Perhaps no other single military invention is as closely associated with warfare during Ancient period in the Near East as the war chariot. Beginning as a four wheeled war wagon during the Mesopotamian Bronze Age, this war machine would eventually evolve into the more familiar two wheeled variety seen on temple bas-reliefs in Ancient Egypt during the Middle Kingdom (c.2055-c.1650 BCE) and New Kingdom (c.1550-c.1070 BCE) eras manned by warrior-pharaohs as important elements in their combined arms warfare.  At the same time, war chariots were used by the Indo-European Hittites and Mycenaeans to bring royal and noble warriors to the battlefield.  The war chariot’s role in Near East and warfare continued into the early Iron Age, with both Neo Assyrian (c.850-612 BCE) and Achaemenid Persian (550-330 BCE) warfare using this horse-pulled weapon as a missile firing platform and for shock combat, although the rise of cavalry corps increasingly made the chariot a battlefield anachronism.  And after defeating the Persian Empire, Alexander III of Macedon (r.336-323 BCE) faced Indian chariotry in his Eastern campaigns. In the Mediterranean world, chariots transitioned from weapons of war to instruments of racing and ritual. In Archaic Greece (c.800-c.500 BCE), chariot racing began as an official sport in 684 BCE, while the popularity of chariot racing in Republican and Imperial Rome (c.509 BCE-476 CE) would lead to the rise of the largest purpose-built stadiums of the era, most notably the Circus Maximus in Rome.  Indeed, chariots remained an important part of Roman ritual long after they ceased to be part of its military organization, with conquering generals returning to the “Eternal City” during a state-sponsored triumphal parade riding in a chariot basket as part of this time-honored tradition. Chariot racing remained an important part of the Byzantine social and political fabric well into the medieval era. Rome’s northern enemy, the Celts, continue to use war chariots into the Common Era, with the Iceni Queen Boudica (d.61 CE) perhaps famously riding to war in a chariot in defense of her British homeland.  Remarkably, the war chariot survived as an important military asset for over three millennia, a remarkable run for any weapon system, until finally replaced by cavalry across the Old World.

BRONZE AGE CHARIOTS

Sumerian War Wagons

Although there is evidence of equine-drawn two-wheeled chariots dating to the Sintashta Culture of the western Eurasian Steppes (modern Kazakhstan), the first confirmed military application belongs to the Sumerian civilization of lower Mesopotamia, dating to about 2500 BCE. Images of these war machines are found on the War Panel of the Standard of Ur, showing the war wagons writing over and trampling enemy infantry. These early vehicles were either of the two-or four-wheeled variety, were manned by a crew of two, and were pulled by a team of four onagers or kungas (believed to be a hybrid of a female domesticated donkey and a male Syrian wild ass, producing a sterile offspring similar to mules). The larger four wheeled war wagons were double axled, with wheels constructed of solid wood sections held together by pegs. The absence of a mouth bit made controlling the wild asses very difficult, and it is unlikely that these machines could have moved at more than ten miles per hour. Armed with javelins and axes, Sumerian drivers used their weapons to deliver a shock attack, driving into opposing heavy infantry formations and scattering enemy footmen. The Sumerian war wagon was too heavy and cumbersome to offer effective pursuit.  Still, the Sumerian war wagon served as the prototype for wheeled shock combat for the next thousand years. It is generally agreed by scholars that the prototypical two wheeled war chariot was introduced into the greater Near East by Indo-Aryan invaders, and adopted by the Indo-European Hittites and Semitic Hyksos peoples, with the former diffusing the machine to Mesopotamia, and the latter to Egypt during their conquest of the Nile during the Second Intermediate Period (c.1782 -c.1570 BCE).  

In the early centuries of the second millennium BCE, three different innovations appeared in significant conjuncture to create the first prototype of a true two wheeled war chariot: the widespread use of the domesticated horse, the adoption of the composite bow, and the new technology of lightweight, bentwood construction. Although horses were raised as food in Central Asia as early as the fourth millennium BCE, it was only in the second millennium BCE that domesticated equines spread throughout Europe and the Near East.  At first too small to be ridden as a cavalry mount, the even-tempered horse was originally used as a replacement for the onager, harnessed to chariots, usually in teams of four.  In addition, replacing the selfbow (a bill made of a singular piece of wood) with a more powerful composite bow (made from a careful fusion of materials including different kinds of wood, bone, and sinew) extended the range and piercing power of arrows, making the chariot a deadlier missile platform.  The Akkadian emperor Sargon (“the Great,” r.c.2334-c.2279 BCE) is usually credited with the adoption of this Central Asian technology into Mesopotamia. Finally, the development of bentwood techniques using steam allowed for the construction of the spoked wheel with a rim of curved felloes and the manufacture of lightweight chariot bodies. At the same time, the appearance of the horse bit improved the control of the animal teams at higher speeds. This lightweight chariot with now with spoked rather than solid wheels drawn by teams of horses provided for the first time a fast, maneuverable chariot, one first used by their Indo-Aryan inventors for hunting, but later adapted for war as a firing platform for archers and javelineers. The basket held two people: a driver or charioteer and a soldier, giving the war chariot superior speed, mobility, and an elevated platform for archery or javelin throwing over enemy infantry. Interestingly, this new military technology would take root in a large geographical area during the second millennium BCE, from North Africa across the Near East to South Asia.

Egyptian War Chariots

The Hyksos invasion of Egypt in the eighteenth century BCE introduced important military technologies to North Africa, chief among them the bronze sickle sword, the composite bow, and the horse and war chariot.  By the fifteenth century BCE, the Egyptians had modified the chariot into the finest machine in the Near East. The Egyptian chariot basket had a streamlined rounded front to reduce the resistance and was made entirely of wood and leather.  It was so light (around 60 pounds) that two men could carry the body over rough terr

ain, an advantage over earlier heavier chariots from Mesopotamia. The chariot wheels were larger than their Anatolian and Mesopotamian brethren, and six-spoked for durability. The Egyptians improved the control, maneuverability and speed of the chariot by moving the axle to the very rear of the carrying platform. The Egyptian chariot was drawn by two horses and crewed by two men; a charioteer and a soldier whose primary weapon was a composite bow or javelins, but who was also armed with a variety of sidearms such as a dagger, mace, battleax, or the characteristically Egyptian curved khopesh sword. Body armor consisted of scale mail corselets and high crowned bronze helmets.  We are also fortunate to know how Egyptian chariots were deployed in battle. Ten chariots formed a platoon of chariots, while five platoons formed a squadron under a standard bearer. When combined with the superior impact power and range of the composite bow, the agile Egyptian war chariot became the premier tactical system in Egyptian warfare. Warrior-pharaohs like Thutmose III (r.1479-1426 BCE) and Ramses II (r.1279-1213 BCE) used war chariots in their signature victories at Megiddo in 1457 BCE and Qadesh in 1275 BCE, respectively. But manufacturing and maintaining a chariot corps was a very expensive endeavor, the prerogative of rich and powerful kingdoms. The chariots presence on the battlefield was supported by the complex logistics of horse breeding and training, a small army of wheelwrights and chariot builders, bowyers, metal smiths and armorers and the support teams on campaign who managed spare horses and repaired damaged vehicles. Moreover, the chariots position as the preeminent weapon system in ancient warfare required continued access to strategic materials, specifically the light and heavy woods required for bentwood construction. In the case of Egypt and the Hittites in the late Bronze Age and Assyria in the early Iron Age, this meant access to a variety of woods, including elm, ash, almond and plum trees, sources available in the Levant. It is no wonder why these empires expended so much effort maintaining their presence in Lebanon, a chief source of wood for the armies of the Near East.      

Hittite War Chariots

Our modern understanding of Hittite war chariots primarily come through Egyptian depictions, specifically those found on the battle of Qadesh bas reliefs celebrating Ramses II’s victory over the Anatolian kingdom.  Many different kinds of chariotry are depicted, many reflecting the Levantine allies of the Hittites manning lighter chariots similar in construction to the Egyptian machines. However, larger and heavier Hittite chariots pulled by two horses can be discerned, constructed with slats of wood and the axle set forward underneath the center of basket to accommodate a crew of three rather than the Egyptian crew of two. The placement of the axle made the chariot more stable, but less maneuverable compared to its Egyptian rival, despite it having similar six-spoked wheels. This Hittite crew consisted of an unshielded charioteer, a shield bearer to protect the driver, and an unshielded spearman or archer wearing bronze scale armor and a bronze helmet, with long pigtails or scalp locks flowing in the wind (leading Ramses to despairingly refer to Hittite soldiers as “women warriors”). The shield bearer is often portrayed with a thrusting spear or javelins at the ready.  The detailed reliefs also depict riders with swords, battle axes, or maces.  Egyptian carvings of Hittite chariots also show horses protected by scale barding worn over a textile horse trapper. In combat, Hittite war chariots were effective shock weapons, but due to their weight and centrally located axle, they were not as maneuverable as their Egyptian counterparts, a tactical liability that cost them at Qadesh.

Mycenaean War Chariots

In the Aegean, the Bronze Age Mycenaean civilization (c.1700-c.1100 BCE) also utilized chariotry, but the history of this military vehicle is quite different than in other parts of the Near East.  Here, chariot warfare is divided into two phases: an earlier phase between 1550 and 1300 BCE when the so-called “box chariot” was a mobile fighting vehicle, and a leader.  Between 1300 and 1200 BCE, when the “rail chariot” devolved into simply a means of battlefield transport at a time when Mycenaean civilization was in a state of fragmentation and decline.  Both types of chariots were robust vehicles, with the axle located close to the center of the basket connecting two four-spoked wheels. As the name implies, the box chariot was rectangular in shape and framed with steam bentwood before being covered with ox-hide or wicker work.  It was drawn by two horses and crewed by two men, a charioteer and a warrior. Little is known about the armor other than it corresponds chronologically with the famous Dendra panoply consisting of a boars’ tusk helmet and an overlapping bronze corselet that provided excellent protection and poor mobility.  Armament for the accompanying warrior consisted of a thrusting spear and a bronze sword, making the box chariot and excellent shock weapon on the battlefield. The rail chariot appeared at the beginning of the thirteenth century BCE and quickly replaced the box chariot. This was a stripped down chariot consisting of little more than a platform and a grab rail at waist height connected to the platform by stays. This chariot was lighter and more maneuverable but offered less protection to its crew of two who were armed with round shields, with the warrior wielding a short spear. The most important change in armament was the addition of a bronze cut and thrust leaf-shaped blade known across the Near East in Europe as the Naue II sword. Both charioteer and rider were protected by either a bronze or bronze reinforced leather corselet and a simple crested helmet. Unfortunately, our understanding of Mycenaean war chariot tactics is somewhat clouded by the writings of Homer, who lived in the eighth century BCE, commenting about events hundreds of years earlier. Scholars suggest different theories for the change in chariot design. Political fragmentation and economic decline may have hampered the building and deploying of these expensive vehicles, or the introduction of horse cavalry to the region may have spelled the end of the war chariot in the Aegean. War chariots would continue to be used by various Balkan tribes well into the Iron Age, with Alexander the Great facing them in Thrace during his early campaigns.

Bronze Age Chariot Tactics

How chariotry was employed in battle in the Late Bronze Age (c.1600-c.1100 BCE) is a matter of some debate.  One view holds that the Bronze Age kingdoms used war chariots as a thin screen for massed infantry formations, with chariots moving laterally across the front of their own infantry and the chariot archers shooting—-at a right angle—-their arrows against the enemy infantry.   A second view suggests that chariots were held in reserve until the infantry engagement reached a decisive point.  At this moment, commanders would commit their chariots and win the day. A more recent interpretation has opposing chariot forces lining up in long, shallow formations, then hurtling toward each other as archers fired over their teams and into enemy chariot formations. As enemy horses were killed and wounded, chariots veered, slowed and eventually stopped. At this time, friendly infantry “runners” would finish off enemy chariot crews whose machines had been immobilized. Infantry may have also served as a cordon, a haven for damaged chariots to return to after battle. Because there is no evidence for a clash of close-order infantry formations in Late Bronze Age warfare, it is believed the infantry of the period was lightly armored, unarticulated and was most probably used in direct support of chariot charges, to fight in terrain unfavorable to chariot warfare, and to garrison cities.  

