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+--- Thread: specifics in Spear fighting combat (/showthread.php?tid=11872)
Spear fighting/Hoplite drill - Paullus Scipio - 05-22-2008
Paul B. wrote:-
Quote:I know of no author who agrees with the notion that hoplites did not charge in the depth given as "normal" (8-16) besides yourself. Any modern authors agree with you?....I was rather expecting this, given your views on Othismos... :wink:
I don't read many modern authors, so I cannot say.......
Will Xenophon serve ?
Quote:He ordered the Greeks to form their lines and take their positions just as they were accustomed to do for battle,( i.e. not march/manouevre/open order, 8 ranks deep, but 'battle'/close order) each general marshalling his own men. So they formed the line four deep, Menon and his troops occupying the right wing, Clearchus and his troops the left, and the other generals the centre........ And the Greeks all had helmets of bronze, crimson tunics, and greaves, and carried their shields uncovered. When he had driven past them all, he halted his chariot in front of the centre of the phalanx, and sending his interpreter Pigres to the generals of the Greeks, gave orders that the troops should advance arms and the phalanx move forward in a body. The generals transmitted these orders to the soldiers, and when the trumpet sounded, they advanced arms and charged. And then, as they went on faster and faster, at length with a shout the troops broke into a run of their own accord, ( so the charge is seemingly normally carried out at a fast walk....?) in the direction of the camp. As for the barbarians, they were terribly frightened; the Cilician queen took to flight in her carriage, and the people in the market left their wares behind and took to their heels; while the Greeks with a roar of laughter came up to their camp.
Q.E.D.....?
D lol: ( and please don't trot out that "special pleading" that they 'must have' formed up thinner than usual because they were going to fight barbarians.....note that Xenophon says 'as they were accustomed to do')
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Giannis K. Hoplite - 05-22-2008
"Just as they were accustomed to do" may not refer to phalanx depth. I thought we had agreed in the other thread that there was not such thing as "normal" depth.They could change depth according to the situation. Of cource 4 ranks is in the lower end,and 50 in the extreme. "...take their positions" means they deployed in their usual way,with perhaps one of the ways i showed above,and locked shields. Nothing more. Depth had to do with the oponent and the lenght they wanted to achieve. I don't believe in Mantineia for example they were 4 deed either of the phalanxes. And we know that neither in Deleion they were. Another reason why they formed only 4 may had been that these soldiers were the most brilliantly equiped and the four ranks allowd for the prince nad the soldiers to come as close as possible. i don't think the mention of the depth has any significance in this case,Paul.
Khaire
Giannis
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Marcus_Ulpius_Trajanus - 05-22-2008
Quote:Quote:Xenophon seems to use 'pyknosis' and 'synapsismos' synonymously, and that makes a great deal of sense given the size of shield, and the fact that 'fighting stance' for a Hoplite is more front on and less sideways than a 'Sarissaphoroi' - you can't squeeze up so much, though in battle conditions we might expect 'bunching', and edging behind a neighbours shield to occur, as we are told famously by Thucydides referring to the famous 'rightward drift' - which we should be careful not to over-exaggerate.
I think we have the same Loeb in front of us
i just wanted ot add that linear warfare era reenactors and professionals both comment on this same effect. If troops are at 'Shoulder Arms" (British or French) they tend to drift left, and if at "advance arms" (British) they tend to drift right. Troops doing the 1758 drill bayonet charge (which is a leg over leg advance much like the Greek Phalanx with shield, at least as illustrated on many vases) also have a natural "oblique" which has ot be overcome by careful judgment. David Dundas in his 1787 pre-manual comments on this tendency several times.
I wonder if Thuc. was just wrong in his reasoning as to why the phalanx drifted, thus confusing generations of scholars?
Just 2 cents worth!
I just watched this happen last weekend, in the 18th century reenactor context. We had a group of four firing platoons, and were withdrawing. My platoon was the last to withdraw, and I about faced them and sent them off, and turned back to watch the other side for a moment, and when I turned again to look at my platoon, I could see them drifting. That was a six man frontage in two ranks. I can't imagine the issues with a wider frontage.
