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

[Jim Webster]

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.


[/quote]

there are records, it wasn't a Hebrew-Hebrew transaction.
Mind you, with names like Enlil-sum-iddin, Enlil-hatin, Rimut-Ninurta  and Naqqitu they look pretty well integrated 

[Jim Webster]

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.

That's a brilliant idea. The Children of Israel turn up at Jericho, the site was about 12 acres in their day, which means using the archaeologists rule of thumb, a population of 2,400. But people from the villages could have flooded in. So say it's population was 4,000.
Along come the children of Israel, all 601,730 fighting men, plus one assumes women and children, plus other males, so perhaps two million of them.
'Hand over your grain reserves or we'll sack you'
'Certainly, Here's our three years grain reserve we keep specially even though we've no facilities to do so.'
"Thank-you, unfortunately that will barely last us two days."

[Jim Webster]

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.

Chaeronea isn't the nearest city, it is 305 km away but a lot of that trip can be made by boat.
Interestingly Antony's army and fleet were perhaps 150,000 strong. Might be 200,000 depending on allied contingents etc. After a couple of months in Greece even a tiny army like Anthony's was stripping everything up to 300km away just to stay alive.

[Flaminpig0]

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.

My mental health training would advise me not to encourage you.

[Patrick Waterson]

  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

If.

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.

It is just that I remember running into something like this elsewhere in which a document detailing the expenditure of a one-time sum in respect of a returning contingent of cavalry under the aegis of the temple was proclaimed as 'evidence' that Babyonian troops 'received pay' and were thus 'mercenaries'.  On examination, this assertion fell apart because if the troops concerned had been mercenaries, a) they had the wrong paymaster (the temple instead of the state), b) the amount of money was not divisible by the number of soldiers in any shape or form and c) the payment was issued after not during the campaign.  The transaction actually made more sense as a one-off payment to replace missing/defective equipment in order to bring the contingent up to scratch for next time.

In a discussion elsewhere, someone sought to prove that the Achaemenids had mercenaries other than Greeks by taking references to tribal 'mercenaries' from Thucydides.  This was misleading: tribal troops could be (and were) acquired for a payment, but they were not mercenaries in the sense we understand the term.  What happened was that the hirer made a present to the tirbal chief and the chief sent some of his men to do the hirer's bidding.  We incidentally see this kind of process in Tacitus Annals VI.33 except the Sarmatians refine the process by accepting rival bids and keeping the sums bestowed by both winer and loser.

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

there are records, it wasn't a Hebrew-Hebrew transaction.
Mind you, with names like Enlil-sum-iddin, Enlil-hatin, Rimut-Ninurta  and Naqqitu they look pretty well integrated 

Erm ... "Cardascia and others have postulated that the Murasils retailed their stores of crops to the urban populations of Nippur and its environs, receiving silver in payment for the sales. It is a plausible suggestion. The sources of demand and supply, and an organization well situated to intervene between them, are clearly in evidence; only the retail mechanism is unattested."

I thought 'postulated' and 'unattested' signified an absence of records in respect of this aspect.

That's a brilliant idea. The Children of Israel turn up at Jericho, the site was about 12 acres in their day, which means using the archaeologists rule of thumb, a population of 2,400. But people from the villages could have flooded in. So say it's population was 4,000.
Along come the children of Israel, all 601,730 fighting men, plus one assumes women and children, plus other males, so perhaps two million of them.
'Hand over your grain reserves or we'll sack you'
'Certainly, Here's our three years grain reserve we keep specially even though we've no facilities to do so.'
"Thank-you, unfortunately that will barely last us two days."

Which shows how even a modest population can sustain a really sizeable army on the move - provided it stays on the move.  Given the density of cities in the Fertile Crescent, the average Egyptian or Assyrian army would have had little difficulty remaining in supply.  They would have numbered in the hundreds of thousands (at most) rather than millions, and would have been drawing from major cities rather than pocket-size settlements.

After a couple of months in Greece even a tiny army like Anthony's was stripping everything up to 300km away just to stay alive.

Or it was stripping cities in rotation, quite possibly in advance, and had got as far as Boeotia.  In fact Octavian's army and fleet were also present and presumably stripping the near side of northern Greece, and Greece itself had been pretty thoroughly combed in 49-8 BC by Pompey and Caesar following a century of less-than-happy existence under Roman rule, so the Greece of 31 BC may have compared very poorly with the Greece of 480 BC.  That said, it was sustaining Antony's and Octavian's forces and apparently neither had yet touched Thessaly, so there was still plenty of potential remaining - at least from the viewpoint of the Romans.  The inhabitants probably saw it differently!

[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.

My mental health training would advise me not to encourage you.

Ian, if you have a substantive point to make, please make it.

[Jim Webster]

  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

If.

of course, that is what the discussion is about, so you cannot produce a supposition to claim Herodotus's figures are right if that supposition is based on Herototus's figures

If you claim that there was universal obligation to serve, then you should produce evidence of that universal obligation. My comments about how the army was recruited are based on original records from the time.

