Got a Real World Weapons or Armour Question? Mk XII

[JustSomeGuy]

I am meaning more from a respect/social point of view, from their own 'command structure' (as it was) and informal heirachy - why would someone equalyl able to function in either, chose to operate as a 'lowly' archer at the bottom of the food chain when he could get payed more in a more prestigious combat role?

As i understand it, the french knights at agincourt held the english archers in contempt and didn't see them as equals to fight against, because of their social position (ignoring their actual effectiveness - forgive me, it is the most obvious example illustrating what i'm trying to convey), so why would someone chose to be seen as basically scum when they could also be something better (i'm no expert, but weren't men-at-arms something like followers effectively, or else something like how commisioned officers viewed enlisted men in the 'days of empire')? Or were they a more 'specialised' (in terms of their combat role, not their weapon skills) type of troop, in the vein of irregulars such as Sharpe in popular media, operating on their own terms outside of drawn up battle lines, and seen as somewhat elite veterans or somesuch and respected accordingly?

[Mike_G]

A lot depends on the period.

Skilled infantry like the English longbowmen or Genoese crossbowmen were respected for their effectiveness, but they were still lower class than the knights, and many nobles did treat footsoldiers with contempt. It often worked out badly for them.

This is a longstanding prejudice of military superiority, and can be seen in regular armies contempt for irregulars, from Fetterman swearing he could defeat the Sioux Nation with 80 men (which worked out badly) to the Zulu War to a recent prominent US official describing the enemy as a bunch of "dead enders" who nonetheless gave us quite a bit of trouble. Part of training is convincing men they are better than everybody else. The danger is they may believe it a bit too much.

Later on, in the black powder period, the flank companies-- Light Company and Grenadier Company-- of a British regiment were considered better quality troops than the center companies of regular infantry.

There will always be better specialized units and "average" units of men recruited and trained en masse, and the specialists generally gte better pay and better stuff. Class was a huge part of that back when men were expected to bring their own gear, obviously a man of means can have better armor and weapons and spend more time training if he doesn't have fields to plow and wood to cut. This changed slowly as armies began to issue standard equipment, but for a long time officers were expected to buy their own kit and even pay for their rank.

[Beleriphon]

...We could just ask Christopher Lee about the whole backstabbing / throatslitting thing.

Yeah, that man is scary. And not because he was Dracula. Isn't his service record still sealed?

[Mr. Mask]

He was also Saruman, that makes him pretty scary.

[Brother Oni]

Yeah, that man is scary. And not because he was Dracula. Isn't his service record still sealed?

They still are and reportedly when quizzed on his SOE service, he leans into his interviewer and asks whether they can keep a secret.
When they say 'yes', he replies 'Well so can I'.

[Mr Beer]

Anybody ever seen the movie The Hunted with Tommy Lee Jones and Benicio Del Toro? Jones is a civilian combat expert employed by USDOD for special forces training, supposedly based on a real dude. They use a kukhri-like knife-axe hybrid.

From behind they begin with a slash to the forearm near the inside of the elbow to disable the trigger hand. Then they move to the front (or on top if they've tripped him) and perform five fast slashes with the off hand pressed on the back of the blade: to each side of the base of the neck, to each side of the groin to get the femoral arteries, and once down the sternum and belly. Not necessarily in that order. There might've been a stab to the neck before moving to the front, can't recall. The opening move when surprising a sentry from the front was different, can't recall.

The intent is massive blood loss and shock to make a quick, sure, and quiet (not silent) kill.

As somebody has said, overkill is not a bad thing.

Holy ****, that's brutal.

I presume this was against helmet-wearing soldiers? Because otherwise it would surely be simpler to just hack them vigorously in the side of the head and then hit them in the skull a few more times when they fall over.

[Mr Beer]

They still are and reportedly when quizzed on his SOE service, he leans into his interviewer and asks whether they can keep a secret.
When they say 'yes', he replies 'Well so can I'.

If I could be bothered I would now trawl the internet for a caption picture: Saruman with a trollface superimposed over his feature.

[Galloglaich]

A lot depends on the period.

Skilled infantry like the English longbowmen or Genoese crossbowmen were respected for their effectiveness, but they were still lower class than the knights, and many nobles did treat footsoldiers with contempt. It often worked out badly for them.

