Knights in Medieval Europe were famed for fighting on horseback, but something that has been mentioned in a few places is that knights in England, specifically from the Norman era onwards, often fought on foot whereas knights in other countries mostly fought on horseback. Can someone tell me why this is the case? I understand they also fought on horseback and continental knights fought on foot when necessary, its just that English knights seemed to be particularly fond of it.
The English adopted dismounted tactics from the Scots during the Wars of Scottish Independence. The Scots themselves developed these tactics to counter the English heavy cavalry of Edward I. The battles of Falkirk (1298) and Bannockburn (1314) are some of the earliest documented occurrences of the Scottish forces deploying in what is known as a schiltrom (or sheltron), a tight-packed pike formation meant to defend against cavalry charges. As anyone who has seen Braveheart can imagine, this turned out to be a highly effective tactic and the English themselves were fairly quick to adopt it themselves.
The earliest English use of this tactic that I have found is at the Battle of Boroughbridge (1322), fought between English Royal forces under Andrew Harclay, the Earl of Carlisle, against English rebel barons led by the Earl of Lancaster. The Royal army held a vital bridge and ford against the rebel barons, and Harclay deployed his dismounted men-at-arms to guard both crossings. The battle itself was rather short and one-sided, but it is also notable as an early (if not the earliest) example of the effectiveness of the longbow against cavalry horses, another tactic the English would use to great effect during the Hundred Years' War.
Ten years later at the Battle of Dupplin Moor (1332) the English army again deployed in their soon-to-be-typical fashion. The center of the English line was formed of dismounted knights, with forward-projecting wings of archers on either flank. Only a small reserve of cavalry was kept in the rear of the formation. The Scottish charged the English line under heavy missile fire, and all manner of battlefield command and control quickly deteriorated into chaos as the Scottish knights in the center became packed in and pressed from behind by their own infantry. The press of bodies was so great that the Scottish warriors were unable to maneuver and many high-ranking Scottish nobleman were killed (including Robert Bruce, bastard son of the late King). The battle was an overwhelming rout.
These tactics were repeated against the Scots at the Battle of Halidon Hill (1333) and the Battle of Neville's Cross (1346), both decisive English victories. Neville's Cross resulted in the capture of Scottish King David II.
Not two months before Neville's Cross the English army under King Edward III and his son the Prince of Wales engaged in the historic [Battle of Crécy] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cr%C3%A9cy) in Picardy. I won't go into detail as this is a rather famous battle and the story is fairly well known, but Crécy proved that the combined-arms tactics of dismounted men-at-arms and archers together could inflict a tremendous defeat upon one of the largest and most glorified knightly armies of the age. Why the English were able to repeat this tactic again and again (Poitiers (1356), Agincourt (1415)) with such seeming success in the face of French obstinacy is an altogether different debate, but the standard operating procedure for English armies in this period was first learned from a half-century of war against the Scots.
*I have cited Wikipedia rather extensively in this comment, but if requested I can dig out some of my more scholarly references tomorrow and update this comment with better sources.
Late medieval English men-at-arms almost always fought on foot because their tactical role was to protect the large numbers of longbow archers that the English so commonly fielded. The dismounted men-at-arms defended the archers against the main thrust of an enemy advance, so that the archers were free to maneuver around the flanks and continue shooting or join in the melee themselves. For the early stages of a battle, the men-at-arms would remain relatively static, but if the fighting was going well for the English, they would begin to push forward and crush the demoralized enemy. For this stage of the battle, they would again be supported by the archers, who would drop their bows in favor of mallets, swords, and axes and begin enveloping the enemy from the flanks. The greatest English victories were always won from a defensive position that they had maneuvered the enemy into attacking head-on.