The Army of Herod

[Dave Beatty]

I have a Herodian army based on the Warrior "Imperial Warrior" List #14 Later Judean 63 BC - 6 AD.  I relied heavily on Samuel Rocca's Osprey The Army of Herod the Great. I use a mix of Hellenistic Greeks, Successor States, Parthians, Palmyrans and pre-Islamic Arabs with some Maccabeans thrown in for fun.  My figures are mostly Essex and Old Glory 15mm, with a few Donnington, Xyston, Tabletop and old Minifigs in the mix as well.
Cav is basically extra-heavy with lance or medium with javelin and shield.  There can be a Marian Roman, Imperial Roman, Parthian or "Bandit" ally general (bandits are basically irregular light medium infantry with javelin and shield - 3 per base, 20mm depth). The core of the army are Judean "cohorts" regular LMI JLS Sh (essentially Hellenistic-style peltasts).
It is actually a pretty versatile army in Warrior.
For some good references on the list here are some links:
Coins:
http://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=4700
https://www.academia.edu/4488308/Ariel_D.T._Hasmonean_Coins_Found_in_the_Cave_of_the_Warrior._In_T._Schick._The_Cave_of_the_Warrior._A_Fourth_Millennium_Burial_in_the_Judean_Desert_IAA_Reports_5_._Jerusalem_Israel_Antiquities_Authority_1998._Pp._131_137
http://www.biblepicturegallery.com/samples/la/world/nations/rulers_p/Coin%20of%20Herod%20Archelaus%20Ethnarch%204%20BC%20-%206%20AD%20Righ.gif
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rak/courses/735/Realia/coins-Judean-vw.html

Good general history:
http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Library.sr/CT/ARTB/k/1387/Herod-Great.htm
http://scrollhouse.com
several relevant ebooks –
Between Rome and Jerusalem – 300 Years of Roman-Judean Relations ($15)
Jesus and Empire: The Kingdom of God and the New World Disorder ($15)
https://bible.org/article/roman-military-new-testament
The Roman Military in the New Testament

http://faculty.ucc.edu/egh-damerow/roman_judea.htm
Roman Judea

http://faculty.ucc.edu/egh-damerow/second_temple.htm
Herodian discussion from Livius

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/7598-herod-i
Herod the Great

Dead Sea Scrolls - "War Scroll" or "Rule of War" scroll
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/scrolltranslation.html
http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/war

[Patrick Waterson]

Nice listing of sources, Dave: thanks.

I add the usual caveat about translations, e.g. in an engagement against the 'usurper' Antigonus in Josephus' Jewish War (I.17.4), Herod is wounded in the side by a weapon variously translated as a 'spear' or a 'dart'.  Strictly speaking, it is a 'palta', which in Xenophon's time meant a short (c.4' long) javelin carried by Achaemenid cavalry, but in Josephus' might correspond to the

treis ē pleious akontes, plateis men aikhmas, ouk apodeontes de doratōn megethos

(three or more javelins, broad-pointed, not smaller than spears)

carried by Roman cavalry (Jewish War III.5.5).

Prior to this engagement Herod's brother Joseph had moved against Antigonus with a force consisting of 'five Roman cohorts' which had been 'new-raised in Syria' and which were wiped out in a fight resulting in Joseph's death (Jewish War I.17.1).  These cohorts had presumably been raised by Herod in his capacity as procurator of Syria under Cassius and Brutus (Jewish War I.11.4).  For our purposes we may note that Herod had experience in Roman administration and seemingly also military organisation.

In I.17.9 we get the following description when Herod and Sosius combine forces:

"When he had thus married Mariamne, he came back to Jerusalem with a greater army. Sosius also joined him with a large army, both of horsemen and footmen, which he sent before him through the midland parts, while he marched himself along Phoenicia; and when the whole army was gotten together, which were eleven regiments of footmen [telē pezōn], and six thousand horsemen, besides the Syrian auxiliaries [summakhon = strictly 'allies'], which were no small part of the army, they pitched their camp near to the north wall."

It is not clear whether 'telos' is intended as a Hellenistic 2,048-man formation or as a term denoting 'legion'.  Given Herod's involvement with and Sosius' subordination to Antony, plus the listing of Syrians as 'allies', one is tempted to consider the 'tele pezon' to mean 'legions', imitation and/or real.

These pointers seem to suggest that Herod's forces would have had a heavily Romanised flavour.

[Dave Beatty]

I've also read the MH Gracey article "The Armies of the Judean Client Kings".

Where might one find this intriguing sounding article? I must read it!

Thanks,

Dave

[Jim Webster]

I've also read the MH Gracey article "The Armies of the Judean Client Kings".

Where might one find this intriguing sounding article? I must read it!

Thanks,

Dave

my thoughts exactly, has anybody got the pdf or a url which doesn't lead to a paywall?

Jim

[dwkay57]

The Gracey article is referenced in the bibliography of the Rocca book and can be found in (I think if I've remembered properly) "Proceedings of a colloquium held at the University of Sheffield in April 1986". I obtained my copy - temporarily - via an Inter-Library loan.

The Shatzman book is probably a better read from a wargamers' perspective. Again I obtained a copy via the Inter-Library loan service and so am reliant on the notes I took.

Dave's army doesn't sound too far off the sort of line up I was envisaging - a mix of legacy Hellenistic types with some new fangled Roman ideas coming in, and the odd barbarian type unit for colour and variation.

