It might sometimes be known from spies or obvious because of the situation that an army of invasion was on its way to besiege a particular town. In that case the inhabitants, with the help of their lords, would spare no effort or expense in preparing its defense.7 Walls would be repaired, perhaps completed or improved, if there was enough advance warning. Wooden or wood-and-earth outworks might be built to enclose unfortified suburbs or to add an additional layer to weak spots in the defenses. Cisterns might be cleaned and filled with water laboriously carried up by the mule or wagon-load.8 To reduce the effectiveness of stones or incendiaries launched into the town, streets and roofs might be covered with earth.9 Buildings located too close outside the walls would be stripped and then pulled down, with the useful building materials carried into the town, if time allowed, or burned, if not. This prevented the besiegers from using them for shelter from the elements or for cover while preparing an assault, or for materials for siege engines, and also forestalled them from using the threat of their destruction to impel surrender. Houses, stalls, or other impediments to free movement along the inner circuit of the walls were also likely to be demolished. In some cases, even the villages and weaker castles in the surrounding area might be destroyed, for similar reasons. The more moderate step of evacuating the rural inhabitants with their valuables, their millstones, mill irons, and anvils,10 and their comestibles, was the norm. Individual townsfolk and the town council alike would work to ensure that sufficient stocks of food and military equipment were laid in. The militia would be mustered, equipment checked and distributed, and plans and duties reconfirmed as the townsmen steeled themselves for a stint of life-and-death soldiering. Some women, children, or old men might be sent away, to spare them the siege and to help the food stocks last longer, but in general, most or all of them stayed home.11 Finally, elite troops, chosen for their political reliability as well as their fighting abilities, might be brought in to assist the townsfolk in conducting the defense and also to watch over them and ensure they did not surrender too readily.
More often, the precise destination of an invading army would not be known, but a large number of towns and castles would recognize that they were under threat. Their preparations would be similar in nature, but less thorough. Town councils would communicate with their colleagues in neighboring towns, with whom they were linked by bonds of intermarriage and commercial cooperation, seeking news of the enemy’s actions and their lords’ responses and pledging mutual assistance.12 Only at the near approach of the invaders might the defensive demolitions begin, and rather than any evacuations from the town, it was likely to receive a large influx of refugees from its district, along with all the food stocks (including livestock) that urgent efforts could bring in. The field force shadowing the invaders would provide reinforcements of experienced and well-equipped soldiers to stiffen the defense. One might expect a priori that these contingents would leave some or all of their warhorses behind since these animals consume copious amount of oats and grain as well as fodder, but in fact, this was almost never done, a reminder of the high value placed on the capacity for mounted combat.13
Even if put off until the last moment, defensive preparations of this sort could greatly increase the besiegers’ difficulties, so naturally, an attacker would want to prevent them from taking place. Commonly, a strong mounted strike force would make a rapid advance, including a long night march, to block reinforcements from entering the targeted town and to secure for themselves the stores of the surrounding villages, both to supply themselves and to reduce the defenders’ provisions. With great luck, such an advance party might even achieve such surprise as to seize the place by a coup de main, but this was not common—and if successful, would eliminate the need for a siege, which is our topic here. Alternately, the soldiers might try to pillage the local villages in such a way as to allow the inhabitants time to escape to the shelter of the town’s walls, but, ideally, not enough time to pack their goods and food stores along with them, thus hastening the day when those inside would run short of food. A third possibility, especially if the siege was intended as part of a campaign of conquest, was to block the rural inhabitants from entering the town but then to promise them protection from the approaching army provided that they agreed to accept a new lord’s authority and to cooperate with provisioning his men.
It should be noted that advance parties of this sort were sometimes on the scale of small armies themselves and could be sent weeks, or even months, ahead of the main body. They would then not normally attempt a complete siege but would set themselves up in a defended position, seized or constructed, and harass the town with raids, attacks on agricultural workers, ambushes on the roads, and so on. These actions could have a great impact, even if only a few townsmen were captured or a few merchants’ wagons seized. Even a small band acting in this way could force goods to be brought into the town under escort and, through terror, prevent farmers from tending or harvesting their crops or townsfolk from working their gardens, which would in turn make supplies expensive and scarce and thereby shorten resistance. That was how James the Conqueror proceeded against Valencia in 1238: ripening it, he explained, “just as one would with a fruit that one wishes to eat.”14
World History