Spear-fighting/Hoplite Drill - Paullus Scipio - 05-22-2008
Giannis wrote:-
Quote: I thought we had agreed in the other thread that there was not such thing as "normal" depth.
....sure, I would agree that this was not the only depth, and that depth/length of line would depend on the situation/size of battlefield.......but for this scenario, Xenophon is quite unequivocal, and his meaning is plain ....in 'battle'/close order, the Hoplites were 'accustomed' to form up four deep. ( and therefore the usual eight deep in 'normal'/open order). 'Form up line and take their positions' is also about as plain as you could wish....
As an officer who actually commanded REAL Hoplites, I think Xenophon is to be preferred to any modern "armchair strategists", don't you?
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Kineas - 05-22-2008
Quote:ekeleuse de tous Hellênas hôs nomos autois eis machên houtô tachthênai kai stênai, suntaxai d' hekaston tous heautou. etachthêsan oun epi tettarôn:
Just to be argumentative, I spent some time translating these lines myself. (Shrug). So the Loeb translator was dead right. Never hurts to check.
Note to other reenactors--all of Xenophon is available at [url:2uaz3dfh]http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cache/perscoll_Greco-Roman.html[/url]
along with most of the relevant texts in Greek and English. Note that all the words in Greek are interactive, so if you want to waste hours (it's not a waste, actually) you can look at the word definitions even if you don't speak a word of classical greek.
Quote:And when, as they proceeded, a part of the phalanx burst out, those who were thus left behind began to run; at the same moment they all set up the sort of war-cry which they raise to Enyalius, and all alike began running. It is also reported that some of them clashed their shields against their spears, thereby frightening the enemy's horses. [19] And before an arrow reached them, the barbarians broke and fled.
This is Xenophon again, with the Perseus translation amended by me because a key word, exekumaine, is used to describe things bursting into motion or waves crashing on a shore, as opposed to "billowing" which is used in other translations.
I'm bringing this up because here, and again in Hellenika, Xenophon describes not an orderly march of the phalanx to meet its opponent, with careful rank closing and then a charge--he describes a 'bursting forth" of some warriors, with the rest running in behind, crashing like a wave. Remember, the start of this thread has to do with whther there's much in the way of single combat. I'm trying to steer back that way...
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - PMBardunias - 05-22-2008
Quote:Will Xenophon serve ?
Quote:
He ordered the Greeks to form their lines and take their positions just as they were accustomed to do for battle,( i.e. not march/manouevre/open order, 8 ranks deep, but 'battle'/close order) each general marshalling his own men. So they formed the line four deep,
Nice try, but you have proved nothing about "doubling." A direct reading of this is that he formed up 4 deep and charged that way. Were he to describe these troops prior to battle he would have said they formed in four ranks. You are adding the step where they form in 8 ranks first then double. For this you have no more evidence than for forming in 12 and tripling or forming in 16 and doubling twice- both just as unlikely.
Quote:Q.E.D.....? ( and please don't trot out that "special pleading" that they 'must have' formed up thinner than usual because they were going to fight barbarians.....note that Xenophon says 'as they were accustomed to do')
I'm not sure why the most obvious solution to the problem is special pleading. :wink: By this date forming in 12 was more "common" than forming in 8. So were they "specially" thin, in 8 ranks, because they were in Asia?
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Marcus_Ulpius_Trajanus - 05-22-2008
Quote:Quote:ekeleuse de tous Hellênas hôs nomos autois eis machên houtô tachthênai kai stênai, suntaxai d' hekaston tous heautou. etachthêsan oun epi tettarôn:
Just to be argumentative, I spent some time translating these lines myself. (Shrug). So the Loeb translator was dead right. Never hurts to check.
Note to other reenactors--all of Xenophon is available at [url:2xb6y1wi]http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cache/perscoll_Greco-Roman.html[/url]
along with most of the relevant texts in Greek and English. Note that all the words in Greek are interactive, so if you want to waste hours (it's not a waste, actually) you can look at the word definitions even if you don't speak a word of classical greek.
Quote:And when, as they proceeded, a part of the phalanx burst out, those who were thus left behind began to run; at the same moment they all set up the sort of war-cry which they raise to Enyalius, and all alike began running. It is also reported that some of them clashed their shields against their spears, thereby frightening the enemy's horses. [19] And before an arrow reached them, the barbarians broke and fled.
This is Xenophon again, with the Perseus translation amended by me because a key word, exekumaine, is used to describe things bursting into motion or waves crashing on a shore, as opposed to "billowing" which is used in other translations.
I'm bringing this up because here, and again in Hellenika, Xenophon describes not an orderly march of the phalanx to meet its opponent, with careful rank closing and then a charge--he describes a 'bursting forth" of some warriors, with the rest running in behind, crashing like a wave. Remember, the start of this thread has to do with whther there's much in the way of single combat. I'm trying to steer back that way...
Does the style of that charge have anything to do with the type of opponent? I mean, the passage sounds like they're chasing off horse archers. Seems to me that running at a horse yelling and waving a pointy stick is good way to startle the animal.
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Kineas - 05-22-2008
Well, they're running at Barbarians. And Herodotus says that when the Athenians charged the Medes at Marathon, they were the first Greeks to "run.' And that's run as in a race, when charging.
But yes, Marcus Ulpius Trajanus, I concur that it is not just possible but probable that they had a different way of fighting various different opponents. I find it hard to read Hellenika, with all the different things tried there, or Polyaenus, which is less easy to read but FULL of cool stuff, without seeing that there is not one Hoplite truth. Not only do some things evolve over time, but different generals take time to train their men to different tasks. Look at the Spartans sending different age groups off on "raids" against enemy skirmishers. Look at Iphacrates (forget his so-called reforms, just look at the training he put them to). Scholars have a belief that the hoplite way of war was unchanged for 300 years--hey, people try to say the same about medieval knights. Daft. There was change every campaign. We just can't document is all, and neither could they, and hence we're surprised by all of the deviations from "the norm."
I don't think there's a "norm." Except maybe in Sparta, and even they could improvise. But a careful reading of any campaign account shows that the first thing a commander did was to recondition his men (ie, many are out of shape in the spring) and the second was to march a lot and practice (hmm, sounds like Fit For Service, actually).
I'm really into seeing what effect naval training had on Hoplites at the moment. Considering that 12-1800 Athenian hoplites went off every year on ships...
But I'm a heretic.
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Marcus_Ulpius_Trajanus - 05-22-2008
Quote:But I'm a heretic.
Well, aren't we all in our own ways.
I'll be interested to see if you find anything concerning sea service.
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - hoplite14gr - 05-22-2008
Some people claim that the hoplites in Marathon run 1500 meters! Plain rediculus!!!!!!
Herodotus opinion is that Atheniams were the first to run. But were they.
Battaglion size tactical groups can cover a distance orderly in open order
The came from shieldwall when 200 meters apart and jog/charge in the last 50 meters.
Sea Service: Sorry no phalanx on board. We tried to form in closed space with chairs marking the limits of a trireme deck and we failed miserably.
Yet fighting in pairs where the spearman tries to open eay and support a swordsman trying to cross to another deck is more feasible.
More experimentation needed though. I can hardly call a days fumbling over stambling chairs as safe for drawing conclusions.
No the do not give us "Olympias" trireme for tests :evil: :evil: :evil:
Kind regards
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - PMBardunias - 05-22-2008
Quote:I'm really into seeing what effect naval training had on Hoplites at the moment. Considering that 12-1800 Athenian hoplites went off every year on ships...
Iphicrates reforms have been postulated to have resulted from Athenian marines armed after egyptian fashion. I can't find the link to Luke Ueda-Sarson's article on this, perhaps someone has it.
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Giannis K. Hoplite - 05-22-2008
Quote:....in 'battle'/close order, the Hoplites were 'accustomed' to form up four deep.
As an officer who actually commanded REAL Hoplites, I think Xenophon is to be preferred to any modern "armchair strategists", don't you?