This is a longstanding prejudice of military superiority, and can be seen in regular armies contempt for irregulars, from Fetterman swearing he could defeat the Sioux Nation with 80 men (which worked out badly) to the Zulu War to a recent prominent US official describing the enemy as a bunch of "dead enders" who nonetheless gave us quite a bit of trouble. Part of training is convincing men they are better than everybody else. The danger is they may believe it a bit too much.

Later on, in the black powder period, the flank companies-- Light Company and Grenadier Company-- of a British regiment were considered better quality troops than the center companies of regular infantry.

There will always be better specialized units and "average" units of men recruited and trained en masse, and the specialists generally gte better pay and better stuff. Class was a huge part of that back when men were expected to bring their own gear, obviously a man of means can have better armor and weapons and spend more time training if he doesn't have fields to plow and wood to cut. This changed slowly as armies began to issue standard equipment, but for a long time officers were expected to buy their own kit and even pay for their rank.

Well put..

Historically it also depended a lot on the country. Late medieval France was a very hierarchical, aristocrat oriented society. There were a very small number of nobility (less than 1%) and a sharp difference between nobles and commoners, most of whom were quite poor. Even when they were not, the nobles didn't even differentiate say, a rich merchant from a serf, at least in theory, but tended to lump all the non nobles, especially on the battlefield, into the same (contemptable) category.

As Mike_G noted, the French nobility had so little respect for footsoldiers in general, that they even trampled their own infantry in a few battles, often leading directly to their own defeat and annihilation. In Italy both the French and the Spanish were infamous for killing captive footsoldiers they thought weren't worth ransoming (though there is some evidence that English and French soldiers used to ransom one another.

On the flipside, in medieval Poland, 1/5 of the population were technically in the nobility, and it was normal to parole or ransom even common soldiers after a battle (king Jagiello of Poland released 14,000 German prisoners after the battle of Grunwald in 1410, for example). Peasants had rights and property (though that would change later) and Burghers could be more powerful than most nobles.

Germany was kind of in between, but generally was a place where commoners could and often did reach high status. Flanders and Northern Italy favored burghers. Sweden, Switzerland, the Tyrol and lower Saxony were places where peasants had significant rights and respect and could often be rich.

Sure a bowman could pick up a sword and be a passable man-at-arms, but he's not going to last long against the guy who has spent ten thousand hours practicing with his sword.

Keep in mind, in the period they are referring to, and in fact in nearly all periods, a sword is a sidearm. The main weapon of a mounted man at arms is a lance, as a footsoldier (which you saw in England quite a bit), a bill or a pike or a bow. But most soldiers carried swords as well by the time of Agncourt.

G

[Incanur]

Regarding specialization, it's complicated issue but one worth contemplating. The distinction between missile weapon skill and close combat skill bears remembering. I make two arguments against specialization. First, I'm fully convinced that melee prowess involves, as di Grassi says, being able to defend yourself with anything whatsoever. Second, I argue that mastery of the bow in no way impairs or reduce a warrior's ability to fight at hand strokes, and that various historical combatants excelled at the bow, spear, sword, dagger, etc.

The di Grassi quotation speaks for itself and matches the thought of other period masters. George Silver wrote that "professors of arms ought to be skillful with all manner of weapons" and personally challenged a rival to duels with "the single rapier, rapier and dagger, the single dagger, the single sword, the sword and target, the sword and buckler, & two hand sword, the staff, battle axe, and Morris pike." Musashi wrote the following: "You should not have a favorite weapon, or any other exaggerated preference for that matter. To become overly attached to one weapon is as bad as not knowing it sufficiently well." Joseph Swetnam, an English master of defense who wrote in the early seventeenth century, listed "more then twenty sorts of weapons, which Masters of this Noble art of Defence, are, or, else ought to be expert therein." In general, medieval and Renaissance manuals include a variety of weapons and expect skilled warriors to fight well with all of them. The idea that focusing on one to the exclusion of others grants any advantages appears nowhere that I've seen. From my limited experience playing and sparring, I suspect variety best cultivates the kind of flexible martial skilled on both on the battlefield and for personal defense. Furthermore, each melee weapon shares fundamental of movement, timing, and body mechanics.

