Cavalry and chariots against infantry

[Domen]

Some cavalry vs infantry collision models:



So this actually confirms my point of view - in each case at least the first 4 ranks of infantry (and in some cases all ranks) are smashed by cavalry. But please note that in their model the horse is only 330 kg heavy (and its speed is only 40 km/h). And they also wrote:

"The mass of horse and rider is deliberately slightly underestimated, as we do not have reliable data on the size of horses used by Roman cavalry."

While as I have read, late Medieval combat horses were often even over 800 kg heavy.

And 330 kg is surely way too low (not "slightly") for Roman horses (even though they were certainly not as heavy as late Medieval ones). 500 - 600+ kg would be more realistic for Roman horses. Even nowadays an average adult horse is 550 - 650 kg heavy, according to this website:

http://zapytaj.onet.pl/Category/010,009/...kon__.html

330 kg is a normal weight but for a pony - not for a horse! I don't think that Roman cavalry used ponies in battles. So actually this model suffers from serious bias - too small mass and speed of horse compared to mass & speed of real combat horses. Thus kinetic energy of a charging horse from their model is not as large as kinetic energy of a real charging horse (especially Medieval one). Heavier and faster horse would inflict even more damage (i.e. smash more ranks of foot soldiers) than horse from their model.

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On the other hand - it is possible there are also some other flaws in this model (apart from underestimated mass of horses), which work in favour of infantry, on the other hand.

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And here such an interesting article:

"Saddle, Lance and Stirrup. An Examination of the Mechanics of Shock Combat and the Development of Shock Tactics":

http://www.classicalfencing.com/articles/shock.php

A discussion regarding shock charges without saddles and stirrups (the final conclusion was that saddles and stirrups were not absolutely necessary for shock cavalry, although surely made their work easier):

http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread...t-stirrups

Regarding how animals are - supposedly - too intelligent to be forced to do suicidal things: :whistle:



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A video showing modern horses - so horses far from being trained to do such things (unlike combat horses from the past) - ramming solid objects and plunging into crowd:

http://animal.discovery.com/tv-shows/unt...-crowd.htm

This video also gives us some idea how shock charges of chariots could look like.

More videos:

A horse ramming a definitely solid, wooden object:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla...r3VxnS42vQ#!

Another one - horse tramples oncoming car:

http://www.break.com/index/horse-trample...g-car.html

And here spectator run over by horse:

http://www.break.com/index/spectator-run...horse.html

Horse slams into starting gate:

http://www.break.com/index/horse-slams-i...-gate.html

Horse runs into fence (on its own, without any encouragement):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOXmruNJjQE

And next one:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-05-08/ho...ce/2708746

And horse goes "crowd surfing":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla...RvxtwDsUHc

Horse crashes into fence:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla...fVS6nmZWho#!

And also (but not so spectacular as some of the previous ones):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qROBbfeT...=fvwp&NR=1

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Regarding the famous charge against squares at Waterloo:

At Waterloo in that failed charge there was 10500 infantry vs 3500 French cavalry - a 3 to 1 ratio in favour of infantry. There were 4 infantry brigades (Ompteda, Kielmannsegge, von Kruse, Sir Halkett) versus 26 cavalry squadrons. Numbers counted basing on:

http://napolun.com/mirror/napoleonistyka...ERLOO.html

Ompteda - 2.087
Kielmannsegge - 3.315
von Kruse - 2.841
Sir Halkett - 2.274

Total of 10500 infantry.

And 26 squadrons of cavalry = 3500 (average Napoleon's cavalry squadron at Waterloo - 135).

A 3 to 1 numerical superiority. And infantry squares suffered heavy losses while repulsing that cavalry (for example V Line Btn. KGL under Mjr. Schroeder which was part of Ompteda's brigade lost 93% of soldiers in the battle of Waterloo - surely large part of them lost during that charge).

Entire brigade of von Kielmannsegge lost 45% of soldiers in the battle of Waterloo.