Page:English Historical Review Volume 35.djvu/143

 1920 REVIEWS OF BOOKS 135 had visited the battlefield he strangely writes that the French line 'extended over a front of about two miles across the narrow space that lies between the woods of Agincourt and Tramecourt ' ; for this he cites the Chranique de St. Denys, ' omnes copias militares hostibus appropinquare per duo fere miliaria', admitting that the meaning is obscure. My own inter- pretation is that the writer describes the French position as nearly two jniles from the English camp at Maisoncelles, which is about the correct distance. If the French front had covered nearly so great a distance many of them could never have come into action at all. With the topographical data thus assured, the placing of the English line (the one that matters) is comparatively easy. Elmham (i.e. Gesta) states definitely that the flanks rested on the woods ; and this suits the size of the English force, which was such as would ' just fill the space ', an argument which Dr. Wylie, not having worked out a plan, seems to reject. Dr. Wylie's own description of the EngHsh formation is that ' The wings were thrown out to right and left in echelon. Spanning the whole front and circling it from flank to flank like a crown were placed the archers, clumped in triangular wedges.' This he derives from various French sources, abandoning for the most part the account in the Gesta, which elsewhere he correctly regards as our most trustworthy source. Such a formation does not seem intelligent, nor can it, as it would seem, be reconciled with the plain statement of the Gesta that in view of his smaller numbers Henry posted his army in a single battle, the van (acies anterior) under the duke of York on the right and the rear under Lord Camoys on the left (this does not, as Dr. Wylie supposes, mean in echelon) ; and intermingled wedges of archers in each ward (acies). One cannot get any * crown spanning the whole front ' out of these words ; on the contrary, they fit exactly with the traditional English formation of a fighting unit with the men-at-arms in the centre, the archers on each flank having their front thrown forward at an angle to the front of the men- at-arms. Thus the archers on the right wing of the left division would then form a wedge in combination with the archers on the left of the centre, and there would be a similar wedge between the centre and right division. On the extreme left and right of the line there would be only half -wedges ; since the flanks were covered by the woods no more was needed and the full wedge would have been useless. This is the formation described by Professor Oman in his text,i though in his plan he shows full wedges on the extreme flanks. When the archers were thus formed (four or five deep) the whole of the stakes were planted before the front line and formed effective chevauz de /rise, which they would not have done if the archers had been in clumps in the front. The formation of the English line compelled the French in their attack to break into three columns to avoid the archers in their palisades ; so it is stated in the Gesta, ' diviserunt se in tres turmas, invadentes bellum nostrum in tribus locis ubi erant vexilla '. Dr. Wylie, however, explicitly rejects this interpretation in a foot-note, and in his text describes the French as splitting up to make way for their own fugitive horsemen. From the Gesta it is clear that the division into three columns was preparatory to the assault which forced
 * Political History, iv. 253.