I was wondering, for chinese armies that uses cavalry, do they use stallions or mares?Or do they just use any horse that can sit a rider?

what is the calvary ?

Calvary- i know as the hill near Jerusalem where Jesus was crucified



If you meant -cavalier-, i would say Normal person don't use mare for war

Almost always geldings.

Quite a number of people on CHF tend to confuse the words 'calvary' and 'cavalry'. I used to make that mistake too, until I was about 11 years old

BTW, a gelding is a castrated male horse. Tadamson, what was the purpose of castrating war horses?

I think to prevent the horses from going horny and trying to mate with the enemy's mare?Imagine 2 cavalry armies charging towards each other and suddenly half of the stallions starting to mate with the enemy mares right in the heat of battle.

it puts the stallion rider in a perfect position to swipe the mere rider's head off. I see no problem with that.

Well, that would take only a second. Who knows how long the vulnerability to the stallion mounted Cavalier would last while he waited on his horse?

I believe the Mongols favored Mares.

And, Tadamson, somewhat on the subject...what exactly were Destriers?

A check on-line seems to indicate Mongols largely used geldings as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destrier

Here is the meaning of what is a Destrier.

Geldings are easier to control and are less hyper. I can attest to this since many in my family raise horse's and compete in various competitions such as o-mok-see's.

chris

For many types of horse, including steppe ponies, the geldings tend to grow larger than ungelded stallions.

For the nomads exporting horses to China, there was also the advantage that geldings can't breed.

Destrier is a Medieval French term for the large powerful horses bread for hunting and war, they were very similar to a modern 'hunter'.

nb re the gelding thread..
In the Late Bronze Age, middle eastern chariot teams were normally stallions, there are several instances if the enemy taking a mare in heat across the front of these formations resulting in their total disruption.