Chabrias' peculiar hoplite formation

[Justin Swanton]

Going back to a topic raised on the Currently Reading thread, we have two sources that describe this unusual formation adopted by Chabrias against the Spartans.

Nepos: Chabrias 1:2:

reliquam phalangem loco vetuit cedere obnixoque genu scuto, proiecta hasta impetum excipere hostium docuit. Id novum Agesilaus contuens progredi non est ausus suosque iam revocavit. he forbade the remainder of the phalanx to cede the place, instructing it with shield braced against (projecting) knee, to receive the enemy attack with (projecting) spears

The 'projecting' in the Latin can grammatically refer either to the knee or the spears; neuter ablative case if referring to the knee, plural feminine case if referring to the spears.

Diodorus 15.32:

Χαβρίας δ᾽ ὁ Ἀθηναῖος τῶν μισθοφόρων ἀφηγούμενος παρήγγειλε τοῖς στρατιώταις δέχεσθαι τοὺς πολεμίους καταπεφρονηκότως ἅμα καὶ τεταγμένως, καὶ τὰς ἀσπίδας πρὸς τὸ γόνυ κλίναντας ὀρθῷ τῷ δόρατι μένειν. ὧν ποιησάντων τὸ προσταχθὲν ὥσπερ ἀφ᾽ ἑνὸς παρακελεύσματος, ὁ Ἀγησίλαος θαυμάσας τήν τε εὐταξίαν τῶν πολεμίων καὶ τὴν καταφρόνησιν, τὸ μὲν βιάζεσθαι πρὸς ὑπερδεξίους τόπους καὶ συναναγκάζειν τοὺς ἐναντίους ἄνδρας ἀγαθοὺς γίνεσθαι πρὸς τὸν ἐκ χειρὸς κίνδυνον οὐκ ἔκρινε, πεῖραν δὲ λαβὼν ὅτι τολμήσουσιν ἀναγκαζόμενοι διαγωνίσασθαι περὶ τῆς νίκης, ἐν τῷ πεδίῳ προεκαλεῖτο. Chabrias the Athenian, however, leading his mercenary troops, ordered his men to receive the enemy with a show of contempt, maintaining all the while their battle lines, and, leaning their shields against their knees, to wait with upraised spear. Since they did what they were ordered as at a single word of command, Agesilaus, marvelling at the fine discipline of the enemy and their posture of contempt, judged it inadvisable to force a way against the higher ground and compel his opponents to show their valour in a hand-to-hand contest, and, having learned by trial that they would dare, if forced, to dispute the victory, he challenged them in the plain.

Experimenting a bit, I have a problem with resting an aspis against the knee as it simply cannot be done if one is standing. The aspis is three feet long and convex, which means that when you stand, its rim rests against the top of your thighs or your waist, and doesn't touch the knees at all. And why not 'knees' in the plural since if you stand the shield would rest against both if it could rest against one?

If you kneel however and hold the aspis normally the bottom edge - 18 inches from your left arm - will just cover your knee with the rim that projects a little below it. What is interesting though is that the top rim of the aspis will be just below your eyes, meaning you are very well covered. You do not have to exert any muscular effort to hold up the aspis as the knee takes its weight. Your right arm will have to extend straight downwards to hold the spear that projects pretty much straight ahead below the aspis, or you hold it in a high underarm grip (more likely) or an overarm grip (less likely) above the shield.

IMHO and after some reflection, Chabrias, with 'projected' applied to the knee, makes more sense than Diodorus.

[Duncan Head]

Peter Connolly's interpretation of Chabrias' "at ease" position (second from the left). One knee.

[Justin Swanton]

Peter Connolly's interpretation of Chabrias' "at ease" position (second from the left). One knee.

Not the knee!

[Chuck the Grey]

After Duncan's mentioned J.K. Anderson's  Military Theory & Practice in the Age of Xenophon as being the starting point of the theory of the at ease position with the shield resting on the knee, I pulled my copy of the book and found the discussion in Chapter V "Weapon Training."

Anderson refers to the confrontation between Chabrias' command and the Spartans under Agesilaus where Agesilaus "marveled at the good discipline of the enemy and at heir disdain." Anderson feels that this "at ease" position was a standard hoplite drill since it was instantly copied by the Theban Sacred Band. He also mentions that the attitude of "contempt" exhibited by Chabrias' ordering his troops to "at ease" also avoids fatiguing his men by keeping them in a shields up and spears levelled position while waiting for the Spartans to advance.

Anderson has two plates in his boo, both Attic red-figured hydria (vases), showing a hoplite standing upright with the shield resting on a knee and the spear held upright.


More food for thought.

[Jim Webster]

I must admit I was never convinced by Connolly's suggestion, it certainly doesn't look like an 'at ease' position or something you'd draw up hoplites in for any length of time waiting.
Also it doesn't show any sort of contempt. It's more cowering behind the shield as if you're waiting for an arrow storm

[Erpingham]

This seems to be a common interpretation among re-enactors



Perhaps we should ask Paul bardunias about it, as he has the reconstruction experience?

