Macedonian cavalry success against close order infantry

[Erpingham]

This is a bit of an unfair question.  Cavalry and infantry both tired to maximise their chances of success in this sort of fight by using supporting troops, advantageous terrain, surprise etc.  So there aren't many head-on, both sides fully prepared, no sneaky tricks examples.  Here are some medieval examples.

Battle of the Standard : Scots cavalry rode through part of English line to attack baggage.  Other than it wasn't the main mass of English, not clear who was attacked.
Battle of Valmont (1st day) : French cavalry rode through English line to attack baggage.  Seems on this occassion they rode through main force but this was spread only one or two men deep.
Battle of Verneuil : Italian cavalry in French pay rode through part of English army to attack baggage (is there a pattern here?).  Not certain who was attacked - could have been archers, could have been part of main body.

Delbruck has three examples of Swiss formations being defeated by cavalry, in 1271, 1289 and 1322.  It is not clear in the examples whether the Swiss were in good order, though surprise was involved in 1289.  On all three occassions, a knight rode into the formation and disrupted it but died in the process.  The Swiss clearly didn't feel they were supposed to stand still to let the horseman trot through

[Patrick Waterson]

Patrick
I should have identified the passage. It is V1.8.6-7:

...But when the Indians saw he had cavalry only, they turned about and made a vigorous resistance, in number about fifty thousand.  Alexander, seeing their infantry formation solid, and with his own infantry not yet on the field, kept circling round and making charges, but without coming to close quarters with the Indians...

My apologies, let us look at the passage you intended.  To put it in context, we should also look at the immediately preceding activities.  The Penguin translation gives:

"Alexander at once advanced with all his available cavalry to the point on the Hydraotes where the Mallians had massed, and gave orders for the infantry to follow.  Reaching the river and observing the enemy in position on the further bank, though he still had only the cavalry with him, he plunged, without even waiting to reform after his march, into the ford.  When he was half-way over, the enemy withdrew from the river bank rapidly but in good order."

Whatever the ability of Macedonian cavalry to punch through formed enemy infantry may have been, the Indians were convinced it would be good enough to make their position untenable.

Now we move on to the section you quote:

"Alexander followed them up, and as soon as they realised that he had only mounted troops with no infantry in support, they checked theior withdrawal, turned and offered a vigorous resistance.  Their force was some 50,000 strong.  Alexander's infantry had not yet joined him; accordingly, as the Indians were massed in close formation [puknen], he held off for the time being, keeping his cavalry manoeuvring and making an occasional probe [prosbolas = attack, assault or approach]; presently however, the Agrianes arrived on the scene together with the archers and some picked units of light infantry [psilon ... epilektous] which were serving under his personal command, while at the same time the heavy infantry was already visible at no great distance.  Faced by these simultaneous threats the Indians broke ..."

Interesting is Arrian's information that the Indians were in close formation [puknos = closed up], and that this seems to have been the factor that decided Alexander to wait for his infantry.  A closer than usual formation would prevent the Macedonian cavalry from making an effective penetration, and may well have been the reason why Alexander, who so confidently led his cavalry against the enemy line at the ford, did not attempt to do more than the occasional prosbolas when it had formed up in the open.

The arrival of the Macedonian heavy infantry was enough to bring about the flight of the Mallians.  My point is that the Macedonian cavalry alone were not the battle winners but it was Alexander's uncanny ability to organise the combined arms of foot and horse in mutual support on the battlefield.

I am in full agreement with this conclusion; the discussion in this thread is not so much whether Macedonian cavalry could go it alone against heavy infantry (although there is an element of that) but rather whether they could go it at all, even with support.  Naturally, any instances of heavy infantry shying away from a frontal attack by Macedonian cavalry, such as at the ford crossing above, are indicative.

Aren't hoplites supposed to lock shields? So where exactly are these gaps which horses are looking at?

Hoplites could not 'lock' shields.  Perhaps you are thinking of a Roman testudo?  The gaps are between the men: as Jim pointed out earlier, if a horse hits a shield it will most likely spin the owner round, not be stopped by him.

The very existence of the term sarissophoroi  to identify one unit of cavalry actually implies that other Macedonian cavalry - notably, the Companions - did not carry the sarissa. There'd be no point in distinguishing them as "sarissophoroi" if everyone else had the sarissa, it would be like calling them "The Helmet-Wearers".

So unless we think that Alexander led not the Companions but the prodromoi at Chaironeia, the term "sarissophoroi hippeis" is actually quite a telling argument against his leading a wedge of sarissa-armed cavalry.

