Quote from: RichT on November 24, 2015, 02:53:55 PM
Hypaspists are fun - I'm happy to argue about hypaspists, but the problem is that there is almost no evidence, and no academic consensus to argue for or against. More broadly - how about Macedonian shields? This is a subject on which I have a Slingshot article on the back burner and wouldn't mind kicking around here if anyone is willing. There is a consensus (Macedonian phalangites' shields were small and carried on a strap round the neck) which is in my opinion very possibly wrong. Ties in to hypaspists too (where the consensus is more or less that the chaps with 'hoplite shields' on the Alexander Sarcophagus are hypaspists, as they can't be phalangites as phalangites' shields are small (see consensus part 1)) - also in my opinion very possibly wrong.
OK, here's a new thread.
I don't really recognise that as a statement of the current academic view on Macedonian shields (though you can certainly find "little buckler hung round the neck" repeated in quite a few places). There certainly was a strap, but not just a strap. The big question as far as I can see is whether there is one type of "Macedonian shield" or two distinct sizes.
As for the hoplite shields on the Sarcophagus, they can't be phalangites' shields - or at least, they can't be shields used with the sarissa. But that's not primarily because of the size, but the shape. Using an Argive shield, the left hand holds a grip that is some distance in from the edge of the shield, because of the broad, flat rim. Therefore, I don't see how the left hand can hold the
antilabe and a pikeshaft at the same time.
(I'm not sure that my 1980s idea that the Sarcophagus figures were hypaspists was ever a consensus, though.)
OK thanks Duncan, a good beginning.
I don't know what the consensus is or if there is one, but I think that the views of Markle are those most commonly quoted - he sees there being two types of Macedonian shields - the small rimless pelte/pelta, the one Asclepiodotus calls 'bronze,, eight palms across, not too hollow' - and the classic hoplite shield, as seen on the Sarcophagus. He (like you in the 80s) thinks the hoplite shield was carried by Hypaspists and the pelta was carried by the Foot Companions (in Alexander's army and the Successors that is), and that sculptural shields on the monument in Beroia depict these two types.
Problems:
QuoteThere certainly was a strap, but not just a strap
Is it certain there was a strap - Markle offers some coin depictions of shields with what look like straps, but is that all the evidence? When Cleomenes adopted the sarisa (or Philopoemen? Sorry I've forgotten and don't have references to hand) he trained his men to carry the shield not with a 'porpax' but with an 'ochane', but I think 'ochane is 'handle' not 'strap', and it's not clear what the distinction is between ochane and porpax.
Quotethey can't be shields used with the sarissa
Is that certain either? There is a figure on the Sarcophagus (one of the pediments) holding a prisoner by the throat, and his hand projects beyond the rim of his shield. So do we know for sure that a sarissa can't be held with an Argive aspis? Cleomenes/Philopoemen's reform involved a change of carrying arrangements, but not a change of shields - nothing is said about new shields. I don't know how the left hand would hold the sarissa, but it seems to me possible that it could. The only depiction of the carrying arrangements of Macedonian shields - figures on the Aemilius Paullus monument - seem to show standard porpax/antilabe - yet everyone assumes (I assume) these were sarisophoroi.
Got to go, more later...
Quote from: RichT on November 24, 2015, 04:57:48 PM
I don't know what the consensus is or if there is one, but I think that the views of Markle are those most commonly quoted - he sees there being two types of Macedonian shields - the small rimless pelte/pelta, the one Asclepiodotus calls 'bronze,, eight palms across, not too hollow' - and the classic hoplite shield, as seen on the Sarcophagus.
More recently Juhel and Sekunda are arguing that there are two kinds of non-hoplite Macedonian shield, based chiefly on the sizes of recently discovered bronze shield-facings from Greece and FYROM - all round, rimless and decorated, but one group about 75 cm in diameter, one group about 65 cm. The smaller one would be the "pelte" of the Antigonid peltasts. Of course the smaller size also conforms to the "eight palms" of the tacticians - although they seem to be suggesting that the pelte carried by their "peltasts" is
smaller than the eight-palm shield of their hoplitai, which suggests either an error by the tacticians or an error in the identification.
Sekunda at least, I think, would add the Argive shield as a third type carried by the phalanx, as he seems to think that the Sarcophagus shields are those of Alexander's "line" phalanx.
QuoteQuoteThere certainly was a strap, but not just a strap
Is it certain there was a strap - Markle offers some coin depictions of shields with what look like straps, but is that all the evidence?
I think that when you get "the Macedonian troops ... drawing their peltai from their shoulders round in front of them" (Plut. Aem. Paul. 19.1) then you're looking at some sort of shoulder-strap, baldric or whatever.
QuoteWhen Cleomenes adopted the sarisa (or Philopoemen? Sorry I've forgotten and don't have references to hand) he trained his men to carry the shield not with a 'porpax' but with an 'ochane', but I think 'ochane is 'handle' not 'strap', and it's not clear what the distinction is between ochane and porpax.?
It's Kleomenes - Plut. Kleom. XI.2:
Quote
raised a body of four thousand hoplitai, whom he taught to use a sarissa, held in both hands, instead of a doru, and to carry their aspides by an ochanē instead of by a porpax
"ochanē" is rendered "strap" in the Perrin translation; but the LSJ does seem to suggest that "ochanon", at least, is equivalent to porpax. However in Herodotos II.141 the ochana belong to Assyrian, so presumably non-hoplite, shields; and are eaten by mice, so he is thinking of something leather, or at least organic. Hence I suppose the "strap" - Kleomenes' shields use something leather instead of a bronze porpax.
QuoteQuotethey can't be shields used with the sarissa
Is that certain either? There is a figure on the Sarcophagus (one of the pediments) holding a prisoner by the throat, and his hand projects beyond the rim of his shield. So do we know for sure that a sarissa can't be held with an Argive aspis?
You could probably even drop the antilabē on an Argive shield in order to grasp something like hair; holding a pikeshaft is a different question.
QuoteCleomenes/Philopoemen's reform involved a change of carrying arrangements, but not a change of shields - nothing is said about new shields.
And nothing is said about them being the same shields, either. They have aspides with ochana rather than aspides with porpax, that's all.
QuoteI don't know how the left hand would hold the sarissa, but it seems to me possible that it could. The only depiction of the carrying arrangements of Macedonian shields - figures on the Aemilius Paullus monument - seem to show standard porpax/antilabe - yet everyone assumes (I assume) these were sarisophoroi.
I don't think everyone does - I've seen that one identified as an Argive shield, though I cannot immediately think where.
Incidentally, if anyone has JSTOR access, these might be useful:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25010697 - J K Anderson, "Shields of Eight Palms Width"
http://www.jstor.org/stable/4129993 - "Der Makedonische Schild aus Pergamon der Antikensammlung Berlin"
Haven't read either of them, and I know the Pergamon shield only through the painting in Peter Connolly's books.
I have sent them to your inbox.
I included a couple of others that may be related, but appear after the Markle 1999 article, and some of Markle's earlier stuff.
Not my area though, so I have no idea of relative relevance. :)
And if anyone else wants them, please let me know.
Very kind of you, Nick, thanks. I'll try to have a read tonight and see if they tell us anything new.
Thanks for the articles. I don't suppose anyone here speaks German and feels like translating the 'Der Makedonische Schild' article...? I haven't read that one - I also have Liampi's 'Der Makedonische Schild' (though as I have no German I haven't read it either :( - but it has tables and diagrams...)
At the time Anderson wrote 'Shields of Eight Palm's Width' there were far fewer examples of actual Macedonian shields (or shield covers) than have been discovered since, and they might have altered his conclusions a little - was it Anderson elsewhere or someone else who concluded that all the archaeological, literary and artistic evidence showed that the shields of the phalanx were aspides not peltai and were pretty much the same size as standard hoplite shields, if rimless. That conclusion might be altered a bit now since the found shields seem to be around 65-70 cm - which is bigger than Asclepiodotus' eight palms width though not much.
I'm not convinced by two types of shields of 75cm or 65cm as that seems like a small enough variation to be within normal bounds (presumably shields did come in different sizes, to allow for people with different length arms). But however you look at it, it seems to me very hard to believe the 'eight palms' of the tacticians - given that found shields are a bit larger than this, depicted shields are significantly larger than this, and that Asclepiodotus (etc) himself says that the hoplites carried 'the largest size of shields' and the peltasts smaller shields (which if smaller than eight palms would have had to be dinner plates).
Anderson's observation that the AP monument shields are markedly convex (as are a number of other depictions of Mac shields) and that "this explains the recommendation of the tacticians that the shield should be 'not too hollow'" has always perplexed me - far from explaining it, it seems to contradict it.
I suppose the question then is which phalanx Asclepiodotus is describing. "Of the shields of the phalanx the best is the Macedonian, of bronze, eight palms across, not too hollow", he says. So first of all - the best shield for the phalanx (in his humble opinion) is what he describes. but other shields are available. And does he mean "the best is the Macedonian, a shield which is bronze, eight palms across, not too hollow", or does he "the best is bronze, eight palms across, not too hollow, and of Macedonian type". The Macedonianness of a shield seems to be its decoration (the familiar hoops) and its lack of rim - not its size or construction. This might mean there are not two or even three shields for the phalanx, but many, in use in different times and places. Interestingly if there is a Ptolemaic origin for Asclepiodotus' work, which is possible, the Ptolemaic shield example we have (no reference, sorry - Allard Pierson Museum I think - it's a stone shield model onto which a bronze cover was preumably hammered) - is noticeably flat, very different from the AP monument or the Pergamon plaque or the coin depictions. It is also a bit larger than eight palms (about 70cm as I recall).
Duncan:
QuoteSekunda at least, I think, would add the Argive shield as a third type carried by the phalanx, as he seems to think that the Sarcophagus shields are those of Alexander's "line" phalanx.
I'm inclined to agree with him on this, in that I've not been convinced (yet) that it's impossible to carry an Argive shield and a sarisa. Experimental archaeology to the rescue?
Duncan:
QuoteI think that when you get "the Macedonian troops ... drawing their peltai from their shoulders round in front of them" (Plut. Aem. Paul. 19.1) then you're looking at some sort of shoulder-strap, baldric or whatever.
So am I right in thinking that's the only evidence? If so I'm not convinced by that either - I imagine it would be normal for anyone to march with a shield on their shoulder then bring it to their front when going into action, and I don't see evidence in that for a strap. There might have been a strap of course, but I just don't think this is good evidence for one (and at any rate if there was a strap, this would seem to imply it was a carrying strap, not used in action when the shield was brought to the front). I don't think this is clear at any rate.
Duncan
QuoteIt's Kleomenes - Plut. Kleom. XI.2... "ochane" is rendered "strap" in the Perrin translation; but the LSJ does seem to suggest that "ochanon", at least, is equivalent to porpax. However in Herodotos II.141 the ochana belong to Assyrian, so presumably non-hoplite, shields; and are eaten by mice, so he is thinking of something leather, or at least organic. Hence I suppose the "strap" - Kleomenes' shields use something leather instead of a bronze porpax.
Thanks that's the one. It would make sense if it's the material that's different, but that it is still a loop on the back of the shield, not a baldric round the neck. This would give more flexibility for the carrying arm. I have another reference somewhere (Herodotus) that the Carians (?) replaced their shield straps with ochana - which implies to me that ochane is not a baldric (though of course usage may well have varied).
Duncan
QuoteAnd nothing is said about them being the same shields, either. They have aspides with ochana rather than aspides with porpax, that's all.
True. He doesn't say, and absence of evidence etc - but taking the simplest explanation, it seems to me that same shields, different carrying arrangements is perfectly possible, if nothing more.
I don't have an overall theory on all this that fits all the evidence (sadly, I don't think any one theory ever will) but my overall impression based on these bits and bobs and a dose of wild speculation is:
- the phalanx of Alexander (the Foot Companions) carried (at least some of them) standard Argive shields, with some different carrying arrangement that freed the left hand to hold the sarisa. These are what are depicted on the Sarcophagus.
