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Here we go, the knight. Take one.

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He is the knight in shining armor.

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Invincible, he rides through the pages of history, answering to no one but his own code of chivalry.

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Whoa there!

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Time out?

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Cut.

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Sorry to take the shine off your shoes there, boss, but you're starting off all wrong.

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What do you mean?

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Well, if you're going to talk about knights in the Middle Ages, there's only one place to start.

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A knight is a man on a horse. That's where it all begins.

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Let's cut to the century's clock.

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We're starting in the years between 800 and 900.

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During this time, warriors got the hang of fighting on horseback.

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And by the 11th century...

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But that's not a knight. No armor. A simple helmet.

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And that lance, it's a glorified toothpick.

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That's armor all right for about 300 years. It's all a guy needed look closer. I

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Mean look real close

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This coat is made out of rows and rows of tiny iron rings all linked together

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Thousands of them woven together the rows of iron chains form a mesh

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Mail is the Latin word for mesh

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so chains of mail became chain mail in English which the Knights simply called

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mail here's your night wearing mail a helmet covering the top of his head

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carrying a sword and a lance but you'll notice the Lance is more like a spear

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that big heavy Lance for knocking other guys off horses that one comes later

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Well, if that's all there is to it, what makes this guy so tough?

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Put this guy on horseback, team him up with a couple hundred more just like him,

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and we're talking a fast-moving wall of iron coats and sharp spears.

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Pretty tough to resist. Get the point?

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Back in the year 1066, there was a great battle at a place called Hastings

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to decide who would rule the land of England.

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Knights on horseback won that battle, and we have pictures to show us how they fought.

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The pictures are woven into a great tapestry telling the whole story of the Battle of Hastings.

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These are the knights of 1066.

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They're wearing coats of chain mail that come down to their knees.

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Look at the way that they use their lances, throwing or thrusting them.

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It would be another hundred years or more before the lance developed into the longer,

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heavier weapon carried close to the knight's body.

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These pictures come from what's known as the Bayeux Tapestry.

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It's in a museum in a small town in France.

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The Bayeux Tapestry is one of the best real-life snapshots we have of early medieval knights

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at war.

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Got it?

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Good night, take two.

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Dressed in his chain mail, lance in hand, the knight rides forth, a lone warrior seeking

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adventure.

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Nope.

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Try it this way.

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The knight, wearing an incredibly expensive suit of mail and riding a war horse that costs

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as much as five years pay for a working man.

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I mean, this horse was like the sport utility

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vehicle of the Middle Ages.

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To maintain all this expensive gear,

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the knight needed some way to pay for it.

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And the kings and lords wanted these expensive knights

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to fight in their wars.

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And so the two were made for each other.

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The knights served the lord, and the lord financed the knight,

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usually by giving him large farms.

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The Lord also took him on wars and raids and let the knight keep all the loot he could carry.

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Hey, wait a minute.

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You said the knights went raiding and warring for all the loot they could carry?

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Well, that wasn't the only reason, but it was a big part of it.

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But there's all this stuff in the script about the age of chivalry.

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Here, listen to this.

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The code of chivalry demanded that the knight defend the weak,

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be generous, compassionate, honest, and courteous, especially to women.

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So are you saying that's all just baloney?

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No, not really.

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But let's break it down to what chivalry really means.

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The word chivalry comes from the French word for horse, cheval.

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It came to mean the code of conduct for what the French called a chevalier,

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or knight as we say in English.

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It begins as the code of warriors, loyalty and courage in battle.

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Then the church expanded the code.

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They were trying to get the violence of the Middle Ages under control

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by making it chivalrous to protect the poor, the weak, and of course, the church.

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Finally, the poets and the troubadours, who were traveling musicians, added a touch of romance.

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A chivalrous knight served the lady he loved.

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Real life knights didn't always live up to their code of chivalry, but the evidence is many of them tried to.

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Just like today, when you might dream of being like the hero of an action movie,

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The knights of old could dream of being like the action heroes

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and the legends of King Arthur and his knights of the round table.

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Let's get the load out on King Arthur.

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Some experts think there was a real King Arthur.

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But he wasn't a king and he wasn't a knight.

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He was chief of a tribe in ancient Britain.

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We're talking maybe in the 500s,

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back in the days when Romans were still running around in togas.

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But Arthur became a hero in ancient folktales.

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In the Middle Ages, poets and singers picked up those old folktales

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and retold them as stories about a king and his brave knights.

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Then, just about everyone who told the story added new, fun little details.

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Characters like Merlin the magician and Sir Lancelot, who was the bravest of the knights,

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ready to sacrifice anything and everything for true love.

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And somewhere along the line came the idea of King Arthur and his knights of the round table.

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According to one of the earliest tales, the king chose a round table

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so no one could get mad about who was sitting at the head or foot of the table.

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These knights were a proud group of guys.

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The tales of King Arthur and his knights of the round table

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were the best sellers of the Middle Ages.

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All those stories don't tell us anything about the real life King Arthur

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and just a little bit about how real life knights lived and fought.