I didn't question Xenophon,I just interpret him differently.He was talking in other Greeks who didn't have to be explained how hoplites formed the battle line.The comment "as they were accustomed" would sure be enough to them.But the need to mention their depth in that particular occasion has some significance. In other words I think he could be paraphrazed as : "the greek phalanx was set in the way that is the normal for the greeks,and with which they can form any desirable depth. In this case they formed 4 deep in close order"
Khaire
Giannis
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - PMBardunias - 05-22-2008
Quote:"the greek phalanx was set in the way that is the normal for the greeks,and with which they can form any desirable depth. In this case they formed 4 deep in close order"
I agree with Giannis. I see no reason to doubt that a standard formation for fighting hoplites was 8 or 12 deep, while a standard formation for frightening Cilician queens is 4 deep :wink:
Quote:He ordered the Greeks to form their lines and take their positions just as they were accustomed to do for battle, each general marshalling his own men...So they formed the line four deep, Menon and his troops occupying the right wing, Clearchus and his troops the left, and the other generals the centre........
Xenophon is clearly more interested in the place of the individual units in line than the depth. You are incorrectly linking the 4 ranks to the "positions", in my opinion. Its not "the four ranks they were accoustomed to for battle", it "the position in line that each contingent is accustomed to take, and they were in 4 ranks". Again, no evidence at all for their ever being in 8 ranks.
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Kineas - 05-22-2008
Quote: I have been looking for articles or books detailing specific fighting techniques for an ancient greek hoplite. but, i have yet to find any. I know that when a spear-tip was broken, then the hoplite would generally draw his short sword and fight as such. But, id imagine that he would have a very specific and precise spear fighting style to get the brittle tip into flesh as opposed to breaking it against armor.
I mentioned ship fighting because the gentleman who started this thread was interested in hoplite fighting man to man (as per the quote above)
I agree with Stefanos that there is no phalanx fighting on ship board
My point is this. If there were a wide variety of hoplite experiences of combat; and if hoplites had sometimes to fight in a rout, or at the edge of a phalanx, or in "non major battle" situations (like foraging, or plundering, or like small fights against a handful of peltasts), and if, further to that, hoplites outside of Sparta could expect to be called upon for sea service (after 425, even Spartan hoplites!)...
If all these are accurate statements, then whether or not our hoplite phalanx fights this way or that, it was, in fact, useful to a hoplite to have personal fighting skills. Ship fighting would, I would argue, ALWAYS be a set of personal duels. Ship fighting also called upon hoplites to throw javelins and leap and run and sit down... and then get landed somewhere in the Cheronese and form a phalanx for a few days....
Phalanx fighting, of whatever type, was not the only function of a hoplite's life, especially in the looser and more wide ranging battles from 430 BC to 279. And Pankration, swordsmanship, and perhaps even spear fighting would all be useful skills to have, from a wine shop brawl to the deck of a trireme, especially after war becomes "professionalized." And given how often Xenophon mentions a guy as a champion at Pentathlon just before saying "and he killed three men," it seems to me the personal combat skills may well have played a roll in phalanx fighting, too.
And if Xenophon says they fought four deep, doesn't Aristophanes have something to say?
Quote:houtôs epoliorkês' egô ton andr' ekeinon ômôs
eph' heptakaidek' aspidôn pros tais pulais katheudôn.
Tee hee.
Re: specifics in Spear fighting combat - Giannis K. Hoplite - 05-22-2008
Quote:houtôs epoliorkês' egô ton andr' ekeinon ômôsIt proves nothing more than what we said above that the phalanx did not have a specific depth that was "normal"
eph' heptakaidek' aspidôn pros tais pulais katheudôn.
So yes,the rich of the late 5th century must have thought like you,and they hired "hoplomachoi" to teach them how to fight. Of cource Plato ridicules them,being a fanatic supporter of the old ways and the hoplite battle as the only honorable one.
However one would argue that in modern war special skill are very useful,too. But you don't need to have these skills to fight effectively.
Wrestling was considered valuable even in phalanx battles. The Thebans had a tradition in wrestling and the ancients considered this an important factor why Boeotians were so good warriors.
But the truth remains,if you're given a dory and an aspis and you're supposed to kill and defend yourself with these,you'll find your tecnique on yourself,if you survive the first time. Basically this is what Plato puts his characters to agree with,together with the fact that weapons are natural for men and should normally know how to use them properly. And of cource they take for granded the the traditional phaanx battle doesn't require special skill,if only you're not put in a rout.
Khairete
Giannis