Men of Bronze: Hoplite Warfare in Ancient Greece (2 page)

PREFACE

DONALD KAGAN AND GREGORY F. VIGGIANO

The papers published in this volume resulted from a conference on early Greek hoplite warfare held at Yale University in April 2008. The idea for the conference grew out of a spirited debate that took place following a panel presentation at the American Philological Association’s annual meeting at San Diego in January 2007, “New Perspectives on Ancient Warfare.” From the audience, Gregory Viggiano argued in favor of the theses of Victor Davis Hanson’s
The Western Way of War
and
The Other Greeks
against the positions of Peter Krentz and Hans van Wees. These scholars later agreed to continue the debate in a formal setting. Viggiano then discussed with Donald Kagan the unique possibility of having the world’s leading scholars on the subject air out their differences face-to-face at Yale. Further discussions with Paul Cartledge helped bring about the Yale conference. The conference panels debated a variety of issues surrounding the hoplite orthodoxy and the attempts to revise it: (1) questions concerning the origins of the tactics and weapons employed by the Greek hoplite (heavily-armed infantryman), fighting in massed formation on behalf of his autonomous city-state (polis); (2) questions about the political, economic, and social significance of the new mode of fighting; and (3) questions regarding the impact hoplite warfare had on Greek culture in general. All these issues have in recent years been at the center of one of the liveliest and most important controversies in the fields of classical studies, ancient political history, and ancient military history.

We want to thank everyone who contributed to the success of the Yale conference, which was held at the Hall of Graduate Studies on the Yale campus. Our first concern in putting together an international workshop was making sure that the scholars would be willing to come and debate, so we are grateful to all the participants for sharing our enthusiasm for the idea. We were very fortunate to have Susan Hennigan’s superb assistance in arranging the travel and stays of the participants, and in taking care of all the logistics (meals, programs, audiovisual equipment, etc.) for the event. One scholar remarked that everyone got along so well because there was so much good food to eat. The panel sessions were well attended by faculty, undergraduate and graduate students from Yale, as well as faculty from Sacred Heart University, especially the Department of History. A number of scholars and graduate students from universities as far away as
the West Coast came to attend the sessions, in addition to people from the New Haven community. Therefore, we owe special thanks to International Security Studies (ISS) at Yale, as well as the Yale Classics Department; for without their kind generosity there would not have been any conference. We make special mention of Ted Bromund of ISS and his dedication to the project, and the support of Professor Christina Kraus, the chair of Yale Classics. Rob Tempio of Princeton University Press has given invaluable support and inspiration at every stage in the production of this volume.

INTRODUCTION

DONALD KAGAN AND GREGORY F. VIGGIANO

The study of ancient Greek warfare begins with what scholars might infer about fighting techniques from the archaeological remains of the late Bronze Age (1600–1100 BC). It appears that, similarly to the situation in the contemporary Near East, the war chariot was the main offensive arm of the king’s military. But during the chaos that attended the collapse of Bronze Age civilization, infantry seems to have become capable of breaking the charges of the palace’s chariot forces. The ensuing period from the eleventh to the eighth century, which scholars often call the Dark Age,
¹
is notable to the military historian for the introduction of iron weapons. However, to the ancient Greeks themselves this was the Age of Heroes, and the bard Homer was its most famous witness.

At its most basic level, the hoplite orthodoxy argues that critical changes took place in Greek warfare around 700 BC that had fundamental importance for the rise of the polis. Prior to that “revolution” in arms, armor, and tactics, the aristocrats dominated in war. They fought at long range with missiles and in close combat as individual “heroic” champions with swords. The main equipment they used included the short throwing spear, an open-face helmet, a round single-grip shield, and a sword. Since these heroic figures bore the brunt of battle in the protection of their communities, it followed that they had a monopoly on political power as well. The semidivine heroes of the
Iliad
give the most brilliant expression of the fighting style and ethos of this period. For example, there are the famous duels between the champions Menelaus and Paris, Hector and Ajax, and Achilles and Hector above all. Hector learned to be valiant always and fight far out in front of the others. Achilles was taught always to be the best and to be preeminent among men in order to win his own godlike glory. The consensus placed Homer in the second half of the eighth century and claimed that the
Iliad
provided an idealistic depiction of warfare before the polis.

