A Quantitative Evaluation of Hoplite Combat

For years now I have advocated that those interested in hoplite combat should make greater use of reenactors who put a great deal of time and money into acquiring an authentic hoplite panoply. Many groups of reenactors exist all over the globe, and I know memeber of many of them. In discussing various hoplte topics with them, one thing is clear: if you ask any two reenactors the way hoplites did something, you'll get three opinions. The fundamental problem is that all the conclusions they draw are based on anectdotal evidence. This does not make any of them wrong, even when they disagree, but the lack of standardization makes comparing between them almost impossible. Often we can't know exaclty why they had different experiences.

It has long been a goal of mine to assist groups of reenactors in generating quantitative data on various aspects of hoplite combat. This would be hard data, numbers that we could crunch to provide a true comparison between individuals and between hoplite reenactment groups.

There are many elements of hoplite combat that need to be tested, but my main concern is the safety of reenactors, thus no othismos for the time being. I've attached an image that could serve as a first attempt at a standardized test for hoplite groups. This set-up is a basic stabbing test. The data will give us a rate of striking for a hoplite in formation. I think this rate can be fairly well correlated to the offensive potential of hoplites engaged in doratismos. By altering the size of the target and requiring more accuracy, we can simulate strikes that would "kill" or wound. Because we are simulating group combat, at least three men side by side are needed to create a hoplite bounded on both flanks by other men. For our purposes only the central hoplite can be have his strike number recorded, for only he in flanked by others.



Within this basic set-up, we can alter a variety of variables:

Duration of test period: stamina
Size of target (moving target): accuracy
Grip type: underhand or overhand
Number of ranks in the phalanx
Lateral inter-hoplite spacing
Fore-and-aft spacing
Number of ranks stabbing forward at targets (1, 2 or 3)
Striking while under physical pressure from rear ranks of various length files
Change focus to record the striking rate of the second or third man in the file

Here is a second simple test. This one is to quantify the loss of cohesion that we all know occurs as a phalanx advances rapidly in close order. You simply measure the distance between a point on any adjacent hoplites in rank or file- I suggest the left foot. Then you have the formation advance at whatever speed and in whatever formation you wish to test. The men are made to stop at some signal, a horn or simple shout is preferable to a demarkation so that it is harder to predict. Then you simply remeasure the distances between hoplites. The deviation between each pair from their original spacing is a measure of a loss of order. From there you can ask if they became tighter or looser. The test can be repeated varying the with different starting formations, individual advancing posture, distance, and speed of advance, etc.



I've got a few groups signed on for some testing and welcome any who seek to join. Whatever we are able to do I will run appropriate statistics on and we'll try to publish someplace so that we can all refer to it. Obviously a large number of individuals being tested is good to control for variation between hoplites, but I'd like to get multiple groups involved as well if possible. I welcome discussion on this experiment and hopefully we can plan other experiments as well.

Schwartz and Mathew on Hoplite Combat

I just received Adam Schwartz's "Reinstating the Hoplite: Arms, Armour and Phalanx Fighting in Archaic and Classical Greece". It is an excellent resource, and a good rebuttal to many of the weak points of Hans Van Wees "Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities." Unfortunately, he passes over some of Van Wees better ideas and propagates mechanics for othismos which you should recognize as flawed if you've read through my previous posts. There is not all that much new in the book, and some of the the newer elements are subject to logical flaws, but as a review it is an excellent resource if you can afford to add it to your shelf.

The book is most useful to me in that he provides passages from German works that have been opaque to me until now. One of these is a book by Franz (2002) that actually discusses crowd behavior, though once again confusing the manner in which force is generated in crowds. Still, I would have cited him in my 2007 paper had I known he even broached the topic.

I'll do an in-depth review of this book at some point. Perhaps comparing where I agree with him and where Van Wees and Goldsworthy are correct.

The second work that has come into my possession is a paper by Chris Mathew, "When Push Comes to Shove: What was the Othismos of Hoplite Combat?" I have corresponded with Chris in the past, a hoplite reenactor and a very nice fellow. I was very pleased to see a reenactor working for his Ph.D. and looked forward to his input into the debate. Unfortunately I cannot agree with most of his views on hoplite battle. His main assertion, that hoplites fought with the dory using what I and others have termed the "high underhand" grip, is surely incorrect. As with the book above, I will try to do a full review of this paper in the near future. I think his main problem is that he was working within the paradigm of the "charge directly into othismos" crowd. The formations he describes are well suited to defeating such a charge, but taken out of that context can be shown to be quite ill suited to hoplite combat.

