07-07-2005, 10:39 AM
Chairete
I kind of agree with warrior11. Byzantium should be included, as part of RAT or GAT, or even as a separate BAT.
The reason? Byzantium was the place where the military traditions which interest us all here, were preserved and where they evolved. True, a mostly mounted army with a large percentage of asiatic horse-archers is not reminiscent of Pydna or Zama, but one should remember that the Byzantines usually fought against nomadic or semi-nomadic (i.e. Bulgars) peoples, therefore infantry was rarely the principal arm.
Quoting Vortigern,
‘’OK, the Late Byzantine army looked very like their enemies’’
true, as long as this has to do with their mercenary troops. The native element is, however, another story. Even by the mid-fourteenth century, soldiers would wear a linen ‘’cuirass’ with pteruges, a distinctive byzantine military characteristic. I recently saw a miniature showing troops from the civil war of about 1345. The men were the same as 4 centuries before, but wearing french bascinet helmets! No such metal or plastic figure exists, to my knowledge.
The question whether during X century they gave orders in greek or in latin, is a secondary one. Most people were greek-speakers, military terminology AND the legal system were in latin untill the 7th century, when some more enlightened emperors found out that their subjects could not understand a word from a legal text... However, the army terminology conserved many latin words, which is normal: suppose you are a recruit, and one tells you that a sergeant will from now on be called a ‘lochias’, it isn’t that hard to keep this in mind. Same with some state official titles (quaestor became keistor etc.).
Greeks or Romans? Well put question. What is certain, is that they were not ‘byzantines’, nobody called them like that, nor did they use that name for themselves. Indeed they called themselves Romans, which was precise, as after Caracalla’s decree everyone was now a Roman. With Constantinople as a new capital, the Empire still stood, although it had lost all of its western european and african territories. It is therefore better, i think, to say that politically the were Romans, ethnically they were mostly Greeks. That the Greeks had –with the loss of the western part– become the ‘roman’ population of a Roman Empire, was certainly no bad news to them. In addition, after some violent christianisation measures, the word “Greekâ€ÂÂ
I kind of agree with warrior11. Byzantium should be included, as part of RAT or GAT, or even as a separate BAT.
The reason? Byzantium was the place where the military traditions which interest us all here, were preserved and where they evolved. True, a mostly mounted army with a large percentage of asiatic horse-archers is not reminiscent of Pydna or Zama, but one should remember that the Byzantines usually fought against nomadic or semi-nomadic (i.e. Bulgars) peoples, therefore infantry was rarely the principal arm.
Quoting Vortigern,
‘’OK, the Late Byzantine army looked very like their enemies’’
true, as long as this has to do with their mercenary troops. The native element is, however, another story. Even by the mid-fourteenth century, soldiers would wear a linen ‘’cuirass’ with pteruges, a distinctive byzantine military characteristic. I recently saw a miniature showing troops from the civil war of about 1345. The men were the same as 4 centuries before, but wearing french bascinet helmets! No such metal or plastic figure exists, to my knowledge.
The question whether during X century they gave orders in greek or in latin, is a secondary one. Most people were greek-speakers, military terminology AND the legal system were in latin untill the 7th century, when some more enlightened emperors found out that their subjects could not understand a word from a legal text... However, the army terminology conserved many latin words, which is normal: suppose you are a recruit, and one tells you that a sergeant will from now on be called a ‘lochias’, it isn’t that hard to keep this in mind. Same with some state official titles (quaestor became keistor etc.).
Greeks or Romans? Well put question. What is certain, is that they were not ‘byzantines’, nobody called them like that, nor did they use that name for themselves. Indeed they called themselves Romans, which was precise, as after Caracalla’s decree everyone was now a Roman. With Constantinople as a new capital, the Empire still stood, although it had lost all of its western european and african territories. It is therefore better, i think, to say that politically the were Romans, ethnically they were mostly Greeks. That the Greeks had –with the loss of the western part– become the ‘roman’ population of a Roman Empire, was certainly no bad news to them. In addition, after some violent christianisation measures, the word “Greekâ€ÂÂ
Antigonos Leonidou