- the Hypaspists, being lighter equipped and used for special missions etc, dispensed with the heavy Argive shield and carried 'peltai', rimless Macedonian shields, significantly smaller and lighter than the hoplite aspides. Some of the Foot Companions (the 'lighter equipped') might also have had these shields
- in the later years of Alexander's reign and under the Successors there were a lot of changes and variations which are lost to us, but which led to some level of standardisation, for the hoplite phalanx, on large Macedonian shields, rimless, heavily convex, not much smaller than classic Argive shields (and called aspides, not peltai). At the same time, the Hypaspists and their successors, the guard units, transformed into 'Peltasts' and retained the smaller (maybe flatter) Macedonian shields, called peltai.
- there remained considerable regional and chronological variation as different shields came into and out of fashion. Some still used Argive shields (Cleomenes' Spartans, maybe). Some used slightly smaller shields for the hoplites (the Prolemies, maybe).
Feel free to shoot all this down...
I will revisit my notes and those articles also.
Here are the other references I was after.
Plutarch Philopoemen 9 "In the first place he changed the faulty practice of the Achaeans in drawing up and arming their soldiers, for they used thureoi which were easily carried because they were so light, and yet were too narrow to protect the body, and spears (dorasi) which were much shorter than the sarissa. For this reason they were effective fighting at a distance, because they were so lightly armed, but when they came to close quarters with the enemy they were at a disadvantage. Morever, the division of line and formation into small units (speirai) was not customary with them, and since they employed a phalanx without either projection (probole) or close order (synaspismos), like the Macedonian, they were easily dislodged and scattered. Philopoemen showed them all this, and persuaded them to adopt aspis and sarissa instead of thureos and doru, to protect their bodies with helmet and thorax and greaves, and to practice stationary and steadfast fighting instead of mobile movements like peltasts."
Pausanias 8.50 "As the Achaeans now turned their gaze on Philopoemen and placed in him all their hopes, he succeeded in changing the equipment of their infantry. They had been carrying short spears (mikra doratia) and shields like the Celtic thureos or Persian gerra. Philopoemen however persuaded them to put on breastplates and greaves and also to use Argolic shields (aspisin Argolikais) and long spears (dorasi megalois)."
Plutarch Cleomenes 11 3 "Then he filled up the body of citizens with the most promising of the perioikoi and thus raised a body of 4000 hoplites, whom he taught to use a sarissa held in both hands instead of a spear (doru) and to carry their shields (aspida) by a handle (ochane) rather than an armband (porpax)."
Herodotus 1 171 "It was the Carians who first taught the wearing of crests on their helmets and devices on their shields and who first made ochana for their shields; till then all those who used shields carried them without ochana and guilded them with a baldric (telamon) which they slung round the neck and over the left shoulder."
The historicity of all these events is not undisputed of course. But assuming the accounts are accurate, interesting points are:
- Achaeans had equipped themselves as thureophoroi some time earlier in the 3rd C.
- changing to Macedonian armament meant a general increase in defensive equipment (shields and armour)
- shields used are aspides, specifically Argolic aspides - which to me means 'hoplite shields'
- the ochane is specifically contrasted with the shoulder strap
My conclusions are that sarissai could be and were used with 'hoplite shields', and that sarissa-bearers carried their shields using some not fully understood leather handle, but not with a baldric or strap.
Quote from: RichT on November 25, 2015, 10:13:33 AM
Thanks for the articles. I don't suppose anyone here speaks German and feels like translating the 'Der Makedonische Schild' article...? I haven't read that one - I also have Liampi's 'Der Makedonische Schild' (though as I have no German I haven't read it either :( - but it has tables and diagrams...)
I speak German but I'm likely to have little time for translation in the near future. If you sent me the article I could try and summarize.
Thank you! Anything at all would be most helpful. I can't work out how to send the article so I've PMed you a link.
I took photograph's of said Sarcophagus when I visited the museum in Istanbul a couple of years ago. I'll check as I took pictures of all four sides and the top so if I find anything of use I'll post it here.
I should add that there are vase depictions of hoplites holding shield and spear in the left hand, e.g.
http://i551.photobucket.com/albums/ii459/history_of_macedonia/Sun%20of%20Vergina/athenian_hoplites_departing.jpg
http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/295/1823/1600/scan0001.jpg
Not in action of course - since the hoplite wielded his spear one handed - but to me this does demonstrate that it's not impossible in principle to carry a rimmed aspis while holding a spear in both hands.
Quote from: RichT on November 27, 2015, 12:45:54 PM
I should add that there are vase depictions of hoplites holding shield and spear in the left hand
And if you're holding your spear vertically, I can see that that's not a problem; sources as early as the Chigi vase seem to show hoplites with two spears, after all. But the hoplite on your second vase has his spear passing inside the line of the rim, which isn't going to work with a spearshaft held in both hands unless he's holding his shield horizontally below the pikeshaft. With the departing hoplite it's less clear because of the angle of the picture, but he may be in the same position. Still don't really see that holding a pike in two hands is practical with a rimmed Argive shield. You might manage to do it with an
extremely long cord handgrip, I suppose, but then is the shield going to stay upright and under any control? Perhaps if there's a baldric taking the weight?
Sorry I haven't replied to other points yet: I still intend to do so before too long.
I remember that when Alexander was campaigning in Thrace at the beginning of his reign, the so-called "free Thracians" were preparing to roll wagons down a slope to break up the phalanx. One of the commands that Alexander gave was for his men to lie down and lock shields allowing the wagons to roll over them without harm. That would seem to indicate that the Macedonian shield was somewhat larger than the small pelta implied in some writings.
I remember a modern commentator, maybe JFC Fuller, suggesting that the soldiers that locked their shield may have be the hypaspists equipped with the hoplite shield.
Food for thought?
Arrian I.1.9 is your reference, Chuck.
Quote"... any sections [taxin] ... which were caught in the narrow pass were to form in the closest possible order [perikatalambanointo, xunneusantas = squeeze into the tightest group possible], such men as were able lying prone on the ground with shields locked together [sugkleisai es akribes tas aspidas = with shields precisely closed together] so as to give the heavy wagons, as they careered down the hill, a chance to bounce over the top of them without doing any harm."
It may or may not be significant that Arrian refers to these shields as 'aspidas': in I.6.4 he uses the word for the shields of the Macedonian phalanx and in II.11.6 he uses the word for a Persian shield when Darius' chariot, shield, mantle, and bow are captured following Issus. IV.23.2 has 800 'pezikais' (infantry of unspecified nature) mounted on horseback for speed, still carrying their 'aspidas'. In VI.10.2 Peucestes, a hypaspist, shields Alexander with the sacred
aspis taken from Troy (which Diodorus has Alexander use at the Granicus), though in Diodorus XVII.98.5 Alexander himself is carrrying a
pelta.
Arrian XVII.13.2 uses 'aspis' for a 'normal' cavalry shield, contrasting this with the 'pelta' carried by the assumed Amazons produced by Atropates, governor of Media, for Alexander's inspection. This is the only time he uses 'pelta' in any context, so either everyone else everywhere carried the
aspis or Arrian is using it generically as a shield-word.
Yes indeed - the wagon incident does imply, to me, larger shields. The argument that they were hypaspists with hoplite shields seems circular - regular phalanx must have had small shields - the wagon people seem to have big shields - therefore they can't be regular phalanx. I would question the initial assumption.
The word 'aspis' can just be a generic word for 'shield' (and to make matters worse, a pelta is a type of aspis, as it is a type of shield) so I don't know that much can be inferred from the common use of 'aspis' for the shields of the phalanx. Even so, 'aspis' really is used very, very commonly - in Arrian, Polybius, the tacticians, inscriptions (eg Amphipolis code) - all talk about Macedonian aspides. So far as I know, peltai are mentioned three times in a Macedonian context - Polyaenus' account of Philip II's training regime, an 4th/3rd C fragmentary Athenian inscription, and Plutarch's account of Pydna. I've argued elsewhere that at Pydna it is the Peltasts who are referred to (which I freely admit seems a bit like special pleading similar to the wagon incident being hypaspists). But - to me at least - the frequency of Macedonian aspides and paucity of Macedonian peltai does tell us something.
On carrying aspis and two handed spear - it's a difficult question, I think, and there really isn't much ancient evidence. It seems like something a re-enactor could answer very easily (not whether it was done, but at least whether it is possible).
One would think that the wagon incident does imply larger shields, but the insistence on the men clustering closely together also makes smaller ones quite possible, on the basis that if the men are forming a continuous carpet of humanity they can perhaps cover themselves even with a smaller type of shield, and one might even wonder about the shape implied by sugkleisai es akribes, which implies the shields were exactly fitted together.
I would seriously hesitate to propose square or other tessalating shield shapes for the phalanx, particularly as all shields found to date have to the best of my knowledge been round (see earlier in the thread) but suspect that smaller shields would have served well enough if the men could huddle together sufficiently closely. (Alex would presumably have given them a dummy run through the procedure before risking life and limb.)
This would be another activity for re-enactors potentially to validate or otherwise, albeit perhaps leaving out the actual wagons. ;)
The promised summary:
The Pergamene shield, or rather bronze covering of one, the wooden core being lost, was 65-67 cm in diameter. It was squashed flat, wherefore a restauration was attempted in the 1930s, which caused some damage to it. The shape after restauration approximates, but does not equal the origianal, which can be seen in the irregularity of outline and the imperfectly right angles of the formed by diameters connecting the four fastening points along the perimeter, originally evenly spaced (or so Peltz takes for granted). Original diameter assumed to be a constant ~660 mm. The original height of the curve of the shield will have been about 110 mm. The covering is 0.35-0.5 mm thick and the weight is 1080 g (original weight by implication somewhat greater, to which one has to add the weight of the wooden core, a layer of papyrus between wood and bronze, and any leather carrying straps etc).
At the edge, the bronze sheet curves back inward; the inward-thrusting part is cut into a zigzag shape except for the abovementioned fastening points, which are rectangular and have two holes for nails to attach to the wooden core. Each quarter has a different number of "zigs" between the fastening points, 21, 22, 23, and 24 - Peltz declines to guess whether this has any significance or is just the result of lacking precision. In addition to the damage caused by the '30s restauration, there are four ancient holes in the bronze covering, possibly caused by spear, sword, and/or arrow strikes against it. Alternatively, some of them may result from the shield having been nailed to a pole as a trophy. At least some of the papyrus lining between bronze and wood had writing on it, the letters omega and tau being identified. The bronze, papyrus, and wood were attached by an animalic glue mixed with silicate filler.
There's a similar shield from Pontus, now in the J. Paul Getty Museum, which however has a blazon (a Macedonian star) driven into the bronze - any on the Pergamene shield was merely painted. Other shields of the same "Macedonian" type range in size from less than 40 cm to about 80 cm diameter.
The bronze in the Pergamene shield has less tin and more copper and other elements than is usual for hoplite shields. The simpler, compared to hoplite shields, fastening between bronze and wood had evidently shown itself sufficient in practice. Nothing can be said about the inner accoutrements of the shield, nor is anything known from other perserved Macedonian shields.
The shield was restored again ca 2000, with time apparently without further damage, and brought into a condition where it could be displayed in the Pergamonmuseum, but was still in magazine as of Peltz's writing.
Were any of the surviving shields found with any fittings e.g. handles, buckles, fixing nails? They might help us understand how they were used better.
Quote from: Erpingham on November 29, 2015, 09:35:02 AM
Were any of the surviving shields found with any fittings e.g. handles, buckles, fixing nails? They might help us understand how they were used better.
None of the Macedonian ones, as I understand Peltz.
Quote from: Chuck the Grey on November 27, 2015, 09:15:25 PM
I remember that when Alexander was campaigning in Thrace at the beginning of his reign, the so-called "free Thracians" were preparing to roll wagons down a slope to break up the phalanx
....
I remember a modern commentator, maybe JFC Fuller, suggesting that the soldiers that locked their shield may have be the hypaspists equipped with the hoplite shield.
Heckel's article here (http://www.casa-kvsa.org.za/2005/AC48-13-Heckel.pdf) comes to that same conclusion; he also summarises some other scholars' different suggestions.
I'm having trouble keeping up with this thread, been scurrying around trying to find some references. I'll try to contribute some more before too long.
