HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE WARRIORS

One can risk a statement that the origins of the German state can be dated to the 9th century, when the Carolingian state was divided into three parts (the Verdun Agreement, 843), and the East Frankish state resulting from this division was the direct predecessor of medieval Germany. The knightly class developed relatively quickly in what was then Germany. It is worth adding that the Polish word "knight" was derived from the German word "ritter", which meant not only a horse warrior, but also a landowner who, thanks to the income from the land, could arm himself with relatively expensive equipment. In the full (X-XIII centuries) and late (XIV-XV centuries) of the Middle Ages, the German knighthood was involved in numerous conflicts in various parts of Europe and beyond. First of all, the expansion of the German Empire (from 962) to the south, towards the peninsula, should be mentioned. Apennine, but also to the east - to the lands occupied by the Polabian Slavs, Poland, but also the Baltic peoples. Anyway, the expansion carried out at the expense of the Baltic peoples (13th-14th centuries) was carried out mainly by the Teutonic Order. Not since the parade seems to mention the considerable participation of the German knights in the Third Crusade to the Holy Land (1189-1192), organized by the German emperor Frederick Barbarossa. The expansion towards the south was fought with varying luck and often cost the German knights a lot of blood (e.g. the defeat at the Battle of Legnano in 1176) and ultimately ended in failure. It is worth adding that in the 13th century, the main protective equipment of the German knight was chain mail, to which elements of plate armor were added over time. It was not until the end of the 14th century and in the 15th century that full plate armor began to be used. It was also on German territories that the so-called gothic armor, which was an almost armor's masterpiece. A great example of it is the armor from around 1480, attributed to Sigismund of Tirol, made in Augsburg and presented at the Art History Museum in Vienna. In the 12th century, the German knight most often wore the so-called a great helmet, which, however, from the 13th century began to be replaced by the so-called basinet, which began to receive a movable veil relatively quickly. In Germany, often in the form of the so-called klappvisier (from the 13th-14th centuries). In the fifteenth century, the salada, which may have reached Germany from the area of present-day Italy, became popular among the German knights. When it comes to offensive weapons - of course, the sword and (from the middle ages) also the copy reigned supreme. Various types of blunt weapons were also used, such as the stuffing box (in the late Middle Ages).