But warfare changed with the introduction of the double-grip hoplite shield and the tight formation of the phalanx at the beginning of the seventh century. In the new fighting style the warrior substituted for his pair of throwing spears a single heavy thrusting spear. The new shield, which was much wider, heavier, and more difficult to wield than a single-grip model, only made sense in close ranks, where one soldier sought cover for his vulnerable right-hand side behind the redundant half of the shiel
of the neighbor on his right. Therefore, soldiers arranged themselves in orderly rows with about three feet between them and in columns about (usually) eight men deep. The phalanx required many more men and much greater cohesion than the open-order combat of the Dark Age. It was essential for each soldier to keep his assigned place in the formation in order to provide cover for his neighbor and to make it possible for his side to break through the opposing ranks of the enemy.

Whereas in the Dark Age the common soldiers fought as an unorganized, open, and fluid mass subordinate to the elite, the hoplites played a decisive role in the phalanx. Unlike the heroes in Homer’s epics who strive for individual honor, the hoplites in the martial poet Tyrtaeus’ elegies must hold their ground in the phalanx to win glory for the polis. The phalanx was unique in ancient warfare in that each soldier was a citizen of his polis and provided his own arms to fight in its defense. The hoplites comprised a middling stratum,
²
wealthy enough to afford their own panoply, but lacking the divine ancestry and large landholdings of the elite aristocrats. On the other hand, the newfound military importance of the hoplite put him in a position to demand greater political power from the aristocrat who now fought at his side and in an identical fashion. In some poleis, the hoplites supported an aristocrat as a tyrant to overthrow his oppressive peers. The hoplite revolution brought an end to narrow aristocracies and paved the way for the creation of democracy. The American Philological Association panel and discussion showed how closely the hoplite orthodoxy has become associated with the work of Victor Davis Hanson over the past two decades.
³
Notwithstanding the undeniable influence that Hanson’s
Western Way of War
and
The Other Greeks
have exercised in the field, the grand hoplite narrative has in fact taken shape over the course of more than 150 years.
⁴

George Grote in the 1846–1856 edition of his famous twelve-volume
History of Greece
gave the first full expression of what was to become the hoplite orthodoxy. His narrative of the rise of the polis includes all the hallmarks of the later narrative. A revolution in military tactics occurred at the same time as the political change in Greece from monarchies to republics. During this period the numbers and importance of the middling farmers rose for manning the ranks of the phalanx. At the same time, the Greeks transformed their political institutions from heroic kingdoms to narrow oligarchies in which eligibility for high office was based on a claim to divine or heroic descent. Grote considered the
Iliad
useless for historical accuracy, but a reliable witness of Greek warfare and society in the ninth century. The champions of Homer had enjoyed armor and fighting skills far superior to those of the common soldier in both long-range and close combat. During the eighth and seventh centuries, on the other hand, the phalanx became the driving force behind the political and cultural as well as the military developments in Greece. The hoplite, having an assigned place and duty in battle, transformed what had been an unorganized and ineffective mass into a disciplined group striving for a common victory.

The discipline of the phalanx, Grote points out, trained citizen soldiers to understand their civil and social rights and duties by making the polis their primary source of obligation. The common citizen did not acquire much political power at first. But the intellectual revolution that accompanied the emergence of the first oligarchies had
trained the Greek mind not to accept a subordinate role in the polis. A second revolution took place in the seventh century when in some poleis the hoplites supported a tyrant to break the power of the exclusive aristocracies. The age of tyrants marked the rise of the citizens of middling property, who might back a despot for a limited time. However, by the seventh century there was universal hatred for the idea of permanent hereditary rule, which worked against the principles of the polis. For Grote, the hoplite citizen soldier as an autonomous middling farmer effected the major political and social changes in the early polis. Hoplites, in whose mind the idea of equality was instilled through training for the phalanx, determined the direction of Sparta as well; but the Spartans avoided tyranny and had a subject population to work their fields. Athens, on the other hand, may have remained an oligarchy after Solon, but he gave the middling farmers enough power to oppose the aristocrats.

