The Tree of Battles contains commentary that fits comfortably within the five modern LOAC principles of honor, humanity, military necessity, distinction, and proportionality. (Photo courtesy of author
No. 2
The Tree of Battles
A Benedictine Monk’s Futile Attempt to Promulgate a Code of Military Conduct in the Fourteenth Century
By Lieutenant Colonel Paul M. Shea
Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.1
To appreciate the importance of the principles of the law of armed conflict (LOAC), judge advocates (JAs) must consider their historical endurance. The law of armed conflict has long roots, some buried so deep they have been largely forgotten. Yet these lesser-known precursors also played a crucial role in LOAC development. One forgotten pioneer hailed from a fourteenth-century French monastery, where he struggled to promote the LOAC principles of honor, humanity, and distinction. While history consigned his name to obscurity, the principles he espoused have thankfully endured.
Conventional wisdom typically views LOAC as a product of the European intellectual movement of the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries renowned as the Enlightenment. In his 2012 work, Lincoln’s Code, The Laws of War in American History, historian John Fabian Witt frames jus in bello constraints in warfare primarily as the product of Emmerich de Vattel’s 1758 work, Le Driot des Gens (The Law of Nations in English) and generally refers to subsequent efforts to limit suffering as Enlightenment rules of warfare.2 Witt’s comments echo broader themes featured prominently in the recent works of psychologist Steven Pinker,3 viewing the Enlightenment as the prime mover of modern history and almost everything that preceded it as mere trivia.4
Of course, some earlier, pre-Enlightenment figures still get their due. Practitioners typically consider seventeenth-century jurist Hugo Grotius the father of modern international law.5 The Department of Defense (DoD) Law of War Manual lists him with Vattel as authoritative classical international law publicists.6 Especially learned experts may reach back to Spanish theologians like Francisco de Vitoria and Francisco Suarez, whose respective work on international law influenced Grotius.7 But these individuals and their contemporaries arrived only a few generations earlier, sitting comfortably between the Enlightenment and the Age of Exploration and Renaissance that precipitated it.
Doctors Pinker and Witt might argue the relative dearth of authoritative international law publicists prior to the sixteenth century affirms the Enlightenment as the historical hinge where mankind finally broke through by substituting “dogma, tradition and authority with reason, debate and institutions of truth-seeking . . . [and] shift[ing] their values from the glory of the tribe, nation, race, class, or faith toward universal human flourishing.”8 But, as Henry Kissinger once stated: “What posterity comes to view as a new departure usually results from a series of more or less random acts which make it difficult to distinguish what had been a conscious choice from sheer momentum.”9 To put it more colloquially, such arguments resemble being “born on third base and thinking you hit a triple.”10
This article discusses an earlier, lesser-known figure in the development of LOAC: Honoré Bonet, a French Benedictine monk who tried to promulgate ethical codes of military conduct in the late fourteenth century with his work, The Tree of Battles. Although his efforts ultimately proved futile and his impact minimal compared to other publicists, he nevertheless represents a key link in the evolutionary chain of customary international law from the Middle Ages to the modern age. This article will put The Tree of Battles in context by briefly discussing Bonet’s milieu, the political landscape of fourteenth century France and Western Europe. Next, it will discuss The Tree of Battles in some depth, highlighting various rules that mirror the same LOAC principles recognized today. Finally, it will consider the ultimate historical impact (or lack thereof) of The Tree of Battles and assess whether Bonet deserves reconsideration and greater recognition from legal historians.
“[A] succession of wayward dangers”11
While The Tree of Battles has quietly endured since its release in 1387, only sparse details of Honoré Bonet’s life survive posterity. He self-identifies as a “humble [p]rior of Salon in Provence”12 in the South of France. A few other works and appearances are documented, but, perhaps befitting for a monk, Bonet lived relatively inconspicuously.13 However, one can contextualize Bonet’s lifestyle from the broader historical record.
In this pre-Westphalian era of relatively weak nation-states, Christianity and feudalism dominated Western European culture.14 Ironically, whereas the former espoused the sanctity of all people in God’s eyes,15 the latter promoted a stratified social hierarchy, from king down to peasant, largely based upon land holdings.16 Noble and knightly status carried reciprocal military obligations to serve those above and protect those beneath one’s station,17 either directly or via surrogates, though the provision of equivalent services or monetary payment also sufficed at times.18 In this regard, Bonet’s era did not differ significantly from those of preceding centuries,19 but drastic changes loomed.