It is generally - and probably correctly - assumed that the Macedonian cavalry first adopted long shafted weapons under Philip II.  When one considers adopting a new weapons system the first step is usually to evaluate it: the Romans under Hadrian seem to have fielded an ala contariorum for this purpose.  Lacking definite source information on this point, we can hypothesise that Philip initially formed a unit of 'sarissophoroi hippeis' to evaluate the use of the sarissa by his cavalry.  His hetairoi would have remained hetairoi whether or not they used the sarissa, the xyston or some form of javelin.

The idea that Alexander may have led the sarissophoroi at Chaeronea is one worth considering: he would not have led the ile basilike as that would have been his father's right, privilege and expected station, and the sarissophoroi may have been the next thing to an elite formation Macedon possessed.  This would allow the Sacred Band to fall to Macedonian sarissas without the bulk of Macedonian cavalry needing to be armed with this weapon.

Judging by the fact that Alexander's Companions in Asia seem to have used the xyston, we might conclude that the cavalry sarissa experiment was one which was soon improved upon, the xyston being lighter, handier and less exhausting to use from horseback.  The role of the sarissophoroi as prodromoi is interesting: I did a bit of checking, and they seem to have had a vanguard role rather than a proper scouting role (note how they lead in at the Granicus and launch the decisive charge against the Persian left at Gaugamela), making me wonder if prodromoi signifies 'vanguard' rather than 'scouts'.

Putting Alexander at the head of the sarissophoroi at Chaeronea would make many things fit together rather nicely; thank you for the idea.

[Duncan Head]

Hoplites could not 'lock' shields.  Perhaps you are thinking of a Roman testudo?

http://periklisdeligiannis.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/40.jpg

And this article, especially figure 2.

Whether they did overlap shields is another question, of course. But it looks very much as if they could.

[Jim Webster]

Hoplites could not 'lock' shields.  Perhaps you are thinking of a Roman testudo?  The gaps are between the men: as Jim pointed out earlier, if a horse hits a shield it will most likely spin the owner round, not be stopped by him.

Yes, but Jim also pointed out that a line of shields looks like a wall and horses and other livestock don't like charging walls if there is any other option (like going sideways and hitting the horse next to them to encourage it to get out of their way)

Jim

[Jim Webster]

Hoplites could not 'lock' shields.  Perhaps you are thinking of a Roman testudo?

http://periklisdeligiannis.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/40.jpg

And this article, especially figure 2.

Whether they did overlap shields is another question, of course. But it looks very much as if they could.

With a title like "GREEK HOPLITES IN AN ANCIENT CHINESE SIEGE"
how could I not download it!

Jim

[Justin Swanton]

As an exercise, it might be an idea to look at the cavalry wedge hypothesis in a little more detail. I've redrawn the figures with everything to scale. The hoplite shields are 3' across, the hoplites stand 3' apart with a little overlap on the shields. Their spears are 7' in length.  The Macedonian horse are 7' long (a little smaller than a contemporary horse which is 8' long). The Companion lances are 13' long, which is in the range for a sarissa and xyston.

Putting it all together, a few things stand out:

1. the front rank hoplite will have the cavalry lance in his face before his spear can reach even the horse. In other words, he is completely at the mercy of the horseman.

2. The only immediate threat to the Companion is the hoplite he is targeting. The adjacent hoplites are too far across to target him - they will be looking at the horsemen further back.

3. The horse will hit the hoplite shields on their sides, pushing them left and right, which will swivel the hoplite (if he is not knocked down), enabling the horse to shove him aside and clear a passageway. It doesn't matter if the shields overlap.

[Jim Webster]

Small problem
A trot is 8mph
In one hour the horse will cover 42240  feet

The gap between the infantry spear and the horse's nose looks to be one foot, the horse will cover that in about a hundredth of a second.
There isn't even time for the impetus of the spear to overcome the hoplite's inertia before the horse gets cut up

But actually you miss the real point
The horse is not going to go there anyway because it's a solid bronze wall with spikes

Jim

[Erpingham]

Fine graphics, as always Justin.  I suspect, though, that real life was rather messier.  A quick glance at the initial diagram suggests that, if the file leader moves his head but holds his spear, the xyston will pass over by it.  At the contact speed, loss of aim might make the spear miss the horse, it might not.  If it doesn't, the file leader's horse has had its throat ripped out.  Even if our lead man misses, his second ranker is likely to hit the horse or maybe than man within a second or so - the cavalry leader won't have recovered his weapon by then and has probably dropped it and is going for his sword.  The horse will probably plough on into the ranks - maybe out of the back of this thin formation, before dropping. If he is lucky, the rider will get of the horse and avoid any men behind the phalanx.  He has to hope he can get back to his own lines.  If the hoplites draw up any deeper than four deep (and many believe they did), he really is in trouble.  The next rank will have similar threats and the danger of tripping over fallen horse and men.  Rank three will ease off and try for a controlled impact, making the most of the mess the men in front made.  It may work, in which case the name of the dead hero who led them in will be remembered.  If it doesn't, it won't.  let's hope he is no-one important

[Dave Beatty]

  and that Philip also 'advanced well in front'.  Such positioning is consistent with leading a cavalry wedge.