Syssition to Phitidion

Change has come to Hollow Lakedaimon. You will note that we are no longer the online syssition, we have laconized to the online Phitidion. Phitidia is what the common messes were called at Sparta, so I have broken down and made the change though I do like the sound of syssition much more. Here's what Plutarch had to say:

Plutarch, Life of Lycurgus chapter 12:

(1) As for the public messes, the Cretans call them andreia, but the Lacedaemonians phitidia, either because they are conducive to friendship [philia] and friendliness, or because they accustom men to simplicity and thrift, for which their word is pheidô. But it is quite possible, as some say, that the first letter of the word phitidia has been added to it, making phitidia out of editia, which refers merely to meals and eating. (2) They met in companies of fifteen, a few more or less, and each one of the mess-mates contributed monthly a bushel [medimnos] of barley-meal, eight gallons of wine, five pounds [mnai] of cheese, two and a half pounds of cheese, two and a half pounds of figs, and in addition to this, a very small sum of money for such relishes as flesh and fish. Besides this, whenever any one made a sacrifice of first fruits or brought home game from the hunt, he sent a portion to his mess. For whenever any one was made late by a sacrifice or the chase, he was allowed to dine at home, but the rest had to be at the mess. (3) For a long time this custom of eating at common mess-tables was rigidly observed. For instance, when King Agis, on returning from an expedition in which he had been victorious over the Athenians, wished to dine at home with his wife, and sent for his rations, the Polemarchs refused to send them to him; and when on the following day his anger led him to omit the customary sacrifice, they laid a fine on him.

(4) Boys also used to come to these public messes, as if they were attending schools of sobriety; there they would listen to political discussions and see instructive models of free behavior [eleutheria]. There they themselves also became accustomed to sport and jest without scurrility, and to endure jesting without displeasure. Indeed, it seems to have been especially characteristic of a Spartan to endure jesting; but if anyone could not bear up under it, he had only to ask it, and the jester ceased. As each one came in, the eldest of the company pointed to the door and said to him, "Through that door no word goes forth outside." (5) And they say that a candidate for membership in one of these messes underwent the following ordeal. Each of the mess-mates took in his hand a bit of soft bread, and when a servant came along with a bowl upon his head, then they cast it into this without a word, like a ballot, leaving it just as it was if he approved of the candidate, but if he disapproved, squeezing it tight in his hand first. (6) For the flattened piece of bread had the force of a perforated, or negative, ballot. And if one such is found in the bowl, the candidate is not admitted to the mess, because they wish all its members to be congenial. The candidate thus rejected is said to have been 'kaddished' [kekaddisthai], for kaddichos is the name of the bowl into which they cast the pieces of bread. (7) Of their dishes, the black broth [zomos] is held in the highest esteem, so that the elderly men do not even ask for a bit of meat, but leave it for the young men, while they themselves have the broth poured out for their meals. And it is said that one of the kings of Pontos actually bought a Spartan cook for the sake of having this broth, and then, when he tasted it, disliked it; whereupon the cook said, 'O King, those who relish this broth must first have bathed in the River Eurotas.' After drinking moderately, they go off home without a torch; for they are not allowed to walk with a light, either on this or any other occasion, that they may accustom themselves to marching boldly and without fear in the darkness of night. Such, then, is the fashion of their common messes.

Unfounded Objections to Othismos

The biggest objections to othismos dissapear when you accept my definition of othismos only occuring at crowd-like densities and understand how crowds push:

"Battles were long, men can't push that long."

The crowd cannot do anything fast. As soon as it starts to advance it begins to lose cohesion. Once this occurs it cannot transfer force through the ranks effectively. That is not to say "pushing" stops, but by my definition, the type of pushing done by the first few ranks with not transfer of force from deep in the file is not true "othismos", but the same shield bashing and pushing seen in a clash of any group of close-in fighters such as during Roman battles. For the most part in the Crowd-Othismos men are simply standing and leaning. It is exhausting, perhaps moreso mentally than physically, but no more than active weapons duelling. The phalanx does not advance like a steam roller, but like a ratchet, with perdiodic loosening and tightening of the ranks. When a rapid advance does occur, like it must have as one side gave way, it was only the front ranks pushing and even they were doing more "herding" like we see with riot police and crowds, than pushing in the sense of othismos.

An advance in true othismos can only occur through shuffling steps until one side gives way. As they begin to rout, they reduce the pressure on their foes that the othismos-crowd requires.

