Historical Question on Cavalry Charges

[Parallel Pain]

I thought that warhorses are specially trained to be very aggressive, and thus would not be afraid to crash into infantry.

It's hard enough to train humans, who can be manipulated by peer-pressure, religion, order, or threats to run headlong into a wall. I don't think it's possible to train horses, who are motivated only by instinct and their own survival, to do the same. I mean maybe if we can tell them "do it or I'll put a bullet through your head" but we don't speak horse.

Anyways this is how the infantry square works. It's so compact it gives the men some courage, and even if they do want to run they can't. As the formation remains intact, to the horse the rows and rows of men look like a wall, so they either refuse to charge or shy away before impact. It's the same for line formation as long as the men don't start running or bolting.

[O'ETAIPOS]

It's hard enough to train humans, who can be manipulated by peer-pressure, religion, order, or threats to run headlong into a wall. I don't think it's possible to train horses, who are motivated only by instinct and their own survival, to do the same. I mean maybe if we can tell them "do it or I'll put a bullet through your head" but we don't speak horse.

Anyways this is how the infantry square works. It's so compact it gives the men some courage, and even if they do want to run they can't. As the formation remains intact, to the horse the rows and rows of men look like a wall, so they either refuse to charge or shy away before impact. It's the same for line formation as long as the men don't start running or bolting.

Horses during charge, if it is properly performed, are acting like during stampede, and this is affecting the way they react. Stampeeding horses do not care what is in front of them, but are running in a way where main group is running, ignoring men, diches or other obstacles.

This means that one horse will never charge line of men, but a big group may do this. But they will only do this if none of the horsemen will freak out and turn before impact. If even one person would break from charge, then whole charge will be destroyed.
This obviously means that a lot is in the mind of those who are charging. If the horsemen were ready to sacrifice they will perform much better and will actually take less losses, as only they are able to charge efectively.

[Jaume]

Anyway, always remember that roman horses were just like a pony, I mean they were more little than modern horses.

[Gebeleisis]

well i know that horses and men grew in time but isnt that a bit radical?

[Mindaros]

Apparently what horses don't want to charge are sharp obstacles like bayonets. In the Battle of Waterloo the French cavalry couldn't penetrate the British squares.

[The Persian Cataphract]

Serried ranks of heavy horse, deployed knee-to-knee in a columned formation actually keep their momentum for a longer time, due to the aforementioned "stampede"-effect. First they had to adjust the formation with a slow trot or ambling speed and only seconds before the impact did the horsemen charge with a furious gallop. This is why the cataphract for instance was a successful recipe, both against other cavalry and against infantry; Against cavalry of other formations, they would simply be overwhelmed by this coordinated "iron fist".

Infantry, well, we are not talking small horses, we are talking about large, muscular, and powerful beasts, in cases barded with heavy armour, carrying heavily armed and armoured soldiers; It's a huge difference from fleet light horse with lightly armed skirmishers. The cataphract was always meant to destroy the enemy's front ranks, rather than flank or envelop the entire formation. If as much as a few ranks of infantry had been disposed of by heavy horse, it would often be a sign of a successful breakthrough. Later the Romans dealt with these risks with the deployment of caltrops and deeper deployment of infantry, unit per unit.

[Strategos Alexandros]

I would say an infantry formation could be classed as a sharp obstacle personally.

[Midnj]

I acutally saw a video clip on the internet where some lady is jogging along and goes flying when a horse charges in, lowers its head and nails her. She was literally like a bowling pin.. the horse lost almost no momentum at all.

And this was a relatively small horse and a relatively heavy woman, without any extra mass (armoured rider, armor, etc). If there is nothing the horse can impale itself on, I'm sure it would have no trouble literally running over a line of infantry.. I mean if they attacked a mass of infantry the horse might trip over all the bodies at some point, but it should have no trouble knocking armoured infantry around.

And you can convince a person to run into a wall... a person can brace himself and absorb the impact. You probably couldn't convince a person to run into a spear point.

[Jaume]

well i know that horses and men grew in time

Hum, this is not 100% true. Time ago, I believed, like you, that romans were more little than we (specially because I'm 1,90 tall ).

But a few days ago I've been reading the requirements to be a roman legionary after the Marian reforms, which are:

- Being a roman citizen.

- Being registered (in the census)

- Being bachelor (at least before enlist)

- Being 16-20 years old

- Minimal stature of 1,70

- And so on...

I think that things like the stature are proportional to the quality of life. Same for horses, maybe.

[QuintusSertorius]

Demographically, height changed both up and down with nutrion and such. There was no broad pattern of people getting ever-taller.

Height is a combinant gene thing (ie the more "height genes" you inherit, the taller your potential), but it also depends very heavily on getting sufficient nutrition during puberty. Doesn't matter how good your genes are, if you don't get the right food at the right time, you won't grow to your full potential.

Height is also related to fertility for women. The taller a woman is, the later she tends to become fertile, because the body only has limited resources. Growing your long bones, and developing sexual organs both use up those resources, so it tends to be an either/or type equation. All that said, the taller you are, the healthier you tend to be, shortness (specifically leg-length) being linked with a number of illnesses. So it's an optimum balance thing of health and fertility.