Western Europe, and France in particular, experienced myriad cataclysmic events throughout the fourteenth century. Agriculture was already straining to keep pace with population growth when, beginning in 1315, pervasive crop failure and livestock disease spread famine throughout the continent.20 Worse, the bubonic plague epidemic, better known as the Black Death, began in the middle of the century.21 Before the plague ran its course in the mid-1350s, it killed an estimated one-third of Europe’s population.22 Roughly two decades later, after a residence of several decades in Avignon, France, the Papacy returned to Rome, but some cardinals contested Pope Urban VI’s election23 and took the extraordinary step of electing an alternate Anti-Pope, Clement VII,24 who returned to Avignon. This created a four-decade-long schism in Western Christianity, doing irreparable damage to the church’s prestige and sowing the seeds of the Reformation and the rise of Protestantism.25
More localized, in 1340, Edward III, seeking to exploit divisions rampant throughout French nobility, led English forces in an invasion of France, committing five generations of English and French men to the cyclical violence of the Hundred Years’ War.26 While usually remembered for great battles like Crécy (1346) and Agincourt (1415), the war mostly plodded along with indecisive skirmishing, guerilla campaigns, and internal French conflict.27 Even during periods of formal truce, idle soldiers deprived of steady income and accustomed to pillaging often plundered the French countryside in “free companies.”28 With no strong central governments or organized armies to counter them, these free companies held their own castles and alternatively extorted and terrorized French villages.29 And since truces would inevitably end, nobles knew the brigands could prove useful later.30 So they abided their misconduct in the meantime, much to the chagrin of the peasants.31 Bonet saw the period as “so burdened by wars and hatred, robberies and dissensions, that it is hard to name one little region, be it duchy or county, that enjoys good peace.”32
The clergy had advocated for some restraints in the conduct of warfare in the preceding centuries, with limited success. In 989, the church enacted the “Peace of God,” forbidding attacks against the church and non-combatants.33 Shortly thereafter, in 1027, came the “Truce of God,” banning combat on holy days.34 In 1139, the Second Lateran Council prohibited the use of crossbows against other Christians.35 Infractions of such edicts could trigger spiritual sanctions such as condemnation and excommunication in lieu of more immediate secular consequences. So, voracity often trumped piety, resulting in arbitrary compliance.36
After surveying his environment and consulting both history and theology, Bonet concluded war was part of the natural world and ordained by God.37 Nevertheless, he railed against its rampant brutality. Thus, Bonet devotes the bulk of The Tree of Battles to commentary on the law of warfare. This commentary echoes the 1360 work of the Italian jurist, John of Legnano,38 Tractatus de Bello, de Represaliis, et de Duello,39 itself considered a hallmark in the development of international law.40 Bonet did not simply copy and translate Legnano, however. For better or for worse, Bonet also simplified many concepts and cut out academic references in the hope of reaching a wider audience of knights instead of a small cohort of jurists.41
Law of Armed Conflict Principles in The Tree of Battles
[I]f in war many evil things are done, they never come from the nature of war, but from false usage; as when a man-at-arms takes a woman and does her shame and injury, or sets fire to a church. Such cases do not come from the nature of war itself but from false usage of battle and war, and from war wrongly conducted.42
While modern readers may understandably doubt the value of a work written for fourteenth-century knights, The Tree of Battles contains commentary that fits comfortably within the five modern LOAC principles of honor, humanity, military necessity, distinction, and proportionality. Perhaps this should not come as a surprise. Though Bonet’s world may seem alien to today’s in many respects, modern readers can certainly relate somewhat to a world ravaged by infectious disease, constant violence, and waning trust in established institutions. In any event, the reflection of these principles in a 636-year-old work demonstrates the wisdom of the maxim that “[h]istory does not repeat itself but it often rhymes.”43
Not surprisingly for a culture inundated with the chivalric ideals, The Tree of Battles emphasizes the importance of honor in battle. This idea of mutual fairness and respect between opposing sides still exists today.44 Moreover, the types of violations Bonet denounces are the same ones taught in contemporary LOAC briefings. Bonet draws the classic distinction between deception in battle and perfidy—such as deceptive parley offers—and considers the latter a punishable offense.45 He also rails against soldiers exploiting grants of safe passage, often granted to students, clergy, ambassadors, and others, to surreptitiously maneuver forces.46 He also notes that truces should be respected and encourages punishment for violations thereof.47
