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The origin of the Spanish thirds is found in the colunelas , ad hoc tactical groupings of different captaincies or infantry companies, whose size ranged between and , troops. Fernández de Córdoba, “The Great Captain” , transformed the colunelas into colonelies, each made up of twelve companies of men, of which were pikemen, rodeleros – armed with sword and shield –, and the remaining , harquebusiers. This combination of weapons, which underwent alterations with the disappearance of the buckler and the introduction of the musket, was the key to the success of the thirds over the Swiss phalanxes and the French heavy cavalry. The combat formation of the third consisted of a battalion, or square of pikes, flanked at its four corners by sleeves of harquebusiers; The solidity of the pike block against cavalry was perfectly combined with the offensive power provided by the “mouths of fire.” The battles of Bicoca, Pavia , Mühlberg and San Quentin affirmed the effectiveness of this system.
At the organizational and logistical level, the Spanish thirds signed the transition from medieval feudal levies to modern armies, a process that had begun the previous century. The thirds were permanent units, with a well-defined organic structure B2B Email List and the medical, logistical – and religious – services necessary for their proper functioning. The Spanish armies of the period not only had field hospitals in their operations, but also established the first permanent military hospitals. The meticulousness with which the supply of troops was attended to, on the other hand, becomes evident through the study of the transit of troops from the Duchy of Milan to the Netherlands through a set of routes known as the “ Spanish Road .” The system of seats, or contracts, and the demands of wars, contributed decisively in the th and th centuries to the development of a true military fiscal State that established its own mechanisms to finance its campaigns, without this being an obstacle to the entry onto the scene of private military businessmen such as the famous Genoese Ambrosio Spínola .
The soldier of the thirds was, above all, a professional soldier. Captain Marcos de Isaba recommended, in the treatise Sick Corps of the Spanish Militia (), that a soldier with less than five years of experience not be promoted to corporal, a period to which he added an additional sixth for promotion to sergeant. another two to become lieutenant, and three more before receiving the captain's patent. Such advice became reality in the ordinances of . Furthermore, unlike the German or Swiss landsketch, the Spanish soldier was not a mercenary who fought for money, but a subject of a monarch, known as "the Catholic King", who expected unconditional loyalty and an ethical spirit from him. . Although the discipline of the regiments outside the battlefield was lax and their career was marked by a multitude of mutinies, what an Italian diplomat, Giovanni Botero Benese, testified around is no less true: “[the Spanish soldiers] suffer hunger and thirst with greater tolerance and effort than any other people in Europe, which has made them emerge victorious countless times. Outside their land they defend each other in close friendship, which is why their squads are almost invincible.
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