EARLY IRON AGE CHARIOTS

Neo-Assyrian War Chariots

During the Bronze Age the Assyrian people were a client-kingdom to more powerful neighbors (Akkadians, Old Babylonians, and Mitanni). Freed around 1360 BCE when Hittites destroyed the Mitanni (who controlled the Assyrians as a client kingdom), Assyria adopted many of the weapon systems used to dominate them, including the war chariot. However, their location in the resource poor northern Mesopotamia required the Assyrians to expand their borders to secure wood for constructing forts, temples, and dams, building stone for walls and castles, and iron ore deposits to forge weapons. This empire building also secure to materials needed to build a large cavalry corps. A new phase of Neo Assyrian (c.850-612 BCE) expansion began in the ninth century BCE. Changes in technology also enabled Neo Assyrian woodworkers to design a stronger chariot, with builders emulating earlier Egyptian designs by moving the wheel axis from the center to the rear of the carriage. The result was a highly maneuverable vehicle that reduced traction effort. Interestingly, the size of the Assyrian war chariot changed over the two and a half century rule of the Neo Assyrian Empire, with the smaller and swifter two-or three horse, two-crewed chariot during the time of Ashurnasirpal II (r.884-859 BCE) giving way to the heavier four-horse, four-man chariot of Ashurbanipal’s (r.669-631 BCE) reign. Most likely, many of the traditional military roles of the lighter chariot (reconnaissance, foraging/hunting, and courier duty) were usurped by the rise of horse cavalry.  But instead of dispensing with the war chariot altogether, the Neo Assyrians simply made it larger and better suited for a more dedicated role as a missile and shock platform. The earlier lighter chariots were crewed by a charioteer and a bronze or iron scale mailed archer with the characteristic conical helm worn by Assyrian soldiers. By the late seventh century BCE, the Assyrian heavy war chariot was pulled by four horses wearing caparisons. Here, the charioteer was accompanied by some combination of armored archers and spearmen, some wielding round shields for additional protection. This heavier Assyrian war chariot outlived their empire, adopted by the short-lived Neo Babylonian or Chaldean Empire (616-539 BCE). Still, the Neo Assyrian chariot suffered from terrain restrictions, unable to exploit its impressive shock capabilities on anything but level ground.  Over time, the Assyrians developed their own cavalry corps and their own horse recruitment, acquiring specialized “yoke” horses for chariots and riding horses for cavalry obtained from as far away as Nubia and Iran. Still, the chariot remained the dominant weapon system into the early Iron Age due to the sociology and psychology of the forces the chariot led and faced. In the Bronze Age, the chariot was often the weapon of the aristocracy, rode into parade and battle by a social class culturally ordained as superior to the common soldiers who gazed upon these often excessively decorated weapons, but by the early Iron Age, the advantages of cavalry increasingly regulated the chariot force to a secondary tactical position on the battlefield. However, the war chariot would have another significant champion in Near Eastern warfare, the Achaemenid Persians.

