Investigations of a Dog

This week I’ve been looking at early seventeenth-century cavalry manuals. Although many drill books and treatises on military theory were written in the first half of the seventeenth-century, very few of them covered cavalry. Only four English authors wrote on the subject. Their works are all prescriptive: they claim to tell cavalrymen what they should be doing. They don’t necessarily reflect what was actually being done. Since I was an undergraduate I’ve been aware of the potential difference between theory and practice, but I used to think that if theory didn’t agree with practice, it could simply be discounted as “wrong”. Now I’m approaching these texts from a cultural perspective and reading them very differently. Even the physical process of reading feels different. In my empirical days I developed a useful habit of skimming through text and picking out relevant information, but now I’m reading slowly and carefully, thinking about the choice of words, what isn’t there as well as what is there, how the text relates to other texts and to early-modern culture in general. I’m mostly looking for traces of gender ideology (see my previous post about Horses, War, and Gender) but I’m also picking up a lot of Renaissance culture (see Military Revolution or Military Renaissance?). This post examines what military theorists thought were the criteria for a good war horse.

One of the most striking things about the four books I’ve been concentrating on, is how closely related they are to each other. It’s all the more surprising because I’ve used these books so much in the past and thought I was very familiar with them, but hadn’t noticed the similarities. Certain passages are repeated almost verbatim — intertextuality in action! Nevertheless, there are also significant differences between them. Even when the authors copied each other or a common influence, there might be a different emphasis. Although there are major theoretical disputes over authors’ intentions (which I don’t want to go into right now), it’s evident that each of the texts has a different character from the others. Whether this is down to autonomous authors, or just different circumstances of production is open to debate. In any case, I still find it hard to avoid talking about authors and what they say or do, even though I try not to assume I know what they think.

Just to prove that language is gendered, every one of these four books consistently refers to the horse as “him”, even when they don’t specify a preference for stallions, geldings, or mares.

Gervase Markham: The souldiers accidence (1625)

This is a drill book which combines infantry and cavalry maneouvres. Markham also wrote several books about horsemanship and animal husbandry, but I don’t know whether he had any military experience. This is the only one of the four books to talk about the social class of cavalry troopers. There are very few classical references in this work, but more recent history is well represented. Markham admits that men-at-arms and lancers are no longer in use, but still devotes around two pages to details of how they were armed, not just for wars but also for tournaments. This might suggest nostalgia, and also a sense of continuity from the middle ages to the late sixteenth-century. Not quite what you’d expect in the age of military revolution or renaissance. However, after this detour he acknowledges recent changes in tactics and technology, particularly emphasising firepower (p. 41):

Thus for your knowledge, not your example, I have shewed you the severall Compositions and armings of Horsemen, according to the auncient times, when the Bow and the Hargobus had the first place, and the Musquett, and other fierie weapons lay obscured. But to come to these our present times, wherein the uttermost strength of the Fire is found out and explaned, and to shew you that which you must onely imitate and follow; you shall know, that all our Horse-troopes are reduced to one of these three Formes.

Very specific criteria are given for horses, both for the old and new types of cavalry.

Men-at-arms: “His Horse should bee strong, well shaped, of great courage, and thoroughly mand and ridden; he should (by all meanes) be stoned (because tyring hurts them not) of lustie age, and faire trotting: and of these Horses the Neapolitan is the best, the Greeke next, then the Spaniard, the English, the Almaine or the French.”

Lancers: “strong horses, well ridden for the field”

Light horse: “Their horses were nimble light Gueldings, fayre trotting, and well ridden”

Cuirassier: “their horses should be stoned, and of the best Races, fayre trotting, and well ridden for the Warres, that is to say, being able to passe a strong and swift Cariere, to stop close, to retire at pleasure, and to turne readily on both hands either in large Rings or in strayt”

Arquebusiers/Carbines: “His horse shall be either afayre stoned trotting horse, or a lustie strong Guelding well ridden”

In this context “stoned” means a stallion (stones are testicles). Stallions are recommended for the heaviest/most prestigious cavalry, while the lighter/less prestigious types can use stallions or geldings. No mention of mares.

