Great flying bodkins - longbows again

[nikgaukroger]

Regarding Agincourt, I agree it was not a typical battle, given the unusually high proportion of archers,

Only high to what had been the norm in the C14th. In the C15th we see an ever increasing proportion of archers used in English indentured armies - topping out with Edward IV's 1475 expedition where the ratio is about 1:8+ men-at-arms to archers.

[Erpingham]

Regarding Agincourt, I agree it was not a typical battle, given the unusually high proportion of archers, but it would be surprising if the archers there had used a different system from the norm; such would have required improvisation unless there was a range of options practised for differing deployments.

There were indeed a number of deployments, the obvious one being deploying the men-at-arms behind the archers.  However, in this case, they chose the other common one, deploying to the flanks.  The small number of men at arms led them to cluster them in the centre, which gave a large proportion of the battleline to be archers, and those archers would need to be abnormally deep because of the narrowness of the battlefield, so improvisation would certainly have been called for, although not necessarily innovation.

there were two groups of French mounted, so someone would have to control the shooting against each one.  However we think things were done, the latter matter is worthy of thought.

This would always be true when you had separate bodies on opposite flanks.  They almost certainly came under the overall command of the vanguard on one side and the rearguard on the other.  I assume they also had their own dedicated command to control them independently. 

[Erpingham]

Regarding Agincourt, I agree it was not a typical battle, given the unusually high proportion of archers,

Only high to what had been the norm in the C14th. In the C15th we see an ever increasing proportion of archers used in English indentured armies - topping out with Edward IV's 1475 expedition where the ratio is about 1:8+ men-at-arms to archers.

They were above the norm until much later - certainly till the 1430s.  The ratio rises from then but is complicated by what troops were already "in theatre".  For example, expeditions to Gascony often had very high ratios of archers, because Gascony would provide contingents of men-at-arms and infantry.  I believe the expectation of Edward IV was to meet a Burgundian army, which would have upped the proportion of men-at-arms.  How well Edward would have got on with such a high proportion of archers against a contemporary French force was not seriously tested.

[nikgaukroger]

Do we have numbers for the 1417 army?

[Erpingham]

Do we have numbers for the 1417 army?

Not in detail apparently .  The Soldier in Late Medieval England lists 10,809 men at a ratio of MAA to archers of 1:3.5.