Need some information about Mantinea 207 BCE

[Paullus Scipio]

Duncan wrote:-

Paullus Scipio wrote:
...at least you don't have to invent cliffs to have stones dropped off, or have the Macedonians obligingly stand under them while the Phocians did so - they would only have to withdraw a very small distance to be perfectly safe from 'dropped' rocks .....

This bit made me laugh out loud. If you check our respective messages, you'll see that I have never used the word "cliffs". In fact, you have invented the cliffs, Paul.

Quite right - my apologies ...you merely actually said 'dropped', and only implied 'cliff or cliff-like' to go with dropped! :lol: O.K., so it's 'hillside' ( or if Stefanos is correct - see his post -mountainside, which rather changes the scale of things ) and 'hurled/shot/launched' then ( see Stefanos post again - and noting that ancient and modern greek often are different due to changed meaning over time...)

In other words, the men are hiding on the hillsides, ready to pelt the Macedonians with rocks.

...there's no mention of men, merely 'petroboloi'/stone throwers, which word appears to be the heart of the debate - I shall return to it later

(By the way, how on earth do you hide a stone-throwing machine with a 9-foot bow?! Actually, several of them! Dozens, d'you think?

To a military man, easy ! If the heights/ridges are forested or scrub-covered, no problem at all ! How about if the slope is bare? Again, easy ! depending on whether the slope is concave or convex, either on or just behind the crest, completely invisible, and only the rocks/stones appear, as if by magic! ( very demoralising I should think!) hock:
...which is a lot easier than concealing hundreds/thousands of men at hand-throwing distance on a slope, say 25 yards/metres....unless of course, we go back to a cliff scenario again! D lol: :lol:

In case you give the impression that petrobolos always means a machine, it most certainly doesn't. W.K. Pritchett wrote a sizeable tome about human lithoboloi and petroboloi which, unfortunately, I don't have access to, just now.

...back to that ambiguous word again! :? )
BTW 'ballo' if Stefanos is correct, means 'shot', at least in modern Greek..... and if the lexica are correct this was the ancient meaning too - "to throw or hurl or shoot with (a thing)"....(Liddell Scott) .....such as a machine, sling, or bow. So the more correct meaning is (something) shooting, which in context can only be machines....no imaginary men throwing! :lol:

Thucydides (1.106) records how a force of Corinthian hoplites (!!) were trapped and stoned to death by Athenian light troops.
And later (4.43), he describes how a section of the Corinthian phalanx at Solygia retired up a slope to a dry-stone wall, and showered their Athenian adversaries with the stones.

...relevant how? I never said there were no hand thrown missiles at all, and I meant 'lethal' in the sense of 'lethal' to an army, to the point of mutiny and refusal to take the field ( only artillery here in Philip's case, and the prospect of elephants by the thousand, in Alexander's case, had this effect on the hard-bitten Macedonian army). But taking 'lethal to individuals', in your first instance the killing is shooting fish in a barrel by proper Athenian light troops - slingers and javelinmen, or maybe slingers alone - there is no mention of 'hand-thrown', and in your second example, when Corinthian Hoplites take to throwing lumps of dry stone wall, no-one is reported killed.... both your examples are irrelevant.
One more point; we must always take the surrounding circumstances into account. A man who shoots another is a murderer, right? But what if the victim was coming at him with a knife? Or he's a soldier? Circumstances alter cases! wink: :wink: