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Unlike the Roman legions, the Byzantine army's strength was in its armoured cavalry Cataphracts, which evolved from the Clibanarii of the late empire. Its type of warfare and tactics were evolving from the Hellenistic military manuals and the Infantry were still used but mainly in support roles and as a base of maneuver for the cavalry.
The only description of horse armour in the Byzantine writing of this time is by Choniates and is a description of the front ranks of the cavalry of the Hungarian army at the Battle of Sirmium. [94] However, earlier military treatises, such as that of Nikephoros Ouranos , mention horse armour being used and a later, 14th-century, Byzantine book ...
In the 10th century military treatise attributed to Emperor Nikephoros II, On Skirmishing, it is stated that the cavalry army of any mobile army commanded by the emperor must be of at least 8,200 riders, not including 1,000 household cavalry—that is, the force belonging personally to the Emperor. These 8,200 horse ought to be divided "into 24 ...
By 1453, the Byzantine army had fallen to a regular garrison of 1,500 men in Constantinople. [8] With a supreme effort, Constantine XI succeeded in assembling a garrison of 7,000 men (included 2,000 foreigners) to defend the city against the Ottoman army. [9] Byzantine troops continued to consist of cavalry, infantry and archers.
The Byzantines called all heavy shock cavalry kataphraktoi. The Byzantine army maintained units of heavily armoured cavalrymen up to its last years, while neighbouring Bulgars, Serbs, Muscovites, and other eastern European peoples emulated Byzantine military training and equipment.
The Clibanarii or Klibanophoroi (Greek: κλιβανοφόροι, meaning "camp oven-bearers" from the Greek word κλίβανος meaning "camp oven" or "metallic furnace" [citation needed]), in Persian Grivpanvar, were a Sasanian Persian, late Roman and Byzantine military unit of armored heavy cavalry.
The focus then turns to the deployment of the kataphraktoi and general tactics for cavalry fighting independently against both infantry and cavalry. Three aspects of battle have particular attention paid to them: how infantry were to defend against cavalry, how the kataphraktoi were to attack infantry, and how an army should pursue a defeated ...
They were a cavalry corps, somewhere between one and five thousand strong, and formed part of the central reserve army, their commander bearing the then unique title of taxiarchēs. [ 3 ] [ 4 ] The presence of descendants of these men, called Gothograeci ( Γοτθογραίκοι ) by the chronicler Theophanes the Confessor , is attested in ...