I finally located my copy of Fuller's work on Alexander's generalship. Fuller does not claim that the men hunkered under their shields were the hypaspists. Fuller seems to regard the hypaspists as being lighter armed and equipped in order to provide a tactical hinge between the faster moving cavalry and the slower phalanx proper.
I can sympathize with Duncan's scurrying around to find references. I have three different translations of Arrian's account of Alexander's campaign and when I went searching, I couldn't find any of them. Thanks Patrick for providing the reference in Arrian. Now I have to figure out how two of the copies mysteriously appeared on the proper bookshelf. They weren't there before when I looked before. Honestly.
Thanks for the link to the artlcle Duncan. I look forward to reading your comments when time permits.
Heckel' reasoning seems to be based on a premise that the less nimble phalangites would find it easier, and the more nimble hypaspists harder, to avoid the wagons.
At least he sensibly has the troops in the path of the vehicles lie down. When a vehicle trundles onto a shield, ground pressure per square inch from the wheels becomes ground pressure per square foot from the shields, i.e. a diminution in pressure to about 1/144 of what a loaded wagon would inflict. It is no surprise that the wagons simply rolled or jumped over the prone Macedonians.
The smaller 2' phalangite shield might actually have stood this treatment better than the larger 3' Argive-type, which would be accepting correspondingly greater concentration stresses relative to its overall shape when taking the load of a wagon.
None of this really helps to decide which shields the hypaspists were carrying at this juncture. Perhaps etymology and technique can assist. By the time of Philip V, the hypaspist had been replaced by the peltast, suggesting a change of shield to one of lesser dimensions than hitherto. These 'peltasts' were trained as close-formation fighters, as is evidenced by the following incident:
QuoteBut when the Aetolian horse rallied and ventured to meet him at the ford of the Achelous, which is about twenty stades before you reach the town, believing that they would either stop his advance altogether, or inflict much damage on the Macedonians while crossing the river; the king, fully understanding their tactics, ordered his peltasts to enter the river first and to cross it in close order, keeping to their regular companies, and with shields interlocked [sunēspikotas]. His orders were obeyed: and as soon as the first company had effected the crossing, the Aetolian cavalry attacked it; but they could make no impression upon it, standing as it did in close order, and being joined in similar close order, shield to shield [sunaspisasan], by a second and a third company as they crossed. Therefore they wheeled off discomfited and retired to the city. - Polybius IV.64.5-7
The change in designation from hypaspist to peltast would seem to imply a change to a smaller shield. There is an alternative explanation for the change in designation, which would be a change in role. In Diodorus XVII.9.4, Peucestes, who is carrying the shield from Ilium, is a hypaspist and actually holds his shield over (huperēspise) Alexander. If the hypaspists were indeed originally foot bodyguards whose theoretical task was to shield* the king, they would have needed a shield of suitable proportions for the task.
*
Aspizo means to protect,
huperēspise is the 3rd person perfect indicative active form, but gives us a possible origin for the term 'hypaspist'.
This train of thought would point to the likelihood of a more substantial shield for hypaspists, at least in Alexander's time.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on November 30, 2015, 09:23:26 AMThere is an alternative explanation for the change in designation, which would be a change in role. In Diodorus XVII.9.4, Peucestes, who is carrying the shield from Ilium, is a hypaspist and actually holds his shield over (huperēspise) Alexander. If the hypaspists were indeed originally foot bodyguards whose theoretical task was to shield* the king, they would have needed a shield of suitable proportions for the task.
XVII.
99.4.
Technically Peukestes was one of the
somatophylakes, not a hypaspist. And according to Arrian VI.9.3, Peukestes was carrying the sacred
aspis of Athene from the temple at Troy, so this may not have any bearing on ordinary hypaspist shields.
Interestingly in Diod. XVII.98.5 and 99.3, the shield that Alexander himself carries as he climbs into the city is a
pelte.
Duncan - yes I tend to find my notes and references are in one place and my opportunity to spend time on this forum is in another (ahem). Any contribution will be welcome when you are able.
Ooo just seen your "Interestingly in Diod. XVII.98.5 and 99.3, the shield that Alexander himself carries as he climbs into the city is a pelte." Interesting indeed! I will now scurry off to look at that...
I should add - having now checked - that I'm wrong about there being only one inscriptional reference to peltai in a Macedonian context - Liampi lists four, the latest from early 2nd C. Nevertheless I think the general point stands I hope - 'aspis' is still more common.
The Heckel wagons article is interesting. He says "A.B. Bosworth, noting the small size of the phalangite's shield (Asclepiodotus, Tact. 5.1 says it was 8 palms or about two feet in diameter" - this always seems to me an enormous leap of faith - the phalangite's shield at the time Asclepiodotus was writing (late 2nd C?) might have been two feet in diameter - taking this as evidence of the size of shield of Alexander's phalanx is a bit of a stretch, IMHO - yet it is very common to do so, as if Macedonian armament must of necessity have remained completely unchanged for 200 years.
Also - "There is, of course, a direct correlation between the length of the offensive weapon carried by the infantryman and the size of his shield." This begs the question - I don't believe there's any necessity for such a correlation. Heckel, like others, sees the hypaspists as more lightly armed, mobile and flexible - yet gives them the quintessentially heavy shield of the hoplite. To my mind if the hypaspists are lighter armed, this above all should apply to their shields, since the shield was the single heaviest piece of equipment (and the one Iphicrates' reform, if real, aimed to replace for precisely that reason). That's my hunch, anyway - can't prove it of course.
Anthony - no, there are no surviving rmeains of the insides of Macedonian shields - no fixtures or fittings. The only direct evidence is the inside of one shield on the Aemillis Paullus monument which we've mentioned; and the Pergamene bronze plaque of phalangites in action http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/pergamon1913/0165, which is odd as it seems to show the sarissa passing to the left of the shield instead of the right. Maybe because it did, maybe because the artist depicted it poorly, maybe because the line drawing (the only version of this plaque that has survived) represents it badly - we can't tell.
Patrick:-
QuoteThe change in designation from hypaspist to peltast would seem to imply a change to a smaller shield.
Perhaps, but it doesn't imply that to me. Macedonian unit names seem to have undergone a process of expansion - originally 'Companions' meant the personal companions of the king, but under Philip or Alexander the designation was extended to cover the whole of the Macedonian heavy cavalry. Similarly, at some point Philip or Alexander extended the title 'Foot Companions' to the whole of the heavy infantry (the hoplites). My guess is that originally the Foot Companions were the king's personal infantry guard. When the title was extended to cover the whole of the infantry, a new title was needed for the guard, and the title chosen was 'hypaspist' - this having previously been (and in fact continuing, under Alexander and later Macedonian kings, to be) the designation of some body of close attendants of the king. As such 'hypaspist', means not "bearer of an aspis" but "bearer of the king's shield", and as such it doesn't tell us anything about the type of shield they themselves carried.
I admit that this (I hope) neat argument is undermined by the Hypaspists becoming Argyraspides, which is a problem for my theory. But maybe this
was due to a change of armament...
Diod xvii.98 - Alexander's pelta at the Mallian city - is interesting. I would guess that if Alexander needed to grab a shield off someone, the closest to hand might well have been that of a Hypaspist (or Argyraspid) - Alexander's guards, in attendance upon him. As such this might be evidence that the Hypaspists carried peltai - QED! But this is a leap of faith too - I'm not sure any firm conclusion can be drawn from this incident, either way.
Quote from: RichT on November 30, 2015, 10:18:06 AM
Also - "There is, of course, a direct correlation between the length of the offensive weapon carried by the infantryman and the size of his shield." This begs the question - I don't believe there's any necessity for such a correlation.
One can't avoiding thinking of Renaissance pikemen without any shield at all.
Quote from: RichT on November 30, 2015, 12:06:16 PMAs such 'hypaspist', means not "bearer of an aspis" but "bearer of the king's shield" ...
Did anyone read the article on hypaspists in the latest
Ancient Warfare? The author suggests that there is one reference to hypaspists being called "the hypaspists of the Companions" (if I ever knew this I had forgotten it), and argues that the three battalions of the hypaspists had three different origins, IIRC something like:
- "the hypaspists of the Companions", presumably originally the Companion cavalry's shield-bearing squires;
- the Royal Hypaspists (which term Tarn always regarded as a mere synonym for "the hypaspists");
- and I think the third would have been the
agema.
Not sure if that helps at all!
Isn't it in Arrian where early on in Asia Minor the Companions dismount (on a hill?) with their shields?
Going from memory here
OK, finally one of several pints that I want to discuss here – the size of the Macedonian shield.
There has been some academic quibbling in the past about exactly what the phrase "Macedonian shield" means: I use it to mean a round, rimless, concave, bronze-faced shield, regardless of whether it has the characteristic decoration or not. Whether or not this was the only shield used with the pike phalanx, I think it was clearly the main one. (And yes, I am aware that some shields used by non-Macedonians might fit the bill as well...)
Surviving examples and "apparently life-sized" representations seem to vary from about 65cm to about 80 cm, assuming that the "Pharnakes of Pontos" shield in the Getty (http://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/9221/unknown-maker-shield-greek-185-160-bc/) -also here (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shield_Pharnakes_Getty_Villa_80.AC.60.jpg) - is in fact a "Macedonian" shield: it certainly looks like one, but it is the largest example, and Melikian-Chirvani (http://www.jstor.org/stable/24048420?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents) - argued that it was a type of Iranian cavalry shield.
One thing that this seems to mean is that when Asklepiodotos or Ailian say "The best shield for use in the phalanx is the Macedonian, of bronze, eight palms in diameter, and not too hollow" (Ask. V.1), then – since the palm is about 8cm, and so "eight palms" about 64 cm - the tacticians are citing the smaller end of the range of shield sizes. This sits a little oddly with their view (Ask. I.2) that the sarissa-armed hoplitai use "shields of the largest size", since the shields they recommend a few paragraphs later are not really "the largest" at all. It's not entirely clear what the thought processes are here, and it's possible that one or other paragraph has been over-simplified since the original text of Poseidonios (or Polybios, or whoever actually wrote the first manual in the tradition). The range of sizes does also mean, though, that when people speak of Macedonian shields "two feet" or "60 cm" in diameter, that is slightly exaggerating how small they were – even the smallest is a bit larger than that, and some were noticeably bigger.
Sekunda, in both the Osprey "Macedonian Armies after Alexander" and his academic "The Antigonid Army", discusses recent finds of Antigonid shields from Greece and FYROMacedonia. Diameters of the six shields he cites are 74, 74, 73.6, 72, 66 and 66 cm. This he sees as two distinct groups , the larger of 74 cm which he suggests is carried by the ordinary phalanx, the other of 66 cm carried by the Antigonid "peltasts".
(I am not completely sure where he gets all the diameters from. For the three FYROM shields he cites two articles by Pierre Juhel from 2007 and 2011, but I've read them both and they don't give diameters: at the point those articles were written, the shields are still fragmentary. Pers. comm.? Hammond's 1996 article (http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=8533303&fileId=S0068245400016555) (thanks Nick) – does cite 66cm for one of the Greece shields, though.)
As Richard has said, this isn't a large sample to be basing a conclusion on, but there do seem to be two groups there – with the 72 cm shield as maybe a bit of an intermediate anomaly. There is also some supporting artistic evidence, in that the stele of Zoilos from Marvinci does show a smaller shield than the stele of Nikolaos son of Hadymos or the Lyson-Kallikles tomb. In addition we have the Pergamon shield-facing, reckoned at 66cm by Peltz, which isn't Antigonid but does neatly fit the same smaller size. So provisionally I am prepared to accept Sekunda's suggestion that the Antigonids did make shields to two distinct patterns, slightly different in size, in which case it does seem more than likely that the smaller group belonged to the peltasts – and also corresponds to the size of Asklepiodotos' and Ailian's "eight-palm" phalanx shields, although they explicitly allocate this type of shield to the hoplitai and not to their "peltasts".
Another bit of supporting evidence, not for those particular sizes but for uniform shield sizes within a given army, is that we seem to have two life-sized representations of Ptolemaic shields. One is the stone model or former in the Allard Pierson museum, which is 70 cm in diameter according to the catalogue (http://images.tresoar.nl/bibl-collectie/Hermeneus/Jaargang%2048/4803.pdf). The second is the relief of Macedonian arms in St Mark's in Venice, which may come from Egypt or may be a Roman copy of a Ptolemaic piece – again the shield measures 70cm. Discussed here (http://www.pothos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3778&sid=729dc1c14e1076fd3d9b2caa4c0bcd0b) and size cited here (http://makedonia-alexandros.blogspot.co.uk/2010/08/quest-for-tomb-of-alexander-great-by.html).