Persian War Chariots

The Indo-European Achaemenid Persians arrival on the Iranian Plateau coincided with their more powerful northern neighbor, the Medes, and both came from a strong cavalry tradition. Contacts with Mesopotamian peoples and the Elamites of what is today southern Iran introduced new forms of warfare, including the war chariot. The Persian Empire’s (550-330 BCE) rapid expansion under Great King Cyrus II (“the Great,” r.559-529 BCE) and his successors accelerated these martial contacts, reinforcing the mystique of the wheeled vehicles as instruments of war. However, the size and wealth of the Achaemenid dynasty allowed them to field large armies of both cavalry and chariot forces, giving their generals advantages never seen in Near Eastern warfare. Despite the existence of these large multinational forces, the Persians continue to utilize war chariots in their art of war, specifically one modified with blades extending outward from the hub of the wheel horizontally about three feet. The Athenian general and military philosopher Xenophon (c.430-355 BCE) describes these war machines and attributes their invention to Cyrus himself, stating in his biography of the great Persian king, the Cyropedia, how he employed them in battle using the first person voice characteristic of Greek writing of the time:

"And again, what would you have done, if you heard that chariots are coming which are not, as before, to stand still facing back as if for flight, but that the horses harnessed to the chariots are covered with mail, while the drivers stand in wooden towers and the parts of their body not defended by the towers are completely panoplied in breast-plates and helmets; and that scythes of steel have been fitted to the axles, and that it is the intention to drive these into the ranks of the enemy?"

"On both sides of the wheels, moreover, he attached to the axles steel scythes about two cubits long and beneath the axles other scythes pointing down toward the ground; this was so arranged with the intention of hurling the chariots into the midst of the enemy. And as Cyrus constructed them at that time, such even to this day are the chariots in use in the king's dominions."

 Xenophon witnessed 150 scythed chariots firsthand while serving as a Greek mercenary in the service of a Persian pretender at the battle of Cunaxa in 401 BCE. However, despite Xenophon’s assertion of an earlier date, most modern scholars believe this specialized chariot was fielded for the first time in the first half of the fifth century during the Persian Wars (499-449 BCE) as a response to unprecedented killing power of the densely packed Greek hoplite phalanx. They continued to be part of the Persian inventory for the remainder of empire’s lifespan. The Persian scythed chariots was pulled by a team of four horses and crewed by three men, one charioteer and two armored warriors armed with bows, javelins, or thrusting spears. The Achaemenid dynasty’s last Great King, Darius III (r.336-330 BCE), had a substantial chariot corps at his disposal against Alexander the Great at the battle of Gaugamela in 331 BCE in northern Mesopotamia. His 200 scythed chariots would function as part of the Persian combined arms tactical system, theoretically used as shock troops to break through enemy lines, followed by Persian and allied cavalry to exploit the tear. However, at Gaugamela, this tactic did not go as planned. The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus (first century BCE) writes that when the scythed chariots attacked the phalanx, the Macedonians beat their shields with their long thrusting pikes (sarissas), creating such a noise that the horses shied and turned their chariots back on the Persians. Those chariots which continued forward were allowed to pass as the Macedonian soldiers opened wide gaps in their lines. Some Persian horses were killed as they pulled their chariots ahead, but the momentum of others allowed them to charge through, the blades of the chariots severing…

"…the arms of many, shields and all, and in no small number of cases they cut through necks and sent heads tumbling to the ground with the eyes still open and the expression of the countenance unchanged, and in other cases they sliced through ribs with mortal gashes and inflicted a quick death."

Diodorus tells us the Persians were allowed to penetrate to the middle of the Macedonian phalanx, where the charioteers either lost control of their horse team or were either pulled from their baskets by the enemy infantry.  Some chariots were overturned by the terrified horses, as wounded animals dragged along the dead, while other chariots continued to charge forward, inflicting slicing into the Macedonian footman and littering the ground with severed limbs.  Despite the Persian chariot charge, Darius was unable to exploit this chaos, with follow-on attacks, and the Great King not only lost the battle but also his empire.  Alexander continued his conquests eastward, consolidating his newly acquired Persian Empire under Macedonian rule.  While fighting in the Punjab, Alexander faced 120 Indian chariots at the battle of Hydaspes River in 326 BCE, choosing a time and place where the chariots would bog down in the mud before being dispatched by allied cavalry.  After Alexander’s death in 323 BCE, his empire was divided by his generals into what became known as the Hellenistic Successor States, with some of the successor kings not only adopting Persian customs and dress, but also the scythed war chariot as a military arm. In fact, the Romans would face war chariots during their wars of expansion in the eastern Mediterranean and the Celtic fringes of Europe.

