Sub-Roman Britain (Cavalry etc)

[Alanus]

Hey guys,

apparently acording to this one article (I need to find the article again) the Scythians and Sarmatians used rope stirups to mount and support themselves on the horse. According to the same article they introduced them to the Northern Britons, such as the Votadini and the Kingdom of Ebrauc.
What are your thoughts?

Nicholas,

I would like to see the article-author's citation to "stirrups" used by Scythians and Sarmatians. Picturially, we have loops attached to the bottoms of Scythian trousers, the same type of loop attached to ski-pants when I was a kid. These could be easily mistaken for soft stirrups. We know that the Indus used this form, in leather not rope. There is a solid cultural-trade between the Saka-Massagetae and India, but there is no sign that the soft stirrup made it above the Indu Kush.

There was cultural borrowing that did affect the West and the Romans in particular. The Saka borrowed the Han Dynasty jian, and it shows up first on the Orlot battle plaque as an exact copy, an M-shaped hand guard, scabbard slide, and squared scabbard chape'. The same thing goes with the so-called "Sarmatian" ringed pommel, a direct borrowing of the Han dau (single-edged sword). Both styles entered the West, as mentioned by Pliny and found on the Hungarian Plain by Harmatta. A ring-pommeled short-sword (gladius) is in the British Museum.

Yet while these are examples of cultural borrowing, they are not "Sarmatian." They are Eastern Iranian as brought to Europe by Saka descendants, the Roxolani, Taifali, Aorsi, and Alani. Sarmatians arrived as the Iazyges and two related tribes, all of whom were descentants of Western Scythians and the Sauromatae. Nowhere, as of yet, is there any signs of stirrups arriving in Europe until we get to the Avars and Magyars, a time when the Western Empire no longer existed.

I hope this isn't a damper, but ancient depictions can be both enlightening and deceiving. :wink:
aj