The same does not apply to shooting a bow or crossbow, slinging, or hurling thrown weapons. Experience and the historical record both suggest that it's possible to be deadly with a blade and a lousy archer, or vice versa. However, this does not mean that skill in the one detracts from the other. As mentioned earlier, elite cavalry units from Egypt to Japan almost always employed the bow in addition to sword and lance. Such warriors also fought effectively on foot with polearms and swords. Mamluks, for instance, explicitly trained with the bow, lance, sword, mace, and dagger. Now, common infantry didn't have the same battlefield role and weren't necessarily up to the same standard. I assume some archers indeed lacked melee prowess. But English archers, especially in fifteenth century, had such success in part because they eagerly took up polearms, swords, and daggers when the situation called for it. At Poitiers 1356, Auray 1364, Otterburn 1388, Agincourt 1415, and Verneuil 1424, English archers demonstrated their skill in the press of close combat. Writing in the middle of the sixteenth century, Roger Ascham and Henry Barrett both described English archers as fighting with polearms as needed. Ascham considered this a key element of the English archer's power on the battlefield.

On the similar social status of mounted archers and men-at-arms as well potential for advancement, Matthew Strickland writes the following in The Great Warbow:

It was not uncommon for a family to send one member to fight as a men-at-arms, while another, perhaps a younger brother or son, would serve less fully equipped as an archer. This trend could only be furthered by the levying of archers together with men-at-arms in contract retinues. The later evidence of the composition of the retinues of John, Lord Talbot, between 1439 and 1442 reveals a number of men who had served as archers subsequently being recruited as men-at-arms.

While we rightfully emphasize the difficulty of training skilled archers when discussing historical warfare, the progression from archer to man-at-arms - for which there are other sources - indicates the greater value attached the latter role. I imagine many at least English men-at-arms could have performed admirably as archers but accomplished more - and received greater monetary and social rewards - fighting hand-to-hand in heavy armor.

[warty goblin]

Holy ****, that's brutal.

I presume this was against helmet-wearing soldiers? Because otherwise it would surely be simpler to just hack them vigorously in the side of the head and then hit them in the skull a few more times when they fall over.

Blades can get stuck in skulls, which are also probably the single hardest target on the human body. I'd think it a bit chancy that a person could reliably get a deep enough penetration to quickly shut a person down. Safer to hit the soft, equally lethal spots

[Avilan the Grey]

Regarding soldiers vs nobility etc...

There were indeed huge differences between countries. France was one of the worst, where commoners wasn't really respected at all. England was somewhere in between, and Scandinavia (at least Sweden-Finland, I am not completely sure about Denmark-Norway) as well as the german nations were "best"; peasants were free land owners most of the time, had a very strong say in politics and were a majority of the armed forces. In fact most of the time the King and the peasants were conspiring together to keep the nobles in check.

Of course we had a very small population and the majority of our forces up until the 30 year war was mercenaries, primarely germans and scotsmen.

Absolutely worst was Russia, where peasants were basically slaves, with no rights of their own to speak of and were more or less owned by the nobles ruling them.

[Spiryt]

Regarding soldiers vs nobility etc...

There were indeed huge differences between countries. France was one of the worst, where commoners wasn't really respected at all. England was somewhere in between, and Scandinavia (at least Sweden-Finland, I am not completely sure about Denmark-Norway) as well as the german nations were "best"; peasants were free land owners most of the time, had a very strong say in politics and were a majority of the armed forces. In fact most of the time the King and the peasants were conspiring together to keep the nobles in check.

That's pretty gross simplification, would require some specifying on when and how....

peasants were free land owners most of the time

That's generally, not true, as far as I'm aware, it came very close to 'most of the time' - at the break of 16th and 17th century, it was basically 50/50 between taxed land owners and tenants etc. but from then it declined again.


http://pub.epsilon.slu.se/5502/1/For..._in_Sweden.pdf

Page 11

In this 17th century, categories like trälar, brytar i landbor were probably (?) somehow extinct already, can't find sources. Those things had significant inertia though, in practice slavery isn't even extinct in Europe right now, after all.






Anyway, though, political and legal status is really always somehow insignificant, if it's not 'supported' by economical and sociological freedom.




In 17th century, French peasants, were, from what I know, pretty much free, serfdom was largely extinct.

But as mentioned, most of French peasants were anyway in extremely poor situation compared to the higher classes. Particularly financial.

Absolutely worst was Russia, where peasants were basically slaves, with no rights of their own to speak of and were more or less owned by the nobles ruling them.

To may scant knowledge it's quite true. Unfortunately Mongol conquest caused destruction and political entities that aroused to break said Mongol domination resulted in very absolutist model of social relations.

But again, this should mainly relate to 18th century, when it got really bad in some places.

