Pre gunpowder era infantry was a meme I'm convinced it was some kind of prank why the fuck would anyone bother with them when cavalry and archers exist?
>muh extensive training
fucking Goth and Vandal barbarian forest niggers living in mud huts and singing hakuna matata every evening was cavalry oriented and you're telling me more civilized people couldn't pull it off?
Infantrymen were rused.
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> horses cost more upkeep
> peasants cant afford upkeep of horses
Bur barbarians could huh?
Barbarians didn't have complicated feudal systems. They were fucking skulls in their mudhuts and couldn't care less
Thats a special kind of stupid.
en.wikipedia.org
Cavalry is only good for harrying. The core of any successful army has, with few exceptions, always been polearm bearers.
Cavalry was garbage until the invention of the stirrup. Then it did dominate the battlefield.
>alternative history
kill yourselves
Too expensive for professional armies to field in large numbers.
Except bows were pretty shit at killing large numbers of people in battle. Go look up the battle of Towton, where you had 20-30,000 longbowmen between the two sides firing at each other for HOURS and still not decisively defeating each other.
And cavalry can't pack as much lethality per foot of engagement as infantry. A man on a horse occupies more space than a man on foot, and can't stand planted and use heavier polearms or even bows as much as one on foot.
Infantry is necessary you imbecile.
Infantry is the core of the military. You have plenty of battles where large groups of cavalry were defeated by an infantry standing their ground (Most infamous exemple : Battle of Coutrai, 1302). Infantry costs less upkeep, has a greater body, is easier to train. Even knights, who were reknowned as heavy cavalry, could get down their horses and act as heavy infantry instead (Battle of Agincourt, for exemple).
Not to mention that it's a pretty big myth that barbarians had a shit ton of horses. The mongols did and other people's from the steppes like the Magyars. Heck the hundreds didn't even use that many horses because they couldn't support them. Most other barbarians were just a bunch of villages dudes who were like, I need to join me a warband so I can stop farming mud. Once they did that it was basically a shit ton of running and spear shit
Huns* my phone autocorrected sorry guys
Tell that to Mongols.
Except the Mongols brought significant numbers of both infantry and hand to hand cavalry. This 100% horse archers thing is memery of the highest order.
WHich Barbarians?
Because Steppe Nomads, while they can raise horses easier than settled cunts, a horse-owning man is by no means a "peasant" among them.
If we're talking of European "Barbarians" like Celts and Germans, these found raising horses VERY problematic, like their medieval descendants later on. Like them only rich warriors can own horses.
They didn't spend time and resources tilling the land, paying as much taxes, building cities and fortifications and elaborate infastructure (roads, docks, etc.), so yeah.
Vandals and Goths I mentioned you dumb fuck.
Jesus the ammount of delusional infantryboos is insane face it infantry was dog shit fucking meat shield at best.
>Goths
>Vandals
>Cavalry Oriented.
No?
They're just good in cavalry but it doesnt say they have an easier time raising fucking horses.
Someone's been playing too much Attila.
They memed their way to india
elefuns tho
One example does not change the fact that infantry is shit.
ok
Calvary didn't have stirrups back then nor was there horses breed for handling armor so they were more easy to get off their horse so long as they keep them in a fixed position.
Archers couldn't do shit against shields in tight formations. Huns ruined their day by avoiding the fuckers with shields in tight formations and fucked with the ones that didn't have shields or weren't in formation.
Hoplites were made to ruin the day of archers and ancient Calvary. Their spears fucked with Calvary and their shields fucked with archers.
>Calvary didn't have stirrups back then
So? Makes very little difference. But keep on meming
It makes a lot of difference when infantry halts your horse so abruptly you're thrown off it slapstick style.
constantly saying "meme" doesn't really change the fact that Calvary were only good for flanking until the Middle ages.
I see you have never rode a horse.
Stirrups do very little in regards to keeping you on your horse, they are designed for better control and balance while turning. Saddles were plenty good enough before stirrups to hold riders on their horses. Cavalry was used for much more more than flanking, very effectively, well before the middle ages.
Quit repeating pop culture history.
I spent 2 years working with horses and riding which is where i realised the stirrup meme was just that.
>Calvary were only good for flanking until the Middle ages.
hmmmm
Why weren't pikes used again until 16th century?
raiding and recon too I admit and can take out light infantry and archers
but Heavy infantry cancel out your momentum (since horses are smart enough to not run into spears pointing right at them) and essentially trap your usually outnumbered Calvary force in a circle of shields, spears, and swords.
