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Message: <blockquote data-quote="SKyOdin" data-source="post: 5088596" data-attributes="member: 57939">Why do people tend to attribute every change that happened in the Early Modern period to the existence of guns? There seems to be a fairly common belief that the rise of gunpowder immediately obsoleted the knight, which then caused a chain reaction in Europe's social structure that swept aside the feudal system and transformed the Western world.There is no way I can understate how wrong that simplistic notion is. Guns in of themselves did little to change Europe. Many of the changes that people claim that guns are responsible for are the results of a complex mix of factors and only came about gradually across centuries. The gun didn't eliminate knights, the pike did. Even then, the knight just evolved into new forms, abandoning the lance in favor of pistols and arquebuses. Cuirassiers and harquebusiers, gun-wielding, plate-armored cavalry that still predominately used the sword, were a major force on the battlefield in the Thirty Year's War, in the early 17th century.Even if the gun had completely eliminated the knights, that in of itself wouldn't have caused any kind of social upheaval. The transformation from the feudal system to absolute monarchies and the modern nation state was the result of extremely complex factors, and it can be in no way simplified down to being a side effect of the gun. Regardless, the stereotypical fantasy kingdom more closely resemble an Early Modern nationalistic absolute monarchy than a medieval feudal government anyways. That is one of the classic anachronisms of "medieval" fantasy.Guns didn't eliminate castles either. Fortresses were still in use in the American Civil War, and weren't totally obsoleted until the advent of air power (even then, they persist in the form of the armored bunker to this day). Versailles wasn't built because castles were useless, it was built because the French Kings had no fear that an enemy army would get that close to them, and thus they could afford the luxury. Fortifications remained a pertinent part of warfare, there just came a time when kings no longer felt like living in them anymore.So, I don't see where all of this talk about guns transforming society with their existence talk is coming from.</blockquote>

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