Lancia, scudo… e dadi. Tre grandi battaglie medievali reinterpretate tramite il gioco di simulazione

Abstract

In the context of medieval history it is not difficult to encounter several clashes often defined as “decisive”, the repercussions of which were felt in vast portions of the territory even several decades later. The present study analyzes three conventionally recognized as such (Poitiers/Tours 732, Hastings 1066, Lake Peipus 1242), using some simulation games (also called “wargames”) as an active historical research tool. The statistical rigor which is at the basis of these interactive models allows in fact to come into close contact with the previous causal chains, the actual dynamics, the consequences and even the influence on the subsequent collective imagination of the battles, provided that they configure themselves not only as mere moment of leisure or abstract hypothetical speculation, but as a support for an adequate historiographical research of direct and indirect sources. With an experimental observation applied to the three aforementioned feats of arms and to others connected to them, the study therefore exposes the intrinsic nature of the simulation tool, consequently illustrating what, in today’s strategic simulation, are defined as “insights” on the events represented and which can be surprisingly useful even in a context of research on the past.