Macedonian cavalry success against close order infantry

[Jim Webster]

Just to point out that with livestock a 'visually' solid wall is a solid wall. There are technical vision problems with equine binocular vision (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equine_vision#Visual_field ) because of eye placement and head shape, but you see it in cattle as well. Moving cattle and horses out of a field onto a lane, they'll not see the gateway because in a narrow (ten foot wide) lane, the hedge of the opposite side of the lane 'blocks' the gate.

What you're forgetting with a hoplite formation is that if the infantry are loose enough for there to be viable gaps a horse can see so the infantry can be knocked down and brushed aside, the infantry in the second rank can attack the point of the wedge from the side and may even move forward to tackle the horsemen. One man with a shield can screen the man behind him disemboweling the lead horse
If the infantry are too tightly packed to do this sort of thing, there are no gaps and nobody is getting knocked down so the wedge doesn't happen.

As for "no evidence of any hoplite infantry actually having an anti-cavalry drill" we don't have much evidence for them having formal drills of any sort except in the later period.
But they'd been fighting Thessalians and Persians for a couple of centuries prior to the Macedonians getting involved so it wasn't as if you're discussing Aztecs seeing horses for the first time.
It's difficult to assume that Macedonian cavalry came as a shock to the Greeks or were doing anything they hadn't seen before, both Scythians and Thessalians used a wedge

Jim

[Erpingham]

Couple of points from Patrick.

"Horse eye level"  - there doesn't seem to me a lot of difference between the height of a spear held overarm and the eye level of a horse.  Horse would be a bit higher but nothing that would create difficulty.  Also, stabbing at the throat maybe more worthwhile - horses have tough heads.

Second, grounding spears.  This is a bit static - hoplites surely would have actively stabbed at the cavalrymen and horses.  They may not have had cavalry drills but that is how they fought infantry, so why would they just stand there against infantry?  If I'm allowed a parallel, medieval spearmen did ground their spears to receive cavalry but also actively stabbed, so I would be surprised if hoplites would stand there waiting for something to run onto their spear.

[Jim Webster]

Roman cavalry horses were 14 hands (or thereabouts), so that is about 4'8" at the withers

Looking at http://www.allenandpage.com/uploaded/image/Feed-Chart.jpg you get a feel for the weight, and http://www.equine-world.co.uk/about_horses/horse-images/measure-horse.jpg you can see that the eyes are about four to six inches higher than the height in hands. The eyes of a 14 hand horse will be about 5ft above the ground.

Jim

[Erpingham]

Assuming Vitruvian proportion, a 5ft 6in hoplite and the spear held level on the shoulder, I reckon the point would be about 4ft 9 inches above ground.  It is often shown with arm extended higher than this, thrusting down, but this may be a more infantry combat stance (to get over the shield of the man facing in a hoplite clash).

[Mark G]

Just to check,
We have no other examples of companions breaking frontally into formed infantry.

So why abandon a battle winning tactic?

[Patrick Waterson]

Just to check,
We have no other examples of companions breaking frontally into formed infantry.

So why abandon a battle winning tactic?

The short answer would seem to be that after the end of the Achaemenid Empire, the kind of formed infantry that Companions found themselves up against were mostly armed with sarissas.  The 21' sarissa would conclusively outreach a 13' xyston no matter what the cavalryman did.

The other consideration is that Macedonian cavalry usually had a more pressing preoccupation on the field: enemy cavalry.  At Issus Darius put all his cavalry in one sector, leaving the Companions free to plough through his Kardakes.  At the Granicus, Alexander used a small number of contingents to restrain and dispatch the Persian left, reserving his Companions for a strike through to Darius.  From the lineup Darius used as described in Arrian, and looking at the scene depicted by the Alexander Mosaic, Alex would have driven through the hoplite contingent on Darius' left to engage his (mounted) kingsmen - the scene that appears to be depicted on the Mosaic.  One may note hoplite bodies on the ground (scattered rather than clumped) and the fact that the Companions still have their lances.

