The genesis of the French musketeers
The history of the French musketeers is inseparable from the evolution of military weaponry in the 16th and 17th centuries. It was under the leadership of great soldiers that the first French musketeers saw the light of day until the advent of the prestigious Musketeers of the King’s Guard, symbol of the French military elite, forever engraving their image in the history and the collective imagination.
By Francompagnie | Last update : 12/07/2024
When you see our soldiers marching with poise, their rifles slung over their shoulders, it’s hard to imagine the centuries of research and innovation that went into perfecting this weapon. The beginnings of portable weaponry can be traced back to the ‘hand cannons’, simple iron tubes attached to handles that appeared five centuries ago. These rudimentary ancestors evolved into couleuvrines, then arquebuses, foreshadowing modern rifles. The musket, a large-calibre arquebuse, still needed a fork to be used effectively. It took almost fifty years for this imposing weapon to supplant the wheeled arquebuse, marking a key stage in the history of military weaponry.
From the appearance of muskets…
At the siege of Parma in 1521 and then at the battle of Pavia in 1525 [reign of Francis I (1515-1547)], the Spanish used muskets for the first time, a particularly effective improvement on the harquebus reserved for siege warfare.
This type of matchlock rifle could fire projectiles twice as heavy as those of the arquebuse and much further. However, it was so heavy and so powerful that it required twice as much powder and the use of a stabilizing fork, the fork, as well as a pad to compensate for the violence of the recoil. The musketeer had to be accompanied by a valet to help him carry the weapon and its accessories, a disadvantage which prevented the musket from being adopted during this period by the French infantry.
In 1567, when the Duke of Alba (1507-1582), a great Spanish general, passing through with his troops coming from Spain, then at peace with France, was sent to Flanders, prey to unrest, to reestablish the order in the Spanish Netherlands, the King of France (Charles IX) was so envious of the Spanish musketeers that he asked his supreme infantry commander, Philippe Strozzi, to copy the muskets in order to equip his guard with them personal. Strozzi had around a hundred made in Metz but these first poorly made models were very heavy and cumbersome and he advised the king against equipping his soldiers with them.
Strozzi brought from Milan, which was renowned for the manufacture of these weapons, around twenty modified Spanish muskets. They arrived at the time when La Rochelle was besieged in 1572. He had them distributed to the most faithful captains of his regiment so that they would set an example. Not yet equipped with musketeer bandoliers with the right doses of powder, it was customary to use a double arquebus charge.
Quote from Abbé Brantôme (Pierre de Bourdeilles, soldier and writer, 1540-1614) in his memoirs about M. d’Estrozze (Strozzi):
« He was also the first who introduced the use of muskets in France, and certainly with very great difficulty, because he did not find a soldier who wanted to take charge of it: but, to win them over little by little, he himself at the headquarters of La Rochelle he always had one brought to a page or to a lacquays; and when he saw a good shot to be made, he fired… I saw, and several with me, the said Mr. d’Estrozze kill a horse, from five hundred paces (approx. 310 meters), with his musket. »
Philippe Strozzi
Strozzi's key role in introducing the musket to France
Filippo di Piero Strozzi (1541-1582), Colonel des gardes royales (1561) puis Colonel général de l’infanterie française (1569-1581)
Strozzi was responsible for many of the technological advances in firearms in the French army. An enthusiast of large-calibre cannons, he first had the infantry arquebuse perfected.
He is credited with introducing the first muskets into the French army, although they were so long and heavy at first that no soldier wanted to use them. Especially since, unlike the Spaniards, Strozzi did not allow his musketeers to be accompanied by servants carrying muskets on marches. In spite of everything, he managed to make them acceptable by adapting them and reducing them to more manageable proportions.