Rome versus War Chariots

Rome’s rise as a civilization in the eighth century BCE took place too late for war chariots to be part of their military organization, and the mountainous terrain of the Italian peninsula was not suited for this type of military vehicle. Chariots were an important part of Roman religious and civic festivals, including Roman triumph parades were the victorious general or triumphator was carted through the streets of Rome in the back of a chariot drawn by four horses.  Additionally, chariot racing (ludi circenses) was a favorite pastime for all levels of Roman society and was the most attended spectacle throughout the Republic (509-31 BCE) and Empire (31 BCE-476 CE), a sporting event that continued well into the Byzantine era.  Circuses and hippodromes were major architectural features of large Roman and Byzantine cities, with the Circus Maximus in Rome holding up 250,000 spectators, and the smaller Hippodrome in Constantinople seating 40,000.  However, Rome did face adversaries who used war chariots from time to time.  In the eastern Mediterranean, the Romans faced the Hellenistic Seleucid king Antiochus III (r.222-187 BCE) at the battle of Magnesia in 190 BCE. The Greek historian Polybius (c.200-118 BCE) describes the scythed war machine, echoing earlier Persian descriptions:

"These chariots were armed in the following manner: On either side of the pole where the yoke-bar was fastened spikes were fixed which projected forward like horns, ten cubits long, so as to pierce anything that came in their way, and at each end of the yoke-bar two scythes projected, one on a level with the bar so as to cut off sideways anything it came against, the other turned towards the ground to catch those lying down or trying to get under it. Similarly, two scythes pointing in opposite directions to each end of the axis of the wheels."

Another Greek historian, Appian (95-165 CE) also commented on this battle, stating that the slingers and archers aim deliberately at the horses, causing them to turn back on their own ranks.  However, scythed chariots were used to good effect at the battle of Amnias River in 89 BCE when the long-reigned King Mithridates VI of Pontus (r.120-63 BCE) successfully, if temporarily, wrested Anatolia away from Rome.  Here, his war chariots were deployed against Rome’s Bithynian allies. Again, Appian comments, stating the scythes were effective in “cutting some of them in two, and tearing others to pieces” and creating a general panic that cost the Romans the day.  Three years later, at the battle of Chaeronea (86 BCE) the Romans learned from their mistakes, allowing the chariots into their ranks before surrounding and dispatching both horse and crew by Roman pila (light and heavy javelins). Gaius Julius Caesar (100-44 BCE) fought war chariots in both Britain and Anatolia. During his Gallic campaigns, Caesar was met by Celtic Britons riding war chariots while attempting amphibious landing at Kent in 55 BCE, and later had to rescue his legionaries, who were attacked by chariots while on a foraging expedition. At the battle of Zela in 47 BCE, Caesar faced Mithridates’ son, Pharnaces II (r.63-47 BCE), halting the chariot charge with a barrage of missile fire, contributing to the end of this client kingdom rebellion so swiftly that Caesar famously remarked, “Vini, vidi, vici” (“I came, I saw, I conquered”). 

Celtic War Chariots

The last culture to use war chariotry in European history were the Celtic peoples in the British Isles.  The prevailing theory asserts the Indo-European Celtic peoples originally arrived in Europe in migrations from their homeland in the Volga River basin around 1000 BCE, bringing with them the iron technologies and the horse and chariot. Chariot burial was an Iron Age Celtic custom, providing modern scholars with a wealth of information concerning their construction.  Usually, the wooden chariot has decayed, while the bronze horse harness survives, as well as the iron wheel covers and other iron parts to allow for well-informed reconstructions. Like elsewhere in the Near East, the chariot was associated with the ruling Celtic elite. Roman depictions of Celtic chieftains often included chariots. A Roman coin dating to 110 BCE depicts the naked Gallic king Bituitus of the Averni throwing javelins from the basket of his chariot. The Celtic war chariot was a single axle vehicle with the axle placed below the center of the basket.  It was oblong in shape, with side panels formed by double semicircular bows of wood filled in with inserts of wood, leather, wicker work, or a combination of these materials. It was a small basket that offered little protection for both charioteer and the singular warrior who themselves often went to war with very little personal protection.  A rough contemporary of Julius Caesar, Diodorus Siculus remarked on this lack of armor, stating:

