Questions tagged [medieval]
For questions about the medieval era (500-1500AD o.e.) as a whole.
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0answers
64 views
How did medieval fishermen work a long line? [on hold]
What did they use as bait? How many hooks were there? I just want as much detail as I can get.
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6answers
517 views
How much should a witch charge for her magic? [on hold]
I am writing a medieval fantasy novel. In my world, magic exists, but there are not a lot of people with magical powers. If a witch can summon rain and heal people, how much should she charge people ...
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2answers
2k views
With 12th-15th century technology, is a “vending machine” possible?
Say that I own a business from around the 12th-15th century. My country uses a Silver (or, if you so wish, Gold) currency in the form of coins. I want to make a secure "vending machine" to give out ...
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6answers
372 views
How win a medieval war with air superiority?
There is a new empire trying to conquer the world and it is populated by an avian species (looks like an early bird-dinosaurs with bigger head) and their first target is a human kingdom
Abilities :
...
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19answers
7k views
Mutually invisible foes. How can they fight?
For millennia the Arbol and the Byrond clans have engaged in bloody warfare. A benevolent wizard who is passing by and hears of this decides to stop them once and for all.
He casts a powerful spell ...
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2answers
134 views
How to breed war elephants?
Let's imagine following scenario:
Human society, mostly possessing technology on level of continental Europe, around year 1000 AD ("High Medieval Period").
There are rare, but not unknown, ...
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7answers
1k views
Medieval airlocks, would they be possible?
In terms of context, this airlock would be used on airships which fly at a height in which oxygen levels are too low for humans to live. Within the hull of the airship, stored oxygen would be pumped ...
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8answers
1k views
Towers to Low Earth Orbit - How to make them usable for navigation
In a world I'm constructing the sun, the moon, and the stars are not visible but there are tower that stretch from the ground to, roughly, low earth orbit. Each one is around 200 meters in diameter ...
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3answers
425 views
What alloys and metals can fantasy dwarves refine/create? [closed]
What metals are dwarves capable of refining and producing?
I'm working on a setting where the players have a lot of meta knowledge (Computers and nukes in a pre-industrial world anyone?¹) and need to ...
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27answers
21k views
A guy asked me to kill 15 trolls, how do I prove that I did it?
In my world there are adventurers who are squeamish about getting blood on them. Trolls are commonly hunted by adventurers. What trophy can my squeamish adventurers collect from these trolls, and not ...
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6answers
537 views
What can an adventuring group do to protect their items/money while questing? [closed]
I'm starting a new adventuring group with my friends. I live in a fantasy world with predictable levels of danger in certain areas. We're part of an adventuring guild. Everyone in our group has a ...
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10answers
7k views
What's the role in a medievial society for people who are magically bound not to lie?
In the prosperous capital of the country where my story is set, undesired babies are discreetly abandoned in the darkest hours of the night on the front door of the guild of Truthers.
There, as ...
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4answers
553 views
Could a hand grenade be effective against a band of medieval knights?
So, a group of people have just been transported back to early 14th century England, and have angered a band of noble knights. Their armor looks like this.
One of my characters, Tim, received a hand ...
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8answers
7k views
Arrow proof medieval glass
In my world, I have ''classic'' knights but with helmets that have transparent visors which are strong enough to protect from arrows.
So which material available in medieval times could withstand an ...
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3answers
238 views
where can my protagonist get shot by arrows while in full plate and have them bounce off
my protagonist gets jumped in a cave by Goblins armed with Composite bows from about 30 feet away my protagonist has full plate and a kite shield, the goblins are decent archers but startled and ...
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1answer
152 views
How effective is a defensive wall without a wall walk?
I see a lot of historical and fictional illustrations of walls that do not have wall walks. My understanding of medieval tactics is largely based on cinema and some wikipedia, so as far as I know a ...
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3answers
558 views
How do I calculate the number of people who have ever lived in a place over a given span of time assuming a fixed population?
