heavy cavalry engaging heavy cavalry

[Michael Kerr]

Vindex wrote:

(just playing devil's advocate and someone who does not like the assumptions the ancients couldn't ride).

Sorry if you feel I was assuming ancients couldn't ride as that was not my intent. I was quoting from the captions from the images & forgot to put them in quotes, I was merely referring to a book which covered early nomad riders point of view & the effects of contact with sedentary nations particularly the Assyrians & how these nations/empires coped & then adapted to changes in cavalry warfare like getting rid of chariot wagon & mounting driver & archer & still operating as a team with driver steering and archer shooting as initial step against early nomads like early Medes, Scythians, Cimmerians & how nomads also benefited from contact with Assyrians with better armour & weapons. Richard A. Gabriel in his book “Soldiers Lives Through History The Ancient World" says of the early Assyrian horsemen.

The new “cavalrymen” still fought in the manner of the old chariot system of driver and archer, operating in pairs, with one “charioteer” riding his horse while holding the reins of another, on which sat the chariot archer with his composite bow. The “charioteer” managed both horses, leaving the archer free to concentrate on shooting, just as if he were in a chariot. The “charioteer” was armed with a spear, and both he and the archer wore the standard armor, helmet, and other equipment of the Assyrian chariot team. The cavalry team used the same horse harness and bit used for chariot horses. The Assyrians used these cavalry teams for almost fifty years before the individual horseman armed with either spear or bow made his appearance during the reign of Tiglath-Pileser III (745–727 b.c.e.), giving rise to the true horse cavalryman.

Maybe it was the fact they had to use chariot harness why they look so awkward on the horses or would the rear of a horse be a more stable shooting platform for an inexperienced horse archer?


Regards
Michael Kerr