This would have been the last occasion in which Companions needed to charge through hoplites (as far as I can recall).  Thereafter the foes faced by Alexander either fielded a substantial mounted contingent (Scythians and Indians) which the Macedonian horse concentrated upon. or the opposition did not attempt battle, but endured a siege.  Following Alexander's death, the predominant infantry type was the sarissa-armed phalanx, and attacking that head-on was not really an option for any cavalry type.

[Patrick Waterson]

Couple of points from Patrick.

"Horse eye level"  - there doesn't seem to me a lot of difference between the height of a spear held overarm and the eye level of a horse.  Horse would be a bit higher but nothing that would create difficulty.  Also, stabbing at the throat maybe more worthwhile - horses have tough heads.

Second, grounding spears.  This is a bit static - hoplites surely would have actively stabbed at the cavalrymen and horses.  They may not have had cavalry drills but that is how they fought infantry, so why would they just stand there against infantry?  If I'm allowed a parallel, medieval spearmen did ground their spears to receive cavalry but also actively stabbed, so I would be surprised if hoplites would stand there waiting for something to run onto their spear.

Jim did mention that horses lack effective binocular vision: if they can miss a gate, not seeing a spearpoint should be easy.  From the hoplite's point of view, trying to stab the throat or even the chest would indeed seem more productive, and in my understanding of the Macedonian technique the length of the xyston and the advance deployment of the point would be intended to get the hoplite to look to his own defences before he could think about making mischief with his spear.

So yes, I agree that a hoplite would naturally incline to an 'active defence', attempting to insert his steel rather than hoping the target would do it for him.  Against standard javelin-armed cavalry he should be able to do this, which may explain why they did not usually close to melee against hoplites (there is one case in Xenophoon's Hellenica where the Persians did, having caught the hoplites foraging and run a couple of scythed chariots through them first just to make sure, but frontal charging into melee against hoplites was very much the exception not the rule).  The length of the xyston, combined with Alexander's preference for using the opponent's face as target, would tend to pre-empt any 'active defence' by the hoplite.

What you're forgetting with a hoplite formation is that if the infantry are loose enough for there to be viable gaps a horse can see so the infantry can be knocked down and brushed aside, the infantry in the second rank can attack the point of the wedge from the side and may even move forward to tackle the horsemen. One man with a shield can screen the man behind him disemboweling the lead horse
If the infantry are too tightly packed to do this sort of thing, there are no gaps and nobody is getting knocked down so the wedge doesn't happen.

The overriding consideration here is that the wedge is not moving in a Xeno's Paradox fashion allowing countermoves by the infantry: it is a developing threat whose aspect is changing all the time, and if hoplites start moving they just lose whatever cohesion they do have and become easier targets for the faster-moving and faster-acting cavalrymen.  There is simply no time for the hoplites to react as the wedge plunges into and through their formation.

Gaps are not necessary to knock down hoplites: reach is.  If the formation is too packed and unyielding, yes, the wedge will come to a stop (as seems to have happened when Alexander charged the mercenaries at the Granicus).  At the normal interval of 3' frontage per man, it will not be sufficiently dense to prevent progress.

As for "no evidence of any hoplite infantry actually having an anti-cavalry drill" we don't have much evidence for them having formal drills of any sort except in the later period.

Precisely.  As far as I can tell, nobody worked out an effective procedure for them against Macedonian cavalry.  Against other cavalry they seem to have relied upon the reach of their weapons (judging very loosely by Plataea once the Spartans got into action).  This would have worked well against javelin-armed types but not against the xyston-armed Macedonians.

But they'd been fighting Thessalians and Persians for a couple of centuries prior to the Macedonians getting involved so it wasn't as if you're discussing Aztecs seeing horses for the first time.
It's difficult to assume that Macedonian cavalry came as a shock to the Greeks or were doing anything they hadn't seen before, both Scythians and Thessalians used a wedge.

Precisely - a wedge with javelins.  The Macedonians used a wedge with the xyston, giving them an appreciable - even decisive - edge in reach and impact, and making the new tactic of frontally charging hoplites possible.  Having a few archers in support did not hurt, either.

