The Hoplite phalanx

[Patrick Waterson]

Perhaps we could go with physical force othismos

Sounds good to me: the first step would be to refine and perhaps define exactly what we think we mean.  Should I post a description of sorts or would someone else like to?  This is intended to discover what we understand by the concept and how we think it may have worked as opposed to erecting a target to be torn down.

[Erpingham]

Perhaps we could go with physical force othismos

It doesn't help a great deal.  Very few othismos theories I've seen have a non-physical othismos.  In fact, while we've done the various variants of physical othismos to death, "othismos as a state of mind" is something no-one has proved particularly keen on.

Perhaps a division of "pushing emphasis" and "combat emphasis" would be better?  Or "formal phased battle" and "evolving situation battle"?

[RichT]

Perhaps we could go with physical force othismos

The trouble with that as a tag is that all battle (presumably) involves physical force, and using the Greek word 'othismos' to denote something unique and unusual is begging the question.

But really, call it 'pink unicorn foreplay' if you like, I don't think the name matters. The objective is just to make it clear to everyone what we are talking about, and 'hoplite scrum' does that job as well as anything (as does the modern English use of 'othismos' - though I won't be using that for reasons given). It's interesting that the term seems to trigger such insecurity among some.

[Erpingham]

The trouble with words is they tend to bring a baggage of meanings.  It is clear in our use of "othismos" that some use the term very specifically in line with their preconceptions, others more loosely as an undefined state of being. 

[RichT]

The baggage attached to the meanings of words is probably a more interesting topic than the literal shove itself ('literal shove' - a better name?)

For the Edwardian public school inventors of the literal shove theory, likening hoplite battle to a rugby scrum would have carried entirely positive connotations - manly endeavour, team sports and all that. I watch a lot of rugby, so those positive connotations are familiar to me too, along with being a fitting description for an organised literal shove. For someone who comes across the word 'scrum' only in its alternative modern meaning ('a disorderly crowd of people or things') the term might seem pejorative (though really, when it has been pointed out so many times why this term was originally applied, and why it is still used, it's depressing if not surprising that there is no ability to recognise and acknowledge the distinction).

If it will cause an outbreak of rainbows and unicorns, I'm happy to use 'literal shove' in future.

[Erpingham]

If it will cause an outbreak of rainbows and unicorns, I'm happy to use 'literal shove' in future.

The trouble I have with that is that jostling and shoving are pretty endemic to combat.  Indeed, there is one school of thought that this is all othismos refers to. The school-formerly-known-as-scrum surely implies an emphasis on the pushing contest ?

It would actually be nice to put the actual form of the Big "O" in a box to one side and look at some of the things that fold around it.  Was hoplite battle compartmentalised, and by implication formalised?  Is the fact othismos does not seem to occur in all battles important or an oversight by our sources?  If hoplite v. hoplite battle was compartmentalised/formalised what does that mean in terms of an asymetric contest (which become increasingly important in professional hoplites lives)?  I think this would be a much more fruitful use of everyone's time than going over the evidence again.

[Andreas Johansson]

For the Edwardian public school inventors of the literal shove theory, likening hoplite battle to a rugby scrum would have carried entirely positive connotations - manly endeavour, team sports and all that. I watch a lot of rugby, so those positive connotations are familiar to me too, along with being a fitting description for an organised literal shove.

Conversely, my idea of rugby pretty much breaks down to "that weird thing done by Englishmen that's sort of like American football"*, which always leaves me feeling at a certain disadvantage when people talk about "scrum".

I don't think "literal shove" is a good designation, though, for the reasons Anthony gives. How about "organized pushing"? Or, considering nobody objected when I used it above, "orthodoxy"?


* My idea of American football is, of course, "that weird thing done by Americans that's sort of like rugby".

[Erpingham]

NFL players scrimmage rather than scrummage, of course.  Scrimmage is a variant of skirmish.  Perhaps we've been referencing the wrong sporting analogy all along

[PMBardunias]

Accepting the 'scrum;' othismos as fact I wonder if having multiple people pushing on a front ranker's back would make it difficult for the individual to defend himself , dodge blows etc.

