Talk:Maryannu

Similarities to other warrior elites
To my mind, the maryannu sound like they're analogous to medieval European knights: both are warrior elites which came into being because weapons and/or armor were expensive. Is there any general term for such elites, to which this article could link?

(By contrast, the article on samurai says the first samurai originated as clans of farmers who needed to defend themselves.)

Hmm. European knights lost their privileged position on the battlefield when longbows and pikes were invented--that is, when the cost of effective weapons dropped to the point that the elite were no longer needed. Did anything similar happen to maryannu?

Metageek (talk) 17:04, 4 December 2008 (UTC)


 * In the broad evolution of military tactics, chariot superiority gave way to disciplined infantry superiority (phalanxes and Roman legions) which gave way to heavy cavalry superiority, which showed vulnerability at Agincourt and Nancy just in time to begin to give way to gunpowder superiority. Charioteers were certainly a military elite in their heyday, but whether their roles in the different societies meaningfully resembled the role of knights in medieval society would probably depend on particular circumstances... AnonMoos (talk) 21:01, 4 December 2008 (UTC)