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Landsknechte?
By Walter Nelson
andsknechte (plural) were German mercenaries. They were originally constituted as infantry by the "Holy Roman Emperor" Maximilian in the early 16th Century. Given the rather mushy political condition of the Austrian/Holy Roman Empire, many Landsknecht companies quickly found that they had better luck hiring out to the highest bidder than waiting around for the Emperor to call on them.
Landsknechte were known for their outlandish dress, with parti-colors, slashing, big hats with feathers, stripes and god-knows-what-else. They were armed with pikes and arquebuses, like everyone else's infantry. In addition, they had small groups of shock troops whose job was to smash in to enemy pikes, waving two handed swords and halbards, and try to disrupt the enemy's line and make them vulnerable to being rolled up by the pikes.
They served primarily in the armies of the French, the Imperialists (Holy Roman Emperor/Austria) and the Dutch states, though they also fought for the Italian city-states, the Poles, the Muscovites, and the Spanish as well (I'm sure I missed somebody). They served briefly in English pay during Henry VIII's invasions of France, and even more briefly in England itself under Henry's and the Protector Somerset. They did not serve in England during Elizabeth's reign, though they did serve in the combined Dutch/English armies fighting the Spanish in the Low Countries.
Their worst enemies were the Swiss, who were their biggest competitors in the international mercenary market. Swiss and Landsknechte generally didn't take each other prisoner. Their quality tended to vary from every bit as good as the best of the Spaniards or Swiss, to jail and gutter sweepings, thrown together, given silly outfits and called "landsknechte". Their median quality was slipping seriously by Elizabeth's reign, and most of the Elizabethan captains who had occasion to work with them had little good to say about them.
The landsknechte you generally see at Faire tend to wear the clothing of the "golden age" of the Landsknecht, in the 1520s, rather than the clothing of the 1570s, which was equally outlandish, but less road-warriorish than the earlier styles.
Landsknechts began to lose their distinct identity in the early 17th Century, and were finally swept away in the huge mercenary hoards of the 30 Years War.
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