02-12-2009, 01:40 PM
If I were depicting one, which I'm guessing is your purpose, I would show him without greaves and with some kind of boot, to prevent chafing on the calves while allowing some delicacy of touch when giving leg signals to the horse. I do not know anything about Roman boots, but Hellenistic ones of this period could be Iphicratids (a bit like toe-less boxer boots). Although there are representations of mounted figures with greaves (I'm thinking of Classical Greek art), they are far outnumbered by those without.
I said muscled cuirass because these remained popular with senior Roman officers for centuries (and I was thinking of a terracotta horseman from Apulia shown on p. 71 of Michele Feugere's Weapons of the Romans), but then again this is only the commander of a turma. Chainmail might actually serve your purpose well in that it looks 'more Roman' to popular imagination and is, after all, how the Roman cavalry is depicted on one of the earliest clear pieces of sculptural evidence, the Aemilius Paullus monument (though this is from a generation or more after the end of the 2PW).
Ultimately, the lack of conclusive evidence actually gives you a good deal of license within reasonable bounds. The cavalry were drawn from the wealthiest families and provided their own equipment, so could afford to pick and choose their equipment from the various types available.
I said muscled cuirass because these remained popular with senior Roman officers for centuries (and I was thinking of a terracotta horseman from Apulia shown on p. 71 of Michele Feugere's Weapons of the Romans), but then again this is only the commander of a turma. Chainmail might actually serve your purpose well in that it looks 'more Roman' to popular imagination and is, after all, how the Roman cavalry is depicted on one of the earliest clear pieces of sculptural evidence, the Aemilius Paullus monument (though this is from a generation or more after the end of the 2PW).
Ultimately, the lack of conclusive evidence actually gives you a good deal of license within reasonable bounds. The cavalry were drawn from the wealthiest families and provided their own equipment, so could afford to pick and choose their equipment from the various types available.