Battle of Agincourt (Credit: Georgios Killidas-stock.adobe.com)
The Tree of Battles also reflects, at least in part, the principle of humanity: the idea that suffering should be minimized to only what is necessary “to accomplish a legitimate military purpose.”48 Bonet referred to this principle in his discussion on the treatment of prisoners, a subject of great interest at the time. Since ransom was a key source of income, knights had a selfish incentive to take as many (well-heeled) prisoners as possible.49 In addition to the financial incentive to keep prisoners intact, Bonet offered an ethical motivation.50 He notes that “so soon as a man has surrendered, and is a prisoner, mercy should be shown to him, unless there were a risk of his escaping, with the result of prolonged war, damage, or mischief.”51 Admittedly, a knight could interpret Bonet’s caveats broadly, to his prisoner’s detriment. So could a king. England’s Henry V employed similar logic at Agincourt in 1415 when he infamously ordered the execution of French prisoners, ostensibly to prevent French forces from regrouping.52
The principle of military necessity restricts tactics to those “measures needed to defeat the enemy as quickly and efficiently as possible,” which are not otherwise “prohibited by the law of war.”53 In that vein, The Tree of Battles also addressed what actions were or were not required in certain situations. Bonet criticized “those who go to war solely to pillage.”54 He also endorsed a serf’s right to defend himself against his lord and supported the general use of force in protecting others under attack.55 Most interestingly, Bonet repeatedly emphasized that the authority of lords and captains was not absolute. He argued that no lord below a prince should ordain war,56 and he noted that no oath should bind a man to do an unjust thing, such as aid their lord in an insurrection, and that even serfs were not obliged to follow immoral orders.57 He cautioned that eternal damnation awaited knights who died in unjust wars.58
In 989, the church enacted the “Peace of God,” forbidding attacks against the church and non-combatants. (Credit: Andreas-stock.adobe.com)
Bonet specifically declared the forcible conversion of Saracens (Muslims) and other “unbelievers” an unjust purpose.59 This was not an affirmation of nonsectarian unity. He simply believed that “according to the Holy Scripture we cannot, and ought not to constrain or force unbelievers to receive either Holy Baptism or the Holy Faith, but must leave them in their free will that God has given them.”60 He noted, though, that there may be just reasons to battle against unbelievers. For example, if they were “oppressing” Christians, then Christians could wage war against them (unfortunately, he did not clarify what specifically constituted oppression, opening the door for broad interpretation).61 He also affirmed the righteousness of attempts to re-conquer Jerusalem on behalf of Christendom, since it previously fell under its umbrella.62
Nevertheless, as one might expect given his vocation, Bonet focuses primarily on protecting fellow believers. Echoing the principle of distinction, he exhorted knights to distinguish between fellow combatants and the civilian population.63 Bonet went to great lengths to identify a variety of non-combatants who “should be left secure and in peace,” including poor laborers,64 clergy,65 ambassadors,66 students,67 the elderly,68 women, and children.69 Most interestingly, he also specifically recommended no harm against “ox-herds, husbandmen and ploughmen” because “those who cultivate the soil plough and work for all men . . . seeing also that they have no concern with war or with harming anyone.”70
Bonet acknowledged the challenges in following this rule. He stated, “Valiant men and wise . . . should take pains, so far as they can, not to bear hard on simple and innocent folk . . . .”71 But he admitted, “[I]f sometimes the humble and innocent suffer harm and lose their goods, it cannot be otherwise, for as I have said above, all the weeds cannot be uprooted from among the good plants without some of the latter coming to harm, because they are too close . . . .”72 With these words, Bonet demonstrated a rudimentary understanding of the principle of proportionality: that incidental harm to civilians may be inevitable but should not be excessive compared to the direct military advantage expected to be gained.73
Bonet did not just reference proportionality, though. He also carved out two notable exceptions to his general rule of distinction, foreshadowing some of the same analyses and debates that continue to accompany proportionality determinations. First, he noted that “if on both sides war is decided upon and begun by the [c]ouncils of the two kings, the soldiery may take spoil from the kingdom at will.”74 In short, the kings could give license to pillage. Second, he noted that “if the people give aid and countenance to their king”75 then they were legitimate military targets.