Quote from: Duncan Head on November 30, 2015, 10:26:08 PM
Asklepiodotos or Ailian say "The best shield for use in the phalanx is the Macedonian, of bronze, eight palms in diameter, and not too hollow" (Ask. V.1)
Apologies if this is off topic.
But what do you think the significance of "not too hollow" is?
Is it something about the internal surface and how the shield is carried by the arm?
Or is it something about the external surface (because it would echo the internal surface) not being too rounded and the effect this might have on the properties of deflection?
Not sure whether it's relevant but how exactly was the shield worn by the infantryman?
Would a man with long arms try and get a larger shield so his wrist wasn't exposed because the shield wasn't large enough to protect his whole arm?
Why should they make them in one size? It was probably no big deal to turn out half a dozen sizes, once you've got the jigs
Jim
How exactly the shield was worn is something we've touched on already in this thread when discussing what the ochane was; it is not completely certain. If it doesn't have the rigid bronze porpax of the Argive shield, it is possible that the carrying system may have been more flexible and more easily used with differing arm lengths? Carrying systems are another point I want to talk about briefly later.
As for concavity, again uncertain. We know from art that at least some Macedonian shields seem to have been quite concavely curved, bowl-like: look at the line drawing of the Pergamon plaque or the coins of Eupolemos - http://edgarlowen.com/eupolemos-10343.jpg - for instance. It is therefore not too great a leap to suggest that some were more bowl-like or "hollow" than others. Markle's "Shield-Monument..." (http://www.ascsa.edu.gr/pdf/uploads/hesperia/148374.pdf) article even suggests there are two types of shield, one curved and one flattish - which may be going too far. Sekunda suggests that the smaller Macedonian shields he thinks are peltai may have been flatter, but I am not completely sure on what grounds.
I would guess that the more "hollow" shields might provide better individual protection, curving round the arm, but not lock so well with your neighbours' shields in pyknosis?
It is, I suppose, an outside possibility that Asklepiodotos is just contrasting the macedonian with the Argive aspis?
As already been said, if there is a best shield, more than one is either in use or at least available. If A isn't just talking about an Argive shield, then various round shields were available to the book's audience (presumably people who wanted to raise phalanxes). This raises the question, for me, about how standardised equipment would be in kitting out a phalanx. How often would there be a complete change to a new style (Ok lads, we've just received10 thousand peltai 8 palms wide, so please hand in all those 9 palm aspides at QM stores)? Or would there be a mixture and gradual replacement?
The interesting thing about all those Macedonian shields inscribed "King Demetrios" is that they imply first, central issue, which we could probably deduce already; but second, some sort of intention to keep equipment up to date - replace "King Demetrios" shields by "King Antigonos" or whoever. So you are probably replacing shields at least once per reign.
(Egypt of course had it easy, since you could rely on King Ptolemy being replaced by King Ptolemy.)
The St Mark's shield is interesting and I hadn't come across this before (or the "Alexander's tomb" story behind it). One problem is that it is very 'hollow' while the Allard Pierson shield is very flat (and what is the size - the surface of the face, or the chord of the curvature?). Given the difference I'm not sure whether these can represent the same type or size of shield.
I could agree too with Nick Sekunda except that I'm still not totally convinced a 6-8 cm difference is enough to constitute two distinct types. But broadly speaking, if the larger shields in the range belong to the main phalanx and the smaller shields in the range belong to peltasts, that fits what else we know. It is also curious that the shield examples that have survived fall in the range 66-74 (or 80) cm, yet the artistic depictions (eg the Pergamon plaque, Lyson and Kallikles tomb, Ayios Athanasios tomb, Aemillius Paullus monument) all show shields which - to my eyes at least - are similar in size to hoplite shields (in theory, about 90 cm). I think the general point from all this is that talk of the phalanx carrying small shields is overstated to say the least - even if most phalanx shields are around 74 cm this makes them broadly similar to hoplite shields in size - certainly not enough of a difference to be tactically or even particularly visually significant (judging by the artistic depictions).
On hollowness and carrying, I seem to recall in the Slingshot archives an article possibly by Phil Steele that raised this issue and made some interesting points - will have to dig that out when I can.
Central distribution - there are a couple of mass distributions we know about - Doson gave the Achaeans a set of 'chalkaspides' (which led to them being mistaken for Macedonians), and a Ptolemy gave somebody else (aaargh my memory - can't remember the reference either) a set of bronze 'peltast equipment' (meaning small size bronze shields?). Alexander issued silver shields too of course. I wonder whether phalangites who were stood down took their equipment with them, or if it was stored centrally and distributed when they mustered? I would expect them to take it home, but maybe not.
Edit - and thinking about this last question - I've never been sure about the context of the fines in the Amphipolis code for missing equipment (for the sarissa, an obol, for the aspis, two obols etc) - since on active service losing an aspis would seem like a big deal. But if these are fines for failing to show up at muster with the equipment that has been distributed to you, it makes sense.
Even if we in general, or I in particular, are never convinced by the idea that the sarissa might have been carried with the Argive shield, this discussion will have been worthwhile because it's thrown up a number of interesting points, not least the nature of the
ochanē that was used in carrying at least one type of pikeman's shield.
We've already seen Plutarch
Kleomenes XI.2:
Quote... raised a body of four thousand hoplitai, whom he taught to use a sarissa, held in both hands, instead of a doru, and to carry their aspides by an ochanē instead of by a porpax ...
Now
ochanē is rendered "strap" in the usual Perrin translation, and is often taken to be a shoulder-strap or baldric. The feminine noun
ochanē seems to be unique to this passage, but is regarded by the LSJ as the same as the neuter
ochanon. The LSJ gives the following examples, some of which again we have already seen:
- Herodotos II.141: the
ochana of Assyrian, so presumably non-hoplite, shields (
aspides) are eaten by mice, so he is thinking of something leather, or at least organic.
- Herodotos I.171: the Karians invent handles for their shields,
ochana aspisi; because previously everyone had used a
telamon, that is the shoulder-strap described by Homer. So here the
ochanon is quite clearly not a shoulder-strap.
- One I don't think we've discussed before, Aineias the Tactician XXIX.12: conspirators within a city make their own shields, to which they attach handles,
ochana, of
leather or wood -
ochana ... skytina kai xylina.
So an
ochanon isn't a shoulder-baldric, but it is some sort of shield handle that can either be leather or wooden. It may be a word with a quite general application.
At this point, let me introduce the sketch in the attachment. This is Nick Sekunda's interpretation of the arrangement of shield-handles shown inside the
pelte of the soldier in the House of Menander fresco at Pompeii, whom he thinks is an Antigonid peltast – see for instance here (https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/74/cf/6e/74cf6ea27fd7fd790f32fdbf9be8e5a4.jpg). There are three straps, of which the longest is barely visible in the picture. This would be the strap by which the
pelte was hung on the march, and which the agema at Pydna were taking off their shoulders; the other two would be held in battle. Could this arrangement of straps be Plutarch's
ochana?
The only other image we have, as far as I know, of the inside of a possible phalangite shield is one of the figures on the Aemilius Paullus monument, see for instance http://www.hannibalbarca.webspace.virginmedia.com/Graphics/Pydna-small3.jpg at the left. That's a larger shield than the Pompeii one, appears to be rimless in the style of the "Macedonian shield", but looks like it has a
porpax and
antilabē like an Argive shield. Yet Plutarch's
Kleomenes assures us that the Spartan pikemen did not use a
porpax on their shields. So do we assume this isn't a phalangite's shield, or that the method of holding phalangites' shields varied more than we might think?
Quote from: Duncan Head on December 01, 2015, 10:22:55 PM
So an ochanon isn't a shoulder-baldric, but it is some sort of shield handle that can either be leather or wooden. It may be a word with a quite general application.
At this point, let me introduce the sketch in the attachment. This is Nick Sekunda's interpretation of the arrangement of shield-handles shown inside the pelte of the soldier in the House of Menander fresco at Pompeii, whom he thinks is an Antigonid peltast – see for instance here (https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/74/cf/6e/74cf6ea27fd7fd790f32fdbf9be8e5a4.jpg). There are three straps, of which the longest is barely visible in the picture. This would be the strap by which the pelte was hung on the march, and which the agema at Pydna were taking off their shoulders; the other two would be held in battle. Could this arrangement of straps be Plutarch's ochana?
You may be on to something there, Duncan. An
ochana does appear to be a grip of some sort, and for stability it would be better to have two grips rather than just one. I use the term 'grip' rather loosely as with both hands on the sarissa neither would be available to grip anything else.
Quote
The only other image we have, as far as I know, of the inside of a possible phalangite shield is one of the figures on the Aemilius Paullus monument, see for instance http://www.hannibalbarca.webspace.virginmedia.com/Graphics/Pydna-small3.jpg at the left. That's a larger shield than the Pompeii one, appears to be rimless in the style of the "Macedonian shield", but looks like it has a porpax and antilabē like an Argive shield. Yet Plutarch's Kleomenes assures us that the Spartan pikemen did not use a porpax on their shields. So do we assume this isn't a phalangite's shield, or that the method of holding phalangites' shields varied more than we might think?
Perhaps even both: I think there was a difference between Peloponnesian and Macedonian phalangite systems, for a number of reasons. Callisthenes, quoted by Polybius in Book XII, has Alexander change the depth of his phalanx from 32 to 16 and then to 8 while advancing on Issus (Polybius rubbishes this, I think because he totally misunderstands what Callisthenes is describing). This looks like the system of closing up by files as per Aelian/Asclepiodotus in their tactical manuals. They do however have a second system for closing up files, namely face right and close up, but I have never seen a Macedonian phalanx mentioned as using this system, so it may be Peloponnesian. The fact that Cleomenes' pikemen change not their shield but rather their way of carrying it suggests they might indeed have attempted to carry their pikes with both hands while using an Argive-type shield, as Richard implies. When Cleomenes' phalanx meets Antigonus' at Sellasia, the greater 'weight' of the Macedonian phalanx carries the day once Antigonus tells his troops to dense up in a double phalanx. To me, these are clues that the Peloponnesians may have re-invented the phalanx to suit themselves rather than simply copying the Macedonian model.
Is the warrior with the shield on the Aemilius Paullus monument actually identified as Macedonian?
Yes it's my view that the notion of a strap or baldric can be abandoned - Plut Aem 19 doesn't mention one, and Plut Cleom rules it out in the case of the Spartans at least.
Could it be that the only real difference between ochane and porpax is material rather than general appearance/function? If an ochane is a leather shield grip then it will be more flexible than a rigid porpax, and allow enough flex and give to adjust the position of the arm. This would allow the bearer to extend his left hand beyond the shield to grip a sarissa, while still using a grip at the shield edge. This would mean that the AP Monument shield can still be a phalangite shield, since though it
looks like a porpax/antilabe, if the grips are leather and flexible this could in fact be a depiction of an ochane (or the two parts of one possible ochane arrangement). Always assuming of course that the sculptor took the trouble to depict the details accurately and didn't just depict a generic shield interior.
I'm not completely sold on Nick's idea that the Menander fresco shows an Antigonid peltast, but it might, and the shield arrangement would fit, certainly. So the general idea is that ochane implies two (or more) leather handles on the inside of the shield that allow more flexible carrying options than the rigid porpax and rope antilabe. This allows the AP shield to be a phalangite shield and also explains the Spartan practice.
In my view (but I guess not in yours, Duncan!) it also explains those figures on the Sarcophagus who have their left hands free - they have pushed the ochane of their shields further up their arms and slid the edge grip (antilabe equivalent) above the wrist, something that could not be done with a porpax/antilabe. This is of course speculative, and I don't know what the effect of the rim would be.