[Sharur]

I've also read the MH Gracey article "The Armies of the Judean Client Kings".

Where might one find this intriguing sounding article? I must read it!

Thanks,

Dave

my thoughts exactly, has anybody got the pdf or a url which doesn't lead to a paywall?

Jim

Not exactly a PDF or URL for the paper, but you can freely download the contents list for the book it's from:

The Defence of the Roman and Byzantine East: Proceedings of a colloquium held at the University of Sheffield in April 1986, edited by Philip Freeman and David Kennedy, Part i. British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara Monograph No. 8 & BAR International Series 297(i), 1986

via D L Kennedy's Academia.edu Books page, if you're a member (it's free to join - go to https://uwa.academia.edu/).

Gracey's article is on pages 311-323, and with the paper's title, this information will be enough for an inter-library loan if you wish to try that way.

[stevenneate]

I hope there's an article for Slingshot coming from all this excellent discussion?!

[Dave Beatty]

I hope there's an article for Slingshot coming from all this excellent discussion?!

Yes, I'll be writing it up in the next couple of weeks!
Dave

[Duncan Head]

If I had to guess - which unfortunately is all I can do, so do not put too much weight upon it - I would expect the bodyguards, Germans, Thracians and Gauls to be cavalry.

Someone - and I think it's Holder's book on the auxilia - suggests that one or more Thracian cohorts in the post-annexation Roman army in Judaea may have been Herodian units incorporated into the Roman army - Cohors I Augusta Thracum equitata may be one, but definitely cohort(s) not alae, so at least predominantly infantry, possibly mixed with some cavalry.

I'd agree that the Germans and Gauls were most likely cavalry. Josephus (Antiquities XV.7.3) says that Herod had 400 Gauls who had been Cleopatra's guards, and the most likely source for them would be the Gallic and German cavalry who had been stationed in Egypt with the Gabiniani.

"Doruphoroi" could be practically any type, given the word's long usage for "bodyguards" in general as well as its specific use in the Hellenistic manuals for cavalry spearmen. But if anyone really carried the Macedonian shields shown on a few of Herod's coins (as opposed to their having become simply emblems of status) I suppose the doruphoroi might be candidates.

[dwkay57]

If you are writing this up Dave, it might work well as a two part article:
- the first part covering the geography, history, sources (both ancient and modern) and likely or known troop types
- the second containing sections from each of those who responded on their interpretation of the evidence and its translation to the table top battlefield.

[Dave Beatty]

If you are writing this up Dave, it might work well as a two part article:
- the first part covering the geography, history, sources (both ancient and modern) and likely or known troop types
- the second containing sections from each of those who responded on their interpretation of the evidence and its translation to the table top battlefield.

Great advice, I'll take it as guidance for the articles. I'm also working on a paper entitled "An Analysis of Biblical Military Terms" that is basically an exegesis of every military word (weapons, organization, military ranks, etc) in the Bible.... which is rapidly turning into a massive work approaching book-length. I'll put a synopsis into article form for Slingshot...

[dwkay57]

I'm re-awakening this thread, just to find out if anyone has come up with any more information since the last post. The first units of my army are mostly completed (see attached pdf if you want to laugh at my painting) and before committing paint to more figures I thought it would be useful to check.

In particular:
1) Does anyone know what the Trachonites looked like? I missed that episode of Star Trek, but am assuming they are some sort of tunic and mix of light weapons / shield type (something similar to figure 94 in A&EofIR springs to mind).
2) Was a Meros a defined organisation or just a collective of whatever troops were available? Up to now I've been considering making it a combination of low quality lightly armoured peltast types (to represent the reservists) supported by slingers and light cavalry. However re-reading some of my notes I think it may just be a wider and less formal mix of troops, possibly regionally based.
3) And what of Achiab's Certain Force? I'm treating "certain" as meaning reliable and dependable. That and it's small size (1,500) makes me think it was a battlefield reserve or rapid reaction force that could be thrown in where needed. On that basis I was going to form it of some reasonable quality infantry and cavalry.

Any thoughts or ideas welcome. Thanks.
Any thoughts?

[Patrick Waterson]

2) Was a Meros a defined organisation or just a collective of whatever troops were available?

Polybius mentions that at the Trebia the Roman centre broke through the Gauls and a meros of Hannibal's Libyan troops.  In this particular instance (and presumably also as of c.140 BC when Polybius was writing) the meros seems to have been a formal, or at least homogenous, formation, which I would guess to be in the region of 500 men, i.e. the next step up from a 256-man syntagma.

It is possible that usage changed in the intervening century-and-a-bit, but I would consider it an approximate cohort equivalent unless any better information emerges.

Oh, plural of ile is ilai.

[dwkay57]

Thanks for the spell check Patrick.

I would need to check my notes but I had the feeling that a Meros was more of a brigade level term used for a grouping of 2.500 - 3,000 men including up to 500 cavalry.
Rocca advises that Josephus uses it when talking about the Sebastenoi. I had thought it was more widely applied across the army but may well be wrong on that and it was used just for this particular grouping.

[Erpingham]

Perhaps a cautionary note but by the 6th century a Byzantine meros was 5-7,000 strong.  So, it is possible it was already becoming a larger formation in the East at the time of Herod, as David suggests.