RED BOX (8)

The cataphract was a very heavily armoured horseman who usually rode a heavy horse also wearing partial or complete armour. The combination made for a warrior that was very difficult to injure and very difficult to stop once they got going, so they were the ultimate hammer blow against an enemy. Such fearsome warriors were employed by many ancient civilisations, not just the Eastern Romans (also known as Byzantines), but they were of course very expensive to create and so tended to be the core of an army but only a minority of its troops. Their most feared weapon was the kontos, a lance of about four metres in length, which would develop into the lance of the high medieval period, producing the mounted European knight which is so recognisable even today. Specifications Contents: 12 figures, 12 horses Poses: 6 poses, 6 horse poses Material: Plastic (Medium Consistency)

The term clibanarii and exactly what it means has long been the subject of vigorous debate amongst historians, particularly in terms of how they differed from catafractii. This is because there is no clear consensus as to their definition from ancient writers, some of whom even seem to use the terms interchangeably, and indeed for long periods we have no mention of either term in works on Eastern Roman armies. The answer is probably that there was no consistent distinction between the two, but in the modern world we like to impose structure and order on such things, so a common modern approach is to see the clibanarii as heavy cavalry and the catafractii as extra heavy cavalry, and this appears to be the method adopted by RedBox for this and its sister set. Specifications Contents: 12 figures, 12 horses Poses: 6 poses, 6 horse poses Material: Plastic (Medium Consistency)

By the fall of the Western Empire, the Roman world had long embraced the importance of cavalry, and as usual it was the heavy cavalry that formed the elite of the whole army. Indeed the infantry seems to have been treated as no more than a support for the cavalry, offering a refuge should the horsemen need to shelter on the battlefield. The introduction of the stirrup further improved the effectiveness of cavalry, providing commanders with both a highly mobile force of archers to disrupt an enemy, and a means of breaking an opposing unit by sheer force. As discussed with the first set for this set 2, RedBox have provided the medium and moderately heavy cavalry under the name of clibanarii, and here we find six more poses to depict these warriors. Specifications Contents: 12 figures, 12 horses Poses: 6 poses, 6 horse poses Material: Plastic (Medium Consistency)

Having originally built their empire largely by the use of heavy infantry, the Romans came to appreciate the importance of cavalry, particularly in the eastern provinces, where they came into contact with various cultures in the Middle East and the Steppe. Faced with enemies that specialised in light cavalry, the Eastern Romans, also known as Byzantines, adopted much the same tactics, and often employed those very peoples in their own forces. The light cavalry performed all the usual roles such as scouting and skirmishing, but the size of the empire and the nature of the threats meant some Roman forces were almost exclusively light cavalry, where a rapid response was needed to a raid on some border region, for example. Some of these men were native to the empire, but many were often mercenaries, and indeed at some periods in their long history virtually all Roman light cavalry was actually made up of mercenaries, mostly from outside of their territory. Specifications Contents: 12 figures, 12 horses Poses: 6 poses, 6 horse poses Material: Plastic (Medium Consistency)

The Roman Empire was a remarkably long-lasting institution, existing between 27 BCE and 1453, but the sheer size of it made it very difficult to govern as it reached its peak, and a series of divisions, particularly that of 395, split the empire into the Western and Eastern parts. The Western Empire would fall in the 5th century, but the Eastern one would continue for more than a thousand years, although at no time was it ever called the Byzantine Empire, either by outsiders or by the Romans themselves. That name was invented in the 16th century, after it had disappeared, but as might be supposed, such a long history meant that the Roman armed forces underwent many changes. One of the most significant of these was the rise in importance of cavalry, since the early empire had relied almost exclusively on heavy infantry, and while the heavy cavalry would be the elite of the Roman army, the light cavalry would always be a very significant element. Specifications Contents: 12 figures, 12 horses Poses: 6 poses, 6 horse poses Material: Plastic (Medium Consistency)

By the 6th century the heavy cavalry was the backbone of the Eastern Roman army, and the cataphracts were the heaviest of the heavies. With man and horse largely covered in metal armour, the basic idea came from the east, and developed as civilisations gained the means to fabricate the metal armour required, and to selectively breed horses strong enough to carry such a heavily armoured man. As they came into contact with these eastern peoples, Rome adopted the technology and fielded her own cataphracts, although not all were Roman by birth. This continued after the loss of the Western Empire, but over the following centuries there was an increasing reliance on mercenaries as the Roman authorities took money tributes rather than military service, and this was particularly prevalent after the disastrous battle of Manzikert in 1071. Specifications Contents: 12 figures, 12 horses Poses: 6 poses, 6 horse poses Material: Plastic (Medium Consistency)