Movement of dark age infantry and cavalry through woods

[Imperial Dave]

Might seem a daft question but I am looking for thoughts on how dark age troops moved through woods, specifically in Britain. I dont just mean the speed and problems caused by but also in what manner troops moved through. For example did dark armies move discrete "pockets" of infantry and cavalry though in sections or "en masse"? Also what kind of skirmisher screen and scouting tactics might be employed in woods?

I dont expect written records to refer back to (!) but I would be really pleased for some thoughts from the worthies on the forum on what might be likely and reasonable

[aligern]

Most of the dark Age movement that I can think of is along Roman roads or ancient tracks such as the Ridgeway or Icknield way. There were tracks called army roads, which may have meant a route to a regular place of muster such as that to  which Alfred called his men to. muster before Edington.
wooded valleys would be quite dense and had marshy bottoms so they would be a huge barrier to movement.  However, woods were part of the local economy and would have people such as charcoal burners and pig herders working within them so there would be paths and clearings.
Anglo Saxons certainly had a duty of all free men to work , or provide workers for, road and bridge works and fortification building and manning. So we could expect roads to be maintained to a basic level. Once they got ashore and gathered up horses the Danes moved around England quite quickly.

Generally then  I would suggest that troops would avoid the woods and use Ancient tracks on high ground or Roman roads. If they had to cross one of the major forests such as Selwood they would use the tracks and travel in a narrow column rather than try going in groups through the woodland itself.
A real problem with traversing even open woodland is that boggy parts and thickets divert you and it becomes difficult to get back on track without becoming lost. If you are the commander it is much better to accept a long column on a track, but guarantee cohesion at the end of the journey than to have groups of men wandering off uncontrolled.

Roy

[Patrick Waterson]

Some thoughts following, although the proverbial pinch of salt might be worth keeping handy.

Dark Ages Celts would usually be operating in their own territory or territory known to them from earlier campaigns.  This would mean that paths through woods were either something they were intimately familiar with (in their own territory) or reasonably knowledgeable about elsewhere.

Assume a Celtic chief has mustered his horse and foot (this is when Arthur is already a fading memory except among the bards).  His bodyguard are probably cavalry, and want to go where he goes.  The remaining mounted notables are not keen on trailing him at a distance, so his cavalry will tend to travel as a single entity.  His infantry are in clans, and each clan wants to stick together.  (There are also various potentially touchy points of honour involved, but this is more about who goes where on the battlefield.)

Now war is in some ways a bit like the hunt, and the hunt only works well if you have someone to scout out the game beforehand.  We may be safe in assuming that a scattering of scouts would precede any move by the army, checking the trails for hints of enemy presence and above all for ambushes; following their all-clear the army would move.

Routes through the woods would probably be paths allowing 2-3 horses or 4-6 men abreast, these being kept clear by woodsmen and charcoal-burners in order to provide routes through woods that wagons could use.  Such routes would be ideal for moving an army in a rapid close column, perhaps even at a trot in order to clear the constricted terrain as quickly as possible.  The army would if possible move as a single entity because splitting up and taking separate paths is not only a good way of getting lost in woods that were still believed to have nature spirit inhabitants whose joy was to do strange things to the inattentive traveller but also if contingents became split off some of them might not feel like rejoining again.

This would get the army from point A to point B.  Point B might well be a campsite, with a clearing, stream and enough flat ground for everyone to get some horizontal rest.  Moving into combat in woods might be a rather different matter.

Pity the poor invader who tried to hunt Celts in their own woods.  Not only would they be very hard to find, but finding them might be the start rather than the end of his problems.  An invader might find routes blocked by felled trees and the still-open routes all leading into the same clearing which is overlooked by banks and ridges full of archers and slingers, with ranks of spearmen protecting them.

The need for scouting would rapidly become apparent to all.  Mounted scouts are fastest, have the best view and can more rapidly get out of trouble.  Single scouts are vulnerable to a single shot, but small parties of scouts who send a single man in advance can usually guarantee that someone gets away to report.  If checking a route for an army's passage, scouts will scan the route and a short distance (perhaps a quarter-mile) to either side thoroughly, staying in a cluster of small groups.  If looking for an enemy force whose presence is known but whose location is not, they will spread out and follow all routes to make sure nothing is missed.