[Jim Webster]

Actually a javelin has a lot longer reach, and can create the gap before you need to enter it. If the lead rider gets his spear stuck in the shield of a hoplite the entire wedge grinds to a halt out of embarassment :-)

Jim

[Mark G]

Are you arguing that the wedge was only used against hoplites?

[Jim Webster]

Personally I'd suggest the cavalry wedge was used because it was more easily manoeuvred than a line.
When fighting other mounted troops it might be that the wedge naturally flattened out, or it might be that the wedge worked better against cavalry than infantry

Jim

[aligern]

This is an oft worked through debate in which we alll imagine the situation  as cavalry charge infantry.
usually we end up quoting examples from Napoleonic warfare where a horse dies on the square to create a gap or puzzling over how Bayard's fully armoured knights can  pass completely through a Swiss pike phalanx several times. Part of the problem is that there is no one right answer as to what happens when cavalry charge infantry. The weakness of a debate based upon our  imaginative reconstructions is that , even for much better documented periods, there is not much evidence. Where there are incidents we lack basics such as the detail of terrain, the training and drills of the participants, particularly the horses, even the actual useage of the weapons concerned. I see we now even have uncertainty as to whether hoplites would clump up or open to use their weapons against cavalry.
Hoplites had experience of a dangerous charging enemy. the scythed chariot. They seem to deal with these pretty well so I assume that they had drills.  Persian Cavalry were still dangerous, art shows them  fighting with hoplites. That all suggests to me that hoplites in good order resisted cavalry and that melee took place at the front edge of the hoplite formation.
If Alex and his wedge can break in then it becomes crucial how deep the hoplites are. If four deep they are ruined, if eight maybe they hold and if sixteen then Alex is in trouble....if the hoplites have good enough morale not

[Jim Webster]

With the case of the horse charging the square, a dead horse can travel thirty yards and ignores infantry lines.
Basically a horse moving at speed, struck by a musket ball, keeps moving under its own momentum until finally it collapses. This gives it a massive advantage when charging squares compared to living horses who shy away.

With regard to Bayard, he was obviously just awfully difficult to kill. When you think about it you can see the problem facing the Swiss. Do you drop the pike and stab him with a dagger, or leave your mates behind to prod at him with a pike at a distance?
On the other hand Bayard doesn't seem to have done a lot of damage. King Francis would boast that "thirty brave charges" were hurled by the French gendarmerie against the stubborn Swiss but the Swiss were still there,  and finally left when the Venetians arrived. So having gendarmes ride into or through your formation doesn't seem to have been a major issue. Perhaps they weren't doing a lot of damage either?

Jim

[Erpingham]

I think we've actually done well to avoid bringing in out of period examples (though I've been itching to do so ).  We can , for example, say with certainty that medieval cavalry fought formed infantry and have some idea of what went down.  We seem to be seriously deficient in examples of Macedonian cavalry doing so - at best Patrick has turned up two, which exist in such insufficient detail that we can't be sure they refer to cavalry attack on formed hoplites at all.  Patrick's thesis seems to be that for a brief period, cavalry had an advantage because they carried a longer spear and had effective wedge tactics.  The critical element would seem to be spear length - if the hoplite becomes a phalangite, cavalry attacks no longer happen.

To save us going to out of period, are there other examples within a few hundred years of cavalry tackling formed infantry.  For example, did Hellenistic cavalry never attack infantry or was it only phalangites they stayed clear of?  Did anybody attack Romans, Iberians, Galatians?  If so, do we have any details that would help us here?

[Jim Webster]

We have quite a few accounts of Romans versus Parthians and Sassanids. After discussions on DBMM list because of DBMM rule changes I even wrote an article in Slingshot :-)

(Sassanids versus the Romans)


Jim

[Erpingham]

Typical - my post and Jim's crossed in the post and mine now looks sort of sarcastic, which it wasn't meant to be.

Trying to bring a general point out of the Bayard stuff, the key if you look at this and medieval examples isn't isolated break ins, but the infantry managing to maintain the cohesion to isolate and destroy (or in Bayard's case, expel) the intruder.  I think this would have been key in the case of the hoplites too.