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They tell us a whole lot about how real life knights wanted to see themselves.

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Oh, what's that?

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It's the beginning of mechanized warfare, boss.

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A crossbow.

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Well, it takes a while to get it cranked up with the bolt loaded, but once it is, watch out.

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It shoots bolts? Does it shoot nails and screws, too?

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No. The bolt was what they called a crossbow's arrows.

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A crossbow can hit its target from the distance of about two football fields.

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Tough for a knight to get at a guy with his spear or sword at this range.

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When it was cranked and ready, a crossbow could shoot one of its bolts right through the knight's chain mail.

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So, when we get to the middle of the 1200s, things started changing fast.

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Okay, cue the night!

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Piece by piece, we added plate armor.

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We started by protecting our knees and shins.

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Remember, we're fighting on horseback, and those are the parts that stick out.

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Then, over time, we started wearing a coat over the chain mail.

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It had little armor plates sewn into it.

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from about 1300 to 1500 we just kept piling up the plate armor until the whole body was covered

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i'm still wearing 25 pounds of chain mail more or less under all this plus another 50 pounds

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more or less of plate armor if i should get knocked to the ground i shall pick myself back up

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But it may take some doing.

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Knights who were dead tired from battle and fell in water or mud

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had an even greater struggle pulling themselves back up.

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Once I'm back on my feet, no problem.

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I'm safe beneath all of this armor.

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Not for long.

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I hate to break it to a knight wearing all those pots and pans,

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but there was always another weapon to worry about.

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This time, it was the longbow, an English specialty.

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Notice the big difference with the crossbow? It's fast.

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The English archers could fire 5 to 12 arrows in just one minute.

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Get a few hundred archers at work, and that's quite a hail of arrows.

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Plus, the bows were so powerful that a direct hit could pierce the plate armor.

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So the knights loaded up with all the plate armor they could carry

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and hoped the archers didn't get a good straight shot.

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With all those arrows flying in from so far away, even the horses had to wear armor.

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So now we've got knights in armor looking more like pictures in the storybook.

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A skilled warrior could function in a 35 to 75 pound suit, hold a lance steady and charged,

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and guide a galloping warhorse with just the pressure of his knees and the touch of his spurs.

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Where do you find guys like that?

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Well, you start training them from about the time they're 12 years old.

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How would you like it?

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When his son got to be about 12 years old, a knight would send him off to another castle,

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often the castle belonging to the knight's lord.

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The boy would serve the knight as a squire.

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He learned to ride and to handle a sword and lance.

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Yes, my lord.

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Is there any punishment I deem suitable for you?

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Yes, my lord.

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A squire was also put to work grooming horses, assisting the knight with his armor, and serving

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food at the lord's table.

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The training of a squire might continue for eight years, and then the squire was dubbed

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a knight.

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An elaborate dubbing ceremony might go on for days.

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The young knight-to-be would spend all night praying in a chapel.

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The next day, the king, or some other great lord, would tap the kneeling squire on the

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left shoulder and then award him with a shield and a pair of gold spurs. In the

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olden days instead of a tap of the sword the knight was dubbed by a solid smack

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in the face. As time went on those dubbing ceremonies got more and more

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religious because the church got more and more anxious to get those sword

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swinging knights under control. Sometimes when the Knights went on those looting

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raids they would loot the churches too so the church tried turning them into

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soldiers of God rather than soldiers of fortune okay we're ready to tell them

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about the Crusades in 1095 the Pope rallied soldiers all across Europe to

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launch a great crusade against the Muslims who ruled Jerusalem he wanted to

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regain the tomb of Jesus and at the same time to ship a lot of Europe's most

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violent men off to the east. The Knights of Europe loved the idea. They could fight in the name of

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the church, have a great adventure, and maybe get rich on land and loot all at the same time.

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During the next 130 years, there were eight major crusades. At a time when it was a big deal to

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travel a hundred miles, thousands of people traveled thousands of miles across oceans and

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continents. There were great battles and great sieges. Cities were captured, lost, and then

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captured again. It's hard even to count how many thousands died. Knights killed in battle,

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travelers dying of disease, men, women, and children massacred when invaders captured

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their city. When it was all over, the knights were driven out of the east and the Muslims

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still ruled Jerusalem. But the Crusades made big changes in the knights' world. By opening

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up a path to the east, things that were once unknown or else unbelievably rare became a

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part of daily life, well, at least for the rich. Rice, sugar, lemons, spinach, well,

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they can't all be tasty, and spices like ginger and nutmeg and cinnamon. Knights also learned

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from the people they fought against better ways to build castles, better ways to care

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for the sick, and an easier way to write down numbers. Instead of writing a number like

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178 this way, Europeans learned to write it this way. Bottom line, the Crusades showed

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the knights the world was a lot bigger than they thought, and it would never seem so small

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again. The Knight, take three. Having learned the arts of war during their early youth and

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further developing them during the battles of the Crusades, the gallant knights display