As with “oppression” from unbelievers, Bonet never bothers to define “aid and countenance.” Were butchers and bakers who provided nourishment to soldiers legitimate military targets under Bonet’s rubric? What about the variety of skilled workers like blacksmiths, stonemasons, and others whose work ultimately contributed to the war effort? How about taxpayers or even those who prayed for victory? As with the modern-day concerns over how to identify when a civilian “directly participate[s] in hostilities”76 one can argue that, in an era of rampant sieges and raids, liberal interpretation of Bonet’s exception would swallow his rule. The conduct of warfare throughout the history of the Middle Ages and beyond confirms this proposition.
Impact of The Tree of Battles
[T]hat way of warfare does not follow the ordinances of worthy chivalry or of the ancient custom of noble warriors who upheld justice, the widow, the orphan and the poor. And nowadays it is the opposite that they do everywhere, and the man who does not know how to set places on fire, to rob churches and usurp their rights and to imprison their priests, is not fit to carry on war.77
Without question, The Tree of Battles made some impact in France and Western Europe. After its release, Bonet was invited to serve in the court of the French King Charles VI.78 The book would find a place in royal and noble libraries throughout France, England, and Spain.79 Perhaps not coincidentally, England’s Henry V and France’s Charles VII would both issue “ordinances of war that codified both military discipline and principles of humanity”80 in the ensuing decades. Several popular fifteenth-century authors would cite Bonet extensively, including Christine de Pisan in her work The Book of Feats of Arms and of Chivalry.81
Rulers would occasionally enforce the principles espoused in The Tree of Battles. Most notably, in 1474, the League of Constance, a confederation of Swiss, Austrian, and German city-states, tried Sir Peter von Hagenbach for various crimes, including rape and murder.82 He committed these crimes during his administration of the Alsace region between France, Germany, and Switzerland on behalf of Charles the Bold, the Duke of Burgundy.83 A panel of twenty-eight judges, including sixteen knights, sentenced him to death.84 They dismissed his defense that he merely followed the Duke’s orders, noting that he should have recognized such orders were illegal.85
Legal historians consider the “Breisach War Crimes Trial” a seminal moment in international law.86 The Nuremberg Trials would even reference it almost half a millennium later.87 Although one may be tempted to attribute it to Bonet’s influence, no historical evidence directly supports any causal relationship. That said, no evidence directly refutes it either, and the correlation is remarkable. Breisach borders France and the panel’s reasoning aligned neatly with Bonet’s decades-old guidance.88 If nothing else, it shows that the principles merited some deference among the ruling class (especially when it serviced strategic goals).
Nevertheless, for decades and even centuries to come “[t]he observance of the rules was much more remarkable than their breach. In areas overrun by armies, civilians were treated as enemies, and the miseries which they suffered were usually far more inhuman than any hardship a soldier might have to face.”89 The historian Johan Huizinga lauded Bonet’s efforts to refine warfare, but dismissed The Tree of Battles as little more than a “theoretical treatise.”90 Another eminent historian, Barbara Tuchman, paid Bonet a biting backhanded compliment, noting, “Like other prophets, his fate was to be honored—and ignored.”91
Why did Bonet fail to significantly influence his contemporaries and the immediate generations that followed? Why did the ideals that seemed to firmly take root in eighteenth-century Europe fail to do so in the fifteenth century? While there are myriad reasons, many of which fall beyond the scope of this article, some of the main reasons merit discussion here. Broadly speaking, Bonet fought an uphill battle against the social mores of his culture. With neither the means to widely disseminate his message nor a particularly receptive audience, his climb proved far too steep.
As previously noted, Bonet wrote The Tree of Battles for the layman rather than the scholar. However, in 1387, “the average layman acquired knowledge by ear”92 because literacy was relatively rare in Western Europe at the time. Soon, Johannes Gutenberg would pioneer movable type printing in Europe and produce a printed version of the Bible in 1456.93 Thereafter, books and pamphlets became far more accessible in Europe and greater literacy across all social classes would eventually prevail, creating a wide audience and robust marketplace of ideas. But this future lay roughly seventy years after the release of The Tree of Battles.
