The military successes of the first Piasts – both Mieszko I and Bolesław the Brave – would have been impossible without the drużyna: a corps of warriors who accompanied the ruler, serving as his escort and primary strike force. These soldiers were maintained directly by the prince, and they also enriched themselves through victorious campaigns, which in turn encouraged a near-continuous state of warfare.
The drużyna functioned as a permanent, disciplined military force used by the early Piasts in both defensive wars and offensive expeditions. The most complete description of this formation was provided by the Jewish merchant Ibrahim ibn Yaqub, who wrote about the drużyna of Mieszko I.
Ibrahim recorded that the taxes collected by Mieszko served as standardized trade weights and were used to pay his men. Each warrior received a monthly stipend. Mieszko, he noted, had three thousand armored troops divided into units, “and a hundred of them is worth as much as ten hundreds of other warriors.” The prince supplied these men with clothing, horses, weapons, and all necessities.
Moreover, Mieszko extended remarkable care to each warrior’s family. When a child was born – whether male or female – he began paying the father an allowance. When sons came of age, he arranged their marriages and paid the bride-price; for daughters, he married them off and likewise provided the dowry. Because the bride-price among the Slavs was substantial, as among the Berbers, the birth of girls enriched a warrior, while the birth of two sons could drive him into poverty.
This striking account reveals how comprehensively the prince cared for each member of the drużyna and his household. Warriors received arms, equipment, sustenance, and pay. The institution of the drużyna was not unique to the Polanian state; similar formations existed among the Franks, where they recruited men who had previously lacked means of support.
The drużyna consisted of two main components: the senior and the junior retinue. The senior drużyna comprised powerful feudal lords – the ruler’s most trusted commanders and political supporters. The junior drużyna, meanwhile, formed the true military backbone, stationed in key centers across the realm. In wartime, they defended strongholds from enemy capture; in peacetime, they performed basic administrative and policing duties, including collecting dues from the surrounding population.
Not Only Slavs: Who Served in Bolesław’s Drużyna?
The ethnic makeup of Bolesław the Brave’s drużyna was diverse. While it consisted primarily of Slavic warriors, the ruler also employed numerous foreign refugees and their household troops.
One such refugee was Sobiesław, brother of Saint Adalbert, who spent nearly a decade at Bolesław’s court and fought alongside him, eventually dying while covering the retreat of Piast forces from Prague in 1004.
The Merseburg bishop Thietmar twice mentioned a certain Eric the Proud in his chronicle. Fleeing the Reich after committing a homicide, Eric found asylum in Poland and later participated in the victorious 1018 campaign, when Piast forces triumphantly entered Kyiv.
Archaeology clearly shows that Scandinavians – Vikings – also served in the early Piast army. These mercenaries, handsomely paid, were renowned for their ferocity and willingness to fight to the death in virtually any conditions. Several hundred such warriors likely made their way to Poland.
Another group of mercenaries employed by Bolesław were the Pechenegs. The Piast ruler used them twice in his conflicts with the Rus’ (in 1013 and 1018). During the first campaign – intended to free an unnamed daughter of the prince from the hands of Vladimir the Great – he killed a significant portion of these nomads. Although his motives remain unclear, their importance to him was great enough that he hired them again five years later.
During his long wars with the Germans, which continued intermittently until 1018, Bolesław could also draw on contingents recruited from territories that temporarily formed part of his realm – Western Pomerania (lost by 1013), as well as Milsko, Lusatia, Moravia, and Slovakia, all of which were lost during the reign of Mieszko II between 1029 and 1031.
Bolesław the Brave and His “Noble Knights”
The drużyna was an indispensable instrument of Bolesław’s military successes – in both expansionist campaigns and defensive struggles. He treated its members with respect and often feasted with them.
Victories on the battlefield provided occasions for shared celebrations. As the chronicler Gallus Anonymous relates, although King Bolesław possessed immense riches and countless noble knights, he nevertheless lamented that he “lacked only knights themselves.” Any worthy foreigner who earned his favor ceased to be regarded merely as a knight and was considered instead as a royal son.
If Bolesław heard that one of his warriors was struggling with horses or any other need, he showered him with gifts. Joking with those around him, he would say: “If only I could rescue this noble knight from death with wealth as easily as I can relieve his misfortune and want with my resources, I would heap riches upon Death itself to keep such a brave warrior in my service.”
The army of the early Piasts was generally disciplined, and its formations were required to obey the commander’s orders strictly. Several punishments were imposed for breaches of discipline: death for espionage or treason, flogging for lesser offenses, and verbal reprimands for minor misconduct.
The Size of the Piast Drużyna
According to Gallus Anonymous, Bolesław the Brave drew the following military contingents from major strongholds:
• from Poznań – 1,300 armored cavalry and 4,000 shield-bearers
• from Gniezno – 1,500 armored cavalry and 5,000 shield-bearers
• from Władysław’s stronghold – 800 armored cavalry and 2,000 shield-bearers
• from Giecz – 300 armored cavalry and 2,000 shield-bearers
“All these valiant and battle-hardened warriors,” Gallus writes, “fought in the days of Bolesław the Great.” As for knights from other towns and castles, he deemed it too burdensome to list them individually, yet he offered a telling summary:
Bolesław had more armored cavalry than all of Poland in Gallus’s time (early 12th century) had shield-bearers; and in Bolesław’s day, Poland had nearly as many knights as Gallus’s contemporaries had people of all social ranks.
In modern scholarship, the pancerni mentioned by Gallus are identified as heavy cavalry, while shield-bearers represented infantry or, possibly, light cavalry.
Experts agree that Bolesław’s army consisted of heavy and light cavalry, heavy and light infantry, and archers. Specialist detachments also served in siege operations, constructing complex war machines and supporting the army’s engineering needs.