[Justin Swanton]

This seems to be a common interpretation among re-enactors



Perhaps we should ask Paul bardunias about it, as he has the reconstruction experience?

We can, though the photo makes pretty clear the knee doesn't feature. If Chabrias' hoplites had been leaning/bracing the shield against the leg - crus, σκέλος - this photo would have made perfect sense.

[Erpingham]

We can, though the photo makes pretty clear the knee doesn't feature.

I don't think it shows clearly what is done with the leg, or the knee.  The guy on the right hand end is adopting a left leg forward stance but we can't really tell from this angle the rest of the position, hence suggesting asking someone who has done it.

[Justin Swanton]

To carry on beating the topic to death, I did a couple of diagrams showing a kneeling and standing skeleton with an aspis to scale. The moveable skeleton can be accessed here for anyone interested.



Notice that the shield is about 8 - 9 inches away from the knee of the standing skeleton, and when touching the knee of the kneeling skeleton provides good coverage. I suspect the kneeling skeleton would have to lean forward a bit more to allow the forearm to reach the porpax.

[Erpingham]

Possibly there is a need to widen this out beyond the two sources here.  We do not know how familiar either Diodorus or nepos were with hoplite drill.  We do know that Diodorus thought the point was to show contempt by adopting a resting position.  Its possible that the hoplite at ease position was kneeling (didn't Roman triarii kneel while waiting?) but perhaps we need to look wider at e.g. images of hoplites at rest, earlier descriptions of hoplites standing around which may reflect more contemporary impressions to better see the truth of the matter.

[Jim Webster]

I can see no advantage in the kneeling pose whatsoever other than if you're suffering a lot of arrow fire. It's not comfortable, it's not a pose you can get into action from swiftly

When looking at the knee, there's no reason why the middle of the shield has to rest on the knee, it might be that the shield rested with the rim against the side of the knee so the shield is actually to the side of the hoplite rather than in front

[Erpingham]

When looking at the knee, there's no reason why the middle of the shield has to rest on the knee, it might be that the shield rested with the rim against the side of the knee so the shield is actually to the side of the hoplite rather than in front

It is possible.  On the kneeling pose, it does appear in art but I suspect it's often because of compositional requirements of the space available e.g. a coin.  Whether it is an "at ease" pose, I don't know.  Given the shield isn't grounded, it may not be.

[Erpingham]

Incidentally, while looking at images of kneeling hoplites, I came across this one



Closer inspection shows these hoplites are crouching, rather than kneeling, which would be a bit uncomfortable.   Interesting archer/hoplite co-operation, though.

[RichT]

The 'projecting' in the Latin can grammatically refer either to the knee or the spears; neuter ablative case if referring to the knee, plural feminine case if referring to the spears.

No, that's just wrong, as discussed in the other thread. There's no point continuing to flog that particular dead horse since if you want to insist on a kneeling position you are free to do so without mistranslating the Latin - Nepos' words don't rule out a kneeling position (neither do Diodorus') so it's a possibility, just IMHO (and the HO of other people too) less likely given the 'contempt' being shown. Kneeling behind a shield (Connolly's leftmost image) wouldn't obviously fit that description, and Nepos' account isn't explicit that anyone is kneeling - even if 'projecting knees' were correct WHICH IT ISN'T that doesn't require kneeling - Matthew for example interprets the pose as bent leg and shield held between knee and shoulder.

For those of you with Jstor access (or a decent library) there's this good article with plenty of kneeling and at ease illustrations referenced.

The most convincing evidence for me is Xenophon Anabasis 1.5.13, describing an altercation among the 10,000:

"Clearchus escaped to his own army and at once called his troops to arms; he ordered his hoplites to remain where they were, resting their shields against their knees, while he himself with the Thracians and the horsemen, of which he had in his army more than forty, most of them Thracians, advanced upon Menon's troops"

Now this in theory could also be a reference to a kneeling position, but would make precious little sense in this context and has been universally recognised as the 'at ease' position (which is frequently depicted in art). Remember, the hoplite shield is a pain to carry for long periods, so resting it on the ground leaning on the leg is an obvious thing to do, and Xenophon's words (which are very similar to Diodorus') indicate that 'leaning on the knee' could describe this position (even if in reality the knee might not be much involved).

It's an interesting, much discussed topic though, and nobody can rule a kneeling position out completely, but please stop messing with the Latin, there's no need to do so.

The skeleton picture makes me think of the skellies in Jason and the Argonauts (the proper Ray Harryhausen ones) - great film.

[Justin Swanton]

The 'projecting' in the Latin can grammatically refer either to the knee or the spears; neuter ablative case if referring to the knee, plural feminine case if referring to the spears.

No, that's just wrong, as discussed in the other thread.

Actually you're quite right. Double-checking the declension of proiecta as a neuter participle gives proiecto for the ablative, not proiecta. My bad.