Board Thread:Suggestions forum/@comment-5601442-20151231172926/@comment-5601442-20160102043755

Tarver wrote: Where does it say only the chieftains used chariots? In unfinished tales it describes the chariots as a tactic/device commonly used by the wainriders in warfare, not as a thing used by the elite. The point I was trying to make with the mongols, is that they didn't use chariots as a main unit for warfare, unlike the wainriders which did, thus a civilization like the persians/sassanids seems more appropriate than the mongols. Only the Achaemenid Persians used chariots, the Sassanids and Parthians did not. Also, at the same time the Achaemenids were using chariots, the steppe nomads of Eurasia (the ancestors of the mongols, xiongnu, scythians, etc) were ALSO using chariots in warfare.

Now while it doesnt say ONLY the cheiftans used them, when chariots are mentioned in the text it almost always says that their cheiftans rode in them. In any case, chariots were expensive to make, especially those used in warfare. At the time the Wainriders invaded the west, large use of mounted melee men was already common, which in history were the bane of charioteers. Therefore, we can speculate that the chariots the Wainriders used were advanced beyond those of real history in order to deal with these sorts of things and actually be a major threat to the professional, regimented armies of Gondor (perhaps something like the dwarves had in the BOTFA film?). Anyways, thats also just speculation, but the point still stands that in the text the charioteers were ussually presented as specialised forces and not meant to be the main component of the Wainriders army. The name "Wainrider" was given to them by Gondor because they lived and traveled (Nomadically) in Wains, not that all their troops rode in chariots.

In any case, none of the Persian dynasties were nomadic tribes like the Wainriders, but the Mongols/Huns/Xiongnu/etc were. I do beleive youre missing the point though. If any faction would be close to a mongolic steppe nomadic people in Middle Earth, it would most definatley be the Wainriders, and not the Variags, because what we are told of the Variags has nothing alike with mongols or nomads, and what we are told of the Wainriders does.

Also, as of note, I brought this point up to some of the Tolkien experts at the Tolkien Gateway, who agreed with me and have changed the unsourced articles on Khand and the Variags.