out the conquered territories of Asia, also would have spread their formi-
dable martial culture.
Even more is known about the martial arts of the Roman Empire than
about those of the Greeks. Indeed, it is from Latin that we even have our
term martial arts—from the “arts of Mars,” Roman god of war. From the
disciplined training of the legionnaires to the brutal displays of professional
gladiators, Romans displayed their martial prowess. In addition to adopt-
ing the skills and methods of the Greeks, they developed many of their own.
Their use of logistics and applied engineering resulted in the most formida-
ble war machine of the ancient world. Romans of all classes were also adept
at knife fighting, both for personal safety and as a badge of honor. Intrigu-
ing hints of gladiator training with blunt or wooden weapons and of their
battles between armed and unarmed opponents as well as the specialty of
combat with animals suggest a complex repertoire of combat techniques.
Speculation exists that some elements of such methods are reflected in the
surviving manuals of medieval Italian Masters of Defence.
The decline of Roman civilization in the West and the rise of the feu-
dal kingdoms of the Middle Ages did not halt the development of martial
arts in Europe. In the period after the fall of the empire, powerful Germanic
and Celtic warrior tribes prospered. These include many notorious for their
martial spirits, such as the Gauls, Vandals, Goths, Picts, Angles, Jutes, Sax-
ons, Franks, Lombards, Flems, Norse, Danes, Moors, and the Orthodox
Christian warriors of the Byzantine Empire. The medieval warrior was a
product of the cultural synthesis between the ordered might of the Roman
war machine and the savage dynamism of Germano-Celtic tribes.
The feudal knight of the Middle Ages was to become the very embod-
iment of the highest martial skill in Western Europe. Medieval warrior cul-
tures were highly trained in the use of a vast array of weaponry. They drilled
in and innovated different combinations of arms and armor: assorted shields
and bucklers, short-swords and great-swords, axes, maces, staffs, daggers,
the longbow and crossbow, as well as flails and war-hammers designed to
smash the metal armor of opponents, and an array of deadly bladed pole
weapons that assisted in the downfall of the armored knight.
The formidable use of the shield, a highly versatile and effective
weapon in its own right, reached its pinnacle in Western Europe. Shield de-
sign was in constant refinement. A multitude of specialized shield designs,
for use on foot and in mounted combat as well as joust, siege, and single
duel, were developed during the Middle Ages.
During the medieval period, masters-at-arms were known at virtually
every large village and keep, and knights were duty-bound to study arms
for defense of church and realm. In addition, European warriors were in a
constant struggle to improve military technology. Leather armor was re-
Europe 111