Game of Crowns

Game of Crowns – the title tells us something about the war. The lit fuse of the War of the Polish Succession was the Polish ‘crown of thorns’, but a great many crowns were in play. This was a varied and hard-fought war across the vast half-empty plains and forests of Poland, the river valleys of the Po and the Rhine, and the olive groves of Apulia. Light troops skirmished, partisans lurked in forests, horsemen carried fire and sword and everywhere civilians were brutalised, robbed, abused, starved and murdered.

Baroque warfare conjures up images of steady lines of automata in gaudy coats hefting musket and bayonet. Lenihan deploys a firm grasp of terrain, tactics, and technology to clarify and, in some cases, correct the received version of events. The author’s unrivalled expertise in the history of siegecraft, along with many plans and maps, explains and brings to life what would otherwise be an impenetrable mystery to the ordinary reader.

The war stopped abruptly because the sheer intensity of operations, far beyond the normal campaigning season, exacted a fearsome death toll from sickness, especially among the French. Most military histories do not grasp the significance of epidemic disease in deciding wars and campaigns. Not so, Game of Crowns.