Cross and Scepter (16 page)

We do not know how this army was recruited and structured, but we have indications from Danish as well as Norwegian sources of a military organization based on districts, each recruiting the number of men necessary to man a ship, a system normally referred to as
leding
(No.
leidang
, ON
leiðangr
, Da.
leding
, Sw.
ledung
). It is first mentioned in Denmark in a charter dated 1085,
but most scholars believe that it is older, possibly going back to the reign of Harald Bluetooth. The organization is described in detail for the first time around 1170 and then in the laws of the thirteenth century. The sagas attribute the foundation of the corresponding organization in Norway to King Håkon the Good (c. 930–960), which has also been accepted by most historians. The term is used in skaldic poetry from the tenth century, but we do not know if it refers there to this particular organization or just to a large fleet. However, there are detailed references to the
leding
in the laws of Gulating and Frostating, usually dated to the late eleventh or early twelfth century. The
leding
is also known from Sweden, but, as usual, the early sources from this country are too meager to give much information about it.

Already in the earliest laws, the
leding
has also become a tax. This transition most likely happened when kings realized that they could appropriate for other purposes the provisions provided for military expeditions. Local communities were obliged not only to muster men for the ship but also provisions for the expedition, which typically lasted two or three months. The king could get hold of these by mobilizing the
leding
for an expedition, but then dismissing the crew and keeping the provisions. This could then easily develop into a permanent tax. The Old Norse sagas dealing with the civil wars, notably the
Sverris Saga
, give numerous examples of the flexible use of the
leding
and of royal demands for tax rather than men; King Sverre in particular often relied on elite forces rather than mass mobilization, but he needed provisions for these forces. Nevertheless, the tax and the elite forces did not replace mass mobilization in Norway but were employed in addition to it. In the Code of the Realm (1274–77), the
leding
had become an annual tax, defined as half the amount due in case of a mobilization. Late-thirteenth-century sources also indicate that the king might demand the full amount every three years, which seems to correspond to a rule that, though never explicitly
stated, may be inferred from the fact that the sagas rarely mention full mobilizations more often than every three years. By contrast, such a rule is explicitly mentioned in the Danish laws, with the difference that the period is every four years instead of three.

Denmark also differs from Norway in that the tax eventually replaced military service for the majority of the population, while a minority became fulltime elite warriors, with better training and heavy and expensive arms and armor, but exempt from paying the tax. In consequence, the taxes paid by the common people were many times higher in Denmark than in Norway. This change was already underway in 1170 and was fully implemented during the following period. The military class became
herremænd
(gentlemen), similar to knights in England and other countries, and developed into an aristocratic elite. A similar course of events took place in parts of Sweden.

An important reason for this development was the change from sea to land warfare. The use of heavy cavalry is mentioned for the first time in Denmark in the battle of Fodevig (1134), where King Erik Emune defeated his rival King Niels with a force of German knights. It seems to have come into regular use in the following period, and is frequently mentioned by Saxo. In his account of the conflicts in the mid-twelfth century, he explains King Knud's defeat against his rival Sven by his ill-conceived order that his knights should fight on foot to prevent them from fleeing. They were easily defeated. He gives also a dramatic picture of his hero King Valdemar (1157–1182) fighting on horseback against Saxon knights in the service of his rival King Knud in order to prevent them from crossing a river. Valdemar splits his lance in an encounter with a Saxon knight, has four spears thrown against him at the same time and manages to hold onto his horse despite the fact that it is about to throw him off by bucking backwards.

A similar development took place in Sweden from the late twelfth century onwards. The formal expression of the new order in this country came in the
Alsnö stadga
(the Statute of Alsnö), probably drafted in 1280, which is usually regarded as a kind of “constitution” for the Swedish aristocracy, confirming the principle of specialized military service on horseback in return for privileges. It would seem logical that land warfare and heavy cavalry would be more suitable to conditions in Sweden, where a larger percentage of settlements were inland, than in Denmark, the whole of which is within easy reach of the coast. The change nevertheless occurred first and to a greater extent in Denmark, and the explanation must be sought in the importance of Northern Germany in twelfth- and thirteenth-century Danish foreign policy. Although the Danes were also engaged in conquests in the Baltic area, which required crossing the sea, most of the fighting there took place ashore, and ships were mainly used for transport. According to Saxo, King Erik II Emune (1134–1137) was the first who transported horses on ships, and whether this is true or not, it is certainly the case that the Danes fought on horseback on their expeditions in the Baltic area.

