One more time about tactics and weaponry

Abstract

Mark W. Shearwood’s study is devoted to the use of plug bayonets in the English army in the second half of the 17th and early 18th centuries. The author has shown that the plug bayonet was a more universal weapon than the socket bayonet. He rightly emphasizes in the conclusions of his work that when studying the history of military weaponry, especially in the pre-industrial period, specific dates for weaponry changes in particular armies and units cannot be provided. The conclusion is right that the plug bayonet was not supposed to replace pikes completely as was originally assumed by the then commanders; initially, the bayonets were used to equip troops of dragoons and grenadiers, i. e. the soldiers that did not have pikes on their equipment before. This study on the rearmament of individual armies is of interest to historians dealing with Central and Eastern Europe. It is connected with the important question of the continuity in the field of weapons between the West and Central and Eastern Europe at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries. It seems that on the basis of the preserved source base it is not possible to jump at any conclusions concerning the use of the plug bayonet going further than those presented by the author.