Without the complex military machine that his forebears had built up over the course of the eighth century, it would have been impossible for Charlemagne to revive the Roman empire in the West. Early Carolingian Warfare is the first book-length study of how the Frankish dynasty, beginning with Pippin II, established its power and cultivated its military expertise in order to reestablish the regnum Francorum, a geographical area of the late Roman period that includes much of present-day France and western Germany. Bernard Bachrach has thoroughly examined contemporary sources, including court chronicles, military handbooks, and late Roman histories and manuals, to establish how the early Carolingians used their legacy of political and military techniques and strategies forged in imperial Rome to regain control in the West. Pippin II and his successors were not diverted by opportunities for financial enrichment in the short term through raids and campaigns outside of the regnum Francorum; they focused on conquest with sagacious sensibilities, preferring bloodless diplomatic solutions to unnecessarily destructive warfare, and disdained military glory for its own sake. But when they had to deploy their military forces, their operations were brutal and efficient. Their training was exceptionally well developed, and their techniques included hand-to-hand combat, regimented troop movements, fighting on horseback with specialized mounted soldiers, and the execution of lengthy sieges employing artillery. In order to sustain their long-term strategy, the early Carolingians relied on a late Roman model whereby soldiers were recruited from among the militarized population who were required by law to serve outside their immediate communities. The ability to mass and train large armies from among farmers and urban-dwellers gave the Carolingians the necessary power to lay siege to the old Roman fortress cities that dominated the military topography of the West. Bachrach includes fresh accounts of Charles Martel's defeat of the Muslims at Poitiers in 732, and Pippin's successful siege of Bourges in 762, demonstrating that in the matter of warfare there never was a western European Dark Age that ultimately was enlightened by some later Renaissance. The early Carolingians built upon surviving military institutions, adopted late antique technology, and effectively utilized their classical intellectual inheritance to prepare the way militarily for Charlemagne's empire.

Charlemagne's Early Campaigns is the first book-length study of Charlemagne at war. The neglect of this subject has truncated our understanding of the Carolingian empire and the military success of its leader, a true equal of Frederick the Great and Napoleon.

Warfare was an integral part of early medieval life. This book looks at warfare in a rounded context in the British Isles and Western Europe between the end of the Roman Empire and the break-up of the Carolingian Empire.

Struggle for Empire explores the contest for kingdoms and power among Charlemagne's descendants that shaped the formation of Europe through the reign of Charlemagne's grandson, Louis the German (826 876)."

This volume brings together a series of articles by John France, published over a span of more than forty years, covering a number of aspects of the military and crusading history of the Middle Ages, both in Europe and the Near East. An interest in understanding how war worked and why informs a first group of articles, ranging from Carolingian armies to the organisation of war in the 13th century. The focus then turns to the Crusades, the most ambitious conquests of the era, with a set of studies on the First Crusade and others on the manner and conduct of warfare in the territories of the Latin East. The volume also includes a major unpublished analysis, co-authored with Nicholas Morton, of the problems faced by the local Islamic powers in the early Crusading period, reminding us that an army is only as strong as its enemies permit, and suggesting that the crusaders should be seen in this light.

Latest volume of original articles on all aspects of warfare in the middle ages. Volume III of De Re Militari's annual journal once again ranges broadly in its chronological and geographic scope, from John France's article on the evidence which early medieval Saints' Lives provide concerning warfare toSergio Mantovani's examination of the letters of an Italian captain at the very end of the middle ages, and from Spain (Nicolas Agrait's study of early-fourteenth-century Castilian military structures) to the eastern Danube (Carroll Gillmor's surprising explanation for one of Charlemagne's greatest setbacks). Thematic approaches range from "traditional", though revisionist in content, campaign analyses (of Sir Thomas Dagworth, by Clifford J. Rogers, and ofMatilda of Tuscany, by Valerie Eads), to tightly focused studies of a single document (Kelly DeVries on militia logistics in the fifteenth century), to controversial, must-read assessments of the broadest topics in medieval military history (Stephen Morillo and Richard Abels on change vs. continuity from Roman times; J. F. Verbruggen on the importance of cavalry.) CONTRIBUTORS: RICHARD ABELS, NICOLAS AGRAIT, KELLY DEVRIES, VALERIE EADS, JOHNFRANCE, CARROLL GILLMOR, SERGIO MANTOVANI, STEPHEN MORILLO, CLIFFORD J. ROGERS.