Hoplites of the Archaic Age

[Duncan Head]

I bring this up because Snodgrass and Lorimer are rather old sources and in their day there was no evidence for either boetean or dyplon other than vase images. Anything new been said on this topic? Have any archeological finds surfaced?

van Wees (Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities, 2004) argues at some length for the Boiotian shield being quite historical. Definitely worth reading, he has a lot of unorthodox but interesting ideas about the evolution of hioplite warfare.

Before that, I thought the closest to orthodoxy was that the dipylon shield was historical - Connolly illustrates a nice little terracotta shield-model with quite plausible constructional details painted on - but that the Boiotian was generally thought to be an artistic fiction. Not sure where I picked up that idea from - possibly Greenhalgh's Early Greek Warfare: Horsemen and Chariots in the Homeric and Archaic Ages (1973), which does have a discussion on the use of the dipylon in mobile warfare - he sees the side cutouts as useful because you can sling the shield on your back and run, and the gaps mean your elbows don't hit the shield.