And don't forget that Philip was lame (don't ask me to quote a primary source, I am in the middle of taking final exams right now)... so it would be a bit tough for him to outrun his men on foot.  Not to mention that Philip means "friend of horses" if my Greek serves me correctly 

Patrick, thanks for the primary source reminder, it has been 30 years since I did that and was relying upon my memory so I will make sure I dig out my Loeb translations when I write that article this summer.  I do recall there being quite some discrepancies in the primary sources especially for Granicus and I believe that it was Peter Green who first postulated that Alex failed in a frontal attack against the Persian extra heavy cav atop the bank of the river and then forded unopposed some distance downstream for a more conventional set-piece (see Green's Alexander of Macedon p.175).

[Patrick Waterson]

Whether they did overlap shields is another question, of course. But it looks very much as if they could.

Indeed, though 'overlap' is not quite the same as 'lock': one could not drive a chariot over a hoplite formation however they arranged their shields, whereas this procedure seems to have been a classic test for a testudo; but let us assume they did overlap, as seems eminently likely.  As each Companion comes up, he uses his xyston (or perhaps sarissa if a sarissaphorus) to knock down the hoplite ahead to his right, leaving only the one ahead to his left for his horse to brush shoulders with.  The horses could be trained to go for the apparent solid line, knowing it would break up as they arrived.

Christopher Matthews' paper is amusing, arguing that Late Republican Romans could not have formed an effective shieldwall.  Plutarch's Life of Antony and Life of Crassus are noticeably not covered in his discussion, and Life of Antony 45.2 does seem germane to any consideration of the Chinese description:

"However, as the Romans were descending some steep hills, the Parthians attacked them and shot at them as they slowly moved along. Then the shield-bearers wheeled about, enclosing the lighter armed troops within their ranks, while they themselves dropped on one knee and held their shields out before them. The second rank held their shields out over the heads of the first, and the next rank likewise. The resulting appearance is very like that of a roof, affords a striking spectacle, and is the most effective of protections against arrows, which glide off from it."

Back to Macedonian cavalry.

Justin, that is a very nice diagram.  May we hope to see it as part of a Slingshot article?

A quick glance at the initial diagram suggests that, if the file leader moves his head but holds his spear, the xyston will pass over by it.

But how far could or would the hoplite, whose perception is anyway rather limited and movement constrained by the helmet he is wearing, move his head? Suit up and try it.   I think a far more likely reaction would be to keep his head centred but to bring up his shield.

At the contact speed, loss of aim might make the spear miss the horse, it might not.  If it doesn't, the file leader's horse has had its throat ripped out.  Even if our lead man misses, his second ranker is likely to hit the horse or maybe than man within a second or so - the cavalry leader won't have recovered his weapon by then and has probably dropped it and is going for his sword.

I suspect this may seriously under-estimate the ability of a Companion to put his man down - and may also over-estimate the ability of hoplites to create a tactical approach in the space of about half a second when they realise these fools on horseback are actually going to charge to contact.  These counter-tactical arguments all seem to assume that the hoplites are well prepared and fully drilled to receive Companion cavalry, which seems not to have been the case historically.

[Justin Swanton]

Fine graphics, as always Justin.  I suspect, though, that real life was rather messier.  A quick glance at the initial diagram suggests that, if the file leader moves his head but holds his spear, the xyston will pass over by it.

This presumes he has the time to move his head or that moving his head will save him from a lancepoint.

At the contact speed, loss of aim might make the spear miss the horse, it might not.  If it doesn't, the file leader's horse has had its throat ripped out.

It is highly unlikely the hoplite will be aiming for the horse, and even if he was, it is unlikely, given the speed of the whole process, that he will be able to seriously injure it. He doesn't have time to deliberately aim for a vulnerable part of the horse's anatomy. Think about it: a wedge of horse are coming at you at a trot or even a canter. What is your reaction? Get your shield up in the way of that sarissa or calmly poke the horse just as your cranium gets pierced?

