what was the function of the Roman cavalry?

[RUBICON]

For instance in the 17th century, John Cruso in his "Militarie Instructions for the Cavallerie", the standard manual used for cavalry in the English Civil War, wrote how to train a horse "to ride him against a compleat armour, so set upon a steak, that he may overthrow it, and trample it under his feet: that so (and by such other means) your horse (finding that he receiveth no harm) may become bold to approach any object"

Aryaman2 wrote:

I re read the thread. In short, yes a horse could be trained to approach a single figure and knock it down. But anything in the confines and safety of a training facility is easy. As you say...so set upon a stake.... maybe a straw figure in armour..the horse is trained to approach and gets used to it. But let me remind you this is far different than to a group of foot soldiers around you who 's aim is to bring you down.

Just like the bullfighting horses ( blindfolded) are forced to go against a bull....theyre trained but you still sense the fear in the horse (btw i detest bullfighting).

My own experienced trained horses who jump over 14ft of open water, bright coloured obstcles , who canter in BIG arenas with lots of people & atmosphere, etc can still shy at a little piece of paper blowing in teh wind...can stilll stop spin and run away if a dog suddenly appears. Horses are goverened by instinct, training just allows us to get a little control on this.

I cannot possibly see hundreds of horses all remaining calm, attacking a defensive line, and being easy to handle amongst the confusion and banging of swords, shouting and screaming, smell of blood and guts, and most importantly, there would be bodies, shields & armour, mud all underfoot which makes horses very nervous when they dont have sure footing beneath them.....also, foot soldies being lanced from a distance, no way...how easy would it be to grab teh lance and pull the calvary man off...he has a horses head and neck in the way to manouvre that lance around, plus a shield, plus a nervy horse under him and teh saddles though supportive i dont think would have offered that much support without stirrups specially if teh calvaryman was moving from side to side.
It is hard enough organising teh reins when just riding around let alone, shields & swords etc plus looking around for barbarians swining axes at you, not to mention missiles...one would need eyes in teh back of his helmet.

There is no way a calvaryman would allow himself to get amongst a group of enemy footsoldiers unless he was ambushed, as we hear in many accounts. Certain suicide.