A cataphract, from the Greek word kataphraktos, plural kataphraktoi, literally meaning (very) "behind barriers", "behind a fence", or "protected," was a form of heavy cavalry used by nomadic eastern Iranian tribes and dynasties and later Greeks and Latin-speaking peoples. Historically the cataphract was a heavily armed and armored cavalryman who saw action from the earliest days of Antiquity up through the High Middle Ages. Originally, the term cataphract referred to a type of armor worn to cover the whole body and that of the horse. Eventually the term described the trooper himself.