M2TW Cavalry and EB II

[Cyclops]

It seems a fair point the OP raises, and I look forward to the ingenious solution the EB2 team comes up with.

My own uniformed impression is that the stirrup was not in general use (if at all) in the EB2 period, thus making heavy cavalry less effective. Is the problem delivering shock from an unbraced rider and mount to the target without dismounting the rider?

Of course there was effective heavy-to-kataphract weight cav around in the classical age, which did smash infantry quite badly, but just less effectively than horsemen of the age of chivalry. Is that a fair assesment? Its a gross simpification, but the Roman empire held quite well against the northern foes until they were swept away in the Gothic storm, which I'm assuming was a stirrup assisted movement.

I recall a short archaeological film comparing depictions (eg from illuminated mss) with excavated bodies, showing enormous wounds, for example blokes split from collarbone to pelvis. Terrifying how much force a horseman can generate when properly mounted and braced, he had the force of his mount and the extra height (from standing in the stirrups) to swing down from. No wonder even succesful infantry tradtions like the early Franks 9not to mention the eastern empire) adopted heavy cav armament.

[Cullhwch]

The stirrup wasn't fully necessary for the shock action of cavalry. Alexander's Companions prove that point quite well. Instead, the stirrup is really useful for close-quarters fighting when the horseman has to draw his sidearm to crack some skulls. It allowed the rider to stand up and shift his weight to deliver a more powerful, better-balanced blow to whatever hapless infantry stood below him.

[Macilrille]

Like all other germanic Barbarians the Goths were primarily infantry-based, their stay on the Ukranian steppe had probably heightened their proportion of cavalry to infantry, but they were nonetheless still mostly infantry. It is a question of settled farmers being mostly infantry while nomads/herdsmen are primarily cavalry in that specific setting. Battle of Hadrianopolis was an infantry action until the Goth cavalry with their Alan friends/allies/mercenaries returned from foraging and turned the Roman flank. Nor were the Goths the only tribe to invade the WRE and the others were by and large infantry.

Note that at Tours October 10, 732, the well-trained, armed and disciplined Frankish FOOT soldiers withstood the heavy cavalry of the Umayyads and defeated it. Well-trained, armed and disciplined heavy foot will as a general rule defeat any cavalry you care to mention. It is when they break rank as at Hastings, they get slaughtered.

However, it generally takes an organised state to arm, produce and train this body of foot. A state that was by and large absent in the middle ages. Instead the small bands of well equipped and trained cavalry dominated all battlefields where they did not meet organised heavy foot. It is easier to maintain a single or a few knights and bring them together in effective if disorganised and undisciplined warbands than to keep heavy foot (not to mention chivalric ideals and general ideology). In that light some military historians have seen The Middle Ages not so much as the age of cavalry as the age of absent foot.

[Cyclops]

Like all other germanic Barbarians the Goths were primarily infantry-based, their stay on the Ukranian steppe had probably heightened their proportion of cavalry to infantry, but they were nonetheless still mostly infantry. It is a question of settled farmers being mostly infantry while nomads/herdsmen are primarily cavalry in that specific setting. Battle of Hadrianopolis was an infantry action until the Goth cavalry with their Alan friends/allies/mercenaries returned from foraging and turned the Roman flank. Nor were the Goths the only tribe to invade the WRE and the others were by and large infantry.

Definitely the germanic footmen were the rats that swarmed the foundered ship of state, but I'd argue they managed it only once the horsey Goths and Huns had cracked the nut. Up until then the Romans cracked german heads as a regular sport for centuries, and only lost if they put pencil-necks in charge who led legions into swamps in winter....

Note that at Tours October 10, 732, the well-trained, armed and disciplined Frankish FOOT soldiers withstood the heavy cavalry of the Umayyads and defeated it. Well-trained, armed and disciplined heavy foot will as a general rule defeat any cavalry you care to mention. It is when they break rank as at Hastings, they get slaughtered.

Poitiers/Tours in 732 was pretty much the first stop on a charge that commenced at Mecca, so they were due for a halt. Not sure about Ummayid heavies, perhaps they were more of a Berber raiding party than formed Kwarazmian style katas?

From the Red Sea to the Loire valley is a fairly impressive run of wins for the horse vs the foot.

However, it generally takes an organised state to arm, produce and train this body of foot. A state that was by and large absent in the middle ages. Instead the small bands of well equipped and trained cavalry dominated all battlefields where they did not meet organised heavy foot. It is easier to maintain a single or a few knights and bring them together in effective if disorganised and undisciplined warbands than to keep heavy foot (not to mention chivalric ideals and general ideology). In that light some military historians have seen The Middle Ages not so much as the age of cavalry as the age of absent foot.

Very good point. The very real breakdown of civilization (in the West) meant there was not the urban administration to rally and arm concentrations of foot.

I liken the spread of the feudal horse culture to the mafia. Its all about honour, families, getting "made" (a knight), private wars (feuds), extortion (dues and levies) and pimped rides.

[athanaric]

Not sure about Ummayid heavies, perhaps they were more of a Berber raiding party than formed Kwarazmian style katas?

AFAIK they were heavier than your average raiders, although of course not as heavy as Persian knights of other periods. The battle of Tours was hard fought and some kind of raiding party would have given up much sooner than the Muslim forces actually did.

I liken the spread of the feudal horse culture to the mafia. Its all about honour, families, getting "made" (a knight), private wars (feuds), extortion (dues and levies) and pimped rides.

Aye, the Mafia is somehow a decadent rest of the feudal society.

[gamegeek2]

We're talking EB times here. Let's pretend a Roman legionary has about the stats of Dismounted Chivalric Knights, and that Gendarmes are Cataphracts.

This means that a unit of 40 cataphracts charging a unit of 60 legionaries (formed up) takes out half of the legionaries on impact. But the cataphracts at Carrhae (while the ratio was definitely different) didn't do a ton of damage to the legionaries unless they were unprepared for the charge.

[Macilrille]

You may argue so Cyclops, but it goes against historical fact and is a figment of a dated perception of the Goths, Tolkien's Rohir are based on that perception, but since then our view has changed quite a bit. I recommend going and reading Ammian/Ammianus, he should be online here http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/...mmian/31*.html, he clearly states that Cavalry makes up "a part" of the Goth army and that some of it is Alan, not Gothic.

Anyway, even before that, in fact from the very aftermath of Teutoburger Wald even good generals had difficulties with the Germans, on a plain field with armies lined up, Romans would win (but they did against verybody when they were allowed to use the legions as they were intended), in any other terrain they would face difficulty. On the morrow (for it is 01.55 here in Denmark) I shall write an analysis of Germanicus' campaigns to reconquer Germania which I hope shall demonstrate that you are wrong. The point is, German tribes were causing difficulties long before anyone had even heard of Huns- themselves included. What allowed the barbarians (mainly Germans) to overrun the Empire can be followed in another thread ("When was Rome Doomed"), but it was clearly not Goth and Hun horsemen, nor was the Goths primarily horse. As I said, they were farmers = infantry.

As for Tours and the nature of that battle as well as the heavy cavalry there. Copy from Wiki follows as it is a decent article stating its sources and a universal wiev amongst military historians (of which I like to consider myself one).

‘Abd-al-Raḥmân trusted the tactical superiority of his cavalry, and had them charge repeatedly. This time the faith the Umayyads had in their cavalry, armed with their long lances and swords which had brought them victory in previous battles, was not justified. The disciplined Frankish soldiers withstood the assaults, though according to Arab sources, the Arab cavalry several times broke into the interior of the Frankish square. "The Muslim horsemen dashed fierce and frequent forward against the battalions of the Franks, who resisted manfully, and many fell dead on either side."

Despite these inroads, the Franks did not break. It appears that the years of year-round training that Charles had bought with Church funds, paid off. Infantry withstood the Umayyad heavy cavalry. Paul Davis says the core of Charles's army was a professional infantry which was both highly disciplined and well motivated, "having campaigned with him all over Europe," buttressed by levies that Charles basically used to raid and disrupt his enemy, and gather food for his infantry.[1] The Mozarabic Chronicle of 754 says:

"And in the shock of the battle the men of the North seemed like a sea that cannot be moved. Firmly they stood, one close to another, forming as it were a bulwark of ice; and with great blows of their swords they hewed down the Arabs. Drawn up in a band around their chief, the people of the Austrasians carried all before them. Their tireless hands drove their swords down to the breasts of the foe."

Umayyad troops who had broken into the square had tried to kill Charles, but his liege men surrounded him and would not be broken. The battle was still in flux when—Frankish histories claim—a rumor went through the Umayyad army that Frankish scouts threatened the booty that they had taken from Bordeaux. Some of the Umayyad troops at once broke off the battle and returned to camp to secure their loot. According to Muslim accounts of the battle, in the midst of the fighting on the second day (Frankish accounts have the battle lasting one day only), scouts from the Franks sent by Charles began to raid the camp and supply train (including slaves and other plunder).

Charles supposedly had sent scouts to cause chaos in the Umayyad base camp, and free as many of the slaves as possible, hoping to draw off part of his foe. This succeeded, as many of the Umayyad cavalry returned to their camp. To the rest of the Muslim army, this appeared to be a full-scale retreat, and soon it became one. Both Western and Muslim histories agree that while trying to stop the retreat, ‘Abd-al-Raḥmân became surrounded, which led to his death, and the Umayyad troops then withdrew altogether to their camp. "All the host fled before the enemy", candidly wrote one Arabic source, "and many died in the flight". The Franks resumed their phalanx, and rested in place through the night, believing the battle would resume at dawn the following morning.

Contemporary Arab sources say that Abd-al-Raḥmân had 80.000 men, but today 20- 30.000 is generally deemed more likely. With an equal number of Franks.

It was an impressive run indeed, but much of it was against other horse, and much against disintegrating/weak states. Just as only the weakness of the WRE allowed for the germans and Huns to topple it...

Nite all.

[Cyclops]

You may argue so Cyclops, but it goes against historical fact and is a figment of a dated perception of the Goths...

Of course I'm not suggesting any army was 100% cav, or inf, or anything.

The Visigoths provided the heavy cav at Chalons, didn't they?

The difference between the Goths and the older school German tribes was the heavy cav (allied or their own, who knows? it was a horde) that they brought to the fray. The Goths busted major Roman armies in the field, within the Empire proper, something old school Germans had never done (the Arminius and Cimbri businesses were on the frontier).

Likewise the Goths aided Romans to beat Huns, which the Romans simply could not do unassisted. Cav, heavy cav, was very important in way it had not been before.

Contemporary Arab sources say that Abd-al-Raḥmân had 80.000 men, but today 20- 30.000 is generally deemed more likely. With an equal number of Franks...

IIRC there are no contemporary Arab sources and two near contemporary French chroniclers who are more poetic than exact.

It is very unfortunate that we do not possess scientific accounts of Charles Martel's great victory, instead of the interesting but insufficient stories of the old Christian chroniclers.

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/732tours.html

Of course there is a great deal of romantic rubbish in Wikipedia, not much more historical than the Goths as Rohirrim really. I am constantly surprised at the poor level of historical scholarship reflected in military history. I guess its hard to be good at military matters and history at the same time, and it cuts both ways: even an amateur like me can blush at the military ignorance of some historians.

It was an impressive run indeed, but much of it was against other horse, and much against disintegrating/weak states...

In North Africa they were fighting Romans and in Spain they fought Visigoths? Well one was weak and the other (I'd argue) had horses.

Just as only the weakness of the WRE allowed for the germans and Huns to topple it...

Absolutely, the point you made about the decay of civic institutions corresponding to a decay in quality heavy infantry is entirely apposite.

Amazingly the Romans resisted 2 of the main threats, knocking back the Persians (the number 1 percieved threat I think) and the Huns. Only the Goths beat a way in against firm resistance.

Germans and Arabs snuck in once the fabric had been rent by these massive incursions from the steppes and the East.

I do think the shift in emphasis in all armies (even the still civilised Byzantines) must represent a change in military culture over and above the collapsing standards of civilisation. Horses became decisive, and I suspect stirrups had a part in that shift.

From other time periods, I wonder about Phillip's phalangitae: do they fit the model of urban heavy inf? I guess they were rural smallholders but supported/equipped by the mines and other apparatus of the state, and as a response to traditional Hellenic city-state spearmen so they are still the product of an urbanised culture.

I also wonder about the Swiss massed pike: I guess the cantons weren't urbanised in the middle ages and if they were, they certainly weren't really the big smoke. Were they continuing the tradition of those "alpine phalanxes" and mori whassisnames ("sea of spears") chaps? Once again perhaps they are reflecting a response to a neighbours challenge (Austrian and then Burgundian knights) but its an interesting "special case".

[machinor]

I liken the spread of the feudal horse culture to the mafia. Its all about honour, families, getting "made" (a knight), private wars (feuds), extortion (dues and levies) and pimped rides.

Oh no. Please no more Mafia glorification. The Mafia never was about family oder honor. It's about making as much money as one can.

[Cyclops]

Oh no. Please no more Mafia glorification. The Mafia never was about family oder honor. It's about making as much money as one can.

I quite agree. I was suggesting the feudal horse culture were the same sort of thugs (by and large) as the mafia, masquarading as honour.

[machinor]

Ok, luckily I just got you wrong. No offense.

[antisocialmunky]

Hmm, does anyone have any good accounts of the siege of Tigerkant or whatever it was called when the Romans managed to rout that massive army of Tigranes because they bum rushed the Cataphracts?

[Ludens]

Hmm, does anyone have any good accounts of the siege of Tigerkant or whatever it was called when the Romans managed to rout that massive army of Tigranes because they bum rushed the Cataphracts?

I am not sure we have any detailed account of that battle. In fact, Foot once mentioned an reference (Chahin, M., The Kingdom of Armenia) that questioned whether the battle had taken place at all.