10-19-2007, 12:04 PM
I always like to see artworks of the mysterious heavy Achaemenid cavalry, here the classical variant in action!
In my opinion the Persian knights in the great artwork of Johnny Shumate should be satrapial cavalry of Asia minor/Anatolia, the real Iranic cavalry should have been heavier and more Iranic in style.
The wonderful photos posted by Laran are the first ones which I see displaying the royal heavy cavalry about which little is known. I know only one instance in which a Greek source reports about the heavy Persian cavalry, Herodotus and his report about the death of the cavalry general Masistios during Xerxes's Greece expedition and the battle of Plataiai.
I have combined the description of Masistios with the relief on the Sarcophagus of that high ranking Persian to display a heavy Persian cavalryman, Masistios.
Since it’s a General displayed I used much gold and purple, like reported by Herodotus, the standard variants would not have golden breast armour and golden head armour for the horse, the rest of the armour is a silver/bronze/iron combination. It’s likely that the helmet, a metal tiara, as well as the mask and maybe all the other armour part would be golden given the high rank of Masistios but this wasn't reported by Herodotus.
I replaced the lance with the bow, since this would be the usual weapon during the first phase of an attack. For close combat a mace is carried with an Ox-head which is the mythical cavalry weapon of the Persians. The other option for normal troops would be the battle-axe; the mace should have been a prestigious weapon for high ranking generals only.
The acinaces short sword is of course also carried like on the Persian sarcophagus.
The mask is simply modelled after the face of the knight of the sarcophagus which could display a mask rather than a face in my opinion, the helmet is as said a simple metal tiara which is covered by the traditional Persian headwear. The neck and throat protection is not very well displayed on the sarcophagus but there are other pictures available. The upper arm protection is also not well visible, I choose to make them extra large like they seem to be on the sarcophagus, this might have been so for certain protection reasons. The leg armour is a one-piece chaps like one and I also choose to use a frontal one-piece armour for the horse since there are quite some reports about this feature and something is visible on the sarcophagus (which was most likely in colour originally). Most of the armour is scale armour of course.
This kind of cavalry was in my opinion always the core of the Achaemenid forces, most likely less in numbers than the 10.000 Immortals but much more important and elite. These should have been mainly used against the mounted archers of the northern steppes, mainly in the eastern part of the empire.
In my opinion the Persian knights in the great artwork of Johnny Shumate should be satrapial cavalry of Asia minor/Anatolia, the real Iranic cavalry should have been heavier and more Iranic in style.
The wonderful photos posted by Laran are the first ones which I see displaying the royal heavy cavalry about which little is known. I know only one instance in which a Greek source reports about the heavy Persian cavalry, Herodotus and his report about the death of the cavalry general Masistios during Xerxes's Greece expedition and the battle of Plataiai.
I have combined the description of Masistios with the relief on the Sarcophagus of that high ranking Persian to display a heavy Persian cavalryman, Masistios.
Since it’s a General displayed I used much gold and purple, like reported by Herodotus, the standard variants would not have golden breast armour and golden head armour for the horse, the rest of the armour is a silver/bronze/iron combination. It’s likely that the helmet, a metal tiara, as well as the mask and maybe all the other armour part would be golden given the high rank of Masistios but this wasn't reported by Herodotus.
I replaced the lance with the bow, since this would be the usual weapon during the first phase of an attack. For close combat a mace is carried with an Ox-head which is the mythical cavalry weapon of the Persians. The other option for normal troops would be the battle-axe; the mace should have been a prestigious weapon for high ranking generals only.
The acinaces short sword is of course also carried like on the Persian sarcophagus.
The mask is simply modelled after the face of the knight of the sarcophagus which could display a mask rather than a face in my opinion, the helmet is as said a simple metal tiara which is covered by the traditional Persian headwear. The neck and throat protection is not very well displayed on the sarcophagus but there are other pictures available. The upper arm protection is also not well visible, I choose to make them extra large like they seem to be on the sarcophagus, this might have been so for certain protection reasons. The leg armour is a one-piece chaps like one and I also choose to use a frontal one-piece armour for the horse since there are quite some reports about this feature and something is visible on the sarcophagus (which was most likely in colour originally). Most of the armour is scale armour of course.
This kind of cavalry was in my opinion always the core of the Achaemenid forces, most likely less in numbers than the 10.000 Immortals but much more important and elite. These should have been mainly used against the mounted archers of the northern steppes, mainly in the eastern part of the empire.
Bahram Ardavan-Dorood
