Before the battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French proposed cutting the middle finger off of captured English soldiers rendering them incapable of shooting longbows. The Battle of Agincourt was a major English victory in the Hundred Years' War.The battle took place on Friday, 25 October 1415 (Saint Crispin's Day) in the County of Saint-Pol, Artois, some. This battle concluded with King Harold of England dying at the hands of the Norman King William, which marked the beginning of a new era in England. [70]), The tightness of the terrain also seems to have restricted the planned deployment of the French forces. [17] Two of the most frequently cited accounts come from Burgundian sources, one from Jean Le Fvre de Saint-Remy who was present at the battle, and the other from Enguerrand de Monstrelet. Thinking it was an attack from the rear, Henry had the French nobles he was holding prisoner killed. It may be in the narrow strip of open land formed between the woods of Tramecourt and Azincourt (close to the modern village of Azincourt). Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. When the English won the battle the soldiers waved their middle fingers at the French in defiance, thus flipping the bird was born Contemporary accounts describe the triumphal pageantry with which the king was received in London on November 23, with elaborate displays and choirs attending his passage to St. Pauls Cathedral. Winston Churchhill can be seen using the V as a rallying call. [36] Henry, worried about the enemy launching surprise raids, and wanting his troops to remain focused, ordered all his men to spend the night before the battle in silence, on pain of having an ear cut off. He considered a knight in the best-quality steel armour invulnerable to an arrow on the breastplate or top of the helmet, but vulnerable to shots hitting the limbs, particularly at close range. [109] Juliet Barker, Jonathan Sumption and Clifford J. Rogers criticized Curry's reliance on administrative records, arguing that they are incomplete and that several of the available primary sources already offer a credible assessment of the numbers involved. [27], During the siege, the French had raised an army which assembled around Rouen. [22], Henry's army landed in northern France on 13 August 1415, carried by a vast fleet. [101] The bailiffs of nine major northern towns were killed, often along with their sons, relatives and supporters. One final observation: any time some appeal begins with heres something that intelligent people will find edifying you should be suspicious. The "middle finger" gesture does not derive from the mutilation of English archers at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. Historians disagree less about the French numbers. As the mle developed, the French second line also joined the attack, but they too were swallowed up, with the narrow terrain meaning the extra numbers could not be used effectively. The English Gesta Henrici described three great heaps of the slain around the three main English standards. Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured soldiers. The Battle of Agincourt (October 25, 1415) was a pivotal battle in the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453), resulting in an English victory over the French. Snopes and the Snopes.com logo are registered service marks of Snopes.com. [48] On account of the lack of space, the French drew up a third battle, the rearguard, which was on horseback and mainly comprised the varlets mounted on the horses belonging to the men fighting on foot ahead. It lasted longer than Henry had anticipated, and his numbers were significantly diminished as a result of casualties, desertions, and disease. The Roman gesturemadeby extending the third finger from a closed fist, thus made the same threat, by forming a similarly phallic shape. . A complete coat of plate was considered such good protection that shields were generally not used,[75] although the Burgundian contemporary sources distinguish between Frenchmen who used shields and those who did not, and Rogers has suggested that the front elements of the French force used axes and shields. Since pluck yew is rather difficult to say, like pheasant mother plucker, which is who you had to go to for the feathers used on the arrows for the longbow, the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative f, and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger salute are mistakenly thought to have something to do with an intimate encounter. I suppose that the two-fingered salute could still come from medieval archery, even if it didnt come specifically from the Battle of Agincourt, although the example that Wikipedia links to (the fourteenth-century Luttrell Psalter) is ambiguous. There was no monetary reward to be obtained by capturing them, nor was there any glory to be won by defeating them in battle. What it is supposed to represent I have no idea. It was a disastrous attempt. because when a spectator started to hiss, he called the attention of the whole audience to him with an obscene movement of his middle finger. Morris also claims that the mad emperor Caligula, as an insult, would extend his middle finger for supplicants to kiss. Axtell, Roger E. Gestures: The Do's and Taboos of Body Language Around the World. Why is the missionary position called that? Shakespeare's portrayal of the casualty loss is ahistorical in that the French are stated to have lost 10,000 and the English 'less than' thirty men, prompting Henry's remark, "O God, thy arm was here". [125] Shakespeare illustrates these tensions by depicting Henry's decision to kill some of the French prisoners, whilst attempting to justify it and distance himself from the event. It forms the backdrop to events in William Shakespeare's play Henry V, written in 1599. [127], Shakespeare's play presented Henry as leading a truly English force into battle, playing on the importance of the link between the monarch and the common soldiers in the fight. [128] The original play does not, however, feature any scenes of the actual battle itself, leading critic Rose Zimbardo to characterise it as "full of warfare, yet empty of conflict. Since then there had been tension between the nobility and the royal house, widespread lawlessness throughout the kingdom, and several attempts on Henry Vs life. [85], The French men-at-arms were taken prisoner or killed in the thousands. Although the victory had been militarily decisive, its impact was complex. [123] Other ballads followed, including "King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France", raising the popular prominence of particular events mentioned only in passing by the original chroniclers, such as the gift of tennis balls before the campaign. . 