The chevauchee, the second major military development of the fourteenth century, was created to resolve the great military dilemma of the age: how does an army break a siege? “A castle can hardly be taken within a year, and even if it does fall, it means more expenses for the king’s purse and for his subjects than the conquest is worth,” wrote Pierre Dubois, an influential fourteenth-century military thinker. Dubois’s solution to the siege problem, outlined in Doctrine of Successful Expeditions and Shortened Wars, was indirection. Attack civilians, Dubois argued, and your opponent will be
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