1514-1683 Invincibles

[MrX]

Polish heavy cavalry, "winged cavalry", hussars (husaria). The best heavy cavalry ever.

Special warrior character, special training, special weapons, special armor, special horses and, finaly, and maybe most important, special tactic. Almost 200 years of domination in Europe`s land warfare. But not known in common west european knowledge... Why?

[AROUETLJ]

Polish heavy cavalry, "winged cavalry", hussars (husaria). The best heavy cavalry ever.

Special warrior character, special training, special weapons, special armor, special horses and, finaly, and maybe most important, special tactic. Almost 200 years of domination in Europe`s land warfare. But not known in common west european knowledge... Why?


Hey I knew about them, we're not that stupid in Western Europe. But they're not the best heavy cavalry. The Normans at Benevento were Teh Shizz. Tee hee hee. And they dominated fEurope or, er, about 300 years.

[Musashi]

Polish heavy cavalry, "winged cavalry", hussars (husaria). The best heavy cavalry ever.

Almost 200 years of domination in Europe`s land warfare.
They lost a few battles against advantageous enemy forces at that period, for example when Swedes improved their muskets and tactics, being sometimes able to fight off cavalry. Nobody is invincible.

[Nightstalker_pl]

Some pictures....

:)

[Catch22]

I'm dying to hear more on "special armor" thing... And in comparision to classic western cuirassier, winged lancers werent even a particulary heavy cavalry. They began their battlefield career as a more mobile, support cav troop to the true heavy cavalry of the early XVI cent, ironclad in their full plate maximilian armor.

What makes them somewhat unique and eventually effective on the XVI and XVII century besides the look was keeping the lances in use for cavalry charge - something that western cavalry put away in mid-XVI cent, which eventually led (along with large pikemen formations) to degenerating tactics of mounted warfare, such as "caracole" etc.

The sheer psychological strenght of the "medieval-style" lance-armed cavalry charge on the ranks of other troop of cavalry or foot with perspective of being impaled worked well enough to rally some less disciplined footsoldiers. You had to posess a very well organized formations of pikemen and musketeers to keep the fire steady and stand your ground against such shock-troops charge.

WL were surely elite troop in terms of high self esteem, morale and prestige etc, but in no case they were invincible. As with any other formation of the battlefield they needed to be used skillfully if you're wanted to play they strenght.

These topics too often turn into a winged-lancers-wank-contest.

[Nightstalker_pl]

one more :D p-)

[Labud]

In this period in Europe, there was also "croats", or Croatian light cavalry. Besides Croatians, there were many Serbs, Hungarians and Polish. They had permanent heavy battles against Turks, so they in western Europe were almost undefeatable.

[AROUETLJ]

I love the sheer, unbridled patriotism of Eastern Europeans. Here in Western Europe, we wallow in self-criticism.

Invincible. So be it, then. At least they were on our side.

[Musashi]

I love the sheer, unbridled patriotism of Eastern Europeans.
You are not a troll, so I can kindly advice you to check a map to see Poland is located in Central Europe and even a small part of our country is not located in Eastern Europe.


Here in Western Europe, we wallow in self-criticism.
We criticize ourselves more than very much, but do it just in all-Polish forums p-)


Invincible. So be it, then. At least they were on our side.
I wrote they were not invincible in my first post in this topic. It was MrX, who has a lack of knowledge and claims so.
All I can claim they were the best cavalry at that time.

[lastdingo]

You are not a troll, so I can kindly advice you to check a map to see Poland is located in Central Europe and even a small part of our country is not located in Eastern Europe.


Poland is commonly considered to be Eastern European in Western Europe.
That's at least like that since the iron curtain.

Earlier shapes of Poland were even more eastern.

[AROUETLJ]

You are not a troll, so I can kindly advice you to check a map to see Poland is located in Central Europe and even a small part of our country is not located in Eastern Europe.


We criticize ourselves more than very much, but do it just in all-Polish forums p-)


I wrote they were not invincible in my first post in this topic. It was MrX, who has a lack of knowledge and claims so.
All I can claim they were the best cavalry at that time.

Yes yes, Eastern Europe has moved eastwards since 1990. It's just that the adjective "Central Europeans" sounds a bit contrived.

I think you're interpreting my post as some sort of sarcastic anti-Polish one, but I can assure you it isn't.