Bonet’s far narrower contemporary audience, those capable of reading and interested in the conduct of martial activities, proved unenthusiastic about implementing his guidance. In fairness, even the most principled knight would have found it difficult. Anthropologists have noted that primitive war parties were less hierarchical and disciplined than their modern counterparts because they could not train and drill the way modern nation-states—with concentrated resources and established social structures—could.94 The Western European warriors of the Middle Ages more closely resembled their tribal ancestors than their modern descendants, who were fighting on behalf of clearly defined political entities.
Mercenaries95 and vagabonds96 typically made up the bulk of fourteenth-century Western European forces, and many sought to supplement their income via ransom and spoil.97 Thus, selfish pecuniary motives often conflicted with any espirit de corps or unity of effort that commanders might try to instill in soldiers. Worse, allegiances (be they political, financial, or personal) could easily come into conflict or shift.98 Consequently “it was not always easy to be certain what places and persons were in the war, or even what war they were in.”99
Bonet went to great lengths to identify a variety of non-combatants who “should be left secure and in peace,” including poor laborers, clergy, ambassadors, students, the elderly, women, and children. (Credit: Howgill-stock.adobe.com)
Without clear command authority or jurisdiction over soldiers, commanders could not effectively instill discipline or enforce standards. A soldier could “claim that he personally was not bound by a truce or a safe-conduct, or that he was justified in breaking them to avenge a personal wrong. He thus had plentiful excuses to infringe immunities, and the private rights which he could thus acquire in spoil gave him every inducement to do so.”100 Finally, even someone committed to punishing transgressions had to contend with the logistical challenges of mounting a punitive expedition101 in an age when individuals could only traverse the distance a man or, if wealthier, a horse could travel in a single day.102
Sadly, and perhaps most impactful, social considerations also factored into the equation. As Bonet previously noted,103 those with the lowest standing often bore the brunt of unrestricted warfare. M.H. Keen notes the irony that “[r]ank can indeed foster in a class a sense of obligation, but it can also foster a sense of exclusiveness. Too many soldiers treated their obligations as such as applying only to their relations with their equals in the field of battle.”104 Peasants had little socio-political power in the fourteenth century and, consequently, the average lord or captain paid little mind to their concerns.105 Such indifference to the suffering of the marginalized might remind the cynic of the words of the Athenian delegate to Melos almost two millennia prior: “You understand as well as we do that in the human sphere judgments about justice are relevant only between those with an equal power to enforce it, and that the possibilities are defined by what the strong do and the weak accept.”106
Bonet’s failure to tame the excesses of his age explains, in part, why he was largely forgotten. Of course, Francis Lieber is remembered despite purported failures by the Union Army to uphold LOAC principles such as Sherman’s indiscriminately devastating March to the Sea through Georgia107 or Elmira Prison’s high death rates for Confederate prisoners.108 So is Vattel, despite the brutality visited upon Spain by Napoleon’s forces in response to the guerilla campaigns of the Peninsular War.109 History does not hold Bonet in the same regard. Chauvinism, from both historians and Bonet himself, explains why.
Written 636 years ago, The Tree of Battles shows its age in many respects. Appreciation for Bonet’s work dwindled as the triumphant iconoclasts of each succeeding intellectual movement, particularly those of the Reformation and the Enlightenment, undoubtedly approached the work of a fourteenth-century Benedictine monk with skepticism, if not outright dismissiveness. After all, Bonet prominently embodied the old order so many of them disdained. In fairness, some of their suspicions were and remain well founded.
Much of Bonet’s commentary on the ethics of ransoming110 and trial by combat111 simply has no practical value for a modern-day reader, making it challenging to assess his work. Bonet devotes a significant portion of his work to theology and history with a limited grasp on ancient history,112 and, most disturbing to modern sensibilities, Bonet’s writing reflects much of the worst misogyny113 and bigotry114 of his age.
Ultimately, though, Bonet’s writing simply fails to compare qualitatively to the more refined works of better-known classical jurists. In the view of some historians, Bonet merely cribbed the work of John of Legnano and others.115 Worse, he did a poor job of it, sacrificing context and academic references for generalizations and rambling digressions.116 He degraded the law of arms by effectively creating a fourteenth-century hornbook for a cohort that had little interest in applying its guidance.117 His effort failed to substantially impress either jurists or knights, and, consequently, The Tree of Battles largely faded into obscurity.
