 The critic Tom Shippey notes that the Riders of Rohan are, despite Tolkien's protestations, much like the ancient English (the Anglo-Saxons), but that they differed from the ancient English in having a culture based on horses.They use many Old English words related to horses; their name for themselves is "Éotheod", horse-people, and the names of riders like Éomund, Éomer, and Éowyn begin with the word for horse, "eo[h]".In Shippey's view, a defining virtue of the Riders is panache, which he explains means both "the white horsetail on [Éomer's] helm floating in his speed" and "the virtue of sudden onset, the dash that sweeps away resistance."