You cannot dodge or even really move other than to duck your head, though you have free range of motion for your right hand.  Men quickly bind weapons up with those opposite them, second ranks helping protect the promachoi. Then it becomes some hideous mix of arm wrestling and knife fighting.  One of the funnier attacks I have received was a dude on YouTube who suggested that if this type of othismos were real, hoplites would have fought with knives.  He had never read Xenophon: [Xenophon Ages., chapter 2.14] Now that the fighting was at an end, a weird spectacle met the eye, as one surveyed the scene of the conflict — the earth stained with blood, friend and foe lying dead side by side, shields smashed to pieces, spears snapped in two, daggers (ἐγχειρίδια) bared of their sheaths, some on the ground, some embedded in the bodies, some yet gripped by the hand.

Your biggest advantage is that your head is so close to that of your foe that it is hard to hit you and not hit him with anything but a descending strike.  A point heavy sword like the khopis can deliver a chop directly from the wrist like a hatchet, and the short stabbing sword, aimed between the neck and collar bone, would be particularly nasty. Not surprisingly, the period in which I suggest that Othsimos on the battlefield reached its peak, the pilos and other helms that are especially good as protecting from descending blows become ubiquitous.

[PMBardunias]

Lest people assume there's only two options on that point, bear in mind that Maurice has othismos happen after the start of battle but before contact, which should be incompatible with Rich and Orthodoxy alike

(Whether Maurikian othismos is the same thing as the Classical, or if indeed either is really a "thing", is of course at least three further Diets of Worms.)

This is perfectly in line with my crowd-like definition of othismos. It is not a tactic, it is a condition.  If men crowd up on each other they are in a state of othismos within their own ranks.  In fact, if you ever want to try and break a shield wall by charging into it, you have to crowd together to the point that your crowd is almost incompressible further, then smash into the wall- your own front ranks pushing back on the men behind them to keep things tight. Othismos is used is in situations familiar to anyone studying crowd disasters.  In the worst of these, people are asphyxiated or squeezed either hard enough or long enough to cause them to lose consciousness or die because pressure on their chest and diaphragm prevents them from breathing.  Xenophon (A. 5.2.17), Plutarch (Brutus 18.1), and Appian (Mithridatic wars 10.71) all describe othismos occurring as a crowd of men attempt to exit a gate.  Polybius (4.58.9) describes the Aegiratans routing the Aetolians who fled into a city: "in the confusion that followed the fugitives trampled each other to death at the gates...Archidamus was killed in the struggle and crush at the gates. Of the main body of Aetolians, some were trampled to death..."  It is a maxim that most deaths attributed to trampling are in fact due to asphyxia while still standing. 

[PMBardunias]

The trouble with words is they tend to bring a baggage of meanings.  It is clear in our use of "othismos" that some use the term very specifically in line with their preconceptions, others more loosely as an undefined state of being.

I can tell you my issues with the way we commonly describe it.  I call it a crowd-thismos or crowd-like othismos, because it shares mechanics with crowd disasters, not rugby scrums. The two are nothing alike if you understand the physics. I don't believe that othismos was a tactic, not general ever ordered men to othismos their enemies. Thus the "organization" is a problem for me if using the term organized push, because it was not organized in the classical manner of drill. Most accurately it is "an emergent property of close combat by deep ranks of opposing units, whose ranks seek to more forward while they fight".  I don't see that much jargon catching on.  The real question is not why hoplites enter othismos, but why all armies who fight hand to hand do not.

[Erpingham]

The real question is not why hoplites enter othismos, but why all armies who fight hand to hand do not.

Another good question.  It would appear, indeed , that hoplites didn't enter othismos in every battle.  I would turn it back to you (in the spirit of helping the thinking process) and say "How do we know they didn't?"  To some extent, the absence of those who spoke the jargon in the recording process might be involved.  But were there battle conditions that precluded othismos? 

[PMBardunias]

The basic rhythm of this exchange is: P posits the possible without sources. R notes lack of source and disagrees for its implications or assumptions. Repeat.

What exactly do you consider sources?  For everything in that exchange, I am the source, published and reviewed. Do you wish primary sources for othismos? Compare the usage:

Herodotus book 7, 225. Two brothers of Xerxes accordingly fought and fell there. There was an ὠθισμὸς between the Persians and Lacedaemonians over Leonidas' body, until the Hellenes by their courageous prowess dragged it away and routed their enemies four times. The battle went on until the men with Epialtes arrived.

Herodotus 9.62. While he was still in the act of praying, the men of Tegea leapt out before the rest and charged the barbarians, and immediately after Pausanias' prayer the sacrifices of the Lacedaemonians became favorable. Now they too charged the Persians, and the Persians met them, throwing away their bows. [2] First they fought by the fence of shields, and when that was down, there was a fierce and long fight around the temple of Demeter itself, until they came ὠθισμόν. For (because actually) the barbarians laid hold of the spears and broke them short.