U.S. Army Reserve paralegals review their plan to clear the objective during an exercise in the Paralegal Warrior Training Course at Fort McCoy, WI, on 25 July 2023. (Credit: 1LT Julian Magloire)
Conclusion
Despite the shoddiness and futility of his efforts, Honoré Bonet and his work still deserve better than historical obscurity. Historian John Keegan noted the study of warfare requires “long historical perspective.”118 His words ring equally true for the principles and laws that govern it. While The Tree of Battles has little value as an authoritative source of law, it remains a significant historical relic.119 Tuchman put it best when she stated that monks and poets like Bonet “deplored openly the conduct of war not because they were necessarily more sensitive than other men but because they were articulate and accustomed to commit ideas to writing.”120 In criticizing the conduct of warfare in the Middle Ages, Bonet served his voiceless contemporaries by voicing their fears and anguish. He also served their descendants by giving them a glimpse into a forgotten age and insight into the continuing development of LOAC.
Works like The Tree of Battles belie the untenable notion that LOAC sprang forth spontaneously during the Age of Enlightenment. In fact, customary international law has a far older heritage. Bonet’s text exudes archaism, brutality, and chauvinism throughout its pages. Still, it is a progressive work in the most fundamental sense of the word. Because progress, more often than not, results from evolution rather than revolution. As G.W. Coopland stated:
The Law of War in modern times “has been disentangled from theology, ethics, the legislation of Justin, the precepts of the Canonists and feudalism”; though, in passing, it may not be without pertinence to remind ourselves that the stock of ideas brought by the individual nation to the discussion and development of International Law cannot be entirely disassociated from its inherited share, be it large or small, of the past influence of these sanctions.121
LTC Shea is the Executive Officer at the Office of the Judge Advocate, U.S. Army Europe & Africa, in Wiesbaden, Germany.
Notes
1. Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr, Les Guêpes Juillet 1848 [The Wasp July 1848], reprinted in Les Guêpes par Alphonse Karr [Wasps by Alphonse Karr] 278 (Michel Levy Frères ed., 1862) (Fr.). In English, this aphorism reads: “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”
2. John Fabian Witt, Lincoln’s Code, The Laws of War in American History 16-19 (2012).
3. See, e.g., Steven Pinker, The Enlightenment Is Working, Wall St. J. (Feb. 9, 2018), https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-enlightenment-is-working-1518191343.
4. See id.
5. See Sergio Moratiel Villa, The Philosophy of International Law: Suarez, Grotius and Epigones, Int’l Rev. of Red Cross, Oct. 1997, at 539, 546.
6. Off. of Gen. Couns., U.S. Dep’t of Def., Department of Defense Law of War Manual § 1.9.2. (12 June 2015) (C1, 31 July 2023) [hereinafter DoD LoW Man.].
7. Sergio Moratiel Villa, The Spanish School of the New Law of Nations, Int’l Rev. of Red Cross, Oct. 1992, at 416, 417.
8. Pinker, supra note 3.
9. Henry Kissinger, Diplomacy 729 (1994).
10. See Tom Shatel, The Unknown Barry Switzer, Chi. Tribune (Dec. 14, 1986), https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1986-12-14-8604030680-story.html (quoting Barry Switzer). But see Ralph Keyes, The Quote Verifier: Who Said What, Where, and When 16-17 (2006) (arguing that the cliché has been in use since at least the 1930s).
11. Barbara W. Tuchman, A Distant Mirror, the Calamitous 14th Century 580 (1978).
12. Honoré Bonet, The Tree of Battles 79 (G.W. Coopland trans., 1949) (1387).
13. G.W. Coopland, Introduction to Honoré Bonet, The Tree of Battles 15-16 (G.W. Coopland trans., 1949) (1387).
14. Lynn Thorndike, The History of Medieval Europe, 256-57 (1917); see also Flocel Sabaté, Introduction to Life and Religion in the Middle Ages 6 (Flocel Sabaté ed., 2015).
15. Marc Bloc, Feudal Society 86-87 (L.A. Manyon trans., 1961) (1939).
16. Id. at 288.
17. Id. at 145.
18. Nigel Saul, Chivalry in Medieval England 26 (2011).
19. Thorndike, supra note 14, at 256.
20. Peter Turchin, War and Peace and War, The Rise and Fall of Empires 211 (2007).
21. Tuchman, supra note 11, at 93.
22. Id. at 93-94.
23. Id. at 329-30.
24. Id. at 332.
25. Id. at 339.
26. Id. at 70, 594.
27. See Jean Froissart, The Battle of Crécy, 26 August 1346, in The Book of War 46, 46-47 (John Keegan ed., 1999); see generally Hundred Years’ War: England and France [14th-15th century], Britannica, (July 5, 2023), https://www.britannica.com/event/Hundred-Years-War (describing the nature of the lengthy conflict).