[Avilan the Grey]

That's generally, not true, as far as I'm aware, it came very close to 'most of the time' - at the break of 16th and 17th century, it was basically 50/50 between taxed land owners and tenants etc. but from then it declined again.

It did get much worse yes. Between the beginning of the 19th century and pre WWI it was at it's worst, I think, which is kind of sad. The last of the "statare" (farmers who worked on 1 year contracts, getting almost no pay except for the right to eat of the land they were hired to work) was not abolished until 1945 (!) but had it's peak in the mid 19th century.

This should not be confused with the farmers in earlier times that paid their taxes to the church or a noble instead of a king. Yes, they were not free, they "rented" their land, but the conditions only became awful with the introduction of industy, for some reason.

And yes, I stand corrected, it wa about 50/50 at least by the 18th century. However the farmers in Sweden were still a significant political force, and most of the time it was the group the king barted with, because A) the priesthood tended to vote with the king no matter what and B) the nobles would too, unless what was voted on was confiscating noble lands, or other things that harmed them. Which the farmers, as well as the kings tended to view as a good thing, in general.

A king cannot give away land forever, most kings have at least one big "räfs", when he re-confiscates land from the noble families, or they would become too powerful.

[Galloglaich]

Actually I think it was much worse during the days of direct control by the Golden Horde (13th -16th Centuries) because the Mongols routinely killed tens of thousands of peasants during disputes with the various districts, more or less continuously, and a large percentage of the population were captured and sold into permanent slavery in the markets of Caffa and Sarai and so on (this was what the Mongols called "harvesting the steppe". And Ivan Groszny wasn't much better than they were.

The initial invasion was probably the very worst, Fra di Plano Carpini talked about riding for days through fields of skulls around Kiev during his trip into Mongolia in 1245 AD.

"They destroyed cities and castles and killed men and Kiev, which is the greatest Russian city they besieged; and when they had besieged it a long while they took it and killed the people of the city. So when we went through that country we found countless human skulls and bones from the dead scattered over the field. Indeed it had been a very great and populous city and now is reduced almost to nothing. In fact there are hardly two hundred houses there now and the people are held in the strictest servitude."

Mongols were so much more hard core than any fantasy RPG villain or monster I ever heard of...

G

[Yora]

I am always cautious about such reports. After all, the Mongols were really good at phychological warfare and it was always convenient when enemies would surrender without a fight. At the same time, anyone who wanted to portray the Mongols as savages or get political and military assistance from their neighbors, would be very much interested to make them look worse than they are.
The Mongols certainly did their fair share of pillaging and slaughtering, but I'm never quite convinced that they were exceptionally so.

[Spiryt]

They probably actually were exceptionally so, to be fair.

Even for Great Steppe standards.

There are just too many reports like "after 300 hundreds years of existing, Kingdom of Hungary ceased to exist" to claim it was all hyperbole.

And scale of destruction in Transoxiana is supposed to be even greater.

[Incanur]

Mongol armies undoubtedly killed a whole bunch of people in the thirteenth century. The extreme reports are likely exaggerations, but the more reasonable figures still horrify. I suspect the exceptional slaughter correlates highly with their exceptional military success.

[Galloglaich]

The extent of the massive slaughter of the Mongols is so well established in so many different branches of science (from DNA to archeology to plant research) that it's almost pointless to even post links.

You can also still see the results in places like Romania and those parts of China, Eastern Europe, South and Central Asia which used to be the now extinct kingdoms like Transoxiana, great centers of Bukhara, Urgench, and Alamut... wiped out.

The Mongols didn't just slaughter the population, burn the fields, capture the population, steal the livestock and the other usual things, they also tore down hill-terracing, poisoned and filled in wells and springs, destroyed bridges, did everything they could to permanently remove human settlements from the land - often setting back development in a given region by centuries. This was an explicit policy outlined by Ghenghis Khan, who wanted to turn the world into one great steppe (people being only one type of livestock thereon, hence their famous term 'harvesting the steppe as a euphemism for slave raiding). The Mongols burned more books in the libraries in the Arab cities than Alexandria to the power of ten.

It wasn't just in the initial outbreak in the 13th Century. During the 15th Century, Timur the Lame, who arguably outdid Ghenghis Khan in mass-murder, indulged in creative expressions of homicide that so far surpass the wildest genre literature or villains of rpg and computer games as to be in a different league altogether, even just as a concept, let alone in actual reality.

Fra Di Plano Carpini, who I quoted upthread, was only one of thousands of eyewitnesses who described the ghastly results of a full scale Mongol invasion. The Mongols own records corroborate them. I think it's a pretty well settled fact at this point.