"In their journeyings and when they go into battle the Gauls use chariots drawn by two horses, which carry the charioteer and the warrior; and when they encounter cavalry in the fighting, they first hurl their javelins at the enemy and then step down from their chariots and join battle with their swords. Certain of them despise death to such a degree that they enter the perils of battle without protective armor and with no more than a girdle about their loins. They bring along to war also their free men to serve them, choosing them out from among the poor, and these attendants they use in battle as charioteers and as shield bearers."

Displacing or assimilating earlier Bronze Age cultures, the Celts became the dominant culture across the European continent, eventually making their way across the English Channel to the British Isles. In Britain they mixed with indigenous peoples and continue to adhere to a distinctly Celtic culture until contact with the Romans challenged their way of life. Probably due to the insular nature of their homeland, the Britons continue to hold onto the chariot as a weapon of war long after their continental Celtic and Germanic brethren abandoned this tactical system in favor of horse cavalry.  As stated above, Caesar met these war machines during his British expedition (55-54 BCE).  Yet, despite never meeting the Britons in a pitched battle, Caesar was impressed with the barbarians’ chariots, describing their harassing tactics in his Gallic Wars:

“They begin by driving all over the field, hurling javelins; and the terror inspired by the horses and the noise of the wheels is usually enough to throw the enemy ranks into disorder.  Then they work their way between their own cavalry units, where the warriors jump down and fight on foot.  Meanwhile the drivers retire a short distance from the fighting and station the cars in such a way that their masters, if outnumbered, have an easy means of retreat to their own lines.  In action therefore, they combine the mobility of cavalry with the staying power of foot soldiers. Their skill, which is derived from ceaseless training and practice, may be judged by the fact that they can control their horses at full gallop on the steepest incline, check and turn them in a moment, run along the pole, stand on the yoke, and get back again into the chariot as quick as lightning.” 

The Britons were still using chariots when the Romans returned to Britain to stay in 43 CE.  The Roman spent the next two decades pacifying the numerous indigenous Celtic tribes, carving out the beginnings of what would become Roman Britain. The greatest challenge to Roman occupation took place in 61 CE when several Celtic tribes rebelled against harsh and humiliating treatment by the Romans in East Anglia, initiating a killing spree of all foreigners in their wake. Led by the red-headed Boudica, the widowed warrior queen of the Iceni tribe, the Britons massacred three Roman settlements and killed tens of thousands of men, women and children before two Roman legions forced to battle at Verulamium (Saint Albans). Unfortunately, our main Roman chronicler, Tacitus (56-120 CE) give us very few details concerning this engagement, other than an imagined reconstruction of speeches given, and an interesting tidbit that British wagons placed at the far end of the battlefield trapped the Celtic army when the Romans eventually advanced.  Although Boudica is not explicitly placed on a war chariot at this battle, she is often imagined being in one, an image reinforced in modern history by the famous bronze sculpture of her and her daughters located today on the Thames River in London.  Based on the prevalence of chariotry in Celtic warfare, this is a reasonable assertion. Tacitus tells us that chariots were once again present at the battle of Mons Graupius in 83 CE in Scotland, remarking that the enemy chariots “"filled the middle of the plain, making a din as they rode back and forth," but as the battle continued and the Romans began to advance up the mountain, the charioteers abandoned the field, and the "runaway chariots or terrified, riderless horses with nothing but fear to direct them careered into the ranks from the side or head on." As late as the beginning of the third century CE, the Roman historian Cassius Dio (164-235 CE) continue to comment on the use of chariots in Celtic warfare:

"They go into battle in chariots, and have small, swift horses; there are also foot-soldiers, very swift in running and very firm in standing their ground. For arms they have a shield and a short spear, with a bronze apple attached to the end of the spear-shaft, so that when it is shaken it may clash and terrify the enemy; and they also have daggers."

