page_title: Hussar
section_title: The hussar image
hierarchical_section_title: Hussar / The hussar image
caption_attribution_description: English: Hannover: Englisch-Deutsche Legion. Offiziere vom 1., 2. und 3.Husaren-Regiment. Husar vom 3. Husaren-Regiment. 1813 Deutsch: Knötel, Band III, Tafel 35: Hannover: Englisch-Deutsche Legion. Offiziere vom 1., 2. und 3.Husaren-Regiment. Husar vom 3. Husaren-Regiment. 1813
context_page_description: A hussar was a member of a class of light cavalry, originating in Central Europe during the 15th and 16th centuries. The title and distinctive dress of these horsemen were subsequently widely adopted by light cavalry regiments in European armies in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.
  A number of armored or ceremonial mounted units in modern armies retain the designation of hussars.
  Historically, the term derives from the cavalry of late medieval Hungary, under Matthias Corvinus, with mainly Serb warriors.
context_section_description: The colourful military uniforms of hussars from 1700 onwards were inspired by the prevailing Hungarian fashions of the day. Usually, this uniform consisted of a short jacket known as a dolman, or later a medium-length atilla jacket, both with heavy, horizontal gold braid (sujtás) on the breast and yellow braided or gold Austrian knots (vitézkötés) on the sleeves, a matching pelisse (a short-waisted over-jacket often worn slung over one shoulder), coloured trousers, sometimes with yellow braided or gold Austrian knots at the front, a busby (kucsma) (a high, fur hat with a cloth bag hanging from one side, although some regiments wore the shako (csákó) of various styles), and high riding boots (often Hessian boots). A sabretache, an ornate pouch hung from the belt, often completed the accoutrements.
  European hussars traditionally wore long moustaches (but no beards) and long hair, with two plaits hanging in front of the ears as well as a larger queue at the back, a style known as the cadenette. They often retained the queue, which used to be common to all soldiers, after other regiments had dispensed with it and adopted short hair.
  Hussars had a reputation for being the dashing, if unruly, adventurers of the army. The traditional image of the hussar is of a reckless, hard-drinking, womanising, moustachioed swashbuckler. General Lasalle, an archetypal hussar officer, epitomized this attitude by his remarks, among which the most famous is: "Any hussar who is not dead by the age of thirty is a blackguard." He died at the Battle of Wagram at the age of 34.
  Arthur Conan Doyle's character Brigadier Etienne Gerard of the French Hussards de Conflans has come to epitomise the hussar of popular fiction – brave, conceited, amorous, a skilled horseman and (according to Napoleon) not very intelligent. Brigadier Gerard's boast that the Hussards de Conflans (an actual regiment) could set a whole population running, the men away from them and the women towards them, may be taken as a fair representation of the esprit de corps of this class of cavalry.
  Less romantically, 18th-century hussars were also known (and feared) for their poor treatment of local civilians. In addition to commandeering local food-stocks for the army, hussars were known to also use the opportunity for personal looting and pillaging.
  The 1930 operetta Viktoria und ihr Husar (Victoria and her Hussar) has been filmed several times.
caption: Hussars of the King's German Legion in 1813, all armed with the 1796 sabre
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