Illustration : Filippo di Piero Strozzi by Pierre Dumonstier – 1580
…to the birth of the French musketeers
The first foot musketeers emerged in the French infantry with the appearance of muskets copied from Spanish models. Under the impetus of Strozzi, who set about improving the armament of the troops from the start of the siege of La Rochelle (1572-1573) (reign of Charles IX), muskets, although still cumbersome, were on the increase from 1574.
During the Battle of Coutras, October 20, 1587, which saw the defeat of the royal army of Henri III led by the Duke of Joyeuse (1560-1587) against the numerically inferior troops of Henri de Navarre, future Henri IV, the latter’s platoons of arquebusiers and musketeers, then arranged in an innovative way with the light horse cavalry, contributed to his victory.
During the next siege of La Rochelle, in mid-1621 (reign of Louis XIII), lighter muskets made their appearance, and although they still required the use of a fork when firing, they could now be carried by a single man.
Shortly after the surrender of Montpellier, at the beginning of November 1622, Louis XIII set out for Avignon, it was during this trip that he took away their rifles from his Company of Carabins to equip them with muskets, they then took the name of “Company of the Musketeers” which was the starting point of the legend of the “King’s Musketeers” that we all know.
Musket challenges
Although perfected for its time, the musket remained a rudimentary instrument that was difficult to handle. Before each shot, the musketeer had to light a wick with a flint, keep it lit and place it around the coil so that it reached the pan, where the gunpowder was ignited by a spring. This complex and slow procedure made the weapon impractical, while the glow of the wicks betrayed the nocturnal movements of the troops.
Each musketeer carried bandoliers containing a maximum of twelve charges, as well as a pulverin and a powder box to prepare the primer and the main charge. A fork was essential to support the musket, which remained heavy despite the improvements.
This slowness of execution prevented firearms from completely dominating the battlefield: slings, ballistas and crossbows were still commonly used. In addition to the musketeers, the companies included many pikemen. While the musketeers attacked from a distance, the pikemen protected them at close quarters, illustrating the complementary nature of these two corps.
Mousquetier vs Mousquetaire
The term ‘mousquetier’ is used from time to time in French, particularly in the RPG world.
The term ‘mousquetier’ was often used natively in German to designate a soldier fighting with a musket, as was ‘musketier’ in German and sometimes also in English, as was ‘musketeer’.
The few uses of the term ‘mousquetier’ in French publications are recent and are often quotations from Germanic works or refer to German musketeers, which could lead us to believe that its use in French is a neologism, probably the result of an error or an intentional or unintentional lack of translation from German.
However, the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française of 1881 confirms the existence of the term ‘mousquetier’ in French, as an old military term: The original name of the musketeers.
We can assume that once Louis XIII’s horse guards, the famous Compagnie de Carabins du Roi, took the name ‘musketeers’ in 1622 and took centre stage, it would have been more common to use the term ‘musketeer’ generically in French and that the term ‘mousquetier’ disappeared, surviving only in German.
Appearance of the first muskets
Lightweight muskets
The first musketeers on horseback
Creation of the 1st Company of the King's Musketeers
2nd Company
Dissolution of the Company
Restoration
Return of the 2nd Company
The Black Musketeers
Death of D'Artagnan
The Red House
Gradual disappearance of foot musketeers in the infantry
Dissolution of the Royal Companies
Re-establishment of the King's Musketeer Companies
Dissolution of the Companies
Temporary restoration
The King's Musketeers disappear for good
sources :
• Les Mousquetaires du roi : une troupe d’élite au coeur du pouvoir | Julien Wilmart | 2023
• Histoire de l’infanterie en France | Lieutenant-colonel Belhomme | 1893-1902
• Histoire de l’armée et de tous les régiments | Pascal Adrien | 1860
• Œuvres complètes de Pierre de Bourdeille, seigneur de Brantôme | Ludovic Lalanne | 1864-1882
• Histoire de la milice françoise | R.P. Daniel | 1721
• Richelieu et La Monarchie Absolue | G. D’Avenel | 1887
• Crédit/Sources : gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France