I suspect holding arrangements for phalangites' shields did vary - the Macedonian phalanx existed for over 200 years, and like shield sizes, I imagine there was some experimentation. The southern Greeks in this period went through four sets of shields (Argive aspides, thureoi, peltai, Macedonian aspides), so I expect there were regional and chronological variations for those 'armed in the Macedonian style' too.
This discussion has clarified my views on many of these issues too - very useful.
Quote
Is the warrior with the shield on the Aemilius Paullus monument actually identified as Macedonian?
Only by the fact that the other round shield bearers have Macedonian patterns on their shields.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 02, 2015, 01:51:40 PMIs the warrior with the shield on the Aemilius Paullus monument actually identified as Macedonian?
Usually. However:
- Anson in the "Ashthetairoi" article - http://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=1192.msg10573#msg10573 - identified his shield as a hoplite, not a Macedonian, shield;
- Taylor in "The Battle Scene on Aemilius Paullus' Pydna Monument: A Re-evaluation" (mentioned on this forum before; draft formerly on academia.edu, now taken down) wondered if he might be a Pergamene or some such Greek ally of Rome.
Nothing in ancient military history seems to be subject to universal agreement.
Nothing in any field is subject to universal agreement! (Which is a good thing, in my opinion).
I suspect a lot of those who want the AP shield to belong to a 'hoplite' (i.e. someone equipped like a Classical era hoplite), whether Macedonian, Pergamene or Greek, do so because they have already decided that a sarissa bearer must have a small shield (and/or a strap).
I still don't understand how anyone (like Anson in that article) thinks carrying a hoplite shield is a sign of having lighter equipment. If we extend back the characteristics of the later Macedonian army (ie heavy, large shielded phalanx and lighter, small shielded hypaspists/peltasts) to Alexander's army, many of the problems go away (I won't pretend there aren't still other problems though...)
Quote from: RichT on December 02, 2015, 04:50:58 PM
I still don't understand how anyone (like Anson in that article) thinks carrying a hoplite shield is a sign of having lighter equipment.
Because the spear you use with the hoplite shield is lighter than a sarissa, I think. Whether the difference is enough to make the hoplite lighter overall, I do not know; it may depend on your preferred model for sarissa construction (big spearhead and thick shaft, or small spearhead and tapering shaft) and/or whether you're assuming Peter Krentz's lighter poplar-wood aspis (from the Greek & Roman Armour Day talk).
Overall weight has to be a consideration, and as the sarissa cannot really have its weight reduced (except by shortening from 24' to 21' as Polybius notes in XVIII.29), armour and shield need to be as light as possible. If metal, and presumably heavier, armour becomes increasingly popular, shield size - and hence weight - becomes the only significant remaining variable. Iphicrates' reforms, incidentally, seem to follow this general pattern.
At a rough guess a sarissa would be twice the weight of a doru, which means several pounds would have to be saved somewhere in the phalangite's equipment. A smaller shield, which would mitigate pike handling challenges and make very tight frontages easier to achieve, would seem to be a logical step.
That said, Achaean phalangites wore metal armour, but do we know anything about their shields?
If hypaspists had used larger shields with pikes, one consequence would be that they would tend to be overburdened compared with standard phalangites unless they made do with lesser armour. Yet the general impression is that hypaspists were handier than their phalangite compatriots, and their key role on the battlefield and in assaults on cities does not suggest they were under-protected. Would they have carried pikes? They, or someone in the Macedonian heavy infantry inventory, seem to do a lot of javelin-throwing in Arrian.
Quote from: Duncan Head on December 02, 2015, 04:59:24 PM
Quote from: RichT on December 02, 2015, 04:50:58 PM
I still don't understand how anyone (like Anson in that article) thinks carrying a hoplite shield is a sign of having lighter equipment.
Because the spear you use with the hoplite shield is lighter than a sarissa, I think. Whether the difference is enough to make the hoplite lighter overall, I do not know; it may depend on your preferred model for sarissa construction (big spearhead and thick shaft, or small spearhead and tapering shaft) and/or whether you're assuming Peter Krentz's lighter poplar-wood aspis (from the Greek & Roman Armour Day talk).
Well true enough, and Anson does say "Markle is correct that the term 'baruteron' (heavier) refers to offensive weaponry, that is to the spears" but needless to say, I don't think Markle is correct to say that at all - that would be contrary to usual usage, so far as I know.
Whatever spears and shields actually weighed (and I think there are too many variables for any sort of certainty), I think it's fair to say that a hoplite aspis is usually considered indicative of its bearer being heavily armed. It is the first thing to be thrown away when running away, peltasts had always had (presumably) smaller shields, and the point of Iphicrates' reform is to make the shield easier to use by lightening it. My assumption has always been that when Hyaspists and later Peltasts were performing their 'light' duties (climbing ladders, rough terrain etc) they would not have sarissas anyway. I know there's a lot of debate over dual arming and use of javelins etc, and precisely what they did use I don't know. The likely options seem to me to be small shield and smaller than a full size sarissa but still lengthy spear, as described in the tacticians and Iphicrates, or else small shield and javelins, like classical peltasts. If the former, this fits nicely with Sekunda's Menander painting. If the latter, it explains all the javelin throwing in Arrian. On the battlefield, Peltasts definitely had sarissai (see Pydna etc) and I assume Hypaspists did too (but there's zero evidence).
It's probably also true that a Macedonian shield of a given size weighs less than an Argive shield of the same size (because of the lack of rim if nothing else), which may be why Macedonian shields were preferred, and why, if Alexander's heavy infantry did start out with Argive shields (see Sarcophagus), they later replaced them with Macedonian shields of similar size (see coins, Ayios Athanasios etc).
Quote
That said, Achaean phalangites wore metal armour, but do we know anything about their shields?
The only Achaean phalangite shields I know about are the Macedonian ones given to them by Doson - what the rest carried is unknown (to me) - though the Corinthian 'shield bowls' might suggest more widespread adoption.
Quote from: RichT on December 03, 2015, 09:52:24 AMThe only Achaean phalangite shields I know about are the Macedonian ones given to them by Doson - what the rest carried is unknown (to me) - though the Corinthian 'shield bowls' might suggest more widespread adoption.
Achaian shields:
- At Polybios IV.69 we are told that Antigonos Doson had armed the Megalopolitan exiles with chalkaspides for Sellasia (222). At II.65 the Megalopolitans are "armed in Macedonian style" at Sellasia, and at V.91 the Megalopolitans are still "chalkaspides" in 217.
- When we hear of Philopoimen re-arming the rest of the Achaians with pikes in 208, Plutarch (Phil.9) simply says he taught them to use an aspis. Pausanias specifically says it was an Argive aspis. Personally I don't put too much weight on this; it only matters if the word "Argive" was in the common source of Plutarch's and Pausanias' accounts (which is probably Polybios' lost life of Philopoimen) and deleted by Plutarch, rather than being added by Pausanias; or if Pausanias had independent testimony. I am inclined to suspect that Pausanias might not have understood the difference between Argive and Macedonian shields - they're both round and bronze-faced, and he was writing centuries after both had fallen out of use - and just added the adjective for archaic local colour.
- Ptolemy gives the Achaians "6,000 sets of bronze arms for peltasts", "hexakischilia men hopla chalka peltastika" (Polyb. XXII.9.3) - not literally "shields" as in the Loeb translation, though the fact that they're bronze panoplies may imply bronze-faced peltai. This seems to be about 187 BC; note from the description of the battle of Corinth http://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=450.0 that the Achaian phalanx seems to be already divided into clipeati (hoplitai?) and caetrati (peltastai) in 197, so if some Achaian phalangites had bronze peltai it doesn't mean they all did.
- There are Hellenistic terracotta model Argive shields from Corinth, but I don't think they are closely enough dated to be reliably associated with the Achaian pike phalanx: some suggested dates put the finds before Corinth even joined the Achaian League, let alone Philopoimen's reforms.
- The "Macedonian shield bowls" from Corinth have been thought to be inspired by the shields of Macedonian troops in garrison there at various dates, or from trophies, rather than from Achaian shields, so they may have no significance for the Achaian League's troops.
Generally I'm inclined to agree on Pausanias' 'Argolic' - though this is one of those cases where those who argue for Argive shields will fall on this with glee as corroborating evidence, while those who doubt them will have no qualms dismissing such a late, non-technical source (I expect I would do so myself). If this was the only evidence for Argive sheilds I probably wouldn't give it much thought, but taken with the other scraps, I'm more inclined to think it might be true.
On peltasts and 'clupeati' (which is also what Livy calls chalkaspides) - another speculation, given the Boeotian evidence for young men being enrolled in the peltophoroi, and the description of the Peltasts at Pydna as the 'selected youth', and Bar Kochva's speculations about Seleucid Argyraspides (who may be Peltasts), is that Peltasts were the youngest age classes (so more fit and agile), who would go on to serve in the main phalanx when they got older and had slowed down a bit.
Quote from: RichT on December 03, 2015, 01:59:13 PMOn peltasts and 'clupeati' (which is also what Livy calls chalkaspides)
The clupeati/peltast division in the Achaian army does seem to be a direct copy of the Antigonid institutions - after all the two were firm allies at the time Philopoimen introduced the pike.
Quote- another speculation, given the Boeotian evidence for young men being enrolled in the peltophoroi, and the description of the Peltasts at Pydna as the 'selected youth', and Bar Kochva's speculations about Seleucid Argyraspides (who may be Peltasts), is that Peltasts were the youngest age classes (so more fit and agile), who would go on to serve in the main phalanx when they got older and had slowed down a bit.
Age eligibility is given in the
Macedonian Conscription Diagramma inscriptions (like the hypaspists in a previous post, this was also discussed in an article in the current
Ancient Warfare mag): eligibility for service is from the ages of 15 to 60, but you only serve in the field army from 20 to 50; the young and old are reservists, unless there is no-one else eligible in the household. Service in the peltasts was only up to age 35, and there was a wealth qualification as well, so it's not
purely on age-classes but is limited to
rich young(ish) men. In the agema they served till 45, or 50 if still fit - so although the agema is described by Polybios as the elite battalion of the peltast corps, it's not limited to young men in the same way as the other peltasts. See for instance http://www.persee.fr/doc/crai_0065-0536_2000_num_144_2_16165. I don't know what happens to a peltast after 35 - does he transfer to the agema, or to the "line" phalanx?
Ah so not exactly the youngest, but younger at any rate. And evidently it's time I re-read Hatzopoulos.
If I remember correctly wasn't the idea, at least for the Seleucids, that service in the 'Peltasts'/Silvershields supposed to be a period of training and building personal loyalty to the King. The idea being that the man would go home after so many years, take his place in the local phalanx battalion and in time his son would join the Silvershields
Quote from: Jim Webster on December 07, 2015, 09:49:11 AM
If I remember correctly wasn't the idea, at least for the Seleucids, that service in the 'Peltasts'/Silvershields supposed to be a period of training and building personal loyalty to the King. The idea being that the man would go home after so many years, take his place in the local phalanx battalion and in time his son would join the Silvershields
That's Kochva's thesis. From what I recall of his book, there's no direct contemporary evidence for it.
ETA: Which isn't to say that I'm against it or anything, only that it relies on inference and informed speculation rather than explicit statements by ancient authors.
If it's kochva, I'm already dubious.
the problem is that as far as I know, there is nothing explicit from the ancient authors :-[
So far as I know there is nothing explicit in the literary sources. There are conscription rules for the Antigonid kingdom as Duncan points out above. I think Bar Kochva's speculation seems reasonable, but it is only speculation. It doesn't seem to be how things were done by the Antigonids but then they were in a much smaller geographical area.
Resurrecting this thread to mention that I'm now reading Christopher Matthew's An Invincible Beast, which has some discussion of these issues.
Unfortunately I don't think he has anything very convincing to say - he seems firmly committed to all Macedonian phalanxes using a pelte of 8 palms width, and doesn't consider any alternatives (anyone not using a pelte must be a Classical-style hoplite). He sees the ochane as a handgrip, effectively replacing the antilabe, though at least he doesn't think it is a neck strap. He seems to be saying that this panoply was invented by Iphicrates, and adopted by many including Alexander II in Macedon. He doubts Philip's invention of the Macedonian phalanx, thinking instead that Philip inherited the phalanx and his modification was just to add hoplites (Hypaspists) alongside it (!). He believes that Classical hoplites used the one cubit, 18" closest order, and that Macedonian phalangites not only did not but could not (because the sarissa was carried at the same height as the shield, so there had to be gaps between shields). He then wraps himself in knots trying to account for the tactical manual's references to the one cubit formation (either they are describing hoplites, or a defensive formation against missiles in which the sarissas are held vertically).
