Cairate, Frederick Barbarossa resumed the march on Pavia heading towards the Ticino. Meanwhile, some avant-gardes of the Lombard League army stationed in Legnano, formed by 700 knights, broke away from the main army and searched the territory between Borsano and Busto Arsizio. According to other sources, the knights instead controlled the area between Borsano and Legnano, in other words, the modern-day districts of Ponzella and Mazzafame. At 3 miles (about 4.5 km) from Legnano, near Cascina Brughetto, the 700 municipal knights on the track crossed - just outside a forest - 300 knights of the imperial army on patrol, which represented only the vanguards of Frederick's troops. Being numerically superior, the Knights of the League attacked the imperial column and succeeded, at least initially, in gaining the upper hand. Immediately after the first clashes, Barbarossa arrived with the bulk of the army and charged the municipal troops. Some chroniclers of the time report that Barbarossa's advisers had suggested to the emperor to stall for a new strategy, but the sovereign would have refused to take advantage of the numerical superiority and not to be forced to retreat towards hostile territories; furthermore, a retreat would have affected the prestige of the emperor. The fate of the battle, therefore, reversed and the imperial troops forced the first rows of the municipal army to back off in confusion. The strong impact then forced the municipal knights to retreat towards Milan, leaving the soldiers alone who were in Legnano to defend the Carroccio. Barbarossa therefore decided to attack the latter with the cavalry, given that it was defended only by the infantry - according to the canons of the time considered to be clearly inferior to the cavalry - and to a small number of militias on horseback. The defense of the Carroccio in Legnano and the epilogue At this point an exceptional event occurred with respect to the traditional dominance of cavalry on infantry of that period. In Legnano the municipal infantry, with the few remaining knights, after being attacked by Barbarossa, settled around the Carroccio (maintaining a certain distance from the symbol of their municipalities), organizing themselves on some defensive lines along a wide semicircle 2–3 km, each of which consisted of soldiers protected by shields. Between one shield and another the lances were then stretched, with the first row of foot soldiers fighting on their knees so as to form a