Even if our lead man misses, his second ranker is likely to hit the horse or maybe than man within a second or so

If the leading horseman drives the frontmost hoplite into the man behind him with the force of his sarissa, the second hoplite will be knocked off balance and completely disorientated and unable to target the horseman. He has neither the time nor a clear line to the horseman. That quote about Alexander needing a lance and his two neighbours having broken lances is interesting - it implies that they hit their targets with considerable force, which would certainly send them spinning.

- the cavalry leader won't have recovered his weapon by then and has probably dropped it and is going for his sword.  The horse will probably plough on into the ranks - maybe out of the back of this thin formation, before dropping.

The leader is through the hoplite formation in about two seconds, maybe three. No time or need to draw his sword. The horse has not received any serious injuries.

If he is lucky, the rider will get of the horse and avoid any men behind the phalanx.  He has to hope he can get back to his own lines.  If the hoplites draw up any deeper than four deep (and many believe they did), he really is in trouble.

Why? 2 seconds to get through a line 6 deep, 4 seconds for a line 12 deep (I did the diagram just 4 deep to show how penetration would work).

The next rank will have similar threats and the danger of tripping over fallen horse and men.  Rank three will ease off and try for a controlled impact, making the most of the mess the men in front made.  It may work, in which case the name of the dead hero who led them in will be remembered.  If it doesn't, it won't.  let's hope he is no-one important

He gets home to boast about it and have the bards write it up.

[Justin Swanton]

Hoplites could not 'lock' shields.  Perhaps you are thinking of a Roman testudo?

http://periklisdeligiannis.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/40.jpg

And this article, especially figure 2.

Whether they did overlap shields is another question, of course. But it looks very much as if they could.

Interesting article, Duncan. It seems the 'fishscale' formation would correspond to hoplites in close formation - 18" between each file rather than 3'. What is the evidence that hoplites deployed in such a formation and when did they do so?

[Erpingham]

I suspect this may seriously under-estimate the ability of a Companion to put his man down - and may also over-estimate the ability of hoplites to create a tactical approach in the space of about half a second when they realise these fools on horseback are actually going to charge to contact.  These counter-tactical arguments all seem to assume that the hoplites are well prepared and fully drilled to receive Companion cavalry, which seems not to have been the case historically.

Whereas I think you are placing the Companions on a pedestal and ignoring the skills of the hoplites   I have proposed no specific training to face a cavalry wedge, just tried to extrapolate what trained and experienced hoplites might do in these circumstances based on how they fought.  You, however, have proposed a detailed drill, practiced to the point of precision, based on no evidence, contemporary or otherwise.  We both naturally feel our guesses are more plausible or realistic

[Erpingham]

Justin, I think we approach the problem with irreconcilable pre-conceptions.  I think experienced and elite hoplites will have similar levels of military skills to Companion cavalry, for example.  The holding of nerve is down to the man, rather than whether he is cavalry or infantry.  A companion is as likely to miss his thrust as a hoplite if they both keep their nerve.  As to hitting the horse, would a skilled warrior aim at the large unamoured target or the smaller armoured one, partly hidden behind the unarmoured target and three feet further away?  It would fit with known later practice (e.g. Roman, Byzantine, Medieval) too.  As to the time sequence, we probably both underestimate what happens in a very short period of time.  But time applies to both equally, so, if a hoplite can't move his head, his aim can't be thrown off either.  While you are confident that hoplites will spin out of the way to allow an unimpeded trot through, I think the horse will be speared before/if that happens.  Short of detailed modelling software, we probably can't answer that definitively.

Could the lead man penetrate through the formation?  Given the closing speed and a bit of luck, possibly.  It is only four ranks deep, so even in the likely scenario that he is on a dying or falling horse, he may make it.  Very little chance if it were deeper.  The second rank men might be through, but are more likely to be blocked by falling bodies and the confusion of ranks.  After that, it becomes too confused to call, as the subsequent ranks will try to modify their trajectory to avoid collisions but get their strike in and the hoplites will try to retain or regain their order.

[Jim Webster]

  The horses could be trained to go for the apparent solid line, knowing it would break up as they arrived.

Pity nobody seems to have achieved this.



This harks back to the question I had before, I'll paraphrase it as "who has examples of people riding horseman through formed up heavy infantry from the front"

So far we've had knights who either clipped the end of a line (or some sources have rode around the line) at the Battle of the Standard, and two deep infantry ridden through

Given this Macedonian excellence, the Normans must have been total poltroons and appalling bad horsemen, unable to train their horses to ride down Anglo Saxon infantry who didn't even have spears

Jim