Is that actually true? Aren’t there several examples of relatively small cavalry forces (of knights) winning against much, much larger forces?
Quickly googling: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Lake_of_Antioc...
Quickly googling: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Lake_of_Antioc...
1 on 1 duels are glamorous but are more apt for literary works than warfare which is really a branch of political/economic science.
Modern samurai popularity seems to owe a lot to Kurosawa's desire to film Westerns...I can't recall exactly, but I had come across a few accounts where public resentment of the samurai class as corrupt government officials surged from time to time...
I thought that until the last few centuries foraging/pillaging was the main way armies were fed in the field. Gives the obvious advantage of not needing to maintain and defend supply lines.