The Huns..Scourge of God or Gift from God?

[Orda Khan]

There was still a Hunnic cavalry core but mainly due to circumstances ( that you have touched upon already..ie lack of grazing ) Attila's campaigns and army were almost more Germanic than Hun

......Orda

[The Wizard]

Besides that, take into account that the Ostrogoths were heavily influenced by steppe peoples and the Huns, in the sense that they used far more cavalry than their cousins the Visigoths, or the Franks or Burgundians etc etc. The same goes for the Gepids and Lombards.



~Wiz

[hokagenaruto3]

All I know is that when Attila cam to Europe, he realized there weren't many open plains to support his great cavalry, so they were really forced to fight dismounted. The all-out battle against the romans wasn't fought with Hunnic tactics, but with western. That's because they had many Germanic infantry.
Very few armies could at that time withstand the hit and run tactic. Especially when the enemy has composite bows.

[Watchman]

Let's remember here that although there were others, the Huns were one of the main reasons for the Migrations - they pushed other tribes before them, who pushed other tribes before them, who... until the point where the displaced tribes started spilling over the increasingly porous Roman border, an activity greatly helped by the fact the Empire was suffering crisis galore at the time (adminstrational trouble, economic difficulties, demographic and hence tax- and military-base collapse thanks to a slew of new, virulent plagues appearing on the scene, struggles for the throne...). Plus I've heard there was a general "low point" in stability and living quality in realms all over the world, apparently due to climate conjecturals causing a temporary harshening of the weather and hence famine and instability (which would also have been part of the reason the Germans, Huns and others were so keen on moving to new pastures).

And after the first wave of migrating barbarians who fought or negotiated themselves over the border and settled on Roman territory, usually in some sort of agreement with the local Imperial representatives, there soon came another and then another and... None of which contributed to the overall health of the already deeply troubled Empire. It might have survived its other problems, but the Migrations on top of them were a bit much. They managed to buy some time by setting the barbarians against each other (if nothing else the newly arrived tribes weren't too keen on moving on when the next ones came over), but...