10. Your Fellow Soldiers Might Be Clergy
Today, militaries frequently employ chaplains to provide emotional and spiritual support to soldiers on the battlefield. However, chaplains as a rule generally do not carry arms, especially in the United States military. The case was entirely different during the Medieval era though. Consider the Knights Templar, warrior monks who were the Delta Force of the Crusades. Whether or not they carried out religious services for their fellow soldiers, they were fully armed and extremely dangerous to any enemy. They were the best-trained soldiers and the first standing army since the fall of the Roman Empire, and they were also extremely wealthy.
The Knights Templar, who were monks of the Benedictine order, were not the only clergy who rode into battle. Men of the cloth, aka bishops, priests, and cardinals, frequently fought alongside ordinary soldiers. They didn’t just provide moral support to other soldiers, as chaplains do today. They carried their own weapons and fought just as fiercely as any other soldier. During the Battle of Hastings, the bishop of Bayeux, Odo, fought alongside his half-brother, William the Conqueror. Following a victorious battle, they would also join in the looting and pillaging of both the battle fallen and the nearby towns and villages.
