Cavalry -- Greece -- History; Classical literature; Military art and science -- Greece -- Early works to 1800
(27) See "Econ." xi. 17. Cf. Theophr. "Ch." viii. "The Late Learner":
{kai eis agron eph' ippou allotriou katakhoumenos ama meletan
ippazesthai, kai peson ten kephalon kateagenai}, "Riding into the
country on another's horse, he will practise his horsemanship by
the way, and falling, will break his head" (Jebb).
(28) = L10,000 circa. See Boeckh, op. cit. p. 251.
It would be no bad thing either, to forewarn your troopers that one
day you will take them out yourself for a long march, and lead them
across country over every kind of ground. Again, whilst practising the
evolutions of the rival cavalry display, (29) it will be well to gallop
out at one time to one district and again to another. Both men and
horses will be benefited.
(29) Lit. "the anthippasia." See iii. 11, and "Horsemanship," viii.
10.
Next, as to hurling the javelin from horseback, the best way to secure
as wide a practice of the art as possible, it strikes me, would be to
issue an order to your phylarchs that it will be their duty to put
themselves at the head of the marksmen of several tribes, and to ride
out to the butts for practice. In this way a spirit of emulation will
be roused--the several officers will, no doubt, be eager to turn out
as many marksmen as they can to aid the state. (30)
(30) On competition cf. "Cyrop." II. i. 22, and our author passim.
And so too, to ensure that splendour of accoutrement which the force
requires, (31) the greatest help may once again be looked for from the
phylarchs; let these officers but be persuaded that from the public
point of view the splendid appearance of their squadrons (32) will
confer a title to distinction far higher than that of any personal
equipment. Nor is it reasonable to suppose that they will be deaf to
such an argument, since the very desire to hold the office of phylarch
itself proclaims a soul alive to honour and ambition. And what is
more, they have it in their power, in accordance with the actual
provisions of the law, to equip their men without the outlay of a
single penny, by enforcing that self-equipment out of pay (33) which
the law prescribes.
(31) Or, "a beauty of equipment, worthy of our knights." Cf. Aristoph.
"Lysistr." 561, and a fragment of "The Knights," of Antiphanes,
ap. Athen. 503 B, {pant' 'Amaltheias keras}. See "Hiero," ix. 6;
"Horse." xi. 10.
(32) Lit. "tribes," {phulai} (each of the ten tribes contributing
about eighty men, or, as we might say, a squadron).
(33) i.e. the {katastasis}, "allowance," so technically called. Cf.
Lys. "for Mantitheos"; Jebb, "Att. Or." i. 246; Boeckh, "P. E. A."
II. xxi. p. 263; K. F. Hermann, 152, 19; Martin, op. cit. p. 341.
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