Online Encyclopedia

MILITIA (Fr. milice, Ger. Miliz, from...

Online Encyclopedia
Originally appearing in Volume V18, Page 449 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
Spread the word: del.icio.us del.icio.us it!

MILITIA (Fr. milice, Ger. Miliz, from
See also:
Lat. miles, soldier, militia, military service)
  , a
See also:
term used generally for organized military forces which are not professional in character and not permanently embodied . All ancient armies, with the exception of the
See also:
personal guards of their leaders, were militias or
See also:
national levies, remaining under arms for the war or the
See also:
campaign and returning to their ordinary occupations at the close of each military
See also:
episode . Militias such as those of the Greek city-states and that of Rome were of course highly trained to the use of arms; so were the barbarian " nations in arms "; which overcame the professionalized
See also:
Roman armies of the
See also:
Empire; and although in the Eastern Empire these new fighting elements were absorbed into a fully organized
See also:
regular arm, in the West the tribal militia
See also:
system gradually
See also:
developed into feudalism . The noble and the knight indeed spent the greater
See also:
part of their lives in the field and devoted themselves from their youth to the cult of arms, but the feudal tenantry, who were bound to give
See also:
forty days' war service and no more, and the burghers who, somewhat later in the
See also:
history of
See also:
civilization, formed the efficient garrisons of the walled towns were true militias . The
See also:
English
See also:
Yeomanry indeed almost ruled the battlefield . In the 15th century the introduction of firearms began to weigh down the balance in favour of the professional soldier . Artillery was always the arm of the specialist . The development of
See also:
infantry, " fire-power," with the early arquebus and musket, called for the highest skill and steadiness in the individual soldier, and cavalry too adopted the new weapon in the form of long and expensive wheel-lock pistols . In the new military organization there was no place for the unprofessional soldier . The role of the unprofessional combatant, generally speaking, was that of an insurgent—harassing small detachments of the enemy, cutting off stragglers, and plundering convoys . Towards the end of the first
See also:
civil war in England (1645) the country-folk banded themselves together to impose a peace on the two warring armies, but their menace was without effect, and they were easily disarmed by Fairfax and Cromwell, who did not even trouble to hold them as prisoners .

End of Article: MILITIA (Fr. milice, Ger. Miliz, from Lat. miles, soldier, militia, military service)
[back]
MILITARY OPERATIONS OF
[next]
MILITIA OF TIIE UNITED

Additional information and Comments

There are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click and select "copy." Paste it into a website, email, or other HTML document.