The Makedonian phalanx -- why such depth?

[PMBardunias]

think you would grant that at least each contingent within a phalanx maintained cohesion? ( else why would the Spartans march in step?). That being so, 5,000 Spartans at Plataea, formed up, say 8 deep, would occupy 625 yards in close order - and even that length of line would not be practicable to advance in, and maintain close order...... accordingly, such advances/manouevres must have taken place in 'normal'/open order....

Perhaps, or perhaps only each lochoi maintained internal cohesion. The mercenaries at Cunaxa could be considered a single unit as their remnants would ave been later. Even these men whose training was surely far beyond the farmer or potter come out for muster could not keep a straight line. I think that the incident later, where men are calling to others to not break formation in pursuit does speak to a need to keep formation, but we don't really know on what scale this cohesion manifested itself.

One problem with accepting the opened order advance is that I have real doubts that the generally inexperienced troops of the average phalanx could maintain 6' between files wihtout bunching. If they bunched at all, they were screwed when it came time to double again.

Since I do not believe that the greeks had a 6' and 3' (and 1.5') spacing that we see in later manuals, I think they simply formed up in a natural spacing of 3-4' that men would take if told to stand "next" to eachother. In this they advanced, and if they either kept space between ranks or the men had a simple rule not to move past the man in front, some relative or lover, but to kick him in the bum if he lagged, there would be no mixing of ranks.

A myriad of spacing sins dissapears in the advance as well. The one thing we know for sure about the advance of a phalanx is that the man on the leftmost side veered hundreds of meters to the right on many occaissions. We don't know for sure if the man on the right moved a commensurate amount right. This would be almost impossible for Thucydides to know as well. The famed overlapping right wings could be driven more by the enemy left moving right than by your own men moving in the opposite direction. Thus the spacing tightens up even if they did not begin the move shoulder to shoulder with overlapped shields. If I am correct, then tightening up to the right is a big part of what was taken for gross movement of the phalanx to the right (though surely that occurred as well for reasons I have mentioned previously).