5 ms·

Fascinating, but the author missed a couple of the most interesting aspects of the chariot. Number one, wheels. The ancient war chariot is a prime early exampl

by natch 4y ago

Fascinating, but the author missed a couple of the most interesting aspects of the chariot. Number one, wheels. The ancient war chariot is a prime early example of how the adage that you should not reinvent the wheel is poor advice. Chariot builders had to reinvent (so to speak) and hone and advance the wheel greatly for use in chariots, because the wheels needed to be robust and light to an extent that wheels had never been before. And why did the wheels need to be so light? That brings us to the second interesting thing that the author didn’t mention, which is the fact that horses of the time were smaller, not having yet been bred up to the size needed for rideability in battle. Therefore, instead, horses were used to pull chariots. And the chariots had to be light to make them nimble, and because the horses (and mules in some cases, sure, but that is neither here nor there) were not the huge steeds that we have today.

gidorah 4y ago
In a later post he addresses chariots. They were not tanks.
- brazzy 4y ago
  TFA is exactly that post.
  - gidorah 4y ago
    The thread title tripped me up and I obvs commented too quickly.
Nition 4y ago
Thanks, I was actually wondering about that second point (why did chariots need to exist at all if, as the article states, cavalry later superseded them?) while reading the article, so it's nice to see an explanation right away in the comments!
- gota 4y ago
  In age-of-empires-like terms, They were not far along enough in the tech tree to develop Husbandry and Selective Breeding
automatic6131 4y ago
> The ancient war chariot is a prime early example of how the adage that you should not reinvent the wheel is poor advice I'd imagine that "reinventing the wheel" is much better advice 5000 years ago.
- samatman 4y ago
  Tubeless tires didn't exist until the 1950s. Wheels might be completely out of disruptive potential but I doubt it.
  - CRConrad 4y ago
    Tubeless tyres had existed since about forever; they were made out of iron. Pneumatic tyres didn't exist before 1887.
- lupire 4y ago
  "Reinventing the wheel" means inventing the same thing without looking at it, not improving it.
  - natch 4y ago
    Sure, ignoring common usage, from a super Asperger-level pedantic standpoint that’s true. That’s Hacker News for you. But to say that is to miss the point that even “inventing the same thing without looking at it” is often advised against, when that is actually atrocious advice.
- gota 4y ago
  It'd be great to see a list of 'adages' from ancient times and compare - which ones still hold today?
jeromenerf 4y ago
> which is the fact that horses of the time were smaller Driving a 30kg chariot must have been a frightening fast experience, even on a small pony. The lack of bearing, brakes, suspension, … on wooden wheels.
- trashtester 4y ago
  Add a few thousands enemies with arrows, spears and swords who try to kill you, and maye the chariot is the least scary part, though ;)
- Someone 4y ago
  And not on a road, on ground that you may have no idea about what it looks like. Hit a rock or large patch of grass? Chances are you’ll fly of the chariot.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
treis 4y ago
>fact that horses of the time were smaller, not having yet been bred up to the size needed for rideability in battle This is just wrong as can be seen in carvings from the time. The horses pulling the chariots are clearly big enough to ride. Chariots were a thing because a workable saddle & stirrups hadn't been invented. Once they were it was the end of the chariot.
- btilly 4y ago
  Interesting. https://www.fellponymuseum.org.uk/fells/rom_dark/size.htm https://www.fellponymuseum.org.uk/fells/rom_dark/size.htm suggests that horses really WERE shorter. But so were people. And even so, riders were drawn a lot bigger relative to their horses than they are today. Which bones back up. It is not clear to me how the two trade off back in the days of chariots.
  - treis 4y ago
    Horses definitely got much bigger but they've been big enough to ride since they were domesticated. The small Mongolian pony is still 5-600 pounds. Plenty big enough to carry ~200 pounds of people + arms.
colanderman 4y ago
> the horses (and mules in some cases, sure, but that is neither here nor there) were not the huge steeds that we have today Not to mention stirrups [1], which were not widespread until much later. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirrup#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirrup#History
btilly 4y ago
Another reason why they needed to be light is that the harness was not invented until around 500 AD. Therefore those horses were pushing on a bar which was literally cutting their windpipes off. This severely limited the poor beast's strength. We can tell when the harness was invented because horse drawn carts suddenly double in size. It's amazing how much more work a horse can do when it can breathe!
bell-cot 4y ago
I suspect that every low-tech peasant farmer, regularly using some crude wheeled thing to haul [goods|crops|whatever] over [uneven ground|rutted paths|hills] might quickly feel inspired to minimize the dead weight of his crude wheeled thing. Regardless of what draft animal[s] he might or might not have available.

