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Sir John of Felsenbau:
Step 5 The Knight

If he got through all of that, he was knighted or "dubbed". Before a squire was dubbed, he did lots of things in preparation. First, he prayed all night. He prayed without sleeping or eating. When morning came, he would take a nice, warm bath.  Then the almost knighted squire would put on a white tunic. The tunic was white because white is the color of peace. He put on a red hooded robe to show the blood that he may have to spill as a knight. And lastly black boots or shoes to show that he was mortal.  He knelt before his lord. Then his lord would slap him with his hand or the flat of the sword. As his lord was doing that, his lord would say, "I dub thee Sir Knight." Then the new knight would receive his sword, lance, and golden spurs.


Each of the weapons had a good meaning. The lance had a saying. It was said, "As fear of the lance drives back the unarmed, so the knight drives back the enemies of the church." As for the sword, it was said that, "The two edges of the sword show that the knight serves God and the people." Then the knight was free to roam. He usually rode off on quests of adventure. He either stopped by the road and challenged any knight that passed by or he did battle for a damsel in need. After many long years of training and learning the skills of combat and chivalry required of a Knight during the Middle Ages the steps to Knighthood were completed and symbolized in the order of Knighthood ceremony. The culmination of the ceremony was when a knight was dubbed and the words "Arise, Sir Knight" were uttered. This final part of the ceremony would have been knighted by a local knight, or if they were very lucky, by a greater noble or even the king. The ceremony marked the final steps to knighthood made by a Medieval Squire.

 All knights, like all people from all walks of life in the Middle Ages, had to behave in a certain way. This way was called the Code of Chivalry. The code said that all knights had to be brave in battle. They had to keep their promises.

For the ritual on the knighting ceremony please see:
•   ModernChivalry.org »
•   Main »
•   The Round Table »
•   The Knighting of Sir John

(To be continued)[/size]

Sir John of Felsenbau:
Once knighted, there were 4 choices, to serve under a knight’s Banner as a Knight Bachelor, to be a Knight Errant, to be a Household Knight, or to be a member of a Knightly Order:
Household Knights
Ministerials or Household knights were servant-knights who were the direct vassals of some greater lord. Household knights were similar to the old Germanic war band or hearth troop, and lived with their lord at which ever castle or manor he happened to be residing. Their upkeep was paid for by him, and in return the knights were employed on various duties, such as forming a bodyguard wherever he went, escort duty, carrying messages and, most importantly, forming the nucleus of his troops in battle. This group was called the familia and their relationship with their lord was often close. Equally, the king also had his familia regis, made up of bannerettes, knights bachelor and troopers. It formed the main body of men in an English army, men who could be detailed for special duties such as escorting workmen or provisions.

Knight-Errant
A knight-errant is a figure of medieval chivalric romance literature. The adjective errant (meaning "wandering, roving") indicates how the knight-errant would wander the land in search of adventures to prove his chivalric virtues, either in knightly duels (pas d'armes) or in some other pursuit of courtly love. A knight-errant typically performed all his deeds in the name of a lady, and invoked her name before performing an exploit. In more sublimated forms of knight-errantry, pure metaphysical idealism rather than romantic inspiration motivated the knight-errant (as in the case of Sir Galahad).

Orders of Knighthood
For Example:                      The Order of the Teutonic Knights

It was during the Crusades that Orders of Knights came into being. One such Order was that of the Teutonic Knights. Formed at the end of the 12th century in Acre, in the Levant, the medieval Order played an important role in Outremer, controlling the port tolls of Acre. After Christian forces were defeated in the Middle East, the Order moved to Transylvania in 1211 to help defend the South-Eastern borders of the Kingdom of Hungary against the Kipchaks. The Knights were expelled by force of arms by King Andrew II of Hungary in 1225, after allegedly attempting to place themselves under Papal instead of the original Hungarian sovereignty.

In 1230, following the Golden Bull of Rimini, Grand Master Hermann von Salza and Duke Konrad I of Masovia launched the Prussian Crusade, a joint invasion of Prussia intended to Christianize the Baltic Old Prussians. The Teutonic Knights had a strong economic base, hired mercenaries from throughout Europe to augment their feudal levies, and became a naval power in the Baltic Sea. In 1410, a Polish-Lithuanian army decisively defeated the Order and broke its military power at the Battle of Grunwald (Tannenberg).

Ranks within the Order are:
The Hochmeister (Grandmaster) was the highest officer of the order. Hermann von Salza served as the fourth Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights (1209 to 1239).

The Großkomtur (Magnus Commendator), the deputy of the Grandmaster
The order was divided in three national chapters, Prussia, Livland and the territory of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. The highest officer of each chapter was the Landmeister (country master).
Because the properties of the order within the rule of the Deutschmeister did not form a cohesive territory but were spread over the whole empire and parts of Europe, there was an additional regional structure, the bailiwick.

Komtur
The smallest administrative unit of the order was the Kommende. It was ruled by a Komtur, who had all administrative rights and controlled the Vogteien (district of a reeve) and Zehnthöfe (tithe collectors) within his rule. In the commandry, all kinds of brothers lived together in a monastic way.

Kuno (Konrad, Kunz) von Liechtenstein (A relative of Ulrich von Liechtenstein)-  He came to Prussia from Franconia and Swabia. (born in 1360 died. in 1410) - and was the Grand Commander of the Order of the Teutonic Knights from 1404.  He was killed in the Battle of Grunwald . In 1404 he was appointed by Grand Master Konrad von Jungingen Grand Commander, so was one of the five Großgebietiger of the Order. He served as Deputy Grand Master.  This important office he was also elected in 1407 under the Grand Master Ulrich von Jungingen confirmed.

In the battle of Tannenberg Kuno von Lichtenstein commanded the right wing of the religious army, and thus the majority of Western European "guests" of the Order under the banner of St. George .  Among those were to Duke Konrad VII "Old White" from Oels and Casimir, younger son of the Duke Swantibor III. of Pomerania-Stettin , with their train.  After the death of the Grand Master, he tried to claim the battlefield.  As a result of the enclosure through superior Polish-Lithuanian forces his wing was cut off and the Grand Commander was killed.

Kuno was descended from the family of the Frankish Lichtenstein .  The exact date of his birth, and entry into the Teutonic Order is not known.  Kuno is first mentioned as a religious Vogt of Samland during 1389 until 1392 From 1392 to 1396 he served as Commander of Ragnit . The leadership of this far east located Commandery was given the permanent Lithuanian threat this administration in general ensured only by specially qualified knights.  To 1402 Kuno was then Commander of Mewe . 

Kuno von Lichtenstein was known by his contemporaries as one of the most skilled swordsman of the known world.

(To be continued)

Sir John of Felsenbau:
Knight Bachelor
The rank of Knight Bachelor is the most basic rank of a man who has been knighted by the monarch but not as a member of one of the organized Orders of Chivalry. Knights Bachelor are the most ancient sort of British knight (the rank existed during the 13th century reign of King Henry III), but Knights Bachelor rank below knights of the various orders. In battle, that knight carries a pennant either triangular or with a swallow tail. He was part of a monarchs army.

The Medieval Army
Armies were counted by lances.

LANCE: (6 men) each "lance" composed of six mounted men—a Knight Bachelor (heavy armoured horseman), a more lightly armed fellow combatant (coutillier), a page (a non-combatant) and three mounted archers meant as infantry support. The archers were intended to ride to battle and dismount to shoot with their bows, and did so until late in the fifteenth century. A knight was, in general, in command only of his own lance. A knight of the lowest order; he was permitted to display only a pennon. A Lance was usually led and raised by a knight in the service of his liege, yet it is not uncommon in certain periods to have a less privileged man, such as a serjeants. (Knight-Serjeant - A knight of lesser rank…serjeants who were men who had trained as knights but could not afford the costs associated with the title. Serjeants could fight either as heavy to light cavalry… The serjeant class were deemed to be worth half of a knight' in military value.

Bannière:
Ten lances (60 men) create a "bannière" (Banner) commanded by a knight banneret; the knight Banneret was entitled to display his arms on a square banner. When a knight rose to the rank of knight banneret, the point of his pennon was cut off to turn it into a banner. This ceremony was called faire de pennon bannière.

Company:
Knight commanders were in charge of a company of knights (50 Lances – 300 men.)  This commander could be called a Captain.

Regiment:
A Regiment – several companies (2,100 men – 350 Lances) is commanded by a Lord Knight Commander.

