230 Chinese Clay Figures 



corps of chevaulegers (king ki) 1 is recommended, as the heavy infantry 

 and war-chariots of the Chinese were powerless against the Huns. He 

 further advised employing the tactics of the Huns against the Huns, 

 and hiring mercenaries of the horde I-k'ii for this purpose; while within 

 the boundaries of the empire the Chinese army should continue with the 

 Chinese mode of tactics. This suggestion was not carried out im- 

 mediately, but we see it brought into effect under the Emperor Wu 

 (b.c. 140-87), who may be regarded as the reformer of Chinese cavalry. 

 The man who really achieved the work and infused new life into the 

 cavalry arm was General Ho K'iu-ping, who completely abandoned 

 the traditional ground of Chinese tactics, and put the institution of 

 chevaulegers into practice. 2 As a youth of eighteen he was an ac- 

 complished horseman and archer, and at the head of a squadron of eight 

 hundred chevaulegers, forming the advance-guard of the army, gained 

 laurels against the Huns. In b.c. 121, when only twenty years of age, 

 he was appointed commander-in-chief of the entire force of chevaulegers, 

 and defeated the Huns in six consecutive battles. 3 His common sense is 

 shown by the fact that he positively refused to study Sun Wu's "Art 

 of War," and preferred to trust to his own judgment. This doubtless 

 means that he was a practical man who rejected theories, and by long 

 experience had grasped the warfare of his adversary and appropriated 

 the latter's method as the most promising one. His victories over the 

 Huns are due to the tactics of cavalry which he adopted, while his pred- 

 ecessors under the early Han emperors prior to Wu met with dis- 

 astrous failures by opposing infantry to the horses of the enemy. Surely 

 the Chinese had bought their experience at a high price. 



Cavalry thus grew during the Han period into an independent 

 arm, and finally was the most important one in the wars against the 

 roving tribes of Central Asia. The cavalry had its own organization 

 and administrative powers. As shown by a passage in a memorial 



1 Or p'iao ki (No. 9134), "fleet cavaliers" (see Chavannes, Les M6moires his- 

 toriques de Se-ma Ts'ien, Vol. Ill, p. 559), apparently translation of Turkish lap- 

 kunci (P. Horn, Das Heer- und Kriegswesen der Grossmoghuls, p. 21, and W. 

 Radloff, Worterbuch der Turk-Dialecte, Vol. Ill, col. 1922). 



2 A repetition of this spectacle took place in Europe when it suffered in the tenth 

 century from the inroads of the Hungarians, until Henry I of Germany, by adopting 

 the cavalry methods of the enemy, finally succeeded in repelling him. Again, in the 

 thirteenth century, the light horsemen of the Mongols and Saracens got the better 

 of the iron-clad cavalry of central Europe. Only the German Order of Prussia then 

 possessed enough military acumen to form an excellent light cavalry under the 

 designation "Turcopoles" placed at the command of a "Turcopole," which rendered 

 good services against Lithuanians and Poles (M. Jahns, Ross und Reiter, Vol. II, 

 p. 86). 



3 His biography is in Shi ki (Ch. in) and Ts'ien Han shu (Ch. 50). It has been 

 translated by A. Pfizmaier (Sitzungsberichte Wiener Akademie, 1864, pp. 152-170); 

 see also Giles, Biographical Dictionary, p. 260. 