by natch 4y ago

gidorah 4y ago

In a later post he addresses chariots. They were not tanks.

brazzy 4y ago
TFA is exactly that post.
- gidorah 4y ago
  The thread title tripped me up and I obvs commented too quickly.

Nition 4y ago

Thanks, I was actually wondering about that second point (why did chariots need to exist at all if, as the article states, cavalry later superseded them?) while reading the article, so it's nice to see an explanation right away in the comments!

gota 4y ago
In age-of-empires-like terms, They were not far along enough in the tech tree to develop Husbandry and Selective Breeding

automatic6131 4y ago

> The ancient war chariot is a prime early example of how the adage that you should not reinvent the wheel is poor advice I'd imagine that "reinventing the wheel" is much better advice 5000 years ago.

samatman 4y ago
Tubeless tires didn't exist until the 1950s. Wheels might be completely out of disruptive potential but I doubt it.
- CRConrad 4y ago
  Tubeless tyres had existed since about forever; they were made out of iron. Pneumatic tyres didn't exist before 1887.
lupire 4y ago
"Reinventing the wheel" means inventing the same thing without looking at it, not improving it.
- natch 4y ago
  Sure, ignoring common usage, from a super Asperger-level pedantic standpoint that’s true. That’s Hacker News for you. But to say that is to miss the point that even “inventing the same thing without looking at it” is often advised against, when that is actually atrocious advice.
gota 4y ago
It'd be great to see a list of 'adages' from ancient times and compare - which ones still hold today?

jeromenerf 4y ago

> which is the fact that horses of the time were smaller Driving a 30kg chariot must have been a frightening fast experience, even on a small pony. The lack of bearing, brakes, suspension, … on wooden wheels.

trashtester 4y ago
Add a few thousands enemies with arrows, spears and swords who try to kill you, and maye the chariot is the least scary part, though ;)
Someone 4y ago
And not on a road, on ground that you may have no idea about what it looks like. Hit a rock or large patch of grass? Chances are you’ll fly of the chariot.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

treis 4y ago

>fact that horses of the time were smaller, not having yet been bred up to the size needed for rideability in battle This is just wrong as can be seen in carvings from the time. The horses pulling the chariots are clearly big enough to ride. Chariots were a thing because a workable saddle & stirrups hadn't been invented. Once they were it was the end of the chariot.

btilly 4y ago
Interesting. https://www.fellponymuseum.org.uk/fells/rom_dark/size.htm https://www.fellponymuseum.org.uk/fells/rom_dark/size.htm suggests that horses really WERE shorter. But so were people. And even so, riders were drawn a lot bigger relative to their horses than they are today. Which bones back up. It is not clear to me how the two trade off back in the days of chariots.
- treis 4y ago
  Horses definitely got much bigger but they've been big enough to ride since they were domesticated. The small Mongolian pony is still 5-600 pounds. Plenty big enough to carry ~200 pounds of people + arms.

colanderman 4y ago

> the horses (and mules in some cases, sure, but that is neither here nor there) were not the huge steeds that we have today Not to mention stirrups [1], which were not widespread until much later. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirrup#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirrup#History

btilly 4y ago

Another reason why they needed to be light is that the harness was not invented until around 500 AD. Therefore those horses were pushing on a bar which was literally cutting their windpipes off. This severely limited the poor beast's strength. We can tell when the harness was invented because horse drawn carts suddenly double in size. It's amazing how much more work a horse can do when it can breathe!

bell-cot 4y ago

I suspect that every low-tech peasant farmer, regularly using some crude wheeled thing to haul [goods|crops|whatever] over [uneven ground|rutted paths|hills] might quickly feel inspired to minimize the dead weight of his crude wheeled thing. Regardless of what draft animal[s] he might or might not have available.