I've only dipped into the book so far looking for passages relevant to these issues, but so far it seems characteristically eccentric.
I was rather expecting some of that from what he said in his translation of Ailian. Thanks - haven't got that book myself yet, but I'll get round to it in time.
Probably before I do: thanks for the summary of the essentials, Richard.
You're welcome! One small correction to myself though having read more carefully - he does think the ochane is a neck strap, but that it also functioned as a hand grip (so he has a porpax like a hoplite's only narrower, and an ochane as a strap/rope around the neck with a loop grasped by the hand at the shield's edge). He has done a reconstruction but overall I'm disappointed that he doesn't really discuss his findings from this.
Again thank you, Richard: I wonder if you would consider doing a review of this book for Slingshot.
It is curious how Christopher Matthew, following the routes of re-enactment and what he believes to be applied archaeology, has come to a conclusion opposite to that which we would regard as the norm. General understanding, or belief, is that hoplites fought on a 3' individual frontage and phalangites on an 18" frontage; some reservations have been expressed in each case, but this is the basic picture. Christopher M turns this around and has hoplites on an 18" frontage and phalangites on a 3' frontage.
To me, CM's approach seems to be based on plausible misjudgements. Having seen his arguments for an 18" hoplite frontage, which appear to centre on shields being held edgeways to the opposition and spears being used underarm, I have yet to see him provide an adequate explanation for Thucydides' 'right-hand drift' described in Thuc. V.71 and for hoplite armies advancing to the attack dromon, i.e. at the run, both of which imply a 3' individual frontage. He also adduces underarm thrusting from armour bearing upward-slanting score marks, but these could just as easily have been inflicted by overarm thrusts against a falling or prone opponent.
Conversely, he seems to think that the sarissa must have been held at about the level of the centre of the shield rather than, say, at the 7 o'clock position (looking from ahead). My own admittedly limited and improvised experimentation suggests that the phalangite shield would need some form of sling/strap over the shoulder for weight distribution and use on the march and a form of porpax or similar which holds the forearm from elbow to wrist (both exclusive), positioning the wrist at the perimeter of the shield and leaving the left hand free to grasp the weapon shaft, but most importantly requiring the sarissa to be held about level with the base, not the centre, of the shield. This incidentally permits - even encourages - shield rims to overlap and hence to regulate both spacing and the rate of advance (pressure on your shield rim from the man on your right provides a cue that you need to speed up a bit; lack of pressure indicates you should slow down a little), helping to preserve an even line during the advance.
Any thoughts on this from anyone?
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 08, 2016, 10:07:36 AM
To me, CM's approach seems to be based on plausible misjudgements. Having seen his arguments for an 18" hoplite frontage, which appear to centre on shields being held edgeways to the opposition and spears being used underarm, I have yet to see him provide an adequate explanation for Thucydides' 'right-hand drift' described in Thuc. V.71 and for hoplite armies advancing to the attack dromon, i.e. at the run, both of which imply a 3' individual frontage. He also adduces underarm thrusting from armour bearing upward-slanting score marks, but these could just as easily have been inflicted by overarm thrusts against a falling or prone opponent.
You may be misremembering. CM argues that hoplite phalanxes could fight both in a close 18" frontage with overlapping shields (certainly not held edgeways), and in a looser 3' frontage with shields rim to rim. Only the latter,open, formation would charge at the run.
QuoteConversely, he seems to think that the sarissa must have been held at about the level of the centre of the shield rather than, say, at the 7 o'clock position (looking from ahead). My own admittedly limited and improvised experimentation suggests that the phalangite shield would need some form of sling/strap over the shoulder for weight distribution and use on the march and a form of porpax or similar which holds the forearm from elbow to wrist (both exclusive), positioning the wrist at the perimeter of the shield and leaving the left hand free to grasp the weapon shaft, but most importantly requiring the sarissa to be held about level with the base, not the centre, of the shield.
Certainly the Pergamon battle plaque shows the sarisai being held below the centre of the shield (http://bookandsword.com/2014/06/01/the-bronze-battle-scene-from-pergamon/ for the picture I've just looked at, there are other copies online) though not quite at the base.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 08, 2016, 10:07:36 AM
General understanding, or belief, is that hoplites fought on a 3' individual frontage and phalangites on an 18" frontage
You may be misremembering what the 'general understanding' is too, but let's move on quickly from that...
CM (in
Storm of Spears) favours an 18" frontage for hoplites, but with shields facing the enemy and so greatly overlapping. He doubts the usual high overarm thrust of the spear (he thinks many depictions of this in art are actually javelins), and favours instead a high underarm, with the spear held in the armpit (which would allow the spear to protrude over the top of the interlocked shields), as well as a normal low underarm position (spear below the shields). And as Duncan says this is as well as, not instead of, a 3' frontage.
In
Invincible Beast he favours a sarissa/shield grip much as you (Patrick) describe - shoulder strap, porpax, wrist at shield edge, and hand in about the 8 o'clock position. Yet he is absolutely certain that this makes it impossible for phalangites to close up to 18". I'm not really sure why he thinks this. Unfortunately he seems only to have tried this out on his own, not collected a small phalanx (fiteen people would be plenty to test this out - even two would be a start) to see what is really possible or impossible. I don't know why nobody else in the re-enactment community seems to have done this either (except Peter Connolly - he concluded IIRC that the 18" formation was possible to adopt with sarissa and shield, but difficult or impossible to move/attack in, as we would expect - CM seems to take this as evidence that it wasn't possible at all).
It seems to me that the low spear position - as depicted in the Pergamon plaque - should make the close formation possible, so I don't think CM's objections hold up at all. I think it's also possible (though there is no evidence for it) that some if not all ranks used a high spear position (which CM also thinks is impossible) - something like this:
https://img0.etsystatic.com/065/1/9499451/il_570xN.793475528_gdn2.jpg
(from 1618 - I understand the high position was common for Renaissance/Early Modern pikemen - it is also depicted in the rather nice front cover illustration of
Invincible Beast, rather amusingly given CM's views). CM also thinks Polybius' testimony that the sarissa was held such that two cubits extended to the rear is impossible - he holds the sarissa with his rear (right) hand on the butt.
In general I think 'impossible' comes up far to often in this book and CM is too deeply committed to defending his pet theories. I'd be happy to write a review but think I saw in another thread that Holly has already volunteered, and one review is enough.
Someone bagged the review copy over Christmas, I was about to put my hand up for it too but was beaten.
That said, two short reviews are better than one in many cases, and the contrast in thoughts would be an attractive read of itself.
Quote from: RichT on January 08, 2016, 12:20:34 PMCM also thinks Polybius' testimony that the sarissa was held such that two cubits extended to the rear is impossible - he holds the sarissa with his rear (right) hand on the butt.
I was of the evidently mistaken impression that sarssia butts were butt
spikes?
Anyway, Renaissance artists, who may have had some reason to know, didn't think it impossible to let part of a pike shaft extend behind the wielder's rear hand. Two random examples:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Schlacht_bei_Dorneck.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b7/Luzerner_Schilling_Battle_of_Grandson.jpg
Agree with Andreas here. The overarm and underarm position for late medieval pikes had the rear hand inwards of the butt by a couple of feet. The classic de Gheyn-type hand on butt seems to be later 16th century. Although I have seen medieval illustrations of shorter spears used with the hand-on-butt method.
Interesting - though only as a pretty vague parallel - that the Great Ming Military blog reckons that in the C16th:
QuoteQi Ji Guang considered Chinese pikemen to be superior to Japanese pikemen, mainly because of the difference in weapon handling. Chinese held their Chang Qiang (長鎗) at the hinder end, while Japanese held their Yari (槍) in the middle, thus Chinese pikemen had longer reach than Japanese pikemen.
from http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/chinese-infantry-tactics-p1.html
Very interesting - this sort of comparative evidence is underused I think.
I misspoke slightly in saying CM has his hand on the butt (...childish snicker suppressed...) - he holds the shaft a few inches above the end of the butt spike, which therefore sticks back for its own length (a foot or so).
One point about the handling of a sarissa is that the - ahem -
sauroter appears to have been integrated with a counterweight (Hellenistic engineers tended to put counterweights on anything from oars to siege machines), so the point of balance should be pretty much where Polybius puts the user's left hand, i.e. about six feet from the aft end. Setting the right hand on the shaft between the
sauroter and the point of balance would allow the pike to be lowered easily and raised with a little more effort, pivoting on the right hand each time.
The old Hundred Years War question of long piercing weapon use also arises: hold in position - or thrust? Has CM any thoughts on this? Or is it getting a bit far off the topic of shield characteristics and use?
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 08, 2016, 01:34:14 PM
Interesting - though only as a pretty vague parallel - that the Great Ming Military blog reckons that in the C16th:
QuoteQi Ji Guang considered Chinese pikemen to be superior to Japanese pikemen, mainly because of the difference in weapon handling. Chinese held their Chang Qiang (長鎗) at the hinder end, while Japanese held their Yari (槍) in the middle, thus Chinese pikemen had longer reach than Japanese pikemen.
Looking at the Ming Chinese 'pike' (if the modern reconstruction is anything to go by it appears to be more of a short spear) and Japanese yari, the latter seems to be a considerably heavier weapon and hence needs to be held with the leading hand at the point of balance, whereas the lighter Chinese weapon seems able to be used with the leading hand aft of the point of balance, gaining a reach advantage but losing out in weight of strike.
Regarding CM's hoplite frontage assertion, I was both misremembering and mis-expressing, in that the 'edgeways' comment was a distortion of CM's overlap born of the need to let out the spearpoints from the wall of shields. Apologies. I am still intrigued how he managed to combine an underarm grip - high or low - with these seriously overlapped shields.
Quote from: RichT on January 08, 2016, 12:20:34 PM
CM (in Storm of Spears) favours an 18" frontage for hoplites, but with shields facing the enemy and so greatly overlapping. He doubts the usual high overarm thrust of the spear (he thinks many depictions of this in art are actually javelins), and favours instead a high underarm, with the spear held in the armpit (which would allow the spear to protrude over the top of the interlocked shields), as well as a normal low underarm position (spear below the shields). And as Duncan says this is as well as, not instead of, a 3' frontage.
In Invincible Beast he favours a sarissa/shield grip much as you (Patrick) describe - shoulder strap, porpax, wrist at shield edge, and hand in about the 8 o'clock position. Yet he is absolutely certain that this makes it impossible for phalangites to close up to 18". I'm not really sure why he thinks this. Unfortunately he seems only to have tried this out on his own, not collected a small phalanx (fifteen people would be plenty to test this out - even two would be a start) to see what is really possible or impossible. I don't know why nobody else in the re-enactment community seems to have done this either (except Peter Connolly - he concluded IIRC that the 18" formation was possible to adopt with sarissa and shield, but difficult or impossible to move/attack in, as we would expect - CM seems to take this as evidence that it wasn't possible at all).
Steven James once commented: "Evidence is only evidence if it suits your theory."
As you say, a little re-enactment might work wonders for our understanding here. My memory of Peter Connolly's conclusions is the same as yours, so hopefully we both have it right, and familiarity with and a little refinement of the kit and techniques involved might iron out some if not all of the incidental difficulties, or at any rate give a clearer idea of the formation's capabilities and limitations.
Quote
It seems to me that the low spear position - as depicted in the Pergamon plaque - should make the close formation possible, so I don't think CM's objections hold up at all. I think it's also possible (though there is no evidence for it) that some if not all ranks used a high spear position (which CM also thinks is impossible) - something like this:
https://img0.etsystatic.com/065/1/9499451/il_570xN.793475528_gdn2.jpg
(from 1618 - I understand the high position was common for Renaissance/Early Modern pikemen - it is also depicted in the rather nice front cover illustration of Invincible Beast, rather amusingly given CM's views). CM also thinks Polybius' testimony that the sarissa was held such that two cubits extended to the rear is impossible - he holds the sarissa with his rear (right) hand on the butt.
