Cataphract: Encyclopedia II - Cataphract - Equipment and Tactics

Cataphract - Equipment and Tactics

Equipment and tactics varied, but cataphracts generally wore heavy armor of scale armour, mail, lamellar armour, horn, or thick quilted cloth, carried a shield, sat on an armoured horse, and charged with lances (kontos) in a tight knee-to-knee formation. Most armies' cataphracts would be equipped with an additional side-arm such as a sword or mace, for use in the melee that followed the charge. Some wore armour that was primarily frontal rather than providing equal protection all around, and sometimes likewise for the horse armour. In some armies cataphracts were not equipped with shields, particularly if they had heavy body armour.

Many cataphract types were equipped with bows in addition to their lances and heavy armour, to allow them to engage the enemy from afar before charging. Cataphract archery was sometimes used tactically in disciplined formations where half the cataphracts stood facing the enemy as an armoured fence while the other half looped through the line to shoot and then back behind it to reload, increasing their safety against return fire from the enemy. Cataphracts without bows are sometimes referred to simply as lancers.

Some later cataphract types were also equipped with heavy darts (marzobarbouloi) to be hurled at the enemy lines during a charge, to disorder the defensive formation immediately before the impact of the lances. With or without darts, a cataphract charge would usually be "shot in" by foot or horse archers to either side, or by additional cataphracts who would charge in turn after having shot in the first assault. Some armies formalized this tactic by deploying separate types of cataphract, a very heavily armored bowless lancer for the primary charge and more conventional lance-and-bow cataphracts for supporting units.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Equipment and Tactics", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki