,.„A,.. in.] ROMAN OAVALKV. 53 



Roman kniglits to fight dismounted, but it could not 

 have been the intention to use them generally in that 

 way, or it is probable they would have been more 

 heavily armed with defensive armour. 



At the battle of Sentinura, the Roman and Campanian 

 cavalry charged the Gaulish horsemen twice and with 

 ttfect, when they were encountered by the war-chariots 

 of the enemy, a force wholly strange to them, which 

 friglitened their horses, threw them into confusion, 

 and drove them in rout back upon their infantry.^ The 

 war-chariots in this action seem to have done effective 

 .service, but evidently more on account of their novelty 

 and the moral effect they produced, than on account of 

 any real value in them. 



SECTION IT. — EQUIPMENT, ARMAMENT, AND TACTICS OF 

 THE EAKLY ROMAN CAVALRY. 



The equipments of the first Roman horsemen were of 

 a very simple character. They seem to have worn a 

 species of tunic which left the limbs naked, in order 

 that they could mount and dismount with the greatest 

 facility.^ They did not use either saddles or stirrups, 

 but had a pad or covering upon which they sat, and 

 which was kept in its place by a girth, a breast leather, 

 and a crupper.^ They wore no cuirass, their sole defence 

 being a round shield covered with ox-hide, and a helmet. 

 Their lances, according to Polybius, were useless for two 

 reasons : in the first place they were very light and weak, 

 so that the least thing would break them ; in the second, 

 place, they were only pointed with iron at one end, so 

 that when they were broken in the first charge, which 

 was usually the case, the piece remaining in the knight's 

 hand, not being sharpened with iron, was of no further 

 use. Polybius speaks very contemptuously of the 

 bucklers used by the Romans in early times, saying that 

 they were no defence as they were not strong enough to 

 resist anything, and even if properly made, the leather 



1 Arnold, 340. « Duparcq, 117. " Polybius, book vi. 



ch. 4 ; Humbex-t, 27. 



