[Matthew Kelty]

The man is too long winded for me to cite verbatim, but I came across an interesting Gem for you horsey folks:


Certain Instruction Of Orders Militarie
Sir John Smythe
1594
page 169

paraphrased:

The Squadron should charge over 30 paces, 20 at the gallop, 10 at the full Carirre

(A new term for me, but I assume that means the full run?)

He reiterates a little later to not "put forward" into the full Carirre beyond 10 paces.

So, there you have at least one period citation to go by...

[Jean Thibodeau]

Would make sense that if one is talking about the shock of impact the speed of impact is all that matters not for how long a distance the horses were moving at maximum speed.

Now if covering the distance is important to not be subjected to too many voleys of musketery or canon fire then maybe not ambling over slowly to the ennemi would be a good idea.

Also in the last 10 paces there is not enough time for the formation to become disorganised.

As I have no real life experience with riding horses I hope the above makes sense even if only based on what I hope is logical reasonning.

Looking forward to Gordon's comments.

[Gordon Frye]

Well, I had a great, long post, but the server ate my homework, so a slightly shorter one, with fewer quotes, will have to do now.

I've been digging through John Cruso's "Militarie Instructions for the Cavall'rie", in the form of a facsimile of the first edition as printed in 1632, with commentary by Brig. Peter Young. Unfortunately all of the commentary is focused upon the ECW period and how the manual relates, so isn't terribly valid for what we're talking about. But the text certainly is.

First, Cruso defines "pace" in a footnote on page 102 as "[F]ive foote make a pace, 1000 paces make a mile". This seems to be the consensus of most Renaissance authors, though I believe a few go with the more modern idea that a pace is only a yard, rather than five feet. But we'll go with Cruso's definition here.

As far as gaits go, Cruso has this in capter XXVII (page 35): "If you will have him to trot, you are to move both your legges forward, for the gallop, to move them more forward, and for the careere to yerk them most forward, and to move the bodie a little forward with it." Thus we have Trot, Gallop and Careere, the last being a full-on hell-for-leather run (there are still some folks who quarrel with the definitions of "canter" and "gallop" as to which is the faster. We'll say that "careere" in this case is full-speed for a large horse carrying an armoured man, around 30 MPH.)

In chapter XXVIII (page 37) "Managing arms, extending to postures and motions. Of exercising the lance." he states that "In his charging of the enemie, he begins upon his pace or trot, then falls into a gallop, but must not begin his careere untill he be within some 60. paces of his enemie; presenting his lance (from the advance) at the half of that distance, and charing it for the shock as occasion serveth." In a footnote Cruso quotes de la Noue: "De 200 pas ils commencent a' galloper, et de 100 a' courir a' toute bride, qui est faire erreur, n'estat besoin de prendre tant d'espace" meaning that the French gendarmerie tended to start their gallop too soon, at 200 paces, and the careere at 100, also too far out. You would wind your horses quickly with those sorts of charges, leaving little reserve for further charging.

Further on, on page 97, Cruso says that "If a company of Lances were to fight against foot, they were not to give their charge in a united bodie (neither upon this nor any occasion whatsoever) because even the second rank of them hardly doth any certain execution, but the were to charge them rank after rank, wheeling off to the reare; to that end keeping large distances between rank and rank." Then "if the Lances were to fight against Cuirassiers, they were (by two ranks together) to fetch their careers, and so to charge them, especially on the flanks and rear: every second rank forbearing the shock, till the first had done it, and was wheeled off."

Per Cuirassiers vs. Curiassiers: "If one companie of Cuirassiers be to fight against another, your enemie charging in full career, you are to make a Carracoll..." he then goes on to describe a rather unlikely maneuver that he claims to have gotten from Walhausen of dividing your force to let the enemy ride straight through, then pouncing upon his flanks. But no matter what, it certainly describes Pistoliers charging in at "full career".

So there is one more tidbit of period literature to describe fully that not only Lancers but Pistoliers (Cuirassiers) were expected to charge in at speed. More later!

Cheers,

Gordon

[Lloyd Clark]

My wife will be thrilled, I need to expand our library (again)

Thanks for that info, Gordon, you sent me in a direction that I hadn't thought of on some equestrian combat research that I am doing for the Schola St. George. I'll make sure to post me findings here (if anyone is interested).

And tell Mike Neeley, hi from me. We used to work together at the Chicago Medieval Times.

[Gordon Frye]

Lloyd: You bet! I'll say hi to Mike next time I talk to him... amazingly enough he's into the whole "Father and Husband" routine now, LOL! Good for him, I say!

I would be most happy to work with you in building up some good information for your Schola St. George research. There is (obviously!) a HUGE amount that we don't really know about the function and details of the mounted arm from the period, which is there for us to find if only we dig a little deeper. So we both need to get out our shovels (aka "library cards" )and start at it!

I'm digging deeper into Francios de la Noue to, and finding some interesting information as well. One of the things he notes is that while a single Lancer will often beat a single Pistolier, it isn't true for masses. As Cuso notes, you can't focus all of your Lancers together in a mass and have any good result due to the weapon's limitations; however the main strength of Pistoliers IS their mass. Further he points out that once the melee has broken out, the Pistolier is even MORE dangerous (at least until he runs out of loaded pistols, ) for as de la Noue points out as well, the Lance is a single-shot weapon, and the Lancer is forced to his sword in the melee (unless he is wise enough to also have a pair of pistols!) I'll try to dig up those quotes for you later.

Anyway, glad that you are finding out cool stuff here, I sure am! (Hmmm... methinks we need to try an experiment: you form a squadron of heavy Lancers in full armour, I'll form a squadron of Pistoliers in half-suits, and we can play. But if I have to fire blanks/paint balls, you have to use boffer lances!)

Take care, and I look forward to hearing about your research!

Cheers,

Gordon

[Daniel Staberg]

[Gordon Frye]

[Dustin R. Reagan]