500 years ago, the mountain dwelling Carac clan was cursed with undeath: whenever they or any of their descendants die, their corpses rise as undead creatures, or if burned, as shadowy specters. The ...
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4answers
425 views
How to not let magic advance the technology too fast?
So lets say that the level of the non-magic wielding species i.e. humans technology is at around the level it was in the early medieval times.
I would then introduce magic to the rest of the world in ...
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4answers
222 views
How would a medieval army conquer a treetop city?
In my book series, an evil space conqueror named Tate is attacking the planet of Aztlan. However, in order to do so, he must subjugate the Avian tribe and their capital city of Palo Alto. However, ...
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3answers
281 views
Other metal alloys as armor/weapons
We know of the metal iron, and alloys bronze and steel, used as armor and weaponry in the Medieval ages.
Is there another metal alloy that could be used for armor or weapons in the Medieval era?
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3answers
339 views
How thick a stone castle wall needs to be to withstand a modern tank?
From In what war would one modern military vehicle make a difference? question I presume a tank could decimate something like an ordinary medieval castle as have survived to this day.
But at some ...
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0answers
68 views
How fast to become “most wanted” in medieval world? [duplicate]
This is the question every RPG player or D&D player had in mind: "What happens if I kill them all?" So, lets ask the question:
Imagine typical medieval fantasy kingdom. There is some magic and ...
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0answers
57 views
What are ways to destroy a country's government/monarchy by using the underground/black market/illegal doings? [closed]
I'm creating a story in which the main characters want nothing more than the complete and absolute downfall of an entire country, starting from the top and its royalty all the way to the corruption of ...
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5answers
172 views
Consequences to the region near single battle front
Scenario
Medieval technology and warfare.
There's a war between two sides of a continent.
Said Continent has a large mountain range crossing the whole land.
At the north, there's and opening to this ...
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41answers
24k views
Is there such thing as a “one-person” door?
Imagine an evil dictator. He imprisons his enemies in a labor camp, but they never do any work! He doesn't want to torture them, or force them to do that since he is using all of his soldiers to build ...
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1answer
176 views
How often did trading/traveling ships set sail between port cities in Medieval times?
Say there are two port cities (City A) and (City B). The distance between them is the same as the distance between Greece and England. The world takes place in a medieval setting with normal ...
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5answers
318 views
How can medieval-like coalition defeat or force a modern army into submission? [closed]
In my story, there would eventually be a final battle between a modern/high tech army from Earth and a coalition from another world. What are ways that the coalition can gain victory? Given that they ...
23
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12answers
8k views
Is it possible to bind multiple ships together on open water?
In Renaissance period, would it be possible to safely bind ships together for extended periods of time?
Imagine if there was a fleet of large ships (say, two dozen) that have been traveling over a ...
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5answers
643 views
How can a medieval city built in the desert defend against sandworm attacks? [closed]
I'm writing this book series called the Weasel Sagas (link here for more on that) that has this planet called Aurea. Aurea is the planet in this universe most similar geographically to Earth, with ...
6
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4answers
240 views
How would an attacking army take a port city by surprise on land in medieval times?
Imagine a busy port city with hundreds of ships in a medieval setting without gun power. The city is not heavily walled, and is located on a remote corner of the world, away from the jurisdiction and ...
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4answers
232 views
How to slaughter the Pixies in medieval pixie war?
In my world there are pixies/fairy's, little humanoids no taller than a standing squirrel, with 4 bug like wings yet intelligent as a human. Unlike traditional lore they have no magic. They do however ...
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5answers
320 views
What would a medieval war against a subterranean race look like?
To round off the little series started by this and this, I figured that I should add this question.
The setting: there is a race of underground people living beneath a human kingdom.
To avoid the ...
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9answers
3k views
What would a medieval war against an air-borne race look like?
So I've been inspired by this question to ask what would a medieval war against an airborne hominid (let's call them harpies) be like? Basically most of the assumptions about the meerfolk of the ...
58
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13answers
7k views
What would a medieval war against an aquatic race look like?
