Ancient Warhorse

[bachmat66]

My chief interest in the ancient world are:
the development of cavalry, warhorses and their training, horse breeding, riding techniques and equipment.
Following my interests I just acquired two books - Ann Hyland - Horse in the Ancient World, and Sidnell -Ancient Warhorse.
Has anyone read or is reading the new book 'Ancient Warhorse: Cavalry in Ancient World' by Philip Sidnell?
I have just finished reading the first chapter, where amongst other things author mentions 'the frozen soil of Ukraine" which makes me wonder where such area of Ukraine may be found?
well, the book chapters - Origins, Greek, Macedonian, Successors, Early Roman, Late Roman republic, Imperial Rome (ends with Adriannopole) and Medieval Knight -ends with Hastings (sic!).
well, so far I checked the book for bibliography listings and there is nothing of that sort included in this books but there are bibliographic notes to each chapter. Here, original ancient writers predominate, also Hyland and Connolly, and some Osprey.

also I am reading Ann Hyland - Horse in the Ancient world - any thoughts on that book?
By the way can anyone point me to that particular part of the text in Xenophon's 'On horsemanship' where he says that he (then Hellenic world) preferred that his horse would be ridden with his mouth opened?
Hyland makes such a claim in her book but I cannot find this in my version of 'On Horsemanship'
As far as I know, via anatomy and biomechanic studies of horse movement, horses cannot run with their mouth open - unlike humans.
let have some discussion on any of the above

[philsidnell]

Has anyone read or is reading the new book 'Ancient Warhorse: Cavalry in Ancient World' by Philip Sidnell?
I have just finished reading the first chapter, where amongst other things author mentions 'the frozen soil of Ukraine" which makes me wonder where such area of Ukraine may be found?

:oops:
Er...well, I wrote it. Actually the subtitle is Cavalry in Ancient Warfare.

Thanks for pointing out the error above. That's a passage where I was referring to the Scythian tombs at Pazyryk (probably spelt wrong, I'm writing this off the top of my head). It should have been corrected to something like 'the frozen soil of the foothills of the Tienshin mountains, at the extreme eastern edge of the Scythian domain'.
I'll make sure it gets corrected for the reprint, along with a couple of other minor bloopers which I have spotted since publication. I'm sure yu will let me know if you find any more.

Have you read any further yet? What did you think? Any questions, suggestions, constructive criticisms? I Hope you found something to interest you in it.

Phil Sidnell

[philsidnell]

Sorry, should also have replied to your other comments. Hyland's book is very useful. She knows her horses, was pretty much the founder of Endurance Riding in Britain and has done a fair bit of practical experimentation with weapons, ancient bridles etc. You'd better know your stuff if you are going to challenge her on technical equestrian stuff. I'm sure horses often run with their mouths open. I'll try to find some images and work out how to scan and attach them.

I'll also see if I can find the relevant bit of Xenophon, although entirely from memory I thought she said the bits used would force the horse to keep its jaws apart - which they would.

Look forward to chatting more.

Phil Sidnell.

[Dan Howard]

Ann Hyland is a very very poor source for anything other than modern horse subjects. She knows little about ancient or medieval horses and even less about ancient and medieval warfare. On top of this she is very very biased to the point that every sentence she writes has the subtext "aren't Oriental horses wonderful compared to those nassty European ones."

[Chariovalda]

Hmmm...if you can read German you might try the 3-volume "Die Reiter Roms" by Marcus Junckelmann. I don't know Sidnell's or Hyland's books, though a review of the latter by Linda Malcor ([url:15ob8k8p]http://www.mun.ca/mst/heroicage/issues/2/ha2rev.htm[/url]) made me frown a bit (well, actually, quite a lot).

Dan, which books would you recommend?

[Dan Howard]

For medieval horses I would recommend Andrew Ayton's "Knights and Warhorses: Military Service and the English Aristocracy under Edward III".
I can't think of any sources for ancient horses. Cotterell's "Chariot" has some useful info.