Compagnie d ' ordonnance The compagnie d ' ordonnance was a military unit , the late medieval forefather of the modern Company and consisted of 100 " Lances fournies " , which was built around a centre of knights , with assisting page s or squire s , archers and men - at - arms , for a total of 700 men . History . Raised by the King , the " compagnies d ' ordonnance " were a part of the French army reforms of the 1440s , which eventually led to the French victory at Castillon in 1453 , and the conclusion of the Hundred Years ' War . The origins of this name is often attributed to the order or " ordenance " , act of arranging , by the King of France Charles VII in 1447 for a permanent body of cavalry . The " compagnies " themselves were the direct result of the so - called " Grande Ordonnance " of 1445 , promulgated under the name of King Charles VII of France . While traditional historiography has force comprising 20 " compagnies " of 100 lances each , this is not the case , and is a later ( even folk - historical ) assessment . Adding to the murky historiography associated with this development , it seems pretty clear that there was not a single " Grande Ordonnance " , but rather two dozen or more , published simultaneously ( or nearly so ) across France . Each of those localized simultaneous versions applied only to the immediate area and its assigned force , but was otherwise identical to in terms of regulations , guidelines for recruitment , and so forth . Accordingly , the size of companies varied , and individual companies contained anytwhere from 30 to 100 lances , depending on the defense and security requirements of the region where the troops were stationed . Prior to this legislation , the French depended on a haphazard mixture of volunteers , mercenaries , and feudal levies , of very mixed capabilities and reputations . Worse , many of these fighters were essentially freebooters , more interested in larceny or brigandage than in actually defending France . The " Grande Ordonnance " , in whatever form it took , was a coherent , centralized effort to place the defense of the realm in the hands of a reliable force , whose senior officers were ( as direct appointees of the crown ) loyal to the French monarchy , and dependent on it for supplies , pay , and support . Each lance ( properly a " lance fournie " or ' furnished ' or ' equipped lance ' ) contained , as contemporary sources put it , " six horses and four men . " Actually , each lance contained six personnel , each with a horse , but only four of them were counted as combat personnel . The senior member was a man - at - arms ( " gen d ' armes " in French , plural " gens d ' armes " or " gendarmerie " as a collective noun ) . This man was supported by a squire ( " ecuyer " or " coutillier " , usually a younger man still undergoing his apprenticeship to arms , or not yet fully proved in battle . The man - at - arms and squire were further assisted by a page , or " valet de guerre " , usually a teenage male , who was responsible for caring for their armor , equipment , and horses . The squire was generally fully armored , and usually charged alongside ( or close by ) the man - at - arms , and helped him handle the sixteen - to nineteen - foot lance when they fought dismounted ( which initially happened fairly often ) . The lance further contained two archers , who were at first considered mounted infantrymen , provided with horses for mobility alone , but not for battlefield operations . Some were apparently equipped with bows and arrows , others with crossbows , and all also carried swords or axes and some armor , if usually less than the man - at - arms and the squire . As time went on , their role became increasingly difficult to distinguish from that of the other two combat soldiers . By the time of King Charles VIII ' s invasion of Italy , the ' archers ' had apparently evolved into armored lancers . In his famous " Commentaires " , the sixteenth - century soldier Blaise de Monluc noted that he had joined the army as an archer in the compagnies about 1521 , but " since then everything had become degraded , " and the old standards no longer applied . Monluc wrote his " Commentaires " in semi - retirement in the late 1560s , more than a century after the institution was created , so his assessment may well have been correct . Initially though , the archers also shared the support and assistance of their own page or " valet de guerre " , whose role was to provide them with the same assistance as the other such individual provided to the man - at - arms and squire . Most men - at - arms and squires were drawn from the landowning gentry and aristocracy , although not necessarily titled nobility . This tendency became more pronounced as time went on , and the companies gradually grew more ' aristocratic ' in character . The archers were more typically commoners at first , in part to integrate the considerable pool of experienced soldiers who were not gentry or aristocracy , into the framework of the new army . The men - at - arms and squire were both mounted on heavy war - horses ( " destriers " ) , and full - equipped with plate armor and visored helmet . The archers were generally less well - armored , and typically mounted on decent riding horses . They were not at first expected to engage in mounted combat , but that distinction later faded , and the archers became nearly indistinguishable from the man - at - arms , as did the squire . As non - combatants , the two pages were not generally armored , and armed only with a dagger or small sword for personal protection . The pages ' horses , like those of the archers , were not warhorses . The status of the pages remained largely unchanged throughout the development of the " compagnies d ' Ordonnance . " This professional army was supported by a new class of militia , the Francs - Archers , following the edict of the 28th of April 1448 by the same King . The " francs - archers " were not paid , but were exempted from taxes in recognition of their service . As volunteers and part - time soldiers , they were often drawn from the military fraternities which existed at the time in many French municipalities . Such fraternities also existed across much of northern and central Italy , in parts of Spain and the Low Countries , and even in some areas of Germany . As a militia , their standards of equipment and training were very uneven , and despite some earnest effort , the " francs - archers " never enjoyed much success as a military force . References . Allmand , C . T . , ed . " War , Literature , and Politics in the Late Middle Ages " / Liverpool , University of Liverpool Press , 1976 Burne , Alfred H . " The Agincourt War " . London , 1956 Contamine , Philippe . " Guerre , Etat et Societe a la fin du Moyen Age " . Paris , 1972 Monluc , Blaise de . " Commentaires " . Vale , Malcolm G . A . " War and Chivalry : Warfare and Aristocratic Culture in England , France , and Burgundy at the End of the Middle Ages " . Athens , University of Georgia Press , 1981