John Cruso: Militarie instructions for the cavallrie (1632)

This is probably the first English book exclusively about cavalry, and has a very different character from Markham’s. Cruso probably wrote it while he was a student at Cambridge, and had also translated a military treatise by the Lord du Praissac from French. I don’t think there’s any evidence of him having any military experience. However, the text has “Renaissance man” all over it. Whether it’s the author’s personal taste or the dominant ideology of the Renaissance project, there’s an overwhelming obsession with the Romans. The margins are full of latin quotes from classical sources. Cruso still includes plenty of information about the obsolete lancer, but his justification is very different from Markham’s (p. 36):

Howsoever the use of the lance be now left off in the Low countreys, either for the reasons alledged chap. 23, or by reason of the discommodity of the countrey (for the lance is of no use but in a spacious, hard, and even ground) yet will it not be altogether impertinent to shew the manner of exercising the same, seeing that many have taken pains to revive unto us the knowledge of those arms which sometime were in use among the Graecians, Romanes, and other nations, which have been for many ages totally abolished.

Taken out of context this quote might sound a bit sarcastic, but the rest of the book is full of classical revivalism apparently for its own sake. In order to justify this, Cruso plays down the importance of firepower (in contrast to Markham):

For what is there in these modern warres, which is not borrowed from antiquitie? wherein we follow step by step (mutatis mutandis, the later inventions of fire weapons, and the use and dependencie thereof onely excepted) not onely in their manner, but even retaining their very words of command, as in this treatise is partly shewed, and would be more manifestly apparent if the subject were Infanterie; which no way disparageth the modern practise, but rather (for the antiquitie of it) gives it the more respect and estimation.

If I could meet John Cruso I’d be tempted to ask him what he’d do if the Romans told him to jump off a cliff. But anyway, these are his criteria for cavalry horses:

Lancer: “This kinde of arming was first invented to pierce and divide a grosse body, and therefore requires force and velocitie for the shock. His horse was to be 15 hands high at least, strong, swift, and well managed”

Cuirassier: “His horse not inferiour in stature and strength, though not so swift” (note in margin: “By the Edict for musters published by the States, neither cuirassier, nor harquebusier, is allowed to have his horse uder 15 hand high”)

Arquebusier: “His horse (according to the said edict of the States) should not be under 15 hand high, being swift and well managed. The Carabine is to be mounted on a midling gelding”

Dragoon: “His horse is of the least price, the use thereof being but to expedite his march, allighting to do his service.”

No specific mention of sex apart from the carbine’s gelding.

Robert Ward: Anima’dversions of warre (1639)

Another drill book which covers cavalry and infantry. Ward seems to be another Renaissance man, but not as extreme as Cruso. Although he uses the Norman conquest to illustrate one point, there are many more examples from classical antiquity. However, he also stresses current practices in the Netherlands and places more emphasis on the use of firearms by cavalry than Markham or Cruso did (no mention of the lancer here). He emphasises the difference between ancient and modern cavalry:

But our manner of charging the Enemy differs from theirs; for wee are to give fire upon the Enemy by Rankes, and so fall off into the Reare, so that all the Rankes shall come up and give fire by degrees upon the Enemy, whereas their Troopes gave a firme close charge, and wheeled off together; this was the use both of their Archers and Spearmen.

He gives less detail than the other authors about types of horses.

Cuirassier: “his horse is to be fifteene hand high and upwards”

Arquebusier: “Their horses ought not to be under fifteene hands in height”

Carbine: “Likewise the Carbine requires a smaller horse”

Only size matters here. There’s no mention of sex, or any other criteria.

