We not-so-few. . .
What did Henry V really say at Agincourt?
When it comes to eating, drinking, thinking, dressing, and having sex, the French are generally held to be a notch or two above their English rivals. Fighting, however, is another matter. For centuries, the English have met France’s hoity-toity, classier-than-thou attitude with a default response: our country can beat up your country.
It all goes back to the Battle of Agincourt, which took place in a muddy French field on St. Crispin’s Day in 1415. According to legend - fueled largely by Shakespeare’s tub-thumping “Henry V” - around 10,000 tired and dispirited English soldiers fought 50,000 French troops on that field, and, through a combination of tactical smarts and bulldog spirit, won the day. Huzzah!
Recently, an English historian stuck a pin in the myth of Agincourt. Anne Curry of the University of Southampton claims to have found evidence that the two armies facing off that day may have been evenly matched - the implication being that English accounts of the battle used more than a little artistic license. It seems fitting, then, that artistic license be used to set the record straight - starting with Shakespeare’s rousing St. Crispin’s Day speech, delivered by King Henry as his troops went into the fray.
THE KING
If we are mark’d to sprain our wrists today,
If we march home with sore and bloodied knees,
‘Pon our return the honour shall be more.
But let us not, I say, o’er do it here.
My men talk of the battle’s fearful odds:
“Five to one!” shrews Essex, womanly.
Fie! Where learned thee to count, anyway?
I pray you, hyperventilate not.
For what is in’t for us to o’erstate the fight
When we back home do go to tell the tale?
A hero’s welcome? Glory? Riches too?
A maiden’s pale breast, for to rest our lips?
Want us these things we do not warrant?
O, methinks me do! O’erstate away!
Egads! The French be three score thousand strong,
Vicious brutes, armoured to the eyeballs all!
And horses, yes! Big olde knightly steeds,
Charging our ranks, the fury of the world!
The bastard French - and us, the happy few,
Grievously outnumber’d, determin’d, ripp’d.
So yes, proclaim it, quickly, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach for this fib,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And coach provided - economy, of course -
We would not die in that man’s company.
With luck, forsooth, we would not die at all.
For on this mud-mired field we fight the French -
Who have fantastic hair and use bidets,
But in the telling, zounds, they will be fierce.
And we will tell it well, with sound effects,
We’ll strip our sleeves and show our scars,
And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispian’s day.’
E’en though we had these scars another way,
Like cutting cheese, or being bitten by a cat,
We’ll say it was the feats we did this day,
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
Or, at least, ’til someone do the math,
But we in it shall be remembered -
We few, we happy few, we band of liars.
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed,
Or a-sleeping on the floor, wherever,
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap, wholesale per-say,
Who did not break a gentle sweat with us today.
Chris Wright is an editor and writer living in Dubai. He can be reached at chriswrightdubai@hotmail.com 