Thuc. 4.96 The Athenians hastened forward, and the two armies met at a run. [2] The extreme right and left of either army never engaged, for the same reason; they were both prevented by water-courses. But the rest closed, and there was an ὠθισμῷ ἀσπίδων.

Compare that to the way the same noun is used by Xenophon to describe a crowd disaster:

Xen. Anab. 5.2.17] After no long interval a shout arose within and men came pouring forth in flight, some carrying with them what they had seized, then soon a number of men that were wounded; and there was a deal of pushing ὠθισμὸς about the gates. When those who were tumbling out were questioned, they said that there was a citadel within, that the enemy were numerous, and that they had sallied forth and were dealing blows upon the men inside.

and Josephus

J. BJ 2.327) The soldiers therefore encompassed them presently, and struck them with their clubs; and as they fled away, the horsemen trampled them down, so that a great many fell down dead by the strokes of the Romans, and more by their own violence in crushing one another. Now there was a terrible crowding (ὠθισμὸς) about the gates, and while every body was making haste to get before another, the flight of them all was retarded, and a terrible destruction there was among those that fell down, for they were suffocated, an broken to pieces by the multitude of those that were uppermost; nor could any of them be distinguished by his relations in order to the care of his funeral; the soldiers also who beat them, fell upon those whom they overtook, without showing them any mercy, and thrust the multitude through the place called Bezetha, 1 as they forced their way, in order to get in and seize upon the temple, and the tower Antonia.


Or even the way it is used figuratively by Herotodus when he is describing a deadlock or impasse in an argument between leaders:

8.78. Among the generals at Salamis there was ὠθισμὸς.

9.26. During the drawing up of battle formation there arose ὠθισμὸς between the Tegeans and the Athenians, for each of them claimed that they should hold the second1 wing of the army, justifying themselves by tales of deeds new and old.

I submit that in every case these are conditions where two things have come together in opposition that limits forward passage and thus crowds men together, be it two opposing military units, a crowd and a gate wall, or two opposing arguments that are at an impasse.

[Flaminpig0]

Not surprisingly, the period in which I suggest that Othsimos on the battlefield reached its peak, the pilos and other helms that are especially good as protecting from descending blows become ubiquitous.

It seems odd to me that unlike the helmets worn during the non-peak Othismos period they happen to be open faced and a lot less sturdy; the Pilos helmet might be a better ballistic shape against blows from the top but gives less protection from getting a dagger or sword in the face. For me the adoption of the Pilos helmet is an argument against scrum Othismos

[PMBardunias]

The real question is not why hoplites enter othismos, but why all armies who fight hand to hand do not.

Another good question.  It would appear, indeed , that hoplites didn't enter othismos in every battle.  I would turn it back to you (in the spirit of helping the thinking process) and say "How do we know they didn't?"  To some extent, the absence of those who spoke the jargon in the recording process might be involved.  But were there battle conditions that precluded othismos?

Its like I paid you to set that up   I think any two armies that fight close together will enter something we can label pre-othismos, but this is just to say that groups of men crowd together. To understand why all armies do not descend into full blown othismos, we must start with the fact that normally being in the crowd conditions I call othismos will kill you.  Before it kills you, it becomes very uncomfortable.  The reason in most armies othismos does not occur is that this is well known to those involved. If a second rank Hastatii crowds up on the fellow in front, the front man will push back at him for room or signal in some other fashion- insert string of Latin curses- to give him room. It will also become uncomfortable for all those involved to be this close together, and they will naturally loosen their packing.  Essentially, we are asking the same question as why don't the attendees at a rock concert crush their way through the doors on the way in?  If we start a fire in the stadium, they will surely crush each other on the way out!  The key is that it is not a natural thing to do, it is a panic response that inhibits the natural reluctance to pack so tight.

So why hoplites?  One simple reason, because they could survive it. This we have shown. If you can survive the great pressures of a crowd-crush and your culture has a meme that states holding the real estate of the battlefield and the fallen upon it is how victory in battle is defined, then pushing your foes away from the site of initial clash signals them they are losing and they rout. There is a reason that othismos does not work against peltasts. You cannot othismos any unit willing to give ground in front of you, and you cannot defeat a foe in othismos that does not see giving up ground as a sign of losing the battle. In general though, losing ground means losing for most linear formations.