Army:
An Army of 2 or 3 of these regiments (6,300 men – 1,270 Lances) were under the commander (a noble such as a Count) of the battle. A noble was entitled to fly his standard, the length of which corresponded to his rank. A “standard” has a shape that is an elongated and tapered pennon shape, usually terminating in two rounded ends or swallow-tailed ends, but on occasion a single rounded end its size varied with the owner’s rank.

Rank                           Standard Length
The Sovereign                   21 feet
Dukes                                20 feet
Marquises                         18 feet
Earls (Count)                    16 feet
Viscounts                          15 feet
Baron                                13 feet
Baronets                           12 feet
Knights                             10 feet

Knight Baronet
A baronet (traditional abbreviation Bart), is the holder of a hereditary baronetcy. A baronetcy is the only hereditary honor which is not a peerage. A baronet is styled "Sir" like a knight but the baronetage, as a class, rank above the knightage. The earliest mention of baronets was in the Battle of Battenberg in 1321 where baronets took part, along with barons and knights. Unlike knighthoods—which apply to an individual only—a baronetcy is hereditary. A baronetcy is not a peerage, so baronets, like knights, are commoners as opposed to noblemen. All Baronetcies are distinguished by having a territorial designation.

Baronets may command troops of knights or men at arms, though many do not. The largest force a baronet would tend to command would be 10 knights and 50 men at arms.  Baronets who attended powerful lords may be dubbed their liege’s Lord Marshal, and be placed in charge of huge numbers of troops that their lord commands.

Baronets have the privilege to bear in a canton of their coat of arms, or in a whole escutcheon, the arms of Ulster, viz. “in a field argent, a sinister hand, gules.”  The Baronet was entitled to a standard of 12 feet in length.

(To be continued)

Sir John of Felsenbau:
While most concentrate on the stereotype knights, one must remember that the Vikings, in their own way, were knights.

THE VIKINGS[/size]
INTRODUCTION:[/size]

There are a lot of misconceptions of the Vikings. One is that they were an aggressive warrior group. This is not true. There were Vikings who conducted raids, but most were explorers and settlers. A romanticized picture of Vikings as noble savages began to take root in the 18th century, and this developed and became widely propagated during the 19th-century Viking revival. The received views of the Vikings as violent brutes or intrepid adventurers owe much to the modern Viking myth that had taken shape by the early 20th century.

The Vikings (from Old Norse víkingr) were seafaring north Germanic people who raided, traded, explored, and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia, and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th centuries. Their explorations were tremendous…discovering America 500 years before Columbus, exploring the Mediterranean Sea, they made their way to Constantinople, sailed up Russia's rivers and became the first rulers of the Kievan Russian state and even sailed as far as the Orient, bringing back items from there and establishing trade routes between the two cultures. They discovered Greenland, Iceland and established settlements in both of them. They also established settlements in Northern England and many other places. Vikings travelled up the Ob to the Irtysh River and followed the Irtysh to it's source in the Altai Mountains. At that point, they were only 150 miles from the Uighur empire of Kara Khitai on the Silk Road to China. The Vikings even traded with the Muslims and even people farther east. The Vikings would follow the Dnieper River to the Caspian Sea and goods like furs for other things. The trade routes may very well become a refuge for the non-Christian Norse, merging with Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Evenki, Turkic and Tengrist Mongols in a syncretic stew of a new civilization.

Another misconception is that the Vikings wore horned helmets. While they did wear these, they never wore them in battle, fearing the horns on the helmets would make fighting difficult. Mostly they were worn in ceremonies.

Dragons held a special place with the Vikings. Longships were called dragonships by enemies such as the English because they had carved heads of dragons mounted on their bow. The dragon head was to scare away enemies. It also had a magical function: It would provide protection for ships and crew – and it was simply to frighten away sea monsters and to ward off evil spirits both on land and sea. The Icelandic law code Grágás says that the dragon head should be taken off the ship when the Vikings returned to their homestead, not to intimidate the spirits of their native land. Viking shields and other items were of a dragon motive as well. It is important to remember that most people of the Viking age were very superstitious by our standards.

(To be continued)

Timothy:
Sir John, I am new to the forum and have been reading the material that you and other have posted.  Your posts on the
"Knight of the Week" are great. i am still  reading and enjoying them a great deal.

As to the best movie "The Lion In Winter" Sir William Marshal is portrayed by Nigel Stock. He is shown in the beginning rounding up King Henry's three sons and Queen Eleanor . I think he is seen in a few other scenes.

Again great series on the knights.

Tim

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