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Lädt ... Dawn of the Horse Warriors: Chariot and Cavalry Warfare, 3000-600BCvon Duncan Noble
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The domestication of the horse revolutionized warfare, granting unprecedented strategic and tactical mobility, allowing armies to strike with terrifying speed. The horse was first used as the motive force for chariots and then, in a second revolution, as mounts for the first true cavalry. The period covered encompasses the development of the first clumsy ass-drawn chariots in Sumer (of which the author built and tested a working replica for the BBC); takes in the golden age of chariot warfare resulting from the arrival of the domesticated horse and the spoked wheel, then continues down through the development of the first regular cavalry force by the Assyrians and on to their eventual overthrow by an alliance of Medes and the Scythians, wild semi-nomadic horsemen from the Eurasian steppe. As well as narrating the rise of the mounted arm through campaigns and battles, Duncan Noble draws on all his vast experience as a horseman and experimental archaeologist to discuss with great authority the development of horsemanship, horse management and training and the significant developments in horse harness and saddles. Keine Bibliotheksbeschreibungen gefunden. |
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Google Books — Lädt ... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)357.09Social sciences Public Administration, Military Science CavalryBewertungDurchschnitt:
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Nominally, a popular history book about chariot and cavalry warfare, but despite the subtitle, cavalry receives little attention. That could have been lived with, particularly as I came to it primarily out of an interest in chariotry. What makes the book such a disappointment is that the bits I do know something about have so many errors that I can hardly trust it about subjects I'm not already knowledgeable about. Ancillary annoyances include a chaotic disposition, frequent ambiguity, intermittent illogic, and occasional contradictions. The maps are unusually useless even by the relaxed standards of niche publishing and typographical errors abound (which last is something of a specialty of the publisher, Pen & Sword).
Consistency of terminology isn't Noble's strong point either: a particularly bad example is "Central Asia", by which he sometimes seem to understand the steppe belt from the Ukraine to Manchuria, sometimes the area south of the steppe between the Caspian and China; and at one point explicitly takes to include Armenia (which is said to border China). At yet other times it's anyone's guess what he means.
The perhaps best part of the book - recalling that "best" is a relative term - is the appendix about Noble's own experiments with a replica of a Sumerian battle-cart. It's considerably better written than the main text, and while I won't vouch for the accuracy one can reasonably hope he knows what he's talking about here.