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Persian Invasion of 480 BC - articles
Some points:

Based on Strabo, Stefanos of Byzantium, and the works an notes of people who had done geological and architectural research, the population of various Greek city-states have been established.
Most Bibliography is German. Is is a large volume of work.
In many case the calculations of the geologists, biologists and engineers agree with the ancient writers. Only the population of Athens was establised at 60000 thousant without counting the rest of Attika
If any of the most scholarly members can give references the beter.
(Sorry I feel lazy today :oops: )
Based on all these it is likely that Greeks fielded 100,000 men in Platea.
Xerxes mast have anticipated this possibility. So he must had collected more troops than that to better his chances. No one claims 5,000,000 .
The question is about references who can establish that if the defender could field X number then the attacker should field X+ or X++ to get the better of them. I find hard as I said before that the intelligence/diplomatic service of the Persian Empire had not given these estimates to Xerxes.
The biggest possibility is that the King miscalulated in everything.

Inaki does not trust Herodotus numbers but trust Thukidides.
I dissagree but I respect his opinion.
He mentioned Delion but at the same times Athenians were operating in other places too.
In my opinion if we establish number for the Greeks we can establish by comparison for the Persians.
Xenophon (an eye witness) 80 years later say that iws possible for a rebelious satrap (Cyrus) to raise 115.000. So an emperor could raise more than that.
Asuming 300,000 for the Persians I say it is possible and I mentioned various food preserving techniques and the overlook peraparatory campaigns of 485 to 480 B.C. were whole Northen Greek colonies were laid waste, looted and the polulations porbably starved to death in order to build the supply infrastracture.

I belive that Xerxes failed because he ovestreched himself.

Kind regards
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Something of interest regarding the Battle of Salamis.

As some of you may know, the so-called "Archimedes Palimpsest" yielded 10 pages of Hyperides. Hyperides lived from 390 or 389 B.C. until 322 B.C. and was an orator who made speeches at public meetings of the citizen assembly. He was a contemporary of Aristotle and Demosthenes and he wrote speeches for himself and for others and spoke at important political trials.

In one of his recently discovered speeches, Hyperides talks about the number of ships (220) — a number not previously clear— belonging to the Greek side in the Salamis battle.

Isn't that exciting or what???
Ioannis Georganas, PhD
Secretary and Newsletter Editor
The Society of Ancient Military Historians
http://www.ancientmilitaryhistorians.org/


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Quote:Nobody on this thread has found an example of a premodern field army reliably attested at over a hundred thousand troops, ...
True enough! But the there seems to be an assumption that the size of these armies are determined only by logistical technology, and not by a cost/benefit analysis. That there are no other examples of armies of 1,000,000 is not proof that it is *impossible* to move an army that size, only that it is undesirable to do so.
Rich Marinaccio
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Well as for the siege engines that we mentioned.
Polyaenos talks of Generals who made a lot of effort to preserve ans not abandon their siege engines.
Kind regards
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Quote:In one of his recently discovered speeches, Hyperides talks about the number of ships (220) — a number not previously clear— belonging to the Greek side in the Salamis battle.

Isn't that exciting or what???

Wow. Great! I LOVE such recently found things! Big Grin

In that context, may I asked you a favour, Ioannis. There is a little known fact about the pontoon bridge of Xerxes over the Hellespont, namely that its architect was - like with Dareios earlier bridge - actually a Greek, called Harpalos (as you know, Herodot is silent about the name of the architect in his Histories). His name is recorded in the Laterculi Alexandrini, a Ptolemaic papryus found in an Egyptian grave, and edited by one German scholar Diehl in the early 1900s.

In case you have access, could you perhaps post the relevant passage here with the exact source?

Many thanks & Regards
Eleatic Guest
Stefan (Literary references to the discussed topics are always appreciated.)
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