G

[Fri]

This... isn't actually a question about weapons and armour I guess. But I don't feel like making a thread for such a small question.

How does a barehand fighter who's experienced in street brawling but never have any martial art training fight? This is for modern setting, obviously.

[Spiryt]

Probably depends on a dude, largely.

Watching videos of football hooligans could be good guideline, though they often train something a bit.

Generally will be stronger/better in chaotic, rabid and ugly wrestling that end with opponent getting stretched on concrete so he can be punched/kicked a lot. I guess.

[Galloglaich]

An experienced street fighter will more often have the basics -

Courage
In real life there is something like a 'morale check' experience whenever any kind of fight starts, (when the adrenaline hits). Not everybody can get through this at all, most people take some time to go through it and decide to commit to a fight. An experienced street fighter knows the drill so to speak and will adjust to this (accept the reality of the situation) much quicker.

Decisiveness
This is related to the morale issue - having been through a few fights you get more programmed mentally to decisively act. Once you get through the 'morale check' you know it's time to fight and you do it without any further hesitation. This is another big advantage over somebody who doesn't have experience because they will often hesitate way too long - they still think there is a conversation going on or whatever.

Situational Awareness
A street fighter will tend to pay attention to numbers (of his friends or his opponents friends, and how they are acting - if other people are going to join the fight or not and how soon) and the world around him (whether cops are coming, where the broken glass is, where a pipe is laying and so on) more than someone inexperienced. These factors (especially friends ganging up) probably win more fights than anything else. It also goes along with a certain basic sense of space - timing and distance - which comes from experience that some martial artists never quite develop.

Dirty Fighting
A street fighter may be more familiar with things that aren't always taught in martial arts classes, and can distinguish between things he's seen really work, (or done or had done to him) vs things that are fantasies. I remember once a guy threw some throwing stars at me in front of a bar - I thought based on what I'd seen on TV I was going to die and flinched behind my jacket. They hit me but nothing happened. On the other hand, a beer mug upside the head, kicking a bar stool out from under somebody, flicking a cigarette in their eye, cracking their head on a sign pole, I've seen those things work.

The number one 'dirty fighting' technique which I think works the best is the sucker punch, which relies on courage and decisiveness above (and a certain degree of evil). A sucker punch seems to do much more damage than a punch landed while both parties know the fight is on.


On the other hand, street fighters can be susceptible to a confident martial artist who knows how to win a certain game- a wrestler may choke him out and he doesn't even know what's coming, a good boxer can keep jabbing him in the face and back away - wearing him out before he can do any damage, or score a knockout punch. I've seen street fighters surprised by a kick or a throw from someone that knows martial arts.

Generally, I think the basics are actually more important, but if you have both the basics and the advanced techniques, (really have them, not just to the point that you could do them slowly in a gym) that trumps the basic streetfighter.

G

[Mr Beer]

How does a barehand fighter who's experienced in street brawling but never have any martial art training fight? This is for modern setting, obviously.

As mentioned above, one huge difference between a street brawler and a normal guy is that most people need to psych themselves up before fighting. That's why you see (usually) young drunk men shouting and pushing for a while before somebody throws a punch and it's on. Someone who is experienced in this situation will either walk away before it kicks off or will attack first.

My guess is a brawler who gets to attack first will try to do so decisively and with a technique they've used before which works, so a hook to the jaw/a headbutt/an improvised weapon to the head. Then follow up with a crude but effective technique designed to prevent their opponent from getting back up i.e. multiple kicks to the head or torso from a standing position or jump onto them and hold them down while punching them in the face or slamming their skull off the pavement.

EDIT

This is a quite interesting site on street fighting:

http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com...tfighting.html

It's a self defence site. The thing I like about it is the author explains that 99% of self defence is avoiding trouble i.e. don't go to crappy neighbourhoods, have some situational awareness and most importantly of all, walk away from trouble-makers instead of mirroring their aggression.

[Galloglaich]

Hey guys, I need some help with something.

Can anyone give me a detailed breakdown on the types of arms and tactics used during the Wat Tyler Rebellion, in 1381 in England?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peasants%27_Revolt

I need serious details, specifics, preferably sourced, on weapons, armor, units, tactics, who of significance were involved from the nobility, gentry, urban militias, military orders (I gather Hospitalers may have been involved in the crackdown?) and so forth.

