Arms Armor and Tactics of Sassanian Savaran مقاله

خلاصه ماشینی:

Journal of the Iranian Studies Faculty of Literature and Humanities Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman Volume 8, Number 15, Spring 2009 Arms, Armor, and Tactics of Sassanian Savārān 1 Dr. Kaveh Farrokh Assistant Professor of British Colombia University of America & Dr. Manouchehr Moshtagh Khorasani Assistant Professor of Gissen University of Germany ABSTRACT The Sassanian elite cavalry formed the military backbone of the Persian empire during the Sassanian period. KEY WORDS Bow, Early Savārān, greave, horse archer, Late Savārān, lance, mail armor, P-shaped scabbard attachments, quiver, scabbard slide system, shield, Spangenhelm, stirrup, Super-heavy Savārān, Verethragna. The Sassanian ability to efficiently combine quilted armor (for legs and arms), plate armor and mail, optimized the battlefield protection of the Savārān, making them far deadlier adversaries to their Roman opponents than the Parthians (Farrokh, 2005:217). One possibility is that at least some Sassanian horse archers were armored like their lance wielding Savārān comrades and were less vulnerable than their Parthian predecessors to Roman archery. The new heavily armored Savārān were armed with a plethora of hand to hand personal combat weapons such as swords, daggers, darts, maces (Farrokh, 2005:27–28). Tabari’s description of the late Sassanian knight describes him as wearing a helmet with 2 spare bowstrings behind it (it is not clear how this was done), breastplate, mail shirt extending below the knees, arm and thigh guards, greaves, sword, lance, lasso, mace (this was attached to the girdle), axe, a quiver with 30 arrows, a bow case carrying two bows, and a shield.