New hoplite book

[PMBardunias]

I have practiced both styles and I find both usable, left over right (///) being best suited when the hoplites wish to be able to engage in personal combat and have freedom of movement, right over left (\\\\\\) when order is necessary as during a challenging battle in lines. I also had posted an image I had made to make my ideas visible.

That image is great. I happened upon some footage from a show on hoplites where they came together as if in othismos, and you can see this problem play out in reality:

http://hollow-lakedaimon.blogspot.com/2 ... ismos.html

Part of the problem in understanding the hoplite phalanx is that the formation is somehwere between a simple battle-line with high mobility and wide spacing and a shield-wall with limited mobility. No one would have a problem accepting that a Roman would give up individual mobility to form a testudo or the linear version, the late Roman fulcum, wherein not one line of shields, but two lines were superimposed one on top of the other. See Phillip Rance's excellent article on the Fulcum. The hoplite phalanx was an exceptionally mobile shield-wall, perhaps because the aspis allowed the "wall" to be formed only at the last moment and with great ease. Each hoplite with his aspis was in effect a tetris piece or building block and the wall built up very quick and with little confusion or even extensive preplanning. A follow-up note for reenactors: try this, have your men hold their aspises against their chests so that man and shield are one unit and form a line. They should fall together very quickly as a line- like bricks coming into place to form a wall. Once the line is formed and your spacing set, you can take on a 45 degree stance to spear fight, then go bac kinto your shield when the pushing starts.

The true genius of the aspis has yet to be fully recognized.