Could the Persian Empire logistically support an army several million strong?

[Flaminpig0]

Patrick- please tell me you aren't basing your claims of mass biblical mobilisations on the Bible and in particular the Hebrews.

[Jim Webster]

makes keeping 14% in military service for a couple of years without uniforms or complex weapons quite easy by comparison.

I beg to differ

Vive la différence! 

[Erpingham]

Patrick- please tell me you aren't basing your claims of mass biblical mobilisations on the Bible and in particular the Hebrews.

I advise against going there.  Patrick has particular views about this period of history which would take quite a lot of explanation.  We could be seriously distracted.

[Jim Webster]

Patrick- please tell me you aren't basing your claims of mass biblical mobilisations on the Bible and in particular the Hebrews.

I advise against going there.  Patrick has particular views about this period of history which would take quite a lot of explanation.  We could be seriously distracted.

We don't need to, the Persian armies weren't merely conscripted hordes. There were men who had a duty to serve if summoned because they held land or were on the books of an institution which had a duty to provide men. It was a system which might well provide men with as much military training and experience as the hoplites recruited from a small Greek city state

[Erpingham]

On the third appendage, Xerxes' expedition involved an awful lot of marching compared to what the typical Roman or American had to do, so presumably caloric requirements in this particular case were somewhat higher than normal. Acc'd to some numbers I saw somewhere*, marching for eight hours roughly doubles your caloric expenditure compared to sitting around all day, so this is a significant factor.

I think this would be the conclusion of modern militaries.  However, it isn't easily detectable in what we know of ancient ration scales, which seem to be higher in a settled location than on the march.  But then, we know very little for sure.

[Jim Webster]

On the third appendage, Xerxes' expedition involved an awful lot of marching compared to what the typical Roman or American had to do, so presumably caloric requirements in this particular case were somewhat higher than normal. Acc'd to some numbers I saw somewhere*, marching for eight hours roughly doubles your caloric expenditure compared to sitting around all day, so this is a significant factor.

I think this would be the conclusion of modern militaries.  However, it isn't easily detectable in what we know of ancient ration scales, which seem to be higher in a settled location than on the march.  But then, we know very little for sure.

in an ancient context that might merely have been due to ease of supply. We know that the Greeks and some Persian armies had markets with them from which the troops could buy, and these traders would probably do things like 'buying ahead' so they had supplies waiting for them at the next town, rather than just hauling stuff behind the army. Certainly when it's marching through an area which isn't actively hostile

[Erpingham]

in an ancient context that might merely have been due to ease of supply.

Agreed. 

[Patrick Waterson]

Please read some of the documentation they left. We find men who have an obligation to serve, and we find other individuals or institutions who have an obligation to provide men, normally as part deal involving the granting of land. The Persians didn't just sweep up men who got in the way of the press gangs

They did not have press gangs: you are right about there being a military service obligation, although only temples and the like seem to have been able to make arrangements to provide manpower for campaigns in order to exempt their own staff.  Otherwise the obligation was pretty much universal and it was just a question of how many men up to the prescribed limit the authorities wanted.  Xerxes went right to the limit; Artaxerxes more or less went to the limit; Darius (III) did the same.  As I mentioned some time previously, there does seem to be a pattern whereby each of six mega-subdivisions in the Achaemenid Empire was responsible for providing 300,000 men (cf. Abrocomas at the time of Cunaxa), and it would have been up to the satraps to ensure their current arrangements covered that number.

None of this should be new to you, I even did a slingshot article about it a couple of years back. Babylonian infantry were paid the same as Greek mercenaries. (There is a vague possibility that it might be Babylonian cavalry but either way it means that these were properly recruited men paid sensible money, not hordes recruited by the whip)

Is this based upon a temple document recording the issue of a quanitity of silver in respect of a contingent of about 30 or so men who had just returned from campaign?  (Sorry cannot remember the reference/desingation for this one.)

[Patrick Waterson]

You've argued in a circle here. 8% x 25% = 2%. 10% x 20% is 2 %. 

As to whether a "mass mobilisation" will generate a larger percentage is, surely, back to speculation? 

I do not follow.  Just to recap, the standard accepted percentage for a full-time professional army (e.g. Roman) is 1% of population.  For an army which spends most of its time doing civilian things but is turned out for war under conscription or similar the standard accepted figure is 10% of population.  This is an order of magnitude difference, not speculation.

But Herodotus wrote a generation after Xerxes expedition, not a few weeks later.  The Persians would have every reason to maintain the image of a huge, powerful empire which could put huge armies in the field.  Sorry, I don't there is a killer argument for you in this.