In general I think 'impossible' comes up far to often in this book and CM is too deeply committed to defending his pet theories. I'd be happy to write a review but think I saw in another thread that Holly has already volunteered, and one review is enough.
I think we cannot lose from having two reviews of the book: I have the impression Dave (Hollin) is fairly positive about it, whereas you cover the caveats with precision and accuracy. Perhaps the reader would benefit from such all-round coverage.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 08, 2016, 07:36:59 PMLooking at the Ming Chinese 'pike' (if the modern reconstruction is anything to go by it appears to be more of a short spear)
Getting off the real topic here, but it isn't short, I think the photo uses a shorter modern martial-arts spear and is just included to show the posture:
QuoteA Chang Qiang (長鎗, long spear) is a very long weapon. In fact, it is the longest melee weapon in the Ming arsenal, longer than all other types of Chinese spear it replaced. General Qi Ji Guang (戚繼光) standardised Chang Qiang to one zhang eight chi long, effectively making it the Chinese equivalent of pike.
- http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/chang-qiang.html
A zhang is 3.2 metres, so that's 5.76 metres or about 18 1/2 feet.
18 1/2 feet is certainly pike-length status and would confer a considerable reach advantage over the yari or naginata even without being held at the 'hinder end': I wonder how multiple ranks coordinated their weapons.
The sketches showing the Chang Qiang being held (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DHKKlB9PwrE/VRKlobWP-9I/AAAAAAAAAaQ/y7Y2MP1hsRk/s1600/Chang_Qiang.png), curiously enough, seem to show the left hand on the centre of the shaft, pretty much like the holder of the yari (http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Xbf1LXpshFE/VmeUPqqp-0I/AAAAAAAACDA/5ZsH3Y4Asz0/s640/qiang_and_yari.jpg).
Ah well. Thanks for the information, Duncan, though I think the emphasis on different holding techniques may be less significant than the different weapon lengths.
Getting back to the Macedonian pike, the little grey cells have been wondering if the point of balance would have been at the right-hand or left-hand grip. The advantages of the point of balance at the left-hand grip (six feet along the shaft) are a lighter weapon (less heavy counterweight needed) and one which can have its point height adjusted easily in action. The disadvantage is that swinging it upright involves six feet of shaft trying to get into 2-3 feet of space as the weapon angles upwards, whereas a point of balance at the right-hand grip would at least in theory allow the sarissa to be pivoted upwards.
There might however be a way to get the sarissa upright with the point of balance at the left-hand grip, i.e. about six feet from the sauroter end. Use the right hand to push the butt-end down until the sauroter touches the ground, then everyone takes a couple of paces backwards. The sarissa will pretty much raise itself. Once upright, lift it a foot or so off the ground and the formation is ready to march. I would expect that anyone on an 18" frontage would want to deepen the files to 3' individual frontage before doing this, but well-trained troops could presumably achieve it on an 18" individual frontage as it was the Macedonian signal of surrender in battle.
And now back to shields - unless anyone has anything further to add about pike-handling.
CM has quite a lot to say on sarissa balance, handling, penetration etc - I haven't finished those sections yet. I will report (or review) later (though it would be only fair to Pen & Sword to suggest that people interested could buy the book).
I've also re-read Connolly's article which is in fact frustratingly vague but seems to say what we think it says.
For what it's worth I've also done a little 'literature review' of YouTube videos of reenactors doing Macedonian phalanxes - there is a fair amount out there but it's also frustratingly vague - there is no real method or rigour, at least not that gets posted to YouTube (not that I'm surprised), and an awful lot of 'Rome Total War' clips. Even so some of it is quite interesting to watch.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 09, 2016, 10:36:07 AM
18 1/2 feet is certainly pike-length status and would confer a considerable reach advantage over the yari or naginata even without being held at the 'hinder end' ... Ah well. Thanks for the information, Duncan, though I think the emphasis on different holding techniques may be less significant than the different weapon lengths.
Final comment on peripheral eastern matters: no, it wouldn't necessarily give much advantage of reach over the yari, because yari could be pretty long as well. Different commanders in the Sengoku period favoured different lengths for the yari of the ashigaru (those carried by samurai were generally shorter), but Oda Nobunaga is said to have standardised on 5.6 metres - close to the same length.
But the different Chinese-Japanese holding techniques do remind me of Monluc at Ceresoles, urging his newly-recruited pikemen not to hold their pikes near the butt and fence with them as the landsknechte do, but to grip them in the middle and rush straight in like the Swiss. Maybe determination and aggression counts more then length or grip.
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 09, 2016, 07:35:48 PM
But the different Chinese-Japanese holding techniques do remind me of Monluc at Ceresoles, urging his newly-recruited pikemen not to hold their pikes near the butt and fence with them as the landsknechte do, but to grip them in the middle and rush straight in like the Swiss. Maybe determination and aggression counts more than length or grip.
Quite likely: technique also seems to matter. I recall earlier discussion about whether pikemen would all push together or engage in individual 'foyning' and thrusting, and it seems that different cultures at different times did different things, and that a determined communal push achieved more than individual poking against individuals.
QuoteFinal comment on peripheral eastern matters: no, it wouldn't necessarily give much advantage of reach over the yari, because yari could be pretty long as well. Different commanders in the Sengoku period favoured different lengths for the yari of the ashigaru (those carried by samurai were generally shorter), but Oda Nobunaga is said to have standardised on 5.6 metres - close to the same length.
And Nobunaga's men would be those encountered by the Chinese. So perhaps how it was held did matter after all.
Quote from: RichT on January 09, 2016, 11:00:37 AM
For what it's worth I've also done a little 'literature review' of YouTube videos of reenactors doing Macedonian phalanxes - there is a fair amount out there but it's also frustratingly vague - there is no real method or rigour, at least not that gets posted to YouTube (not that I'm surprised), and an awful lot of 'Rome Total War' clips. Even so some of it is quite interesting to watch.
Good idea: worth a look not only to see what preconceptions are involved but also how the various bits of equipment are handled or assumed to be handled and how people try to fit it all together.
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 09, 2016, 07:35:48 PM
But the different Chinese-Japanese holding techniques do remind me of Monluc at Ceresoles, urging his newly-recruited pikemen not to hold their pikes near the butt and fence with them as the landsknechte do, but to grip them in the middle and rush straight in like the Swiss. Maybe determination and aggression counts more then length or grip.
Admittedly, I am talking out of my nether regions, without any actual evidence, but...
It would seem
EXTREMELY difficult to hold anything that would pass as a pike "at the end" while maintaining any control as to where the pointy end was pointing. Your hands would be too close together and too far from the point of balance to have any control, the flex in the shaft would be significant, any movement and the point would wobble around crazily. Any stumble and the point could get driven into the ground, in which case it would get jarred loose.... Hard to imagine.
I think the nether regions have a very good point (cue dreadful pun about butt-spike) and it is interesting to note that the illustration for holding the chang qiang is rather different from the photograph showing the alleged butt-holding technique. In the illustration (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DHKKlB9PwrE/VRKlobWP-9I/AAAAAAAAAaQ/y7Y2MP1hsRk/s1600/Chang_Qiang.png), the left hand holds the chang qiang near or at the middle, i.e. at the point of balance.
My suspicion is that the chest-based-hold-at-the-butt technique would only work with lighter, shorter spears. There does nevertheless seem to be a difference between the style of holding the chang qiang and that of holding the yari, the latter having more shaft visible behind the holder's right hand. This raises the question of whether the Japanese style of holding their shafted weapons was dictated by tradition/affectation or by the balance of the weapon itself. If the latter, then observations about the Chinese style being preferable may reflect more on weapon design than on handling technique. The yari does seem to have a larger, and hence presumably heavier, head than the chang qiang, which doubtless affected its balance.
On the subject of Macedonian shields, does anyone else get the impression that the phalangite shields in the Pergamon battle plaque (https://bookandsword.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/conze_1913-bd_1-text_2-pg_251.png?w=529&h=255) are held to the right of the sarissa? Or would this be just a misleading impression conveyed by casual sketching?
Quote from: Dangun on January 10, 2016, 01:11:04 AM
It would seem EXTREMELY difficult to hold anything that would pass as a pike "at the end" while maintaining any control as to where the pointy end was pointing.
But it is, according to sources, what was done. Duncan has already mentioned Monluc - here is the quote he precised
Quote`Gentlemen, it may be that there are not many here who have been in battle before, and therefore let me tell you that if we take our pikes by the hinder end and fight at the length of the pike, we shall be defeated; for the Germans are more dexterous at that kind of fight than we are. But you must take your pikes in the middle as the Swiss do and run headlong to force and penetrate into the midst of them, and you shall see how confounded they will be.'
So, the "Swiss" tactic is because they aren't as well trained as their opponents. Other writers, like Sir John Smyth, also advocated the pikes thrusting together not fencing individually. So fencing could be and was done with a Renaissance pike.
Much as I'd love to talk comparisons of 16th century and Macedonian pike tactics, I fear it may take us away from the subject of the thread. But, for the interested, I recommend this short piece which quotes plenty of period sources
http://www.marquisofwinchesters.co.uk/Ecwr-Guidelines/Guidelines-pikefighting.html (http://www.marquisofwinchesters.co.uk/Ecwr-Guidelines/Guidelines-pikefighting.html)
Didn't the Swiss hold at shoulder height?
Quote from: Mark G on January 10, 2016, 06:22:35 PM
Didn't the Swiss hold at shoulder height?
Not in the 15th and early 16th centuries. Here's the well-known Fornovo pikeblock.
http://i277.photobucket.com/albums/kk50/Dstaberg/The%20Renaissance%20at%20War/OrdonnaceArchersatFornovo.jpg (http://i277.photobucket.com/albums/kk50/Dstaberg/The%20Renaissance%20at%20War/OrdonnaceArchersatFornovo.jpg)
Marignano
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1a/Marignano.jpg/220px-Marignano.jpg (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1a/Marignano.jpg/220px-Marignano.jpg)
Altdorfers Battle of Issus painting from 1529 shows Landsknecht-style Macedonians using the shoulder-high charge position though. Exactly which posture Monluc is proposing is perhaps moot, therefore.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 10, 2016, 10:44:31 AM
Quote from: Dangun on January 10, 2016, 01:11:04 AM
It would seem EXTREMELY difficult to hold anything that would pass as a pike "at the end" while maintaining any control as to where the pointy end was pointing.
But it is, according to sources, what was done ... So fencing could be and was done with a Renaissance pike.
How would this compare in length and weight to an 18' Chinese
chang qiang or Nobunaga-style Japanese
yari? Renaissance pikes, according to a quick internet trawl, seem to have varied between 12' and 18', with the former perhaps prevalent; English Civil war pikes were issued at 16' length but troops tended to shorten them; the Fornovo and Marignano illustrations suggest to me pikes about 12' long or perhaps slightly less.
My impression is that with a weapon which is basically a long light spear one might get away with this kind of thing, but a robust 18' or more 'true' pike would cause terminal balance problems if held at one end. Hence it seems to me that both gentlemen are correct insofar as one deems a long and heavy pike impossible to handle in such a manner while the other points out that lighter, shorter weapons were indeed held this way.
QuoteAltdorfers Battle of Issus painting from 1529 shows Landsknecht-style Macedonians using the shoulder-high charge position though. Exactly which posture Monluc is proposing is perhaps moot, therefore.
I recall years ago reading an assertion that the Swiss changed their pike-holding technique from points-up to points-down at some juncture because they found that when facing cavalry an upward-held point glanced off armour and flew uselessly upwards while a downward-held point was deflected to the ground and the shaft remained an obstacle. Might they have simply held the pike differently when facing armoured cavalry? And might this explain the occasional shoulder-high depiction?
Quote
Much as I'd love to talk comparisons of 16th century and Macedonian pike tactics, I fear it may take us away from the subject of the thread. But, for the interested, I recommend this short piece which quotes plenty of period sources
http://www.marquisofwinchesters.co.uk/Ecwr-Guidelines/Guidelines-pikefighting.html (http://www.marquisofwinchesters.co.uk/Ecwr-Guidelines/Guidelines-pikefighting.html)
Nice collection of quotes. :)
We seem to be running out of interest on the shield front, so I for one would have no objection to a continuing pike discussion, although it may be worth starting a new thread for the purpose.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 10, 2016, 10:44:31 AM
But it is, according to sources, what was done. Duncan has already mentioned Monluc
Absolutely agree - no disputing that.