28. See Tuchman, supra note 11, at 163.
29. See id. at 164.
30. See id. at 164-65.
31. Id.
32. Bonet, supra note 12, at 79.
33. John Haymond, Laws of War: The Origins of Restraint, MHQ–Q.J. Mil. Hist. (June 11, 2019), https://www.historynet.com/the-origins-of-restraint.
34. Id.
35. Rodney Stark, How the West Was Won: The Neglected Story of the Triumph of Modernity 85 (2014).
36. Haymond, supra note 33.
37. Bonet, supra note 12, at 125 (pt. 4, ch. I).
38. M.H. Keen, The Laws of War in the Late Middle Ages 21 (1965). Contra Coopland, supra note 13, at 25 (arguing against the proposition that Bonet based his writings on Legnano’s work).
39. Giovanni da Legnano, Tractatus de Bello, de Represaliis, et de Duello [A Treatise on War, Reprisals, and Duels] (Thomas Erskine Holland ed., 1917) (1360) (Latin).
40. See, e.g., Cyril M. Picciotto, Review: A Forerunner of International Law, 1 J. Compar. Legis. & Int’l L. 1, 152 (1919) (describing the impact of Legnano’s work).
41. Keen, supra note 38, at 21.
42. Bonet, supra note 12, at 125 (pt. 4, ch. I).
43. While this aphorism is regularly attributed to Mark Twain, only second-hand attributions attest to this. See, e.g., Jeff Sommer, Funny, but I’ve Heard This Market Song Before, N.Y. Times (June 18, 2011), https://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/19/your-money/stocks-and-bonds/19stra.html.
44. See DoD LoW Man., supra note 6, § 2.6.
45. See Bonet, supra note 12, at 154 (pt. 4, ch. XLIX).
46. Id. at 186 (pt. 4, ch. XCVI).
47. Id. at 189-90 (pt. 4, ch. CIII) (discussing the moral uprightness of seizing persons and places by military force during a time of truce).
48. DoD LoW Man., supra note 6, § 2.3.
49. See Keen, supra note 38, at 156.
50. See id. at 157-58.
51. Bonet, supra note 12, at 152 (pt. 4, ch. XLVI).
52. See Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations 17-19 (1977).
53. DoD LoW Man., supra note 6, § 2.2.
54. Bonet, supra note 12, at 144 (pt. 4, ch. XXXIV).
55. See id. at 170 (pt. 4, ch. LXXIII), 137 (pt. 4, ch. XVIII).
56. Id. at 128-29 (pt. 4, ch. IV).
57. Id. at 169-70 (pt. 4, ch. LXXIII).
58. Id. at 156 (pt. 4, ch. LII).
59. Id. at 126 (pt. 4, ch. II).
60. Id.
61. Id. at 127 (pt. 4, ch. II).
62. Id.
63. See DoD LoW Man., supra note 6, § 2.5.
64. Bonet, supra note 12, at 189 (pt. 4, ch. CII).
65. Id. at 186 (pt. 4, ch. XCVII), 188 (pt. 4, ch. C).
66. Id. at 186.
67. Id. at 180 (pt. 4, ch. LXXXVI).
68. Id. at 183-84 (pt. 4, ch. XCIII).
69. See id. at 184-85 (pt. 4, ch. XCIV).
70. Id. at 188 (pt. 4, ch. C) (emphasis added).
71. Id. at 154 (pt. 4, ch. XLVIII).
72. Id. (emphasis added).
73. See DoD LoW Man., supra note 6, § 2.4.
74. Bonet, supra note 12, at 154 (pt. 4, ch. XLVIII).
75. Id. at 153.
76. See Michael N. Schmitt, Deconstructing Direct Participation in Hostilities: The Constitutive Elements, 42 N.Y.U. J. Int’l L. & Pol. 697, 698 (2010).
