A chariot probably works fine on an open plain. But it isn't very efficient use of men and horse if you have 2 horses, 2 people and a chariot to give just one archer with extra mobility.

It may have also been a class/cultural thing. A man on horseback is actively riding the horse, a man in a 2+ person chariot is having someone else do the hard work.

Refusing the give fight to a chariot oriented army versus a non-chariot based army would seem to also be a big factor.

If you don't have chariots and they do, just fight where the chariots can't.

You probably look very kingly fighting from a chariot. Raised up platform, but also standing.

You get an archer with extra mobility AND the ability to focus on hitting his target while someone else does the steering AND armor AND a bigger carrying capacity (more quivers of arrows, ...)

yes, I know the stories of the amazing accuracy of horseback archers (mongol, native american, ...). Just saying that the 2-man thing may be more efficient than you give it credit for.

Personally, I think I would rather face N Persian chariots, than 2N Mongols on horseback. I wonder if anyone has done a comparative test?

I think they are separated by around 1500 years, so I’m sure the Mongolian army would be scarier. But the Alexander-era Persians wouldn’t have that choice, right? For example stirrups and advances in composite bows (they’ve existed for a long time, but were high tech things, so I’m sure every culture iterated on the idea and 1500 years of iterations add up) probably made Mongolian horse archers a lot better than the options they had.

There is also this massive military campaign in China, just for the sake of capturing horses from a Greek colony in Afghanistan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_Heavenly_Horses

With artwork it's hard to tell if that's how it went down or if that's simple an artistic representation designed to imply something based on knowledge shared with the viewers and if the latter then that opens up more questions. Is the artist doing it that way because "chariots -> foreigners -> bad" or it could be "chariots -> old ways -> inferior" or it could be "chariots -> obvious favorites -> underdog won anyway"

Kind of like how George Lucas made the empire look like the Nazis so you know who's good and who's bad in the first minute before you even know what else is going on or how in most artwork about the American revolution it's obvious which side is and isn't a professional army.

>most artwork about the American revolution it's obvious which side is and isn't a professional army

True. But wasn't the reality complicated (as usual)? There were French regulars on the American side and various militias fighting on the British side. And Indians fighting on both sides.

> But wasn't the reality complicated (as usual)

Yes.

Which further underlies the point that you shouldn't take the artistic depiction too literally.

The king of kings’ chariot was a status symbol. Persian cavalry fought from horseback.