I do not see Dark Ages armies pouring through trees in film-maker style; rather, a route designed for wheeled traffic would be preferred as this will be clear of snags, obstructions, low boughs, slippery fallen leaves, animal burrows and all the other hazards and inconveniences that could turn a Mel Gibson-style charge through woods into a minor farce.

That is about it - with the caveat that these are just thoughts and may completely fail to reflect what really happened.

[Patrick Waterson]

And it looks as if Roy has some similar thoughts.  This is a good sign. 

[Imperial Dave]

thanks for the comments Roy, very useful and echo's some of my thoughts, especially re following roads and tracks. I am researching a suggested battle and I have a combination of woods, a major river and fording point within a mile of the possible battle site and a suggested Roman road running very close by (perpendicular to the directon of the river and ford though)

The route from the ford to the roman road and the suggested battle site goes along a tributary valley that is heavily wooded (now) and in an area that was traditionally heavily wooded.

What I am trying to work out is how much of an impedance the (wooded) route from the ford might have been and the effect on the approach of the antagonistic troops (and also the likely size of said troops).

Its all conjecture and second guessing but I am hoping to have a working hypothesis for an admittedly unsubstantiated early 7th century battle in deepest darkest SE Wales

[Imperial Dave]

thanks Patrick,

I typed my response as you were posting yours it seems and yes its good you echo Roy's thoughts!

Thanks for the additional info, makes sense to me and is beginning to clarify my thinking. I am going to revisit the area for some ground walking and observation soon so will report back.

keeping a pathway clear of vegetation makes sense even if there was no true "road" present. The valley I have been looking at leads west directly from the ford of a big river and connects directly with a alleged major N/S roman road into the heart of South Wales

Maybe a flicker of light into this dark age connundrum   

[Erpingham]

One comment of Patrick's is well worth bearing in mind and that is local knowledge.  Read various ancient and medieval accounts and a movement in difficult terrain is facilitated by someone who knows of the local routes.  Otherwise, to avoid getting lost, you use main routes (army roads as Roy quotes) and you meet at well recognised places, like a standing stone or an old (apple?) tree.  For the dangers of English messing about in Welsh woods, Henry II's campaign that led to the Battle of Coleshill might be helpful.

Tactically, we can assume that some movement through some woods would be possible to groups of men as we have evidence of later medieval men-at-arms and archers being able to do so (e.g. Auberoche or Culbeen) but it is hard to see it as a sought after action.

[aligern]

Its hard to gener lise about woods without someone popping out of the undergrowth to ambush you with a claim that they know a wood that is very different from those that one is citing.

However, here goes;
Back in the Dark Ages woods were an economic resource, as Anthony, Partick and I all agree. that meant that there was settlement within them and a network of  paths. That would be true for large woods, but potentially be different for strips of woodland along marshy valleys because there the bog  would be used by bird hunters, fishermen and reed cutters, but the strip of woods would be tangled and difficult. Likely you would only get through where a road cut the strip or a path had been made to say a ford.
As to the larger woods, these would generally be mature woodland with large trees. Around the edge of such woodland grows a band of shrubs and bushes and, if the forest is advancing, low new trees. Inside the wood the light is taken up by the forest canopy, maybe 100 feet high. That means that the only  growth on the forest floor is  bluebells and snowdrops etc early in the year when the leaf cover has gone (Wales being deciduous woodland back then).  so movement within the wood can be relatively easy, though there will still be streams and bogs and places where a tree has fallen where light gets in and there is undergrowth that may well be difficult as well as newly fallen large trunks. However, most of the interior of old woodland is relatively open. 
At the edges there will be thick undergrowth except near settlements where people clear the undergrowth for firewood which is a big user of wood and their animals eat the low growing vegetation.So , if you approach a village the edges of the wood will be open. If there is no village the edge will have thick vegetation, a real pain to get through, but good for concealment. However, I really do not believe that bowmen could do anything but snipe from such cover, it is too dense . They certainly could not deliver fire as massed units. They would have to emerge from the wood.

