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198 



A HISTORY OF CAVALRY. 



[period II. 



portion of the armies. Eacli of these monarchs had large 

 bodies of mercenaries in his pay, recruited, as is believed 

 from the name Brabancons, from Brabant or the Nether- 

 lands. These troops, which were always disbanded at 

 the close of a war, abandoned their military duties with 

 regret, and, unfit for the useful occupations of peace, 

 gathered in lawless companies and oppressed and pillaged 

 the peasantry without pity.' 



P^re Daniel says that in the time of Philip the Bold 

 all feudal tenants received pay from the king, even during 

 the term of their stipulated service. This must have 

 been occasioned by the poverty of the tenants, which 

 rendered them unable to defray the expenses, particularly 

 in distant expeditions.^ 



The mercenary troops of the time of Louis the Younger 

 and Philip Augustus were soldiers in w^ar and bandits in 

 peace. CJne of the first expeditions of Philip was against 

 these brigands, whom he defeated in the Province of Berri 

 and slew 7,000 of them. Their numbers must have been 

 very great, for we see a few years later large bodies of 

 them in his pay, as well as in that of King John of 

 England.^ 



The chief of the Brabancons in the pay of Philip 

 Augustus was named Cadoc, and it will give some idea 

 of the large force which he commanded under the king 

 when it is stated that the daily pay received by them 

 was 1,000 livres a day, which was an immense sum in 

 that age.' 



Richard Coeur de Lion, in his last war with France, 

 had large bodies of Brabancons in his service under a 

 famous leader named Marchader or Merchades ; but it 

 was during the wars of Edward IIL with France, that 

 the organised mercenaries began to occupy so important 

 a position in the military systems of Europe.* Edward's 

 whole army in his French wars was under pay, contracts 

 being usually made with men of rank and influence, who 

 raised and commanded corps and received a daily pay 

 for each soldier furnished by them. The wages were 



^ Hallam, i. 263. 2 Daniel, i. 63. » ibid. 105. * James'a 

 Life bi Richaxd, ii. 445. 



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