These heavy hussars were known in Poland as Husaria.
By the 1590s, most Polish hussar units had been reformed along the same 'heavy' model. By the reign of Bathory (1576–1586), the hussars had replaced medieval-style lancers in the Polish Crown army, and they now formed the bulk of the Polish cavalry. When Bathory was elected King of Poland and later accepted as a Grand Duke of Lithuania in 1576, he reorganized the hussars of his Royal Guard into a heavy formation equipped with a long lance as their main weapon. Over the course of the 16th century, hussars in Hungary became heavier in character: they abandoned wooden shields and adopted metal-plated body armour. Several retinues were combined to form a hussar banner or company ( chorągiew husarska). Each hussar towarzysz ('comrade') raised his own poczet or lance/retinue. Most hussars were recruited from the wealthier Polish nobility ( szlachta). The hussars were the leading, or even elite, branch of cavalry in the Polish army from the 1570s until 1776 when their duties and traditions were passed on to the uhlans by a parliamentary decree. The true 'winged hussar' arrived with the reforms of the King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania Stephen Bathory in the 1570s and was later led by the King John III Sobieski. Polish hussars during entry into Kraków, detail of so-called Stockholm Roll, 1605.