The setting; there’s a large population of merfolk living in the ocean, and a developing seafaring human nation on the neighbouring coastline.
These merfolk are entirely aquatic. They have gills and ...
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0answers
63 views
Steam Locomotive without Industrial Revolution? [closed]
In the world I'm building, there is a steam-powered train, but it's a steam turbine locomotive, not a steam piston locomotive. Otherwise, the desired technological level of the world is (more or less) ...
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4answers
344 views
Can the Mongols conquer France?
Background
In the mid 13th century, France was without a doubt the richest land of the West. Inside its modern borders there were perhaps 18 million people, and maybe more, at that time perhaps 1/5 ...
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4answers
1k views
Why weren't medieval city gates backed with a system that would turn the gate into a rubble filled wall?
Before gunpowder, one of the common ways to break a city is to break the gates. Since they have to be opened and closed they are intrinsically weaker than the wall itself.
There were various ...
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12answers
1k views
How to realistically implement magic-users in medieval warfare?
So, I’ve seen other settings before where magic-users – mages, sorcerers, wizards and similar – are basically gods. There have been fantasy stories where a mage can singlehandedly wipe out an army, ...
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15answers
5k views
For how long can I hide the discovery of a new continent?
I've got a late middle-age like world, with a situation similar to Europe/America: one continent has a technological advance, and enough sailing skills to discover the other continent.
The incentive ...
62
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19answers
11k views
Making the 'Master Swordsman' fantasy realistic?
The idea of a truly masterful swordsman capable of taking on dozens of average swordsmen by himself (sometimes even above average!) is a pretty common depiction in fantasy media.
A recent example I ...
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5answers
377 views
Medieval gem values
I'm working on developing a realistic economy for my setting, but one thing my research has failed at is finding numbers that I can use to create a gem system that can be used to price gems of various ...
4
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3answers
133 views
Most useful multi tools for dwarves
I have spent some time designing a dwarven civilisation. They don’t live below ground all the time. In fact I heavily draw upon the actual culture of mountain tribes, such as The Lisu for inspiration....
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8answers
384 views
Pre-electrical fast long-distance communication using Acoustic Mirrors
It takes a lot of work, but it can be done. The Mongol Yam, a horse-based mail system, is probably the best example that has been done before. But after visiting the local science museum recently, I ...
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4answers
768 views
Can a medieval castle be made today? [closed]
Not sure if it fit well this website, history.SE, or if it's off-topic, but I have a simple question:
Can we build a medieval castle, with the same methods as they used at that time, in 21 century? ...
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3answers
1k views
How early can transparent glass windows be easily available?
TL;DR: How early can windows made of transparent glass (can look through) be readily available (not a rare luxury) to "common" citizens (at least top 10% of population)?
Disclaimer: I know very ...
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9answers
5k views
Is there a plausible way to build a pipette with medieval technology?
I'd like for a character in a vaguely medieval fantasy to be able to dispense drops of a ink reliably from a pipette, but I'm not sure whether this is a plausible - the tech level is pre-1500, but it ...
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11answers
12k views
Is a pig-mounted cavalry possible?
Recently, my neighbour upset me. I have discovered that he plans to somehow improve his trebuchets to throw nasty things across the river. I told him that my pig-mounted cavalry will attack him.
I ...
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2answers
212 views
How could a medieval society catch a large number of birds in a short length of time?
I was lounging about in my throne room when a man came to speak to me. He had one leg cut off (recently, too) and claimed he was an alchemist. He says that he wants to get revenge on the king of the ...
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9answers
5k views
How long does it take to build a medieval city wall?
There is a medieval city that, for multiple reasons, doesn't have any kind of structural defense, but they decided to build a wall now as there is risk of a war in the bordering kingdom, which can ...
25
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11answers
8k views
What can I do to make my son's snowman survive, using medieval technology?
What my son likes the most with winter is making a snowman.
What my son hates the most with winter is melting of his snowman.
I really would like to make him happy and make the snowman survive for ...
