the Crusaders were an endless tide of religiously motivated semi-nomadic pillagers that descended upon Anatolia and the Levant. They were effectively a check on Muslim expansion in the region as a Christian antithesis to the nomadic Turkic armies of the period.

The Crusader counts were constantly betraying each other, and the Byzantine forces under Alexios Komnenos. Their heavy cavalry often won the day if they could actually get in close. Otherwise, they were prone to charging in recklessly and getting ambushed.

Sure, GRRM can't have it both ways. He's specifically mentioned the Mongols, Huns, the great plains nations, all as inspirations because it's a good talking point to sell the pseudo-authenticity of the books, but was very lazy at best in his depictions because he envisioned them functioning as the trope of "barbarians" without actually putting much thought into what that reveals about his own perspective. He's tried to smooth it over with the "mixed with fantasy" qualifiers, but that's pretty weak. Love the books and the show both, but as far as history goes, it's all much more telling about the stereotypes held by the western mind than anything real.

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There was no standing army anywhere in Europe or the Middle East at the time. I recommend checking out some sources that explain how feudalism (known as Iqta' in the Muslim world) worked in Europe

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There is a unique exception in times of war that allowa for a contingent of worshippers to remain vigilant while the other row prostrates, and vice versa. It's often coined as the 'Prayer of fear.' During an actual battle, however, it's unheard of.

Exacting assessment. Well phrased and clearly well thought-out.