Combat of the Thirty

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v • d • e Breton War of Succession Champtoceaux – Brest – Morlaix – St Pol de Leon – Roche-Derrien – The Thirty – Mauron – Auray

v • d • e Hundred Years' War Edwardian – Breton Succession – Castilian – Two Peters – Caroline – Lancastrian

The Combat of the Thirty (March 27, 1351) was an episode in the struggle for the succession to the Duchy of Brittany. It was fought between thirty champions, knights and squires on each side, in a challenge issued by Jean de Beaumanoir, a captain of Charles of Blois supported by the king of France, to Robert Bramborough, a captain of Jean de Montfort supported by the king of England.

Robert Bramborough, the English captain of Ploërmel, had been ignoring a truce in the district commanded by Jean de Beaumanoir, the captain of Josselin. Beaumanoir sent him a challenge, which resulted in an emprise —an arranged passage of arms— which took place at an area known as the chêne de Mi-Voie (the Oak of Mi-Voie) between Ploërmel and Josselin, between picked combatants.

Beaumanoir commanded thirty Bretons, Bramborough a mixed force of twenty Englishmen (including Robert Knolles and Hugh Calveley), six German mercenaries and four Breton partisans of Montfort. The battle, fought with swords, daggers, spears, and axes, mounted or on foot, was of the most desperate character, in its details very reminiscent of the last fight of the Burgundians in the Nibelungenlied, especially in the celebrated advice of Geoffroy du Bois to his wounded leader, who was asking for water: "Drink your blood, Beaumanoir; thy thirst will pass" (Bois ton sang, Beaumanoir, la soif te passera).

In the end, the victory was decided by Guillaume de Montauban, who mounted his horse and overthrew seven of the English champions, the rest being forced to surrender. All the combatants on either side were either dead or seriously wounded, Bramborough being among the nine on the English side to be slain. The prisoners were well treated and released on payment of a small ransom.

While the combat did not have any significant effect on the outcome of the Breton succession, it was considered by contemporaries to be an example of the finest chivalry. It was sung by trouvères, retold in the chronicles of Froissart and largely admired, and honoured in verse and the visual arts. A commemorative stone was placed at the site of the combat situated between Josselin and Ploermel. The renown attached to those who participated was such that twenty years later, Jean Froissart noticed a scarred survivor at the table of Charles V, where he was honoured above all others due to having been one of the Thirty.

[edit] The Combatants

† indicates that the combatant was killed. The English side lost nine killed in total and the remainder captured. The Franco-Breton side lost at least three and probably more. A number of them were captured during the fighting, but were released at the final outcome of the conflict.

[edit] References

• A Distant Mirror by Barbara W. Tuchman (1978)
• Le Poème du combat des Trente, in the Pantheon litteraire; Froissart, Chroniques, ed. S. Luce, c. iv. pp. 45 and 110ff., and pp. 338-340.
• H.R. Brush, ed., "La Bataille de trente Anglois et de trente Bretons," Modern Philology, 9 (1911-2): 511-44; 10 (1912-3): 82-136.
• Steven Muhlberger, Deeds of Arms: Formal combats in the late fourteenth century, (Highland Village, TX, The Chivalry Bookshelf, 2005), 76-120.

1. ^ Oddly, the poem which makes this combat legendary and names these knights lists 31 names for the English side.

[edit] External links

• A Verse Account of the Combat of the Thirty

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.