Split from a different topic I will answer here.

Rodolfo Martínez wrote:

Quote: Well I don't know too much about Western Europe's management of horse exhaustion, so I hope someone can fill us in on that, but it was common practice in many Eastern equestrian forces to have more than one horse per warrior. The Mongols, for example, would have a string of three or more horses per warrior, and if one died or got tired he would go back and get another. European men-at-arms used to have several horses. But, what happens if you find yourself in the middle of a thight melee, and a bastard hurts your horse, or it gets too tired?

The first real 'cavalry' armies we know of are chariot forces. The clash between the Hittites and Egyptians at Kadesh is wellknown.
What I know of this is that no backup horses were travelling with the armies. The horses were extremely well trained and expected to be able to travel the distances without problems and most likely could. The hittite army invested 7 months of dedicated training in each horse and as chariots would fail underway too, this made availeble a multitude of horses as these were used in teams of four per chariot. Same thing during/after battle.

The numidian light cavalry in the roman army would ride one horse only but in their home land often rode with two horses fíghting! They rode one stallion and the other stallion would fight on the left hand side. As a rule this lightest of cavalries avoided direct contact and could indeed ride seemingly untiringly. They lost VERY few horses.

The mentioned asiatic nomads did not realy have dedicatedly trained warhorses as such and in fact calculated to eat the spent horses too. This meant the armies were frighteningly fast but as they needed a vast amount of horses this limited their main strategy of mounted mass artillery to spaceous areas or at least to the 'vecinity' of this.
They had increadible horse resources in their vast home ranges. (What estranges me more is where and how they got the enourmous number of composite bows! Those were not at all easy nor quick to fabricate.)
This seems to have been their main handicap the further they ventured into western europe, the need of a continuous supply of replacement horses and thus a vast herd closeby and this herd needed grazing land.
The asiatic nomads were rather exceptional in the speed of their armies as over the ages the main bodies of armed forces travelled extremely slow. One of the main differences being the using up of horses.

As the sharpest possible contrast to this, Alexander the Great may have had backup horses but nevertheless he rode his Buceaphalus for some 20 years(!) untill the horse died in battle reputedly saving his master out of a tight spot.

During the middle ages in the west a well trained warhorse, the destrier, represented quite an investment and was a realy valuable possession. Breeding, training and proven battle-worthyness made them quality assets. Only the wealthier knights could afford more than one real destrier.
It is mentioned and seems reasonable that the warhorses were usually not ridden unless/untill one expected to do battle.

The mamluk in their furusiyya value the coöperation between man and horse and this only becomes special if the rider can spend time, a lot of time with his mount(s). It is almost inevitable that the rider will have a favourite even if he is lucky enough to have resources for two or more.

Obviously horses died in battle just like men did, so replacements wére a factor that undoubtedly was taken into account. I doubt however that this was more than a secondary logistical problem simply because riders also died.
So, dúring a battle riders could probably mount a horse of a wounded or killed companian more easily than get one from lager íf there was one there.

Who is not familiar with 'a horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!' ? As it turned out King Richard III proved right. He did not get a horse and lost his kingdom.... So, no replacement reaily at hand there :lol:

A different aspect is the expected life-span of a war-horse. Buceaphalus is not likely to have been representative for horses during the medieval period when horses suffered from poor quality husbandry not differenty than men did.
This is a point of further study for me as I have the question how and by which horses the crusaders replaced their destriers as the 'arab' breed is not suiteble. The iberian type barb however is but like I say, different subject.

Peter

In re Megiddo,

My recollection is that Thutmoses' account of the spoils referred to things taken after the battle at Megiddo, not the fall of the town. There were remarkably few Canaanite casualties, suggesting more of a rout than a knock-down slugfest; and that leads me to suspect the ratio of horses to chariots is fairly close to what the Canaanite army started out with.

It is tricky to take document litterally. Both perception and purpose heavily influance the data and numbers are usually doubtfull at least.

Apart from chariots, mounted cavalry did exist next to driving. Reliefs and art is availeable. We may not know much about this and at present assúme
They were not numerous or limited to messengers or scouts BUT... as driving was the noble thing their may have been a heavy biass in the pictural art.
There are several mentions of warriors mounting their driving horses to flee.
So, the appearant ratio between horses and chariot may be a misrepresentation ánd if correct not mean reserve horses as 'horses' does not automatically mean 'charriot horses'.

@Kikkuli
Kikkuli does not mention battle nor tactics AT ALL. There are however very many documents in the librairy of Hattusha.

Apart from the obvious economics, a possibly (thus possibly not too) telling experience is that extra horses need a lot of extra logistics. Even on a trek on a minute scale even load horses are only to be used if not to be avoided.
I do not knów but I find a body of reserve horses, apart from possibly some for the demi-gods in charge, highly unlikely.

Peter

It might not be quite as simple as it seems. Even the Egyptians were transitioning away from chariots and towards mounted cavalry between 1500 to 1000 BCE according to subject matter experts on them. The meaning of the numbers depend a lot on what one assumes.

There is an obvious disparity between the number of prisoners and men killed versus the number of chariots. How big was the army and equestrian constituent that was routed? How many horses per chariot?

I am not refuting Felix's conclusion, just stating that the numbers given in this excerpt did not make it "crystal clear" for me....

Would it help if I add a quip about the Egyptian account mentioning the fleeing Canaanite charioteers being carried up the city walls by means of ropes after the gates were closed? They obviously couldn't have carried their chariots (or horses) along...