Thracian warfare In the 4th century BC, both infantry and cavalry troops started wearing helmets (some of leather) and some peltasts are seen with greaves. Principal weapons in the 4th century BC (as well as earlier) were the spear and short knife. Armor, when it was available (for the nobility), was at first leather or bronze but iron armour started appearing in the 4th century BC. Thracian cavalry would wear leather armor or no armor and would be armed with javelins, a bow, or a spear. Only royal cavalry would wear armor. Oval shields and peltes (even by heavy cavalry) were later
Thracian language (meaning "up") and based on several Thracic items, would have meant "upon", "up", and "Utaspios" is theorized to have meant "On horse(back)", parallel to ancient Greek "ephippos (epi-hippos)". The early Indo-European languages had more than one word for horse; for example Latin had "equus" from PIE "*ekwo-" and "mannus" ("a pony") from another IE root, later receiving "cabalus" as a loanword. In many cases in current Thracology, there is more than one etymology for a Thracian lexical item. For example, Thracian "Diana Germetitha" ("Diana" is from Latin while the epithet "Germetitha" is from Thracian) has two different proposed etymologies, "Diana