In contrast to Denmark, sea warfare was still important in Norway, which explains the continued existence of the
leding
there. This applies to the civil wars of the twelfth century as well as to the foreign policy of the thirteenth. During the former, the fleet was used to a great extent, both to fight great battles at sea and for quick raids against enemy strongholds. Indeed most of the decisive battles of this period were fought at sea, including the most famous of them, Sverre's victory over Magnus Erlingsson at Fimreite in Sognefjorden in 1184, when King Magnus and sixteen of the greatest magnates of the country were killed. An exercise of sea power was the best, and in some cases the only way to maintain control over a country where most of the population lived along the coast. This applies particularly to western Norway, where the country's largest town, Bergen, was situated. Traveling on land in this area meant almost constantly crossing mountains, hills, valleys, rivers, and fjords. Avoiding the latter meant traveling through barren country across mountains up to around 1500–2000 meters (5,000 to 6,500 feet) above sea level.

Later, in 1263, Sverre's grandson King HÃ¥kon HÃ¥konsson used the fleet to defend Norwegian possessions off the coast of Scotland. The immediate impression one gets of this expedition is that of a fight between a whale and an elephant: the Norwegians on ships along the coast of Scotland, the Scots following on land to prevent the enemy from getting ashore. Only one episode
involved active fighting: some Norwegian ships were thrown ashore by a heavy sea at Largs and came under attack from the Scots until the Norwegians managed to launch the ships again and get away. The expedition was a failure and might be regarded as evidence that the Norwegian form of sea warfare had become obsolete. Actually, however, a similar strategy was used with considerable success against Denmark in the 1250s and 1290s, partly as a power demonstration—which clearly had been the intention in Scotland—partly for raiding expeditions ashore, where Denmark had now become vulnerable because of its neglect of sea warfare in the preceding period. Denmark, with its low-lying coast and dense population, was also more exposed to raids from the sea than was Scotland. A treaty with France in 1295 is evidence of the reputation of the Norwegian fleet. According to this treaty, the king of Norway was to assist King Philip IV of France with three hundred ships and fifty thousand men for four months per year in return for a payment of thirty thousand pounds sterling. The size of this force is clearly unrealistic, and the treaty was probably intended as a credible threat against England in the on-going war between France and Scotland on the one hand and England on the other, rather than an actual mobilization. Still, the memory of the expedition of 1263 must have convinced Philip that his money was well spent.

In the fourteenth century, however, Norway was confronted with a similar challenge as the neighboring countries. Warfare along the Swedish and Danish border to the south in the early fourteenth century and then the struggles to regain Sweden for King Magnus and King HÃ¥kon in the 1360s and '70s took place ashore and called for land forces. The Norwegian response seems to have been a combination of a peasant levy on foot and elite forces on horseback. Even at this point, however, no full transition took place, probably because the country, at least after the Black Death, was too poor to raise an elite force that could compete with those
of the neighboring countries. The peasant levy seems to have managed well enough as a defensive force, however, because when Duke Erik occupied Oslo in 1309 during the conflict between HÃ¥kon V and the Swedish dukes, he was attacked by a local Norwegian force and shortly afterwards left the town. Although the
Erikskrönikan
depicts the battle as a Swedish victory, it is obvious that Erik would have continued the siege of the castle of Akershus if he had not been defeated or had not at least found himself in sufficient difficulties to be forced to retreat. By contrast, the Norwegians were defeated in offensive operations. During the fourteenth century, the Norwegian fleet also became obsolete and was defeated by German cogboats, which were higher and bigger and could sink the Norwegian ships or shoot at their crews without fear of retaliation.

A logical consequence of the transition from sea to land and the development of heavy cavalry was the introduction of castles, the first of which were built in the twelfth century. In the 1240s, the king of Denmark had twenty of them, while ten belonged to the duke of Southern Jutland. The greatest expansion took place in the following period, however, as the result of the more intense internal struggles that began in 1286 and of Erik Menved's early-fourteenth-century wars. After a rebellion in Jutland, which was put down in 1313, the king built a number of castles in this region, while up to then most of the castles had been in the border regions and along strategic sea passages. In Sweden, small and simple castles were built in the twelfth century, followed by really large and elaborate constructions dating from the thirteenth century, particularly from its second half, and from the following centuries. These new castles could serve both as residences for the king and his representatives and as fortifications. Similar changes took place in East Central Europe. Western military technology was adopted, partly through imitation, partly as the result of defeats against Western—notably German—armies, and partly as a result of the Mongols' attacks in 1241/42 and later. The result was a strengthening of the top aristocracy who resided in these stone castles and shared the king's governing power.