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their prowess before lords and ladies at the great spectacles known as tournaments well well what

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well aren't you going to stop me and tell me that i've got everything wrong well you haven't got

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this part wrong really they really did have tournaments with lords and ladies and jousting

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with the two guys where they ride right at each other with lances and try to knock each other off

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their horses well i knew it hey can we get the knight back here again what began as mere practice

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for battle became a structured system of tournaments with its own set of rules but it was

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gruesome two teams of knights would pick a time and a place and really it was like going to battle

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in one famous tournament 80 knights and squires were killed the object was to capture an opponent

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not to kill him but look at the weapons we used this is a battle axe it was easy to use on horse

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back this side was to hit the guys on the ground they usually didn't have much armor protection

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for another man in armor this was the end that meant business then there was the mace it could

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be deadly but it could also be handy if you wanted to knock somebody out to take him prisoner but

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This is the one we depended on most.

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When it came to a real fight, you reached for your sword.

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It was the symbol of knighthood.

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When it came time to fight in real warfare, things were not pretty.

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When a sword bit into chain mail, it drilled those little iron rings deep into the wound,

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causing more pain and infection.

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As plate armor grew more complete, knights fighting on a hot summer day

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risked dying of heat stroke or suffocation.

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Along with the threat of crossbow bolts or a hail of arrows from longbowmen, by

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the mid-1200s, infantry learned to use long-handled weapons to knock a knight

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off his horse. Once on the ground, the bravest knight could be at the mercy of

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a fast-moving common soldier, plunging a dagger through the slits in his armor.

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Not a game for amateurs, so a big reason for the tournaments was to keep knights

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in constant practice and prepared. Another was the chance to earn big bucks.

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There's one real-life hero from the Middle Ages we should hear about,

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kind of like their version of a star quarterback.

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Here, let's get the lowdown on William Marshall.

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His name was William Marshall.

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He was born in the 1100s.

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William was always brave in battle, but in the beginning, William was poor.

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But then he started going to tournaments.

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If a knight like me was taken prisoner during the mock battles in a tournament,

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he had to give up his horse and sometimes his armor to the knight who captured him.

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He had to pay a hefty ransom too to retrieve his horse and buy back his armor.

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If a knight was truly a good fighter, he could become rich by competing in tournaments.

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Well, William was one of the best fighters who ever breathed.

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He found another knight to be his partner, and the two of them cleaned up.

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In ten months of tournaments, William and his partner took 103 knights prisoner.

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That made him so rich, he formed a whole team of knights,

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leading them in victory to tournaments all over Europe.

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It was a tough way to make a living, though.

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Once, William won a tournament.

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His friends went to go give him the prize and found him on his knees at the blacksmith.

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William's helmet had gotten so smashed up during the tournament

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The blacksmith had to pound it back into shape

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So William could get it off his head

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The man worked hard for his money

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Get your programs here

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Trust me, you can't recognize your players without the programs

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As time goes on

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These tournaments become less and less like mini wars

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And more like public sporting events

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Spectators cheer for the knights of their choice

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However, one problem

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It's hard to know who you're rooting for

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when everyone's wearing a bucket with eye slits over his head?

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These guys didn't wear numbered jerseys.

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So, instead of a jersey with a number,

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the players at a tournament start putting personal symbols on their shields,

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on the surcoat they wear over their armor,

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even on the cloth draped over their horse.

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It started as a practical device,

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but then the lords began to have all the knights who fought for him share similar emblems,

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the first team uniforms.

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Eventually, every noble family was known for its own coat of arms.

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Learning to read and recognize all these emblems became a full-time job for men called heralds,

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and the use of emblems became known as heraldry.

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We've come a long way in the last 600 years.

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Let's go back over the script and see if we got this right.

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It started with a mounted warrior with chain mail and a spear in the 800s.

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By 1095, knights felt a Christian duty to march away on the first crusade, and felt

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a not-so-saintly itch to get rich by looting the east.

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In the 1200s, the glory days of the crusades are waning, but it becomes the golden age

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of the tournament.

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By 1300, the plate armor starts to pile up to defend against those pesky crossbows and

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longbows until by 1400 you finally got the honest to goodness knight in shining armor from head to

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toe the night take four he is the knight in shining armor after centuries of change he finally rides

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invincible through the pages of oh no afraid so boss better just throw away the script by the time

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you hit the late 1400s, gunpowder is coming into its own. I'll let you in on a little

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something. It really wasn't guns and cannons that made the knight in armor obsolete. It

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was cash. By the 1400s, he was just too darn expensive with his custom-made armor and his

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ride of a luxury horse. Why pay for one of these guys when for the same money, you can

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hire a dozen of these guys? No, not very chivalrous, but they get the job done on the battlefield.

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The most lasting legacy of the Knights, their code of chivalry, was just real enough to inspire generations of people to try to act just a little bit better.

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Maybe a little of that still lives on today.

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But as for this guy, at the time he was all dressed up, he had no place to go.

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Okay, that's a wrap.