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Agincourt 1.2 (work in progress)

The Battle of Agincourt was one of the greatest English victories in the Hundred Years' War. It took place on 25 October 1415 near Azincourt in the County of Saint-Pol, in northern France. England's unexpected victory against a numerically superior French army boosted English morale and prestige, crippled France, and started a new period in the war during which the English began enjoying great military successes.

This battle is notable for the use of the English longbow in very large numbers, with the English and Welsh archers making up nearly 80 percent of Henry's army.

Early on the 25th, Henry deployed his army (approximately 1,500 men-at-arms and 7,000 longbowmen) across a 750-yard (690 m) part of the defile. It is likely that the English adopted their usual battle line of longbowmen on either flank, with men-at-arms and knights in the centre. The English men-at-arms in plate and mail were placed shoulder to shoulder four deep. The English and Welsh archers on the flanks drove pointed wooden stakes, or palings, into the ground at an angle to force cavalry to veer off.

The French were arrayed in three lines or battles. The Burgundian chronicler Jean de Wavrin said there were 8,000 men-at-arms, 4,000 archers and 1,500 crossbowmen in the vanguard, with two wings of 600 and 800 mounted men-at-arms, and a main battle comprising "as many knights, esquires and archers as in the vanguard", with the rearguard containing "all of the rest of the men-at-arms".

As the battle was fought on a recently ploughed field, and there had recently been heavy rain leaving it very muddy, it proved very tiring to walk through in full plate armour. So they were already overcome with fatigue even before they advanced against the enemy".