Barbarians lived on steppes, where there was endless land for pasture.
In Europe, pasture land was very limited and expensive.
Sorry, are you really claiming heavy cavalry didn't exist or charge before the middle ages?
Stirrups had less to do with riding and more to do with fighting on top of the horse.
they did but they weren't as stable or formulated as the Heavy Infantry or Middle Age Calvary
Look I know you think you are smarter than the people who actually fought in ancient battles but Persians had heavy Calvary AND archers in droves doesn't change
Fighting yes, it will help when leading side to side. That isn't directly related to the decisive charges of medieval knights though, which the stirrup wasn't a factor in.
I don't know why you're implying that I said heavy cavalry was amazing that could beat anything, I'm just calling out your bullshit that it didnt even exist.
The thread is about someone saying that infantry is useless compared to Calvary and archer.
So even if you said it it can't beat everything. OP did say that they can beat all infantry .
Persians didnt have cataphracts during Alexanders conquest
OP is an idiot that goes without saying.
GOLDEN SPURS
I'm a history teacher and infantry was useless.
>useless
Funny how the majority of armies were built up of infantry. Who also did all the holding and heavy lifting with the support of cavalry and archers.
I'm an infantryman and we are useless I only joined to sap tax payers money.
>Full mail
>A fucking new white horse
>But no money for sword or lance left
Because you cant drive group of horses though a mass of spearmen without massive casualties.
I'm United States Army general and we only use infantry as a joke.
I'm guessing you're not much for "book-lernin", so how about you just go watch Braveheart, because it pretty much answers your questions.
Memes aside that is basically true today. Infantry is used for holding ground and thats about it.
>There are people, in this thread, who think Infantry was useless in medieval times
>There are people, in this thread, who don't know anything about the battle of the Golden Spurs
to be fair
not much else can hold ground as well
America not putting much emphasis on ground-holding is the reason they suck at it.
he beat ya to it
No, he beat everyone else to it.
Heavy calavary was superior even in the gun powder age. The only problems calavary ever had was when chariots go btfo by iron age spears, javelins, and new formations like the phalanx
>peasants in a feudal army
This meme again
Pikes never fell out of style, the Phalanx formation did.
The Phalanx's main problems are that it is inflexible, it needs to be used in very large numbers to be effective, and requires extensive cavalry support. After Alexander's Empire collapsed, the various successor states opted to mitigate cavalry's usage (Too expensive form them) and just add more pike men to the army. This resulted in them being btfo by the more flexible maniple formations of the Roman army.
Pikes we still popular throughout the middle ages, though in a less prevalent role. They became very prevalent again in the 16th and 17th centuries because they were required to protect musketmen from melee attacks, as they were vulnerable while reloading.
>That isn't directly related to the decisive charges of medieval knights though, which the stirrup wasn't a factor in.
If you are refering to the act of charging with a lance couched under your arm then, yes, a stirrup was in fact necessary. The force would knock you off your horse otherwise. It's not as needed with other forms of attack, though, such as thrusting a spear.
Goths and Vandals weren't forest-niggers. They lived in the steppes among the Scythians for hundreds of years before they invaded the Roman empire.
The stirrup just made it much easier and quicker to train a cavalryman. The actual impact on warfare isn't that great.
Steppe niggers living in mud huts and singing hakuna matata every evening then.
I like this guy
...That's how they became cavalry oriented. You know how people live on the steppe right? All the other Germanic tribes were infantry oriented.
Literally pikemen you nigger. Swiss and Macedonian are both really famous
>The stirrup just improved logistics. The actual impact on warfare isn't that great.
?!
Those horses are illustrated at accurate size, ancient cavalry was an embarrassment.
What is heavy cavalry?
seleucid cav force was better than Alexander's they just had retarded generals who sent it after the baggage train and wrecked their own lines with meme elephants.
Heavy cavalry existed way before the existence of stirrups. Parthian and Sassanid cataphracts existed and were quite effective without stirrups.
What if I tell you that infantry can wield bows?
Infantry can hold positions and defend very well. Archers alone can't do it. Op sound like a retard who thinks that cav archers are the best universal unit. Lrn 2 tactics
Because infantry is good at things cavalry and archers aren't.
Wars were won with pikemen, phalanxes and legions for a reason friend.
PLOUGH THE LILIES
Why won't this fucking shitty stirrup meme go away. One idiot wrote a book claiming the stirrup made Knights and chivalry and everything else medieval possible and everyone laps it up when if you actually put some thought into or even practical testing, it makes no sense.
It's almost as bad as the guy who wrote that book claiming that soldiers don't aim their weapons at enemies and try to intentionally miss, and that soldiers never want to kill their enemies. Which is easily proved wrong by actual battle reports and the fact that humans simply can't stop killing each other since the dawn of our species and war is full of stories of people mowing down lots of men without pause. I mean if almost all soldiers tried to miss WW1 wouldn't have happened.
>If you are refering to the act of charging with a lance couched under your arm then, yes, a stirrup was in fact necessary. The force would knock you off your horse otherwise. It's not as needed with other forms of attack, though, such as thrusting a spear.
No. You do not know how stirrups work. They do not keep the rider from moving backwards off their horse. Not at all. Stirrups slip over the fleet from the toes, if you are pushed back, you will simply slip out of the stirrups, you are not attached to them or clipped into them. Stirrups are platforms for your feet to stand in so you can stand in the saddle for better riding control. They have absolutely nothing to do with preventing you from sliding backwards off the horse, they prevent you falling sideways if you lean, and allow you to lean further.
What does prevent you from slipped off the back of a horse when your lance smashes into a solid object, is your saddle. Your saddle is the thing directly keeping you in place on the horse, saddles have a little wall at the back, preventing you from sliding backwards off the horse, it's quite literally a seat with a back. Saddles with prominent backs have been in use for heavy cavalry forever, well before the medieval, and that is what prevents you from falling off backwards, not the stirrups. Thats how heavy shock cavalry existed well before stirrups and why stirrups are unnecessary to shock cavalry. The real advantage of stirrups, like i said, is superior control of the horse in turning, and being able to stand while riding, like on the peddles of a bike.
I think you're looking at it wrong. There's a difference between your commander ordering you to storm across the trenches and fight and die by the thousands with no other choice, than there is to purposely shoot and kill whole bunches of people at your own accord and free will.
If I ever had to go to war, I would kill people as part of self defense and my orders, rather than because I relish the idea of killing people who are under the exact same bullshit orders from higher up as I am.
That guy´s a bishop, he carried a club so he wouldn´t shed blood.
I don´t think it worked though, clubs shed a lot of blood.
So do fists but it's still less bloody than a blade wound.
You can, because spears does not have magical enchant +100% dmg against cavalry.
>Roman saddle
Celtic actually. The horned saddle was lifted off the Celts.
Doesnt seem to matter as Roman Cavalry was eternally shit tier.
I don't completely disagree with you, of course plenty of soldiers were shooting to kill, but I think it's a narrow point of view to think that most if not all soldiers are happily capable of being murderers, and seeing the enemy as the devil and not just people in the same rut.
Consider the times in war, such as Christmas, when soldiers from each side would sometimes hang out and play cards together before going back to fighting the next day. When the fighting commenced again, they did not immediately dehumanize the enemy to warrant aiming straight for their pretty little faces, it's more that war is chaotic, blind and faceless and it's easier to shoot wildly and never know if you were the one to land any of those kills, than it is to purposely snipe the motherfucker who beat you at poker last night.
Drive your hand into a bed of nails and see what happens, now imagine your hand is a group of horses and the nails are spears.
Even if you can make a group of horses charge such a wall of steel and men if they are not armoured the first will get wounded very badly.
I read some stuff about the club bit just now and it is probably not true that he wields it because of his priestly status.
One of the things I read suggests that the club was a status symbol, because in the Bayeux tapestry both Odo and William the Conqueror wear one.
The club isnt a clerical status, its a military one.
It's called a Baculum. Similar to a marshall's baton, Roman generals held it as a symbol of office (i.e. I can beat you with this stick if you do not obey).
Carried over in the Medieval ages thanks to meme Holy Roman Empire of the Franks.
That's actually a load of fucking shit and you should kill yourself british did charge pikes directly once so the horse bodies would fuck up the formation and simply hopped of them and engaged in melee and that happened when armor was obsolete. Matt Easten made a video about it.
So fuck off with your meme knowledge.
