Collections: Pre-Modern Armies for Worldbuilders, Part III: Paying For It

This is the third part (I, IIa, IIb, III) of our honestly-who-knows-how-many part series laying out some general guidelines for how pre-modern armies are recruited, raised, equipped and paid. In the last part, we looked at the various ways pre-modern armies might mobilize their armies, a process that mainly consisted of recruiting and equipping soldiers. … Continue reading Collections: Pre-Modern Armies for Worldbuilders, Part III: Paying For It →

Collections: Coinage and the Tyranny of Fantasy ‘Gold’

This week on the blog I want to take a brief detour into discussing historical coinage, particularly in the context of modern fantasy and roleplaying settings. In particular, the notions I want to tackle are first how did ancient currency systems work in terms of value (what could you buy with how much) and then … Continue reading Collections: Coinage and the Tyranny of Fantasy ‘Gold’ →

Collections: Bread, How Did They Make It? Part IV: Markets, Merchants and the Tax Man

Thanks to our helpful volunteer narrator, this entire post series is now also available in audio format! As the fourth and final part (I, II, III) of our look at the basic structure of food production in the pre-modern world (particularly farming grain to make bread), this week we're going to look at how at … Continue reading Collections: Bread, How Did They Make It? Part IV: Markets, Merchants and the Tax Man →