The question of female knights

[Qizilbashwoman]

3 hours ago, Oleksandr said:

What also interesting is that her opponent is a monk. Quite odd choice too...😃

I think it's a case of "everyone needs my lessons, even you!"

[Oleksandr]

Another interesting example i dug up, heavy cavalry even.

Here i noticed interesting thing, researchers, when dealing with female fighters, often see such examples as doubtful, because they analyze this examples separately, often ignoring similar ones. I mean, yes, we can't be completely sure, but still.

+in this example researchers express doubts about her authenticity because of her name, which make a pun with her quotes (as if real people never joke about names😅). Interestingly, there was completely historical female dragoon in 19th century russia, whose last name could be roughly translated as "foolish". I wonder what such scholars would say about that.😁 

[Oleksandr]

Strange thing i noticed in "Knight adventurous", in chapter about woman there is picture of female knight, and accompanying description claim that her armor is impractical and even dangerous. While in reality, except for unbuttoned top of chainmail and lack of helmet (which is actually normal outside of battlefield) she wearing perfectly normal early medieval chain shirt, and even leg protection.

[Morien]

1 hour ago, Oleksandr said:

Strange thing i noticed in "Knight adventurous", in chapter about woman there is picture of female knight, and accompanying description claim that her armor is impractical and even dangerous. While in reality, except for unbuttoned top of chainmail and lack of helmet (which is actually normal outside of battlefield) she wearing perfectly normal early medieval chain shirt, and even leg protection.

While some armor is better than no armor...

1. Those boob-plates will deflect hits to the unarmored cleavage. Lack of helmet and neck protection. No armor on hands nor forearms (often hit). The narrowing of the chainmail skirt towards the bottom is a cause for concern, too. The chain mail tunics tended to flare out towards the bottom, to allow more freedom of movement without causing the hem to ride up.

2. The starting time of 3e is AD 531, which means that the knights are dressed more or less like this (including the helmet behind him):

So within the context, yes, her armor is inadequate and has dangerous deficiencies. It would be a good armor for a Saxon in mid-400s, if the chainmail could be laced all the way up and the hem made more loose.

[Qizilbashwoman]

4 hours ago, Morien said:

The starting time of 3e is AD 531, which means that the knights are dressed more or less like this (including the helmet behind him):

that armor is dated to 1420; Saxons wore a mail shirt with a roman-style helm and relied heavily on shield and spear. Plate is very, very late.

Edited January 31, 2023 by Qizilbashwoman

[AlHazred]

6 hours ago, Oleksandr said:

Strange thing i noticed in "Knight adventurous", in chapter about woman there is picture of female knight, and accompanying description claim that her armor is impractical and even dangerous. While in reality, except for unbuttoned top of chainmail and lack of helmet (which is actually normal outside of battlefield) she wearing perfectly normal early medieval chain shirt, and even leg protection.

I direct you to the well-armored ladies on the subreddit ArmoredWomen. Lots of good armored examples there, allthough, admittedly, I go more for the landsknechter...

Edited January 31, 2023 by AlHazred

[Morien]

3 hours ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

that armor is dated to 1420; Saxons wore a mail shirt with a roman-style helm and relied heavily on shield and spear. Plate is very, very late.

I was talking about KAP, where Arthur's knights are clad in plate armor, not the real historical 6th century.

In KAP, AD 531, Partial Plate becomes available and swiftly becomes common. Player characters start with a reinforced chainmail (12 pts). Point being, anyone wearing 8pt chain shirt is severely underarmored in that context.

[Qizilbashwoman]

1 hour ago, Morien said:

I was talking about KAP, where Arthur's knights are clad in plate armor, not the real historical 6th century.

In KAP, AD 531, Partial Plate becomes available and swiftly becomes common. Player characters start with a reinforced chainmail (12 pts). Point being, anyone wearing 8pt chain shirt is severely underarmored in that context.

to be fair, partial plate is available in that era, but it just looks more like Roman soldiers than the 14th century. it just wasn't common or generally worth it when enemy weapons were stopped by maille

[SDLeary]

9 hours ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

to be fair, partial plate is available in that era, but it just looks more like Roman soldiers than the 14th century. it just wasn't common or generally worth it when enemy weapons were stopped by maille

It's literary Mallorian/Morte in context. So at the beginning, you are essentially equipped as a Norman 11C knight, and by the end a 15C knight in plate. Though personally I will admit that I've never visualized, or played that way. 

SDLeary

[Oleksandr]

On 1/31/2023 at 12:48 PM, Morien said:

Lack of helmet and neck protection. No armor on hands nor forearms (often hit)

As i said, most people removed helmets and coifs outside of combat (excepi in the movies 😁). Same with arm protection (it's notable that she wearing plate-mail kneepads, and probably greaves too🧐), and some knights was depicted fighting with unarmored hands (probably trade off for better control)

On 1/31/2023 at 12:48 PM, Morien said:

Those boob-plates will deflect hits to the unarmored cleavage.

That is common saying, but testing proved this to not be the case. Besides, such thing was actually used, although by steppe nomads, not europeans. And they preferred 3 smaller ones, or 1 big, instead of two medium sized. (on the other hand, there quite a lot of medieval european depiction of dudes fighting in chainmail leotards, with little leg protection...😳 )
 

Spoiler

Spoiler

2 here

And 3 here

 

 

Edited February 8, 2023 by Oleksandr

[Oleksandr]

[Oleksandr]

Literary sources seem to confirm that hunting and horse riding was perfectly acceptable hobbies for medieval ladies. It's important to remember that archery and riding are physically quite demanding activity...

Another important fact, muscular mass are mostly dependent on height of the individual, men having some advantage - with everything else equal women have on average equivalent of muscular mass of men 5 centimeters shorter (unless woman in question was born with twin brother). Of course, men are taller on average. On the other hand, height heavily influenced by diet (protein intake in particular) during early life. Therefore it logical to assume that on average noblewomen was taller than peasant men...

[Oleksandr]

Returning to the topic of abbesses, HRE had title of "Princess-Abbess", level abow. While real medieval England had no equivalent, Arthurian Logres might 😉

[Oleksandr]

On 5/3/2021 at 9:11 PM, glassneedles said:

Codex Sanctus (discord) - rules for playing a saint

If playing clergy is planned, it make sense to include options for abbesses/(princess-abbesses?)/deaconesses...

[Qizilbashwoman]

On 6/15/2023 at 3:58 AM, Oleksandr said:

HRE had title of "Princess-Abbess"

notably the princess-abbesses (Fürstabtissinen) of Quedlinburg

[AlHazred]

Osprey Games' Romance in the Perilous Land has interesting interpretations of characters from Arthurian romance. Two of them are particularly interesting in light of this thread:

1) Queen Guinevere is a knight. In this incarnation, war has come to Camelot. Initially healing the injured, Guinevere takes a more active role and takes up arms as the casualties rise and the war is not going in Camelot's favor.

2) Elaine of Astolat is a knight. This version of Elaine takes up arms shortly after Sir Lancelot spurns her romantic advances after healing him where the villain knight Sir Turquine kills her father and attempts to ravage her. She wounds Sir Turquine enough to drive him away, and takes up arms to defend her home since he will return.

I thought this was an interesting take which is not for everyone's tastes, but was worth sharing.

[Oleksandr]

"1335: The Scots defeat a company led by the Count of Namur. Amongst the Count's casualties was a female lancer who had killed her opponent, Richard Shaw, at the same moment that he had killed her. Her gender was only discovered when the bodies were being stripped of their armor at the end of the engagement. "The chronicler Bower seems to have been at least as impressed by the rarity of two mounted soldiers simultaneously transfixing one another with their lances as with the fact that one of them was a woman."

[Oleksandr]

On 7/15/2023 at 5:44 AM, AlHazred said:

1) Queen Guinevere is a knight. In this incarnation, war has come to Camelot. Initially healing the injured, Guinevere takes a more active role and takes up arms as the casualties rise and the war is not going in Camelot's favor.

BTW, this reminded me about one movie i watched as kid, which had Guinevere as protagonist. In this version she are from pagan kingdom, even student of Morgan le Fay at first. There was interesting moment during her wedding, when she annoyed that upon conversion to christianity she no longer allowed to wield weapon, since church forbid it (it didn't actually, but this is common stereotype), and she now have to rely on her knights for protection.

[mandrill_one]

1 hour ago, Oleksandr said:

BTW, this reminded me about one movie i watched as kid, which had Guinevere as protagonist. In this version she are from pagan kingdom, even student of Morgan le Fay at first. There was interesting moment during her wedding, when she annoyed that upon conversion to christianity she no longer allowed to wield weapon, since church forbid it (it didn't actually, but this is common stereotype), and she now have to rely on her knights for protection.

Was this "Guinevere", the 1994 TV movie? This one?

[Darius West]

I thought female Knights in Pendragon were called Dames?

Dames

[Qizilbashwoman]

2 hours ago, Darius West said:

I thought female Knights in Pendragon were called Dames?

always been a fan of the neologism ser, which I first encountered in Dragon Age: Origins and is a term for a knight: it's exactly sir but gender-neutral and is quite popular in fantasy and scifi. It is helpful to distinguish from a noble man (Lord: sir) or woman (Lady: Dame) who is not in fact a warrior. (Mages in that series who are warriors are not sera; they might have a specific title, such as "Warden" for members of the mixed martial and mage Grey Wardens, or Mage for a run of the mill member of the Order of Mages to which all other mages must be a member.)

The form sera is used for someone of a lower rank than you when you are being polite: a king calls a knight sera.

Edited August 25, 2023 by Qizilbashwoman

[Oleksandr]

On 8/25/2023 at 12:07 PM, Darius West said:

I thought female Knights in Pendragon were called Dames?

Not only in Pendragon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dame

On 8/23/2023 at 1:21 PM, mandrill_one said:

Was this "Guinevere", the 1994 TV movie? This one?

Seems to be.

[Oleksandr]

[Oleksandr]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertha_of_Rheinfelden - " According to one account, Bertha ‘fought manfully’ (virilter pugnavit) at the Battle of Jedesheim" 🤔 literal or allegory?

[piersb]

On 8/25/2023 at 10:07 AM, Darius West said:

I thought female Knights in Pendragon were called Dames?

Dames

In the 5.2 rulebook there's a discussion of this by Greg in which he concludes that Dames already has a given meaning which is definitely not that of a knight, and so the correct title for a female Knight is also "Sir".