But why?  Herodotus was not interested in current propaganda but in what had already happened.

Herodotus: "I am interested to learn how many men Xerxes had in his invasion."
Persian: "Oh, millions and millions! We are a great Empire, you know."
Herodotus: "So Greece with about 100,000 troops all told defeated a Persian army in the millions?"
Persian: "Yes; this shows the greatness of our Empire!"

Somehow I do not see it.  In any event, by the time of Cimon's victories at Eurymedon, any attempt to maintain an image of Persian greatness would have been a total waste of time and a source of nothing but embarrassment.

  Individual merit (or lack of it) as a historian does not depend upon position, but on ability and judgement.

This is true.  But it also depends on knowledge.  And Ctesias certainly had access at high level.

Which overall suggests that he wasted a potentially good opportunity.

[Patrick Waterson]

Patrick- please tell me you aren't basing your claims of mass biblical mobilisations on the Bible and in particular the Hebrews.

Those who actually read my posts would have noted the Egyptian and Assyrian references.

[Patrick Waterson]

I note the Murasus have become the Murasils, but that triviality aside I would agree there seems to be no good reason why they should not transfer food to city authorities on a regular basis in return for remuneration.  Or that they might sell to another Jewish concern which ran retail operations in the cities.

There is also no reason why they should not sell it to Babylonians in the market, (after all you've graciously granted the Babylonians a market)

Apart from the absence of records, which to me suggests a Hebrew-Hebrew transaction.

What evidence have you that the city authorities (and if you read the book you'd realise how vague a term that really was) actually wanted to acquire grain other than to feed their own staff (many of whom would be paid by being granted lands anyway)

Because of the way Biblical period armies campaigned.  They simply requisitioned supplies from the nearest city.  Why did the city have supplies available?  1) Because it needed its own reserve and 2) Because handing out a heap of grain was cheaper and easier to recover from than being sacked.

Interestingly, this supply method persisted into the classical period.  Plutarch records how the Battle of Actium saved Chaeronea from being stripped of its food stocks for Anthony's forces - I forget the exact reference, but he states that the citizens had been lined up carrying the city's grain ready to take to Antony's camp when news of the battle came, Antony's officers departed and the citizens thankfully put the grain back into storage.

[Jim Webster]

Please read some of the documentation they left. We find men who have an obligation to serve, and we find other individuals or institutions who have an obligation to provide men, normally as part deal involving the granting of land. The Persians didn't just sweep up men who got in the way of the press gangs

They did not have press gangs: you are right about there being a military service obligation, although only temples and the like seem to have been able to make arrangements to provide manpower for campaigns in order to exempt their own staff. 

No there were individual allotments, parcels of land held by one man. They appear to have been gathered together with other allotments providing men of the same type which seem to have been called Hatru. Sometimes they were men of the same ethnic identifier and somethings it was bow-land, or the men were all army scribes. These men were not affiliated to any institution but might be linked to a private landlord who would collect their tax and pass it on

[Jim Webster]

Please read some of the documentation they left. We find men who have an obligation to serve, and we find other individuals or institutions who have an obligation to provide men, normally as part deal involving the granting of land. The Persians didn't just sweep up men who got in the way of the press gangs

Otherwise the obligation was pretty much universal and it was just a question of how many men up to the prescribed limit the authorities wanted.  Xerxes went right to the limit;

this is a circular argument, it appears the only evidence for universal obligation is that universal obligation is necessary to produce an army the size that Herodotus gives Xerxes, but of course if Herodotus's figures were wrong, suddenly the need for an otherwise undocumented universal obligation goes

[Jim Webster]

Is this based upon a temple document recording the issue of a quanitity of silver in respect of a contingent of about 30 or so men who had just returned from campaign?  (Sorry cannot remember the reference/desingation for this one.)

The temple document provided figures for the pay the men received. This is mainly because we still have temple archives, the foremen of the Hatru would doubtless have been responsible for the same task (they were responsible for collecting taxes or at least some of them) but we don't have any of their archives.

[Jim Webster]

You've argued in a circle here. 8% x 25% = 2%. 10% x 20% is 2 %. 

As to whether a "mass mobilisation" will generate a larger percentage is, surely, back to speculation? 

I do not follow.  Just to recap, the standard accepted percentage for a full-time professional army (e.g. Roman) is 1% of population.  For an army which spends most of its time doing civilian things but is turned out for war under conscription or similar the standard accepted figure is 10% of population.  This is an order of magnitude difference, not speculation.

please give examples of this conscripted army of 10% of the population