33-35). The English won in a major upset and waved the body part in question at the French in defiance. 78-116). [31], The precise location of the battle is not known. Its origins can be traced back to 1066 . ), And even if killing prisoners of war did not violate the moral code of the times, what would be the purpose of taking archers captive, cutting off their fingers, and then executing them? So they were already overcome with fatigue even before they advanced against the enemy". The trial ranged widely over whether there was just cause for war and not simply the prisoner issue. The French had originally drawn up a battle plan that had archers and crossbowmen in front of their men-at-arms, with a cavalry force at the rear specifically designed to "fall upon the archers, and use their force to break them,"[71] but in the event, the French archers and crossbowmen were deployed behind and to the sides of the men-at-arms (where they seem to have played almost no part, except possibly for an initial volley of arrows at the start of the battle). [69] (The use of stakes was an innovation for the English: during the Battle of Crcy, for example, the archers had been instead protected by pits and other obstacles. Singer Robbie Williams insults the viewer. When Henry V acceded to the English throne in 1413, there had been a long hiatus in the fighting. The terrain favoured Henrys army and disadvantaged its opponent, as it reduced the numerical advantage of the French army by narrowing the front. To meet and beat him was a triumph, the highest form which self-expression could take in the medieval nobleman's way of life." [53] A further 600 dismounted men-at-arms stood in each wing, with the left under the Count of Vendme and the right under the Count of Richemont. The battle remains an important symbol in popular culture. Course Hero uses AI to attempt to automatically extract content from documents to surface to you and others so you can study better, e.g., in search results, to enrich docs, and more. Osprey Publishing. The cavalry force, which could have devastated the English line if it had attacked while they moved their stakes, charged only after the initial volley of arrows from the English. Turning to our vast classical library, we quickly turn up three references. [62] In the Battle of Agincourt, the French threatened the English Soldiers that they would cut off their fingers and when they failed the Englishmen mocked them by showing their fingers. Military textbooks of the time stated: "Everywhere and on all occasions that foot soldiers march against their enemy face to face, those who march lose and those who remain standing still and holding firm win. The play focuses on the pressures of kingship, the tensions between how a king should appear chivalric, honest, and just and how a king must sometimes act Machiavellian and ruthless. [26] He also intended the manoeuvre as a deliberate provocation to battle aimed at the dauphin, who had failed to respond to Henry's personal challenge to combat at Harfleur. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992 ISBN 0-19-282916-5 (p. 454). This famous weapon was made of the native English yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as plucking the yew. Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French, saying, See, we can still pluck yew! Over the years some folk etymologies have grown up around this symbolic gesture. [citation needed]. [139] The museum lists the names of combatants of both sides who died in the battle. After the victory, Henry continued his march to Calais and arrived back in England in November to an outpouring of nationalistic sentiment. [84] The exhausted French men-at-arms were unable to get up after being knocked to the ground by the English. Although an audience vote was "too close to call", Henry was unanimously found guilty by the court on the basis of "evolving standards of civil society".[136][137][138]. Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. Two are from the epigrammatist Martial: Laugh loudly, Sextillus, when someone calls you a queen and put your middle finger out., (The verse continues: But you are no sodomite nor fornicator either, Sextillus, nor is Vetustinas hot mouth your fancy. Martial, and Roman poets in general, could be pretty out there, subject-matter-wise. Fighting ignorance since 1973. In pursuit of his claim to the French throne, Henry V invaded Normandy with an army of 11,000 men in August 1415. The two candidates with the strongest claims were Edward III of England, who was the son of Charles's sister, and Philip, Charles's paternal . (There is an Indo-European connection between the p-sound and f-sound see the distinction between the Latin pater and the Germanic Vater/father but that split occurred a long time ago.) After a difficult siege, the English forces found themselves assaulted by a massive French force. When the French rejected Henrys substantial territorial demands, he arrived in Normandy in August 1415 with a force of about 12,000 men and laid siege to the city of Harfleur. [87] Whether this was part of a deliberate French plan or an act of local brigandage is unclear from the sources. Although the French initially pushed the English back, they became so closely packed that they were described as having trouble using their weapons properly. [8] These included the Duke of York, the young Earl of Suffolk and the Welsh esquire Dafydd ("Davy") Gam. The number is supported by many other contemporary accounts. Take on the burden and expense of caring for them? The French knights were unable to outflank the longbowmen (because of the encroaching woodland) and unable to charge through the array of sharpened stakes that protected the archers. This article was. [107], Most primary sources which describe the battle have English outnumbered by several times. But frankly, I suspect that the French would have done a lot worse to any captured English archers than chopping off their fingers. [34][d] The French apparently had no clear plan for deploying the rest of the army. On 25 October 1415, an army of English raiders under Henry V faced the French outside an obscure village on the road to Calais. [116] One particular cause of confusion may have been the number of servants on both sides, or whether they should at all be counted as combatants. Giving the Finger - Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. [93] Entire noble families were wiped out in the male line, and in some regions an entire generation of landed nobility was annihilated. Then they had to walk a few hundred yards (metres) through thick mud and a press of comrades while wearing armour weighing 5060 pounds (2327kg), gathering sticky clay all the way. Adam Koford, Salt Lake City, Utah, Now for the facts. And I aint kidding yew. Some notable examples are listed below. In Nature Embodied: Gesture in Ancient Rome, Anthony Corbeill, Professor of Classics at the University of Kansas wrote: The most familiar example of the coexistence of a human and transhuman elementis the extended middle finger. PLUCK YEW!". An account purporting to offer the historical origins of the obscene middle-finger extended hand gesture (varously known as "flipping the bird," "flipping someone off," or the "one-finger salute") is silly, and so obviously a joke that shouldn't need any debunking. [47] Although it had been planned for the archers and crossbowmen to be placed with the infantry wings, they were now regarded as unnecessary and placed behind them instead. [93] Among them were 90120 great lords and bannerets killed, including[95] three dukes (Alenon, Bar and Brabant), nine counts (Blmont, Dreux, Fauquembergue, Grandpr, Marle, Nevers, Roucy, Vaucourt, Vaudmont) and one viscount (Puisaye), also an archbishop. Certainly, d'Azincourt was a local knight but he might have been chosen to lead the attack because of his local knowledge and the lack of availability of a more senior soldier. [21] On 19 April 1415, Henry again asked the Great Council to sanction war with France, and this time they agreed. [39] Curry, Rogers[118] and Mortimer[42] all agree the French had 4 to 5 thousand missile troops. Eventually the archers abandoned their longbows and began fighting hand-to-hand with swords and axes alongside the men-at-arms. Without the middle finger it would be impossible for the English soldiers to draw the renowned English longbow and therefore incapable of fighting in the future. All quotes delayed a minimum of 15 minutes. Fixed formatting. The metallography and relative effectiveness of arrowheads and armor during the Middle Ages. Your opponent is not going to pay you (or pay you much) for the return of mutilated soldiers, so now what do you do with them? This claim is false. See here for a complete list of exchanges and delays. The 'middle finger salute' did not derive from the defiant gestures of English archers whose fingers had been severed at the Battle of Agincourt. Corrections? French knights, charging uphill, were unseated from their horses, either because their mounts were injured on the stakes or because they dismounted to uproot the obstacles, and were overpowered. [32] In 2019, the historian Michael Livingston also made the case for a site west of Azincourt, based on a review of sources and early maps. After the initial wave, the French would have had to fight over and on the bodies of those who had fallen before them. [51] Albret, Boucicaut and almost all the leading noblemen were assigned stations in the vanguard. Common estimates place the English army at about 6,000, while the French army probably consisted of 20,000 to 30,000 men. It forms the backdrop to events in William Shakespeare 's play Henry V, written in 1599. giving someone the middle finger The next day the French initiated negotiations as a delaying tactic, but Henry ordered his army to advance and to start a battle that, given the state of his army, he would have preferred to avoid, or to fight defensively: that was how Crcy and the other famous longbow victories had been won. It seems to me that the single upturned middle finger clearly represents an erect penis and is the gestural equivalent of saying f*ck you! As such, it is probably ancient Wikipedia certainly thinks so, although apparently it became popular in the United States in the late nineteenth century under the influence of Italian immigration, replacing other rude gestures like thumbing the nose or the fig sign. French chroniclers agree that when the mounted charge did come, it did not contain as many men as it should have; Gilles le Bouvier states that some had wandered off to warm themselves and others were walking or feeding their horses. The archers were commanded by Sir Thomas Erpingham, another elderly veteran. [54] To disperse the enemy archers, a cavalry force of 8001,200 picked men-at-arms,[55] led by Clignet de Brban and Louis de Bosredon, was distributed evenly between both flanks of the vanguard (standing slightly forward, like horns). During World War II the symbol was adopted as a V for victory.