II have access to the usual sources, wikipedia and so on of course, but don't know enough about military history in England to fill in the blanks. If you can even a little, please chime in.

G

[Incanur]

EDIT

This is a quite interesting site on street fighting:

http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com...tfighting.html

That's not really what I think of when I think street brawling. Sure, professional killers, some - definitely not all - gang members, and the like act approximately as the author describes. (Such people in fact tend to live in nice houses. The Iceman would be an example. I wouldn't call him a street rat - I don't think that's a useful term at all.) But plenty of folks throw down without any lethal intent and with interest in displaying their skill and/or courage.

[Brother Oni]

Courage
In real life there is something like a 'morale check' experience whenever any kind of fight starts, (when the adrenaline hits). Not everybody can get through this at all, most people take some time to go through it and decide to commit to a fight. An experienced street fighter knows the drill so to speak and will adjust to this (accept the reality of the situation) much quicker.

I agree with this. In a real situation, a less experienced person will often reflexively glance away at the last moment to decide whether or not they're going to attack you.

I'm not sure whether this is fake, but here's an example of how things typically start up in the UK: lots of shoving and posturing as they get the courage up before it devolves into a fight (which is typically over in a couple of seconds).

Obviously this would vary depending on the culture (including gang cultures, not just nationality), especially when alcohol and weapons (melee or firearms) are involved (alcohol often skipping the courage stage).

On a more humorous view of how an experienced street brawler would fight: link (warning for language).

Hey guys, I need some help with something.

Can anyone give me a detailed breakdown on the types of arms and tactics used during the Wat Tyler Rebellion, in 1381 in England?

Given that these riots happened during the middle of the 100 Year's War, I would think the arms, armour and tactics of that would be a good place to start.

Compulsory archery wasn't introduced until 1511 in the reign of Henry VIII, so any peasant archers as noted in the Peasant's Revolt wikipedia page wouldn't necessarily be ex-professionals (all the archers good enough to make a living from their shooting would probably be in the army fighting in France).

From this page, it suggests that farming implements or their modified derivatives would be the standard weaponry of the rebels (flails, pitchforks, spears, clubs, etc), at least until they took the Tower of London.
Pikes would be the standard weapon of the militias (on the King's side), although the page notes that falchions were a common peasant weapon (probably for the richer ones).

There's not much more I can tell you that isn't already in the wikipedia article (particularly the leaders and important people of both sides) and you probably have access to much better articles through JSTOR than I do.
I can summarise the article if that's of any help.

[Mr. Mask]

That's not really what I think of when I think street brawling. Sure, professional killers, some - definitely not all - gang members, and the like act approximately as the author describes. (Such people in fact tend to live in nice houses. The Iceman would be an example. I wouldn't call him a street rat - I don't think that's a useful term at all.) But plenty of folks throw down without any lethal intent and with interest in displaying their skill and/or courage.

Since he grew up in those neighbourhoods, and was a, "street rat" himself, I'd consider what he says.

[Matthew]

Compulsory archery wasn't introduced until 1511 in the reign of Henry VIII ...

What about the 1363 law?

[Spiryt]

Isn't 1363 law about yeomen, and other more 'free' peasants, and this 1511 about actually 'all", simply?

[Matthew]

Dunno, that is why I am asking. Never seen the complete text of 1363 or the one about labourers later on.

[Crasical]

Questions about the culverin/hand bombard. Please excuse my ignorance, I don't know much at all about real-world fighting techniques/weapons.

It's not rifled, has a bore of ~2 inches (estimated from illustrations), and has a tiny hole in the breech to stick a match into, mounted on a length of wood to be held steady under one arm. It functionally seems to be a tiny cannon on a stick.

I'm uncertain if the game rules for the thing are playing up the kick it's got (I suspect yes), but Pathfinder culverines knock the wielder prone if they're fired without being braced on a window/wall or a stand. Wikipedia describes them as having a fairly flat trajectory, so would there be any use or benefit in extending the rod the culverin is mounted on so that it's haft can be braced against the ground, like a spear against a charge, or am I doomed to fall on my butt or have to wheel my gun around in a tiny cart?

Secondly, it seems to be pretty simple as far as firearms go (no moving parts, even), and it seems like it would be awkward to bayonet, so how effective would one of these things be swung around as a club? Would the simple construction and heavy iron make it reasonably effective, would it just hit something and have the cannon portion snap off the wooden handle, or would it deform the metal barrel and ruin it as a firearm?