77. Bonet, supra note 12, at 189 (pt. 4, ch. CII).
78. Tuchman, supra note 11, at 415.
79. Coopland, supra note 13, at 21.
80. Theodor Meron, Francis Lieber’s Code and Principles of Humanity, 36 Colum. J. Transnat’l L. 269, 280 (1997).
81. Coopland, supra note 13, at 23-24.
82. Gregory S. Gordon, The Trial of Peter von Hagenbach: Reconciling History, Historiography and International Criminal Law, in The Hidden Histories of War Crimes Trials 32-33 (Kevin Jon Heller & Gerry Simpson eds., 2013).
83. Id.
84. Id. at 32.
85. Id. at 35.
86. Id. at 16.
87. Id.
88. See supra note 57.
89. Keen, supra note 38, at 191; see also, e.g., Turchin, supra note 20, at 251 (noting Agincourt and several other harrowing incidents where Henry V failed to lead by example with his treatment of captives).
90. Johan Huizinga, The Waning of the Middle Ages 92-93 (1924).
91. Tuchman, supra note 11, at 415.
92. Id. at 59.
93. Id. at 594.
94. Lawrence H. Keeley, War Before Civilization: the Myth of the Peaceful Savage 12 (1996) (citing Harry Holbert Turney-High, Primitive War: Its Practice and Concepts 34 (1971)).
95. Gunther E. Rothenberg, Maurice of Nassau, Gustavus Adolphus, Raimondo Montecuccoli, and the “Military Revolution” of the Seventeenth Century, in Makers of Modern Strategy: from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age 33 (Peter Paret et al. eds., 1986) [hereinafter Modern Strategy].
96. See R.R. Palmer, Frederick the Great, Guibert, Bulow: From Dynastic to National War, in Modern Strategy, supra note 95, at 92-93 (“In all countries the tendency was to recruit men who were economically the most useless, which is to say the most degraded elements in the population.”).
97. Keen, supra note 38, at 137.
98. Id. at 86-87.
99. Id. at 141.
100. Id. at 217.
101. Id. at 95.
102. Tuchman, supra note 11, at 56 (1978).
103. See Bonet, supra note 12, at 189 (pt. 4, ch. CII).
104. Keen, supra note 38, at 243-44.
105. Id. at 243.
106. Thucydides, The War of the Peloponnesians and the Athenians 380 (Jeremy Mynott ed., trans., 2013) (n.d.). But see Stark, supra note 35, at 155 (noting that Bonet’s era also witnessed significant peasant uprisings in France (1358), Italy (1378), and England (1381), foretelling a European future where the lower classes would prove far less submissive).
107. See Witt, supra note 2, at 250; see also Noah Andre Trudeau, Southern Storm: Sherman’s March to the Sea (2013).
108. See Witt, supra note 2, at 300-01.
109. See generally Ronald Fraser, Napoleon’s Cursed War: Spanish Popular Resistance in the Peninsular War, 1808-14 (2023); see also John Shy, Jomini, in Modern Strategy, supra note 95, at 107.
110. See, e.g., Bonet, supra note 12, at 152 (pt. 4, ch. LIX).
111. See, e.g., id. at 195 (pt. 4, ch. CXI).
112. See Coopland, supra note 13, at 36 (noting that while Bonet’s recounting of history is full of mistakes, misunderstandings, and absurdities, it nevertheless illuminates the conventional wisdom of his time, and historical misconceptions undoubtedly endure in the modern era as well).
113. See Bonet, supra note 12, at 194 (pt. 4, ch. CIX).
114. See supra note 59 and accompanying text.
115. See Coopland, supra note 13, at 30.
116. Id. at 29-30.
117. See id. at 21.
118. See John Keegan, The Face of Battle 303 (Penguin Books 1978) (1976).
119. In November 2021, the U.S. Library of Congress announced the acquisition of a fifteenth-century manuscript of The Tree of Battles (its second copy). Nathan Dorn, New Acquisition: 15th-Century Manuscript on the Laws of War for Knights, Libr. of Cong. (Nov. 15, 2021), https://blogs.loc.gov/law/2021/11/new-acquisition-15th-century-manuscript-on-the-laws-of-war-for-knights.
120. Tuchman, supra note 11, at 415.
121. Coopland, supra note 13, at 68 (citing Ernest Nys, L’Arbre des Batailles d’Honoré Bonet [The Tree of Battles of Honoré Bonet], at xxviii (1883) (Fr.)).