Cataphract, Clibanarii, whatever, against Infantry

[Aulus Perrinius]

And of course a human body is very squishy and so if a running horse stepped on it. . .

Thanks for your reply. I agree that an untrained horse might balk at walking over bodies. I have been at ranches and Zoos where they use either a grate of metal bars or something that looks like a plastic egg carton to block opened gates to hoofed mammal's passage in just this way.

My interest is actually a bit beyond that behavior though. If cavalry hit a phalanx at anything faster than a walk and succedded in killing/toppling men in their ranks, then they could not help but cross over the patch of fallen bodies. I just wondered if this was suicidal, indicating that cavalry would have to charge right up tp a phalanx and then slow to engage the first rank if the phalanx stood firm. This would to some extent render the age-old debate about cavalry charging steady, formed men irrelevent, because I don't think anyone would argue that you can't walk a horse into a rank of men, fighting your way in and pushing. The whole equine behavioral limitation of not wanting to run into a wall of men is gone.

It would also be an indication that accounts where horses do charge through ranks of men and we don't read of piles of horseflesh are either embelleshments on such a walking attack, or indications that the men were already well broken out of ranks.

Only in the sixteen hundreds are cavalry mentioned attacking a trot and this was against the other guy's cavalry. Attacking at a walk destroys any shock capability.

At battles such as Omdurman the 21st is mentioned being slowed to walk only after they hacked their way through the mahadist square. Which shows that the 21st hit the enemy at a gallop as well as Churchhills account of the massive amount of shock. (At least two hundred Mahadists were knocked flying and forty lancers were unhorsed)

As for a running horse hitting a phalanx, well the horses wouldn't have to worry about breaking a leg on a corpse (which seems highly unlikely anyway) because someone who gets hit by a 1,500 pound horse that's running at 35 miles an hour won't fall down, they'll go flying. . . and since the only place the victim can go is among his buddies that would also help destroy the integrity of the formation.