138 CHARIOTS AND CAVALRY 



Each nation passed through a phase when 

 chariotry were the only mounted troops of 

 tactical use in war. The importing of the 

 largest and heaviest horses to be had, the 

 feeding of these with grain, and cross-breeding 

 of the Dun types with the Bay produced by 

 slow degrees a remount for use by cavalry. 



Earliest in the running were the Hebrews, 

 for about looo e.g. King Solomon built stables 

 for 40,000 chariots, and as many as 12,000 

 cavalry. As early as 700 b.c. Armenia, being 

 in contact with the ^Asiatic and Russian horse 

 stocks, became a large horse breeding estabUsh- 

 ment, suppl^dng remounts southward to Asia 

 Minor, where in b.c. 560 King Croesus of Lydia 

 had good cavalry, to Syria and Palestine, to 

 Assyria, and to Persia down to the fourth 

 century. But in the meantime shipping had 

 grown in the Mediterranean, and ships of 

 sufficient burden to carry African Bays began 

 to supply the Greeks. From the pony 

 chariots of the fourteenth century e.g. a 

 steadily improving stock marked the rise of 

 Hellas. The Achaeans of 1000 e.g. had 

 imported Bays. The Greeks of 400 e.g. had 

 cavalry. Then came the breeding of fine 

 horses in Macedonia, and, after the death of 

 Philip in e.g. 336, the mounted troops of his 