The field of scientific archaeology has made some of the most significant contributions to the hoplite question in the twentieth century. For example, Wolfgang Helbig in 1909 used the earliest datable finds of hoplite arms and equipment to determine when the Greeks first adopted the phalanx. The appearance of the phalanx in art, the Protocorinthian Chigi vase in particular, gave the basis for Martin Nilsson’s 1929 classic statement of the hoplite orthodoxy.
⁵
Lorimer in 1947 became the first English scholar to employ the monuments, vase painting above all, to date the origins of the phalanx. Grote had had to rely on Homer’s epics alone to discuss early Greek warfare and the rise of the polis. Scholars could now use actual finds not only to be more precise in their arguments. They could also provide the framework for more nuanced arguments and disagreements. Nilsson, for instance, thought that the martial elegies of Tyrtaeus were inconclusive for proving the existence of the phalanx in the seventh century, since the poet mentions foremost fighters (
promachoi
), reminiscent of Homer’s champions. However, the round shields of the figures depicted in art and of the lead figurines dedicated at the temple of Artemis Orthia in Sparta seemed to leave no doubt.
⁶
The phalanx may have taken time to develop; perhaps the transition lasted until the period of the Chigi vase in the mid-seventh century. But the census classes of Solon showed that the principle of having citizens provide their own arms to defend the polis in return for political privileges was well established by the early sixth century. Therefore, Nilsson reasoned that the practice must have begun much earlier.

For Lorimer, the single structural change involving the replacement of the round shield slung on a telamon marked the end of the long-range fighting of the eighth century.
⁷
The substitution of the single central handgrip for a central armband of metal (
porpax
), through which the hoplite thrust his forearm up to the elbow, and a handgrip (
antilabe
), which he grasped with his left hand, just inside the rim of the shield, created a shield suited for only one form of combat. Whereas the single-grip shield had been easy to maneuver, the double-grip shield restricted the hoplite to the close confines of the phalanx, which afforded him maximum protection as long as the entire formation stood firm. The new formation led the soldier to substitute the throwing spears of the Homeric hero for a single heavy thrusting spear as well. Lorimer dated this momentous change to about 675 BC. She argued that artists in Corinth and Athens at the time depicted hoplite equipment and the tight formations that
characterized the phalanx. In addition, there were the lead figurines of the warriors in hoplite armor from Sparta to confirm the date. Lorimer accounted for the anomalies of the lyric poets by positing that they drew on epic diction and that the extant poems contained interpolations.

Like Grote, both Nilsson and Lorimer had connected the early Greek tyrants with the emergence of the hoplite middle class. A seminal study in 1956 by Andrewes, moreover, applied to the tyrants Aristotle’s theory on how political systems in Greece changed from aristocracies to democracies. The most important element was military strength. The early poleis relied on cavalry to defend the state, which only the wealthy could afford. The next stage involved the middling farmers possessing enough wealth to provide their own hoplite arms. The final stage of democracy and naval supremacy gave political power to those who rowed the ships, the landless poor. Prior to that, however, Andrewes argued that hoplite revolutions played a crucial role in transferring power from narrow aristocracies to a much broader class of citizens. Aristotle himself does not say that the hoplites backed the tyrants in their struggles against their peers, but Andrewes found it impossible that no connection existed. He details the rise of the tyrants from Cypselus to Peisistratus. To compete with its neighbors and stave off civil war, polis after polis adopted the phalanx and yielded power to the citizens that manned its ranks. The hoplites drove the tyrants from power and created broad oligarchies in their place.