I just wonder whether there is something we can infer/guess from a combination of the sources and the apparent difficulty of what they suggest. For example, holding a pike-length thing at the end, would be a lot easier if you were stationary. Or as Patrick suggests, maybe the pikes were lighter or shorter than the quoted length. The "chang" (長 or 长) in chang qiang means long and so perhaps by implication there was something shorter?
Does anyone know an approximate weight of these pike (e.g. 18' Chinese chang qiang)? I would be interested in doing some basic physics of what force would be required to hold it upright, if you were to hold it at the end.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 10, 2016, 08:41:39 PM
Renaissance pikes, according to a quick internet trawl, seem to have varied between 12' and 18', with the former perhaps prevalent; English Civil war pikes were issued at 16' length but troops tended to shorten them; the Fornovo and Marignano illustrations suggest to me pikes about 12' long or perhaps slightly less.
The Swiss standardised on 18ft pikes in the 1470s, so I doubt the later examples were shorter. Pikes were issued by the canton, so returning one you had cut six foot off would be frowned upon.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 10, 2016, 09:29:58 AM
On the subject of Macedonian shields, does anyone else get the impression that the phalangite shields in the Pergamon battle plaque (https://bookandsword.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/conze_1913-bd_1-text_2-pg_251.png?w=529&h=255) are held to the right of the sarissa? Or would this be just a misleading impression conveyed by casual sketching?
That is how it looks, yes (ie the sarissa sticks out to the left of the shield). As this plaque is the one and only depiction of phalangites actually using sarissas in the whole of ancient art and archaeology, it's hard to know what to make of it. I think everyone has concluded that it's just an error or lack of precision on the part either of the original artist, or of the person making the drawing (the original is now lost). I can't think of, and don't think anyone has proposed, a way of holding the sarissa/shield that would work like this. Though I do have a memory, as I might have mentioned, of a Phil Steele (?) Slingshot article a few years back suggesting something, if not quite like this, then at least unusual. If the left arm were held high and crooked downwards, and the sarissa gripped from above by the left hand, then a shield strapped to the left forearm might end up to the right of the shield. It sounds (and feels, in impromptu tests) very awkward though. I think sticking to artistic licence or error is the safe bet.
Quote from: Dangun on January 11, 2016, 03:30:36 AM
Does anyone know an approximate weight of these pike (e.g. 18' Chinese chang qiang)? I would be interested in doing some basic physics of what force would be required to hold it upright, if you were to hold it at the end.
Well, the pikes in the armoury in Solothurn turn out to weigh between 2.5-3.25 kg. and are 4.5-5m long (this is an approximation - I haven't studied all the 100 pikes to get a real average). Anyone really wanting to go in depth, you can get the dimensions of all of them in the online catalogue. It's a bit tricky so I'll quote a post at myArmoury
QuoteThe Solothurn armoury have measurements including weight for all of their preserved pikes as part of their online collection
http://emp-web-45.zetcom.ch/eMP/eMuseumPlus?service=StartPage (http://emp-web-45.zetcom.ch/eMP/eMuseumPlus?service=StartPage)
Click "suche", in the field marked "Sammlungsbereich" chose "Stangenwaffen" in the drop down menu and click "suchen" and you will be able to browse all of their polearms including pikes.
We also need to be aware of the difference in weight given the level of seasoning of the wood. Greener wood was also more prone to sag; here is our old pal John Smythe again
Quote"Also I would that the staves of the picques should bee of a tite and stiffe ashe, and not of ashe that dooth sagge, and bend when the piquers doo carrie their piques breasthigh before hand couched, because that such sagging and bending ashe, although it be verie tough yet it is more heavie then the other ashe; besides that the piquers cannot carry the piques of such sagging, and bending piques so even and straight in their Enemies faces, as they may carrie the other piques that doo not bend nor sagge, but are tite and straight."
Quote from: RichT on January 11, 2016, 09:28:54 AM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 10, 2016, 09:29:58 AM
On the subject of Macedonian shields, does anyone else get the impression that the phalangite shields in the Pergamon battle plaque (https://bookandsword.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/conze_1913-bd_1-text_2-pg_251.png?w=529&h=255) are held to the right of the sarissa? Or would this be just a misleading impression conveyed by casual sketching?
That is how it looks, yes (ie the sarissa sticks out to the left of the shield). As this plaque is the one and only depiction of phalangites actually using sarissas in the whole of ancient art and archaeology, it's hard to know what to make of it. I think everyone has concluded that it's just an error or lack of precision on the part either of the original artist, or of the person making the drawing (the original is now lost). I can't think of, and don't think anyone has proposed, a way of holding the sarissa/shield that would work like this. Though I do have a memory, as I might have mentioned, of a Phil Steele (?) Slingshot article a few years back suggesting something, if not quite like this, then at least unusual. If the left arm were held high and crooked downwards, and the sarissa gripped from above by the left hand, then a shield strapped to the left forearm might end up to the right of the shield. It sounds (and feels, in impromptu tests) very awkward though. I think sticking to artistic licence or error is the safe bet.
Thanks, Richard: attempting to hold everything that way does look (and feel) rather counter-intuitive, not to mention virtually dislocating the left shoulder. We can keep this notional 5 o'clock position tucked away in a quiet corner with a big question-mark over it and carry on with a working hypothesis whereby the sarissa is held at 7 o'clock-ish from an ahead view of the shield.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 11, 2016, 11:31:05 AM
Quote from: Dangun on January 11, 2016, 03:30:36 AM
Does anyone know an approximate weight of these pike (e.g. 18' Chinese chang qiang)? I would be interested in doing some basic physics of what force would be required to hold it upright, if you were to hold it at the end.
Well, the pikes in the armoury in Solothurn turn out to weigh between 2.5-3.25 kg. and are 4.5-5m long (this is an approximation - I haven't studied all the 100 pikes to get a real average).
If this is indeed representative (without having crunched numbers for the whole inventory) it suggests pikes weighing only 6-7 lbs, or about half a pound per two feet of length, which might well be manageable from beyond the centre of gravity.
Contemporary kung fu spears are about 7' long and weigh 2.5 to 3 pounds (source (http://www.jadedragon.com/martarts/spear2.html)), which shows roughly the same relationship. At a very approximate guess the
chang qiang at 18' would weigh in the region of 9-10 lbs assuming a) the shaft was of about the same thickness and b) the spearhead was not much heavier. The Leeds Armoury has a 12' yari (https://www.royalarmouries.org/collections/collection-stories/japanese-staff-weapons/single-object/242) which weighs in at around 5 lbs. An 18' yari might be expected to weigh about 8 lbs, again suggesting a likely weight for an 18'
chang qiang of about 9 lbs (as opposed to, say, 6 or 12 or 18 lbs). Instinct suggests this could be problematic if not held at the centre of gravity, but actual calculations would be a better guide.
By contrast, I would estimate the weight of a 21' Macedonian sarissa at 22-24 lbs, not least because of the counterweight.
Quote
We also need to be aware of the difference in weight given the level of seasoning of the wood. Greener wood was also more prone to sag; here is our old pal John Smythe again
Quote"Also I would that the staves of the picques should bee of a tite and stiffe ashe, and not of ashe that dooth sagge, and bend when the piquers doo carrie their piques breasthigh before hand couched, because that such sagging and bending ashe, although it be verie tough yet it is more heavie then the other ashe; besides that the piquers cannot carry the piques of such sagging, and bending piques so even and straight in their Enemies faces, as they may carrie the other piques that doo not bend nor sagge, but are tite and straight."
John Smythe is a true gift to the English language. :) Presumably a
tite and stiffe ashe (probably a 'mountain ash'; they are heavier) would have a weight somewhat exceeding the half-pound-per-two-feet which seems to be suggested by Solothurn armoury averages, which we can perhaps regard as a lower-end benchmark for pike weights.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 11, 2016, 01:09:48 PM
By contrast, I would estimate the weight of a 21' Macedonian sarissa at 22-24 lbs, not least because of the counterweight.
Assuming cornel wood, or ash? Constant-width shaft, or tapering? Large spearhead, or small?
Markle in the 1970s estimated 14.5 lb for an 18-foot cornel sarissa, constant diameter, large spearhead - someone quoted this on RAT:
QuoteThe eighteen-foot sarissa minus the length of the point and its socket (0.51 m. = 1 ft. 8 in.) and that of the butt-spike (0.445 m. = 1 ft. 6 in.) would equal 178 in., excluding the cones of wood inserted into the sockets of the head and butt. The volume of this shaft (π r2 h: 3.14 x .56 x 178) would be 313 cu. in., and its weight would be this figure times .03 lbs. per cu. in., which would be 9.39 lbs. The weight of the iron sarissa-head is 1235 grammes = 2.7 lbs. and that of the butt-spike 1070 grammes =2.4 lbs. (The weight of the coupling sleeve is not given and is hereby excluded.) The total weight of the eighteen-foot sarissa is thus 14.5 lbs. On the assumption that a fifteen-foot sarissa had iron parts of the same weight and size as those described above, it would weigh about 12 lbs.
The more recent reconstruction by Connolly ("Experiments with the sarissa – the Macedonian pike and cavalry lance - a functional view", JRMES 11, 2000), and estimates by Sekunda ("The Sarissa," in Acta Universitatis Lodziensis, Folia Archaeologica 23: 2001), assuming the smaller spearhead, tapered shaft, and in S's case at least the use of lighter ash, result in lower weights even though, IIRC, they both use large buttspikes.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 10, 2016, 09:29:58 AM
On the subject of Macedonian shields, does anyone else get the impression that the phalangite shields in the Pergamon battle plaque (https://bookandsword.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/conze_1913-bd_1-text_2-pg_251.png?w=529&h=255) are held to the right of the sarissa? Or would this be just a misleading impression conveyed by casual sketching?
Looking at it carefully, the Pikeman 'nearest to the camera' does appear to have his sarissa to the left of the shield, but the one next to him as his sarissa to the right of his shield.
My suggestion is that the artist was portraying combat and the 'leading' pikeman is bringing his shield across to defend himself from a blow from the cavalryman coming in
Jim
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 11, 2016, 02:04:41 PMMarkle in the 1970s estimated 14.5 lb for an 18-foot cornel sarissa, constant diameter, large spearhead - someone quoted this on RAT
So working with Markle's 0.053lbs per inch of wood plus 2.7lbs for the blade of a sarissa, we might estimate a:
* 12' Yari - at about 9.2lbs, pretty close to previous comments
* 18' Chang qiang - at about 12.3lbs, again, pretty close to previous comments
So just a crude thought experiment...
If your left hand is the fulcrum, 3ft from the end of the chang qiang and your right hand is at the end, you are - very roughly - supporting 11lbs (5kg) of weight and average of 7.5ft in front of you, and so to hold the pike level, you are having to exert about 28lbs (13kg) of downward force with your right hand. I think that's quite a lot? I think?
Quote from: Dangun on January 11, 2016, 04:50:06 PM
So just a crude thought experiment...
If your left hand is the fulcrum, 3ft from the end of the chang qiang and your right hand is at the end, you are - very roughly - supporting 11lbs (5kg) of weight and average of 7.5ft in front of you, and so to hold the pike level, you are having to exert about 28lbs (13kg) of downward force with your right hand. I think that's quite a lot? I think?
A European pike would be held with hands about 5ft apart - the front hand by the left shoulder, the right fully stretched out. In the European grip you also lay your right arm on the top of the pike, adding its dead weight to the balance. A hold with hands only three feet apart feels awkward - are you sure that's how they did it?
P.S. Is it time to implement Patrick's split between pike and shield topics?
From left hand at left shoulder to right hand fully stretched back sounds just a touch over a cloth yard, so a bit more than 3'.
If I (at 6' tall) put my hands at shoulder height, to get to 5' gap my right arm is fully extended and my left has a slight bend.
At waist height, both arms are fully stretched to get to 5' and it is decidedly uncomfortable.