Hope that helps.

Roy

[Sharur]

It's also important to remember that woodland management at one level or another has been ongoing in Britain since the Mesolithic, from the grand "clearance for farmland" concept, through to the management of individual trees to produce specific shapes and strengths of timber. All have an influence on the density of, hence difficulty in passing through, woodland. You may find Oliver Rackham's "Trees & Woodland in the British Landscape" (revised edn. 1990, Weidenfeld & Nicholson is mine) useful here, Dave. Despite its relative age now, I'm not sure there's anything better still that's as comprehensive, albeit the coverage for Wales in the period for which you're most interested is especially slight.

[Erpingham]

The degree of woodland management is, as we've agreed, an issue.  We are looking though at a period where we have real wilderness - the Wild Wood to be a bit folklory - which wasn't much visited.  The further from roads and settlements, the less exploited and the more of a trackless waste (though noting Roy's point that mature deciduous woodland can be surprisingly open under the canopy).

[aligern]

Good point Anthony. I rather imagine that the woodland economy in the Weald was rather more vibrant than that in say Selwood. In Wales there were massive forests, but these were muv
ch more scrubby on the higher parts of the hills.
Roy

[Imperial Dave]

all food for thought chaps and thanks for the replies so far

May not be completely relevant but I will try and read up on some local (recent-ish) histories from the Forest of Dean as here there have been (and still are!) communities that live almost exclusively "within" forested land or rather in clearings surrounded by forest

Thanks Alistair for the book reference, I'll dig a copy out and have a look

[Dave Beatty]

Dast I quothe Beowulf?
XXII:17 - "The wise prince [Hrothgar] went forth in splendour; the foot-troop of shield-bearing warriors stepped forward.  The tracks [of the monster Grendel] were widely seen along the FOREST PATHS, the course over the fields."

A few lines later, "Then the son of princes strode over the high rocky cliffs, the NARROW PATHS, the STRAITENED TRACKS, the UNKNOWN ROAD, the steep crags, many a monster's abode.  HE WITH A FEW OTHER WISE MEN WENT AHEAD TO SPY OUT THE LAND, until suddenly he found the mountain trees hanging above the grey rock."

And in XXV:73, "They set out thence ON THE FOOT-TRACKS, joyous at heart; they paced THE PATH, THE WELL KNOWN STREET."

So from this it would seem that, in Beowulf's day, movement through woods was by forest paths and foot tracks and that scouting was employed.

From personal experience, moving bodies of warriors through forest is best done in single file along a track.  This in turn lends itself to parallel files.  Moving in "groups" through any type of closed woodland is impossible.

Dave Beatty

[Imperial Dave]

I dont see a reason why you cant quote Beowulf Dave After all, although "fantasy/heroic" in some respects, the audience of the day would have recognised standard things such as how troops move through woods and the like.

Not having read the original version (lol) I presume street is a reference to a roman road in which case the Beowuld passage could relate to my specific enquiry!

[Sharur]

Beowulf: "Street" in the original appears to be straéte in the Old English, which is commonly translated as meaning a (Roman) road in other contexts (hence so many Roman roads in Britain are called "street" still today, Ermine Street, Watling Street, etc., from their surviving Anglo-Saxon names), though it can be given as "track" or "path" instead, dependent on the individual translator. There's supposed to be a British Library scanned copy of the original Beowulf MS online, but I'm just getting an error message trying to access it today, so the best I can offer as a reference is this facing Old English/Modern English version , line 1634 (albeit in section XXIII, not XXV in this version; there's some confusion around sections 24 and 25, as line 1740 supposedly marks the start of section 25, but it begins in mid-sentence - e.g. note 24 in Child's English translation, available as a free PDF download).

The one downside to this is that Beowulf may have been in Denmark at this stage of the poem - Hrothgar's Hall Heorot has typically been suggested as located at/near Lejre in Zealand, eastern Denmark - but as the origins of "Beowulf" as literature are obscure, and it was likely written in England at some stage between the 8th and 11th centuries, it's plausible such concepts were employed in their intended Old English sense. For more, there's quite a useful Wikipedia page on Beowulf.