[lightfire]

Poland is commonly considered to be Eastern European in Western Europe.
That's at least like that since the iron curtain.

Earlier shapes of Poland were even more eastern.

check your geography and history again.

[perdurabo]

Yes yes, Eastern Europe has moved eastwards since 1990. It's just that the adjective "Central Europeans" sounds a bit contrived.

I think you're interpreting my post as some sort of sarcastic anti-Polish one, but I can assure you it isn't.
if you check them map you will see that from western borders of Russia till end of Europe on Ural mountines there is as much land as from the same borders till British/laManche channel... even if yu take culture and history you can see that we ar diffrent from those on east and those on west, we are in the middle taking a bit from every side.

[Musashi]

Poland is commonly considered to be Eastern European in Western Europe.
That's at least like that since the iron curtain.

Earlier shapes of Poland were even more eastern.
But you see, even Russians always considered Poland a West European country (just a small number of Russian trolls can deny it).
Poland has always been related to the Western culture, not the Eastern (that is based on Orthodox Church). Is it too difficult for you?


I think you're interpreting my post as some sort of sarcastic anti-Polish one, but I can assure you it isn't.
If I had interpreted your post as such one, my previous post would have been much more impolite, be sure p-) :petting:

[ozumn]

Polish heavy cavalry, "winged cavalry", hussars (husaria). The best heavy cavalry ever.

Special warrior character, special training, special weapons, special armor, special horses and, finaly, and maybe most important, special tactic. Almost 200 years of domination in Europe`s land warfare. But not known in common west european knowledge... Why?

hehehe ok.

[Nightstalker_pl]

Video with polish heavy cavalry:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gTNcNpEB5k&mode=related&search=

Enjoy :)

[MrX]

This link already had been posted here, but for those who dont understand why Polish hussars were so special and invincible*

How the Hussars Fought:

http://www.kismeta.com/diGrasse/HowHussarFought.htm





* Yes Musashi, invincible. Of course it is generalization and is commonly understandable, very few not so succesfull small battles during almost 200 years of victories is only marginal exception which dont break the rule.

[Nightstalker_pl]

I'm sure this was posted many times before but not in this thread:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUontcpJ7-s

Polish Cavalry Today :) - still one of the best in the world :)

[Mishka Zubov]

Polish heavy cavalry, "winged cavalry", hussars (husaria). The best heavy cavalry ever.

Special warrior character, special training, special weapons, special armor, special horses and, finaly, and maybe most important, special tactic. Almost 200 years of domination in Europe`s land warfare. But not known in common west european knowledge... Why?

I am sorry, but if I hear again about Polish Hussars in one more thread I will set against them few batteries of Polish Artillery and shoot them to pieces, then finish them up with the fire power of the foreign and Polish Infantry and hack the rest using Lisowski's brigands, Polish Cossacks, some mercenary Reiters and the regiment or two of the Polish Dragoons under the command of Colonel Wołodyjowski.

This is all so one-sided and shallow...

For those who really want to QUICKLY learn something about Polish military conflicts, battles and campaigns, tactics, army development and army composition I recommend this excellent website: Polish Renaissance Warfare 1450-1699, http://www.jasinski.co.uk/wojna/index.htm .

The S.A. Jasinski's work is richly illustrated, includes several big size maps, many sketches, battle orders, and even some interesting numbers and statistics. And best of all: it also describes other importants units, such as artillery, tabor, foreign and Polish infantry, dragoons, Cossacks, Tatars, Wallachians and even infamous Lisowski's brigandry. And yes, it also mentions the hussars. :-)

But hussars did not win the wars alone. Here is Jasinski's example of the composition of the Polish Army in the 1621 compaign against Turks:
8,280 hussars, 8,200 Cossack cavalry, 1,400 Lisowski cavalry, 2,160 western cavalry, 6,800 Polish infantry, 5,800 western infantry, 800 Hungarian infantry and 20-30,000 Zaporozhian Cossacks.

There are other good sites as well. Some will talk more about early horse artillery, or describe Casmir Siemienowicz, General of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth Crown Artillery, whose revolutionary book "Artis Magne Artilleriae" used to be copied for two centuries all over Europe, as in - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazimierz_Siemienowicz.

But as I said - Jasinski's work will give you a quick introduction to the topic.