Military technology - Cavalry, Warfare, Tactics

military technology

Table of Contents

Introduction
General considerations
Prehistory
- The earliest military weapons
- From precious metals to base metals
Antiquity and the classical age, c. 1000 bce–400 ce
- Defensive weaponry
  - Helmets
  - Shields
  - Body armour
    - Bronze
    - Mail
    - Plate-iron armour
- Offensive weaponry
  - The ax
  - The spear
  - The javelin
  - The sling
  - The sword
  - The bow
    - The early bow
    - The composite recurved bow
    - Arrows
- Mechanical artillery
- Fortification
  - Fortress design
  - Field fortification
  - Siege towers
- Land transportation
  - The horse
  - The elephant
  - The chariot
The age of cavalry, c. 400 ce–1350
- The war-horse
- Personal armour
  - Mail
  - Plate
- The castle
  - The motte-and-bailey castle
  - Stone fortifications
- Siege weapons
  - The trebuchet
  - Greek fire
- The horse archer
  - The Huns and Avars
  - The Byzantine cataphract
  - The Turks
  - The Mongols
The infantry revolution, c. 1200–1500
- The crossbow
- The English longbow
- Halberd and pike
  - The halberd
  - The pike
The gunpowder revolution, c. 1300–1650
- Early gunpowder
  - Chemistry and internal ballistics
  - Serpentine powder
  - Corned powder
  - Refinements in ballistics
- The development of artillery
  - Wrought-iron muzzle-loaders
  - Wrought-iron breechloaders
  - Cast bronze muzzle-loaders
  - Cast-iron cannon
- Early use of artillery
  - Terminology and classification
  - Special-purpose shot
  - Gunnery
- The first small arms
  - The matchlock
  - The wheel lock
  - The flintlock
- Fortification
  - From medieval to modern
  - The sunken profile
  - The bastioned trace
  - Duration of early modern fortification

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The beginning of the age of cavalry in Europe is traditionally dated to the destruction of the legions of the Roman emperor Valens by Gothic horsemen at the Battle of Adrianople in 378 ce. The period that followed, characterized by the network of political and economic relationships called feudalism, was an age during which the mounted arm assumed an ascendancy that it began to relinquish only in the 14th century, with the appearance of infantry capable of taking the open field unsupported against mounted chivalry. Cavalry, however, was only part of the story of this era. However impressive the mounted ...(100 of 19804 words)

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