"Men can't fight and push"

When authors envisioned men bent over like rugby scrummers I could understand this objection. In the Crowd-Othismos, men are standing upright, and but for the extreme close range, their right arms are free to do whatever they wish with them. Obviously at this range you cannot use your dory against the man ahead of you, but the dory is some 8' long, not an Iklwa. It could not be used at any range approaching shield on shield contact. Swords, broken spears, fists, foot-stomps/hooks and teeth would be the order of the day.


"Twelve ranks of Spartans could not resist 50 ranks of Thebans for more than a few moments and yet we know that this phase of battle lasted for some time, with the Spartans even gaining ground to pick up their fallen King."

Not a problem when we understand that coordination of the crowds movements is what adds force in the othismos. There is only so much coordination you can get out of a file of 50 men. Even with a deep phalanx you probably can't get much more than 8-12 ranks perfectly coordinated. Thus, each side produces a forward thrust of about the same size at any given moment. As we wrote above, the depth acts like a wall behind your back. If you are pushed back, it forces all your ranks to tighten and become de facto coordinated to resist being moved. Twelve ranks of Spartans could push back the Thebans, but at a great disadvantage. The figurative "uphill battle" could only end one way.

I'll note that my distinction of pushing at different densities, with othimos only occurring at the tightest packed is not something that the Greeks would have made. They only speak of battles coming down to pushing, they did not disect the process and probably did not undertand it any better than a college kid rushing a stage at a rock concert. To them the whole process was one event.

Three Myths of Othismos

As you can tell by now, I am an advocate of a literal pushing othismos. Because of this I am frustrated by some elements of the pro-othismos arguement as it is currently put forth. I've mentioned these problems previously, but they bear repeating:

Myth 1: "The rim on the aspis evolved as the shield became heavier to allow the weight to be borne on the shoulder as well as the arm."

If you look at the cross-section of an aspis, it is clear that the rim section is far thicker than the core of the face of the shield. Thus a substantial portion of the weight of the shield is in the very rim that they would hypothesize grew to ease the carrying of said weight! A rimless aspis is no heavier than many other single grip shields. Sure, there are images that show the hoplites hanging the shield of their shoulder by the rim, but there are far more showing hoplites with their Corinthian helms pushed back, and I doubt many would support fighting with them in this position. Hanging the aspis by its rim on the shoulder simply takes advantage of the profile, which evolved for a very different purpose.

Myth 2: "Hoplites pushed en masse with their bodies side-on, their left shoulders in the bowl of the aspis, pressing into the back of the man in front."

The illogic of this one becomes apparent if we try to envision a file doing so. Clearly this can only work for the second ranker pushing the first ranker. Beyond that the men's backs are perpendicular to the men behind them! The could push into the right shoulder of the men in front, but that renders weapons play impossible- something the side-on stance is supposed to allow. The other problem is that at anything approaching maximum pushing force for a file, the men would collapse into the bowl of their shields in any case and be square to the foes as they should be.

Myth 3: "Hoplites charge rapidly to add momentum to othismos."

This one is counterintuitive, so I don't blame them for not foreseeing it, but a slow packed advance generates more force, faster than a series of single men impacting like rams. With no need to move to othismos directly from the charge, an extended period can occur of spear fencing prior to a pushing occurring. This eliminates a major difference between the pro- and anti- push crowds.

An image of Othismos

I happened upon an image of othismos as I describe it in my crowd-othismos model: men packed tight belly to back, not pushing side-on. This is an frame from the Discovery Channel's War and Civilization that can be seen on youtube.com. Here we can see the type of packing that must occur. Yes, I know the shields are terrible. You can see that in this environment the overhand grip on the spear will provide a much broader range of motion than even a high underhand grip. You'll also see that at this range the dory is useless for fighting in the front rank against your immediate foe. There is no way to choke up on the shaft far enough to bring an 8' spear to bear on the rank ahead of you. Thus, either the first rank used swords, or fought past the men in front, aiming deeper in the enemy ranks.



Another thing you can see is why I think the shields must overlap right over left, i.e: the man on the left comes up behind the overhanging shield of the man to his right. In the image below, the arrows show a weak point in the shield-wall when overlapped left over right as under the top arrow. The reason this joint gives way is that the portion of shield off to a man's left is easier to push back than the portion to the right. The flange to the left acts as a lever on the hoplites arm, while the right side, if forced back, is pushed into his body.

Now look at the lower arrow and you will see that pushing here only tightens the bond between shields and strengthens the wall, forcing both shields back into the body of the hoplite on the left.

The official soundtrack to this blog.

I recently stumbled upon this band on youtube and have to support anyone who sings about Sparta.