05-20-2009, 10:54 AM
Archelaos wrote:
....that is an interesting idea, and certainly plausible, if a little unlikely. All our information suggests that at the time of "Iphicrates reforms", bronze armour ( muscled cuirass/muskelpanzer) was rare. But it is certainly possible that bronze scale re-inforced Tube-and-Yoke corselets were replaced by, say, Asiatic quilted Tube-and-Yoke corselets of linen, for the sake of lightness, perhaps.......
Your comparison of 'peltasts' translated as 'caetrati' is a good one....both roughly meaning 'shield-bearing skirmishing troops' ( as opposed to shieldless ) even if the translation could not be pushed too far, because the 'pelta' shield of Greece was very different from the 'caetra' shield of the western Mediterranean......
Quote:So he replaced "linked and bronze with linen". I do not see it impossible that he found simply "thorax" in his source, and tried to explain it to his readers, or maybe he found something like "thorakes chalkeos" and tried to translate. Obviously it leaves question what word was used for "linen". It is similar to how Livius translate "peltasts" from Polibius to latin "caetrati" - this do not mean that Livius believed that Antigonid peltastai used caetra.
....that is an interesting idea, and certainly plausible, if a little unlikely. All our information suggests that at the time of "Iphicrates reforms", bronze armour ( muscled cuirass/muskelpanzer) was rare. But it is certainly possible that bronze scale re-inforced Tube-and-Yoke corselets were replaced by, say, Asiatic quilted Tube-and-Yoke corselets of linen, for the sake of lightness, perhaps.......
Your comparison of 'peltasts' translated as 'caetrati' is a good one....both roughly meaning 'shield-bearing skirmishing troops' ( as opposed to shieldless ) even if the translation could not be pushed too far, because the 'pelta' shield of Greece was very different from the 'caetra' shield of the western Mediterranean......
"dulce et decorum est pro patria mori " - Horace
(It is a sweet and proper thing to die for ones country)
"No son-of-a-bitch ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country" - George C Scott as General George S. Patton
Paul McDonnell-Staff
(It is a sweet and proper thing to die for ones country)
"No son-of-a-bitch ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country" - George C Scott as General George S. Patton
Paul McDonnell-Staff
