John Hawkwood: An English Mercenary in Fourteenth-Century Italy

by William Caferro

Winner, 2008 Otto Gründler Book Prize, The Medieval Institute Winner, 2008 Otto Gründler Book Prize, The Medieval Institute Notorious for his cleverness and daring, John Hawkwood was the most feared mercenary in early Renaissance Italy. Born in England, Hawkwood began his career in France during the Hundred Years' War and crossed into Italy with the famed White Company in 1361. From that time until his death in 1394, Hawkwood fought throughout the peninsula as a captain of armies in times of war and as a commander of marauding bands during times of peace. He achieved international fame, and city-states constantly tried to outbid each other for his services, for which he received money, land, and, in the case of Florence, citizenship―a most unusual honor for an Englishman. When Hawkwood died, the Florentines buried him with great ceremony in their cathedral, an honor denied their greatest poet, Dante. William Caferro's ambitious account of Hawkwood is both a biography and a study of warfare and statecraft. Caferro has mined more than twenty archives in Britain and Italy, creating an authoritative portrait of Hawkwood as an extraordinary military leader, if not always an admirable human being.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Renaissance, Medieval, Military History, Italy, Research

480 pages, Hardcover

First published March 21, 2006

About the author

William Caferro teaches medieval European history at Vanderbilt University. He grew up in Brooklyn, New York, where he attended James Madison High School. He received his bachelor’s degree from Haverford College in 1984 (with a history major at Bryn Mawr College) and his Ph.D from Yale University in 1992 (where he primarily studied Greek and Latin patristic). From 1984 to 1987, he taught high school mathematics in New York City and Connecticut.

William Caferro specializes in the history of medieval and Renaissance Italy. His research has focused on the transition from the medieval to Renaissance periods, on ascertaining the distinction between the two, particularly with regard to economic forces.
Caferro is author of Mercenary Companies and the Decline of Siena (Johns Hopkins, 1998) and John Hawkwood, English Mercenary in Fourteenth Century Italy (Johns Hopkins, 2006). John Hawkwood won the Otto Grundler Prize from the International Medieval Congress as the best book in medieval studies (2008). He is co-author of The Spinelli: Fortunes of a Renaissance Family (Penn State, 2001) and co-editor of The Unbounded Community: Papers in Christian Ecumenism in Honor of Jaroslav Pelikan (Routledge, 1996). His most recent book Contesting the Renaissance (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) traces the meaning and use of the term "Renaissance" in the major debates of the historiography.

Reviews

[P.S. Beckmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's possible that John Hawkwood was illiterate or that he simply dictated all his correspondence. Considering the scarcity of first hand writing from the condottiero, Mr. Caferro does a fantastic job recreating the life and times of this English adventurer.

We often think of the Italian princes and priors as conniving foxes, and there certainly were many brilliant men of the day, but it's very colorful and fascinating how John Hawkwood outwits and manipulates the warring politicians and city-states. He was a brilliant tactician with sharp intuition; a diligent soldier, studying the local terrain when other foreign condottiere were too lazy to do so.

I had hoped that this book would present a picture of the day-to-day life of the mercenary free companies, go into details of the contracts and arrangements, and overall delve into the intrigue and chaos of the calamitous 14th century. I was not disappointed. I'd recommend this book to anyone interested in 14th century Italian politics, warfare, or daily life.

I'd put John Hawkwood in the ranks with David Livingstone, Captain Cook, the Duke of Marlborough, and the other British adventures and explorers that have such boldness and flare. Mr. Caferro's book does a wonderful job capturing this flavor and pulling together the details and historical context into a very readable and fascinating biography.

[Tom Lloyd · Rating 5 out of 5]

A quite brilliant and exhaustively researched work on a man I had heard of but knew very little about. It's not easy going because of the detail required to tell it properly, but it's a fascinating and far-from-sugar-coated portrait of a man who was a bastard even by the standards of his time, but not just a bastard (as well as not the worst of his kind), instead there was a lot to him and this reads as a fair and unbiased portrait.

[Astor Teller · Rating 4 out of 5]

A deep dive into politics in Italy in the 1300s seen with the mercenary John Hawkwood as the foci. The book is well researched, but to get the most of it, you should be acquainted with the era and the place (I’m not, so I was lost by the many wars, everchanging alliances and the many names). But it gave me insight on how mercenary companies were run (on a par with modern companies), often using deals (and often acting as intermediaries and diplomats) to get profits (protection money for not coming to your neighbourhood).

[Carl Cash · Rating 5 out of 5]

Its not for everyone, its a true History and facts kind of book not a lot of fluff. Its an academic read for sure. That said he is one of those fascinating characters in history and a great look at 14th century Military logistics and tactics.