The Pike as a Weapon in History
Twenty feet of steel tipped polearm ruled the battlefield
From the 1300s to as late as the 20th Century the Pike was a simple concept that revolutionized tactics and maneuver warfare.
For hundreds of years the Pike had been a staple of the modern battlefield. Spears have been around since the dawn of man. A simple enough weapon, made from a stick and something sharp, it could be used in close combat or thrown. The ultimate evolution of the spear was the pike. The pike is a two-handed pole weapon with its origins in the 14th century. Pikes were extremely long weapons, carried by infantry and looked simply like a long spear resembled a spear between 10 and 14 feet (3 and 4 meters) long. The length of this weapon required a strong wood such as ash for the pole as well as specialized treating and assembly techniques to insure uniformity. This design was perfected and pikes were seen as long as 20 feet in length. The steel tip was longer than on a normal spear but was designed to be detached and reused if the pole was broken or sagged. Pikemen were often equipped with a short sword for close combat due to the fact that the pikes amazing length made it awkward in battle .The main advantage of the two handed pike over the more traditional short spear was realized when used in massed formations known as a Pike Square. .
A pike square usually was made of 100 men in a 10×10 formation. While marching the pike was carried vertically. However, the troops were drilled to be able to point their pike in any direction while stationary, with the men in the front of the formation kneeling to allow the men in the center or back to point their pike over their head. When in formation the heel of the pike could be butted against the ground, giving it resistance against attack. Squares could be joined together to form a battle line. If surrounded, pikes could still be pointed in all directions. A well drilled square could turn on a dime, making it difficult to outmaneuver on horseback and this tactic was used extensively by infantry principally as a counter-measure against cavalry assaults. With the warhorses kept ten to twenty feet away from being able to assault the formation, the pike square became the impenetrable porcupine of the renaissance battlefield.
Scottish Pikemen called schiltrons was able to best the English knights and heavy cavalry at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, bringing the pike to the battlefield with a thunderclap. The Pike formation was perfected by the Swiss in the 15th Century and their mercenaries carried them into battle on all sides for nearly 200 years. These weapons also equipped the dreaded landsknechts units of German mercenaries in the Italian wars and others. These formations were the staple of every European army until the firearm era. Most of the European infantry first used seen in the new world were equipped with pikes. Field tactics in almost every battle for five hundred years revolved around the lessons of the pike square.
The rise of the bayonet from the 1700s onward, which basically turned every long musket into a pike, led to the decline of the weapon in modern combat. The last hurrah of the pike was seen several times in last ditch ersatz use. Popular with insurgents, Irish rebels used the pike against the British in 1798 and 1848 as did Polish rebels against the Russians in 1830 and 1863. Faced with severe arms shortages during world war one the Russian Tsarist army issued pikes once again to its troops as late as 1916 for drilling reasons although their use on the battlefield against German machine guns was not seriously attempted. Pikes languished in many colonial armories in Africa and Asia well into the 1950's.
Today the pike remains as a ceremonial weapon in almost every infantry unit in most western armies and their imitators. No longer used as a weapon, a modified pike carries the unit colors and awards when on parade.
