Broń chłopów w późnośredniowiecznej i wczesnonowożytnej Polsce – problem identyfikacji
Peasant weapons in late medieval Poland – a problem of identification

Summary/Abstract: Participation of peasants in numerous wars waged in Europe in the last centuries of the Middle Ages was common and multifunctional. The issue of peasant weapons, however, has attracted little attention of arms and armour researchers so far. One of the reasons for a poor state of research is an exceptional sparseness of source bases with regard to all the main categories of sources used in arms and armour research: written, iconographic and archaeological ones. It has not been possible so far to unequivocally determine what one should consider “peasant weapons.” We cannot accept a much too general statement that “it was every weapon that got into the hands of peasants.” Written and iconographic sources for this issue are not only very sparse, but they also raise interpretation doubts. More precise opinions may be expressed based on the analysis of finds that were gathered in the course of archaeological research on remains of late medieval villages. In this case, however, care is needed as well when conclusions are drawn. A full documentation of such finds has not been put together so far and this task only awaits to be undertaken. On the other hand, some remarks may be made at this point. Military items from examinations of remains of late medieval and early modern period villages are extremely sparse. They belong to only few categories of arms and armour. There is no protective equipment among them. On the other hand, there are knives, small heads of shaft weapons (possibly javelins), as well as bolt and arrowheads. Some of there were found in remarkable contexts, e.g., with bones of wild animals. It can be assumed that a significant reason why peasants possessed weapons was the fact that these were used for hunting. Such an opinion receives support from the observations of ethnographers who carried out research on the Polish countryside of the 19th and 20th c. In spite of numerous legal restrictions of the freedom of hunting, peasants in late medieval Poland not only poached, but also had opportunities and sometimes even duties to hunt. They did it both for their own use and for the use of their lords.

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