John Vernon: The young horse-man (1644)

Like Cruso, this is solely about cavalry. Vernon might have served as a cavalry officer in a parliamentarian army, but there isn’t enough surviving evidence to prove it. The book is a cut down manual intended to be affordable and accessible to ordinary troopers. Considering these factors, there is a surprising amount of borrowing from previous works, including one of the more improbable manoeuvres from Cruso. However, there are also some striking differences. Classical references are completely absent from the text, and there is a noticeable emphasis on self preservation rather than correct drill (p. 10):

for brevity sake I shall purposely omit the postures of the horseman, it being of little use in service, and only acquaint you with those things that are materiall.

There is also a new factor influencing choice of horse(p. 1):

First make choice of a nimble and able Horse of a convenient Stature, of 15 handfuls high, sad coloured, as black, brown, cheasnut, dun, bay, socet, fox, Iron grey, Roe, and the like, for a white horse is not so necessary for thy use, nor so convenient for thy safety, as when thou shalt bee commanded forth on a party in a dark night thou wilt the easilier be discerned by the Enemy, so that if they chance to give fire on you, they will have the greater aime at thee, in regard thou wilt be so visible a marke unto them, it is not save for a Sentinell to have a white Horse in a pitcht field, a file leader being mounted on a white Horse is commonly aimed at by the Enemies Gunners or Musketiers, & so sometimes becomes the overthrow of himself and the rest of the file, some other reasons I could render, but I forbear

None of the other three books mentions colour. It’s difficult to say whether Vernon got this “new” idea from another book, from practical experience, or just made it up. Criteria for each type of cavalry are similar to Ward, with no mention of sex.

Cuirassier: “a good strong horse of fifteen handfuls high”

Arquebusiers and carbines: “a good tall horse of fifteen handfulls high, strong and nimble”

Dragoons: “…and ordinary horse, it being only to expedite his march, for he must perform his service on foot”

Overall, these four writers were not as stallion obsessed as I was expecting. Only Markham explicitly mentions stallions. This might be connected with his possible nostalgia for the age of chivalry and his emphasis on social hierarchies. Cruso specifies a gelding for carbines but doesn’t prescribe sex for any other types. Ward and Vernon are both silent on the issue. However, there are clearly some gender assumptions in all four texts. None of them mentions mares at all, and all of them exclusively use masculine third person pronouns to refer to horses. This could just be a habit of referring to all animals as male, except for this bizarre (but quite amusing) advice from Ward about training horses (p. 290):

Moreover if your horse by wresty, so as he cannot be put forwards; then let one take a Cat tyed by the tayle to a long pole, and when he goes backewards thrust the Cat towards his stones, where she may claw him, and forget not to threaten your horse with a terrible Noyse: or otherwise take a Hedgehog and tye him streight by one of his feete to the inside of the horses tayle, so that he may squeake and pricke him.

Leaving aside the animal cruelty and the sheer impracticality of carrying it out, why is it that horses and hedgehogs are male, but cats are female?

Bibliography

1. John Cruso, Militarie instructions for the cavallrie: ([Cambridge] : Printed by the printers to the Universitie of Cambridge [[i.e. Thomas Buck and Roger Daniel] and are to besold [sic] by Ni: Alsope at the Angell in Popes Head Alley [, London]], MDCXXXII. [1632], 1632).
2. Gervase Markham, The souldiers accidence ([London] : Printed by I. D[awson] for Iohn Bellamie, and are to be sold at his shop at the three golden Lyons neere the Royall Exchange, 1625., 1625).
3. John Vernon, The young horse-man, or, The honest plain-dealing cavalie (London : printed by Andrew Coe, 1644., 1644).
4. Robert Ward, Anima’dversions of vvarre; (London : Printed by Iohn Dawson [, Thomas Cotes, and Richard Bishop], and are to be sold by Francis Eglesfield at the signe of the Marigold in Pauls Church-yard, 1639., 1639).