Italian cavalry in XIII century

[mitra]

Now we can pass to Italian cavalry during the XIII century:

a part from normal heavy knight, enrolled from the urban or feudal nobility, we can find in the sources the figure of "Berroviere", the word derived from the old french and indicate the "man of Berry" a synonim of "man of valor". The "berrovieri" are a light cavalry but anyway with good protection (laminar o mail armour); they can be armed with various type of weapons: spear, sword, crossbow,etc. Their principal role are the incursions and the razzie, but they can be make good also in battle.

During the century we can see appear also mounted crossbowmen (balestrieri a cavallo), they are necessary to assure to heavy cavalry the protection against the more and more numerous missile units in the armies.