>implying a wall of spears won't hurt you if you charge them at full speed
>implying the horse can't get scared, stop right before the pointy steel, and allow you to fall or be cut down
A couched lance is dangerously effective, and has the kinetic energy of a small artillery roundshot. But it only works if the knights are extremly disciplined, charge together, and if the enemy in front of them retreat.
Contrarly to what most people see in video games or movies, a charge is entirely psychological. That's it. Psychology, this is what matters ; Who's going to break first ? Will it be the knights who suddently stop before the wall of spears, or the spearmen who break formation out of the sudden scare of a heavy cavalry charge ?
During Napoleonic Warfare, the french cavalry men would charge at a slow pace, gallop only 200 meters before the enemy and draw their swords at only 50 meters, because when you're a simple guy with a bayonet, and you suddenly see a huge storm of beasts and a forest of steel being drawn from their scabbards, you shit yourself.
Back in medieval times, charges were far less disciplined. And you can compare different battles and different results to see what I'm talking about.
At Courtrai (Or the Golden Spurs), the flemish managed to hold their position together, the french knights were completly unhorsed and unable to pass through them.
At Castillon, the english troops were tired, massacred by Jean Bureau's artillery, dismounted, broken. That's when the french launched a cavalry assault and managed to freely cut through all of them with maximum ease.
May i ask what spears do you have in mind?
So all what was needed to stop cavalry charge was pointy object in front of soldiers. Yeah.
Straighten your hand with sword or dagger (both have pointy edges!) and you are all safe now.
And now it's my turn to give real life example:
Take your spear and go on the road. What will happen when car crashes into you? Car will be obviously damaged, driver safe and you very dead.
"But horses aren't cars"
Yes, but they are still heavy and fast enough to deadly ram you.
Horses aren't cars. They're living beasts. They were known to freeze, stop, brace, move away when you tried to charge them through a wall of pikes.
War horses were trained differently than the ones we use today for fucking horse racing you imbecile. Name some examples where cavalry couldn't proceed because le ebin horse scare.
this
Of course that a lot of horses will be wounded and dead.
To be honest i can't imagine horses stopping on their own. They are "herd animals" (i don't know if i translated it right), and will be running because other horses are running (like in stampede). Also were trained to not stop on obstacles.
Is it possible to infantry stand their ground against cavalry charge? Obviously yes. But as just you said:
"Contrarly to what most people see in video games or movies"
the same applies here. It's not Disney movie, where infantry is standing and knights are killing themselves just by looking at the spears, and viewers think "oh those stupid people from medieval times doing stupid things"
You gave one example of battle. Disciplined and high morale pikemen formations will win with outnumbered mob of random knights. But what will happen with disciplined pikemen formations against disciplined cavalry formations?
Also, my laughing at spears was about something different. Are pikes dangerous? Sure. But spears, what are they different from swords, when fighting a cavalry? IMO nothing. And in games spearman always get some stupid bonus against horses, and that shouldn't be a thing.
Courtrai, any battle with the swiss or the hussites, and later the spanish tercios. There's also instances where the horses died before they could reach the enemy's lines, like Crécy, Agincourt, or Poitiers.
Those are battles lost, not battles where horses got scared and run away.
>any battle with the swiss or the hussites, and later the spanish tercios
I would hesitate to use the term "any" given that examples to the contrary can always be provided.
I was about to say that Medieval Cavalry was a lot larger than that.
>But spears, what are they different from swords, when fighting a cavalry? IMO nothing. And in games spearman always get some stupid bonus against horses, and that shouldn't be a thing.
A spear can be braced against the ground so that the the wielder doesn't take the force of a charging horse. The longer reach also allow you to keep the cavalry further away which is nice, allows the second rank to also present and lets more than one guy stab at a time.
If you want proof that heavy infantry can beat cavalry just read up on Xenophon:
literally every armed force ever in the entire history of the earth appears to disagree with you
>If you want proof that heavy infantry can beat cavalry just read up on Xenophon:
>en.wikipedia.org
>Spend entire battle chasing after lighter troops, accomplishing nothing
Not sure if you picked the right battle?
A spear? 2 meters long spear braced against ground? And at the same time holding a shield?
And even if they threw shield away and did this, how effective will be a whooping ~80-100cm of "danger zone" against 4m lances or/and a rain of arrows?
Multiple rows and bracing against ground is a pike thing. So i'm holding my opinion, that spears are no good against cavalry.
IF YOU WANNA SURRENDER YOU GOTS TO SPEAK DUTCH