MEDIEVAL AND EARLY-MODERN INSHORE, ESTUARINE, RIVERINE AND LACUSTRINE WARFARE* D. J. B. Trim Amphibious operations are not necessarily either ship-to-shore oper- ations or the projection of oceanic power onto land: they also take other forms. This essay is a study of the conduct of inland and inshore amphibious warfare. What ‘inland amphibious warfare’ entails may seem obvious, but to be precise, it entails warfare on rivers, lakes, canals and marshes. ‘Inshore amphibious warfare’ is more indistinct; in considering it, I examine amphibious operations that, while carried out on the seaward side of the ocean-continent divide, take place ‘near or close to the shore’ 1 ––especially those that take place in the waters of harbours and anchorages. 2 Of course, all amphibious operations carried out at the land-sea interface will at some point involve action in such waters; however, many operations simply cross the inshore stretch en route from sea to land. The oper- ations examined here are located on inshore waters: that is, they involve consistent actions thereon, rather than only landings (whether raids or invasions) or defences against them. In practice, many inshore waters are the estuaries of rivers, or lagoons; though seas and rivers (like ocean and land) are distinct, there is, between high sea, inshore waterway and inland waterway, no clear distinction––they merge into each other and so, therefore, can operations on them, both physi- cally and conceptually. Thus, this essay is not a study of two dis- tinct types of amphibious operation, but rather of one broad category, in which waterborne forces that do more than merely transport are integral, but always operate in close, or very close, proximity to the shore or bank. * I am grateful to Mark Fissel, Matthew Bennett and Malyn Newitt for criticism of early drafts and to Mark Fissel, Guy Rowlands and Winifred Trim for sugges- tions, and encouragement. Research in Paris was made possible by grants from the British Academy and the Huguenot Society of Great Britain and Ireland. 1 OED (1989), s.v. ‘inshore, in-shore’, definition ‘B’. 2 See ibid.; Oxford Military Dictionary (2001), s.v. ‘inshore patrol’. FISSEL/TRIM_f12_357-419 9/1/05 2:15 AM Page 357