Lance
It developed later into a term for spear-like weapons specially designed and modified to be part of a "weapon system" for use couched under the arm during a charge, being equipped with special features such as grappers to engage with lance rests attached to breastplates, and vamplates, small circular plates designed to prevent the hand sliding up the shaft upon impact.
During the late 3rd century the weapons of the cavalry attached to each Roman legion evolved from javelins and swords to sometimes include long reaching lances (contus).
In jousting, the lance tips would usually be blunt, often spread out like a cup or furniture foot, to provide a wider impact surface designed to unseat the opposing rider without spearing him through.
After the success of pistol-armed Huguenot heavy horse against their Royalist counterparts during the French Wars of Religion, most Western European powers started rearming their lancers with pistols, initially as an adjunct weapon and eventually as a replacement, with the Spanish retaining the lance the longest.
[5] Only the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth with its far greater emphasis on cavalry warfare, large population of Szlachta nobility and general lower military technology level among its foes retained the lance to a considerable degree, with the famously winged Polish hussars having their glory period during the 17th and 18th centuries against a wide variety of enemy forces.
This followed on the demise of the pike and of body armor during the early 18th century, with the reintroduction of lances coming from Hungary and Poland, having retained large formations of lance-armed cavalry when they had become more or less obsolescent elsewhere in Europe.
During the War of the Triple Alliance (1864–1870), the Paraguayan cavalry made effective use of locally manufactured lances, both of conventional design and of an antique pattern used by gauchos for cattle herding.
[6] The 1860s and 1870s saw the increasing common usage of ash, bamboo, beech, or pine wood for lance shafts of varying lengths, each with steel points and butts, adopted by the uhlan regiments of the Saxon, Württemberg, Bavarian, and Prussian armies.
[13] However, the Boers made effective use of trench warfare, rapid-fire field artillery, continuous-fire machine guns, and accurate long-range repeating rifles from the beginning of the war.
[11] The Russian cavalry (except for the Cossacks) discarded the lance in the late 19th century, but in 1907, it was reissued for use by the front line of each squadron when charging in open formation.
[15] The relative value of the lance and the sword as a principal weapon for mounted troops was an issue of dispute in the years immediately preceding World War I.
Arguments favoring the retention of the lance focused on the impact on morale of having charging cavalry preceded by "a hedge of steel" and on the effectiveness of the weapon against fleeing opponents.
[11] Lances were still in use by the British, Turkish, Italian, Spanish, French, Belgian, Indian, German, and Russian armies at the outbreak of World War I.
In initial cavalry skirmishes in France this antique weapon proved ineffective,[16] German uhlans being "hampered by their long lances and a good many threw them away".
[20] The cavalry branches of most armies which still retained lances as a service weapon at the end of World War I generally discarded them for all but ceremonial occasions during the 1920s and 1930s.
There were exceptions during this era, such as the Polish cavalry, which retained the lance for combat use until either 1934[21] or 1937,[22] but contrary to popular legend did not make use of it in World War II.
[24] The Argentine cavalry were documented as carrying lances until the 1940s,[25] but this appears to have been used as part of recruit riding school training, rather than serious preparation for use in active service.
The New South Wales Mounted Police, based at Redfern Barracks, Sydney, Australia, carry a lance with a navy blue and white pennant on ceremonial occasions.