Celtic war chariots continue to be on the mind of Roman commentators as late as the fourth century CE, when Publius Vegetius Renatus (c.365-450 CE) commented on their liability on the battlefield in his De Re Militari (alternatively known as Epitoma Rei Militaris), referring to them as a “laughingstock” easily defeated by dispatching just one of the horses by missile fire or spiked caltrops. 

By the time of the publication of De Re Militari in late antiquity, the war chariot had faded into history in European and Near Eastern warfare, although it continued to hold the imagination of scholars because of its association with great historical events and perhaps more importantly, the religions of both regions. In Mesopotamia, Persia, Anatolia, and Egypt, bas relief carvings depicted great kings and pharaohs fighting or hunting from the baskets of chariots. Greece’s Iliad describes Mycenaean heroes like Achilles, Hector, and Odysseus arriving on the battlefield in these glorious machines. The famous Alexander Mosaic shows that moment in the battle of Issus (333 BCE) when Alexander the Great is about to confront Darius III on the battlefield, the former on his noble mount Bucephalus, and the latter standing in the back of his golden war chariot.  This preoccupation with war chariotry is also seen in both India and China, with India’s original epic poems, the Ramayaṇa and Mahabharata portraying archery duels between heroes from their chariot’s baskets.  Even in ancient China, the war chariot held a particular mystique. Emperor Qin Shi Huang (221-210 BCE) was buried surrounded by 130 full size war chariots and two half-sized bronze replicas and guarded by thousands of terra-cotta warriors for his journey to the afterlife.  And on the other side of Eurasia, the war chariot continued to have a prominent place in Celtic folklore into the Common Era, as demonstrated in the old Irish epic the Tain Bo Cuailnge (“The Cattle Raid of Cooley”) originally composed around the second century and featuring the hero Cu Chulainn and his charioteer Laeg and their adventures in pagan Ireland. For over 3000 years, the war chariot held a prominent place in Eurasian warfare as an ancient and classical horse-drawn tank and missile platform, a high prestige vehicle for the conveyance of kings, generals, chieftains, and ordinary soldiers to and through the battlefield.

Suggested Readings:

Primary sources

Appian. The Roman History (Volume I: The Foreign Wars). Translated by Horace White. Macmillan, 1899. 

Arrian. The Landmark Arrian: The Campaigns of Alexander.  Translated by Pamela Mensch. Anchor Books, 2012.

Diodorus Siculus. The Library-Philip II, Alexander the Great, and the Successors. Translated by Robin Waterfield. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019.

Julius Caesar. The Landmark Julius Caesar: The Complete Works: Gallic War, Civil War, Alexandrian War, African War, and Spanish War.  Translated by Kurt A. Raaflaub. Anchor Books, 2018.

Polybius. The Rise of the Roman Empire. Translated by Ian Scott-Kilvert. Penguin Books, 1979.

Xenophon: Cyropedia. Translated by Walter Miller. Loeb Classical Library, 1914.

Secondary sources

Bryce, Trevor. Warriors of Anatolia: A Concise History of the Hittites. Bloomsbury Academic, 2022.

Cotterall, Arthur. Chariot: From Chariot to Tank, the Astounding Rise of the World's First War Machine. Abrams Press, 2006. 

Farrokh, Kaveh. Shadows in the Desert: Ancient Persia at War. Osprey, 2009.

Gabriel, Richard A., and Karen S. Metz. From Sumer to Rome: The Military Capabilities of Ancient Armies. Greenwood Press, 1991.

Healy, Mark. The Ancient Assyrians: Empire and Army, 883–612 BC.  Osprey Publishing, 2023.

Hoffman, Birgitta. The Roman Invasion of Britain: Archaeology versus History. Pen and Sword, 2019.

Shaw, Ian. Ancient Egyptian Warfare: Tactics, Weaponry, and Ideology of the Pharaohs.  Casemate, 2019.