[Jim Webster]

It is just that I remember running into something like this elsewhere in which a document detailing the expenditure of a one-time sum in respect of a returning contingent of cavalry under the aegis of the temple was proclaimed as 'evidence' that Babyonian troops 'received pay' and were thus 'mercenaries'.   

it was not my example

[Erpingham]

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.

Could you quote the source of this standard?  Does it apply only to the ancient period or a general rule? 

[Jim Webster]

Erm ... "Cardascia and others have postulated that the Murasils retailed their stores of crops to the urban populations of Nippur and its environs, receiving silver in payment for the sales. It is a plausible suggestion. The sources of demand and supply, and an organization well situated to intervene between them, are clearly in evidence; only the retail mechanism is unattested."

I thought 'postulated' and 'unattested' signified an absence of records in respect of this aspect.

good you've now read something other than Herodotus, so you'll now be in a position to answer your own question as to  where the silver came from.
Note the reason that Cardascia and others suggested this is that there is no evidence of direct sales to institutions either. This is for two reasons, one is explained by the nature of the archive, the second is that institutions tended to have their own lands to feed their own people

[Jim Webster]

Which shows how even a modest population can sustain a really sizeable army on the move - provided it stays on the move.  Given the density of cities in the Fertile Crescent, the average Egyptian or Assyrian army would have had little difficulty remaining in supply.  They would have numbered in the hundreds of thousands (at most) rather than millions, and would have been drawing from major cities rather than pocket-size settlements.

Provided that these modest populations habitually stored three years supplies (for which we have no evidence whatsoever, especially given the level of excavation in Jericho)

Also provided they kept moving. Having to sit in front of Jericho for seven days rather screws the business model.
Also not that Jericho was a major city. In 1800BC even a great city such as Babylon is estimated at only 65,000 and Memphis at 30,000

Given that Egypt had a population of about 3 to 3.5 million (mid point of estimates) in the New Kingdom armies of millions are most unlikely

[Jim Webster]

Or it was stripping cities in rotation, quite possibly in advance, and had got as far as Boeotia.  In fact Octavian's army and fleet were also present and presumably stripping the near side of northern Greece, and Greece itself had been pretty thoroughly combed in 49-8 BC by Pompey and Caesar following a century of less-than-happy existence under Roman rule, so the Greece of 31 BC may have compared very poorly with the Greece of 480 BC.  That said, it was sustaining Antony's and Octavian's forces and apparently neither had yet touched Thessaly, so there was still plenty of potential remaining - at least from the viewpoint of the Romans.  The inhabitants probably saw it differently!

Sorry but what do you mean by stripping cities in rotation? By definition, once you've stripped a city you're unlikely to be able to go back to it to strip it again

The reason they hadn't touched Thessaly was because they couldn't get to it. Remember, unless you can use water transport, your convoys eat their load

[Patrick Waterson]

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.

Could you quote the source of this standard?  Does it apply only to the ancient period or a general rule?

It is a general rule, and I had hitherto thought a universally-known one.  Of all the points in this discussion, I had not expected this one to be questioned by anybody.

But since we now have two people questioning it, try this.

The key extract:
"The World War II armed forces represented about 12 percent of the population and included about
56 percent of the men eligible for military service on the basis of age, health, and mental aptitude."

[Patrick Waterson]

of course, that is what the discussion is about, so you cannot produce a supposition to claim Herodotus's figures are right if that supposition is based on Herototus's figures

That cuts both ways, the difference in weight of evidence being that we have Herodotus' account but not a contrary one.

If you claim that there was universal obligation to serve, then you should produce evidence of that universal obligation. My comments about how the army was recruited are based on original records from the time.

But from specific (temple) records giving a rather incomplete picture.  Or are you claiming that the entire Achaemenid army consisted of small contingents raised by temples? (I trust not.)

Given that Egypt had a population of about 3 to 3.5 million (mid point of estimates) in the New Kingdom armies of millions are most unlikely

Can you produce actual evidence for a population of this size?

Sorry but what do you mean by stripping cities in rotation? By definition, once you've stripped a city you're unlikely to be able to go back to it to strip it again

Apologies, I used a vague expression: I meant stripping them in turn, one by one.  Last week Thebes, this week Orchomenus, next week Chaeronea, that sort of thing.

The reason they hadn't touched Thessaly was because they couldn't get to it. Remember, unless you can use water transport, your convoys eat their load

There is that, although they could get to it if they wanted, the same way as Caesar.  It would have meant sending the fleets (and Agrippa and Cleopatra) elsewhere, though.  This would presumably have been 'Plan B' had they not engaged at Actium.

[Jim Webster]

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.

Could you quote the source of this standard?  Does it apply only to the ancient period or a general rule?

It is a general rule, and I had hitherto thought a universally-known one.  Of all the points in this discussion, I had not expected this one to be questioned by anybody.

But since we now have two people questioning it, try this.

The key extract:
"The World War II armed forces represented about 12 percent of the population and included about
56 percent of the men eligible for military service on the basis of age, health, and mental aptitude."

The ancient world worked differently. As far as I can see, Soldiers were drawn from certain social classes which had a specific obligation to serve if called. Other classes had no such obligation, indeed the state had a vested interest in keeping them unarmed.  Perhaps you could give an example of an ancient state that maintained a force of 12% of the population on active service outside their country