Overdrive wrote:
Re: amount of knights, yes, my figures seemed a bit high. I was thinking that a noble "household" provides either the knight or money to hire one. What the money is used for, well maybe there just ain't enough knightly men, so the king (or the next lord up) can hire what, 4 soldiers for the price of one knight?
Knight-to-commoner ratios vary greatly in medieval battles, from anywhere between 1:30 to 1:3. The number of soldiers hired for the price of 1 knight might be as low as 1 if the soldier is well armed and mounted, or as high as 10 to 15 if we are talking of lightly armed and armoured skrimishers.
But reviewing historical parallels, an army size of about 1% of the overall population is the most an average preindustrial society can maintain indefinetly; prosperous ones maybe half again as much and poor ones only half as much. Most countires limited themselves to much less, often less than 0.5% of the entire population. With 1.35 million inhabitants, Farrenshire might have a “standing†army of roughly 10.000 men, counting both mercenaries and feudal contingents. For a war abroad, which is more expensive due to supplying troops far away, Farrenshire might be able to send out half this amount, but in an emergency, as with a domestic war of defense, twice to three times this number might be raised. But maintaining an army this size would put crippling economic strains on the country after one or two years.
A maximum of about 2.000 actual fighting knights seems alright for me. The rest would be too young, or too decrepit, or too female to fight, or they would be monks or priests, or paying special taxes to avoid actual service.
Overdrive wrote:
Did the Europeans already have ambassadors in the mid 14th century or how did the rulers communicate?
In around 1350, there were not yet really permanent ambassadors in the way we have today. Countires who entertain
especially close contacts might have something along these lines, but this would still be the rare exception. News from other countries are usually gotten from travellers, most often from merchants who frequent the courts (and often double up as spies). If a monarch wants to communicate with another one, he sends an embassy, headed usually by a bishop or a ranking noble.