Victory at Poitiers: The Black Prince and the Medieval Art of War, Christian Teutsch

Victory at Poitiers: The Black Prince and the Medieval Art of War, Christian Teutsch

This is one of those books where the sub-title is more important than the title. Only two of the eight chapters actually look at the campaign and battle of Poitiers. We start with an introduction to Medieval Warfare, before Teutsch moves on to four chapters examining the progress of the Hundred Years War, and the lessons that the Black Prince might have learnt from the victories at Crecy and Neville's Cross as well as the less well known battles of the war.

A major feature of Teutsch's account of the battle itself is his use of the sources, attempting to produce a coherent account of the fighting from often contradictory chronicles. The presence of sizable quotes from key sources helps the reader to decide how successful he has been.

The author has a military background, including a spell teaching at West Point. Some authors with this sort of background make the mistake of writing as if the subject of their work had a staff college education, but Teutsch has successfully avoided that error, remembering that the Black Prince lived in a very different world.

This is an interesting new account of the battle of Poitiers, and as such should be read alongside more established histories to put Teutsch's new ideas in context.

Chapters
Medieval Warfare
The Hundred Years War
The Lessons of Crecy
Neville's Cross
1348-1355, War between Battles
The Great Campaign
The Battle of Poitiers
Aftermath

Author: Christian Teutsch
Edition: Hardcover
Pages: 160
Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
Year: 2010


Help - F.A.Q. - Contact Us - Search - Recent - About Us - Privacy