Men of Bronze: Hoplite Warfare in Ancient Greece (49 page)

Which branch of war mattered most to the Vikings? Clearly, in the long run, the overseas campaigns and raids counted for much more than the dynastic wars within the Baltic and the North Sea. Seaborne expeditions, by vastly increasing Viking wealth,
territory, and contacts with the outside world, did more to shape Viking warfare, society, and culture than did the conflicts between the rival kingdoms. As it was in Scandinavia from AD 800 to 1000, so it had been, I would suggest, in Archaic Greece.

If one considers the impact made by rovers, raiders, and mercenaries on ancient Greek economy, society, and culture, as well as the number of “man-hours” involved in their professional careers, the overseas campaigns undertaken by soldiers of fortune clearly constituted the “main event” of Greek military history in the seventh century BC. By contrast, battles between Greek city-states appear to have been in this early period a sporadically performed and—always excepting the Spartan conquest of Messenia—rather unproductive sideshow.

Hoplite Origins: Of Halls and
Hetairoi
, Ships and Shields

In his book
The Other Greeks
, Hanson observes that the early city-states of Greece owned few warships. He reasons that since the Greek polis was essentially agrarian, and since farmers by nature distrust ships and the sea, modern scholars can rule out “overseas involvement”
⁵²
as the stimulus for military or cultural innovations. However, ships and seafarers often appear in early Greek art, and the Assyrian documents show that Greek ships were venturing regularly to the eastern Mediterranean in the eighth century BC. The nearly contemporaneous waves of Greek settlement expeditions to coastal sites from Asia Minor to Sicily also presuppose the existence of large fleets.

As far as the eighth century BC is concerned, it is indeed hard to believe that any Greek polis possessed a state-owned fleet. But if city-states could not provide ships for overseas campaigns and colonization, then who did? A new evaluation of archaeological evidence from the earliest overseas settlements suggests that ambitious individuals, not city-states, were the driving force behind eighth-century Greek expansion.
⁵³
In all probability, the owner of every
naus
or longship in the Greek world before the age of the tyrants was an individual aristocrat or an aristocratic clan. No one else would have had the resources needed to acquire the raw materials, compensate the shipbuilders, protect and maintain the finished vessel, and assemble the crew of rowers that was required to propel the ship on its voyages. (A pirate or
leistos
could have performed the same functions, but the occupation of pirate chief may have been no more than a temporary role assumed by opportunistic aristocrats.)

In the eighth century the Greek city-state was only beginning its process of evolution. At that time the upper end of Greek society still centered on a much more ancient focal point: the aristocratic feasting hall. Here, the owner of an ancestral estate displayed his riches and power. Standard equipment included iron firedogs for the open-air roasting of spitted meats—forerunners of modern Greek souvlaki. The firedogs were often forged in the shape of long, low warships with pointed rams, and were so highly prized that they were often buried with their owners.
⁵⁴
The fires banked under the spits made these halls “smoke-filled rooms” where deals and destinies were decided. As the assembled men accepted the food and wine, they also tacitly
recognized the paternal and dominant status of the aristocrat who was the founder of the feast. They became bound to him as
hetairoi
or companions.

The poet Alcaeus from Mytilene, brother of Nebuchadnezzar’s champion Antimenidas, composed a vivid description of one such great hall where young Greeks could “get on board” and prove their worth through prowess in fighting.

The great hall [
mégas dómos
] is ablaze with bronze; ranks of bright helmets cover the ceiling and spill white horsehair crests, ornamentation for masculine heads. Glistening metal greaves, legs’ rampart against the arrow’s force, hang on the wall on unseen pegs. Fresh linen corselets and hollow shields clutter the floor; here are blades from Chalcis; here, belts in abundance and tunics. From the moment we took on this job [
ergon
], these are things we could not forget.
⁵⁵

The
ergon
or “work” that called for the distribution of these arms and weapons must have been an enterprise that, if successful, would increase the wealth and fame of every man involved. As for the personality, background, and worldview of the aristocrat who was tempted away from his inherited lands, we can turn to Homer’s
Odyssey
for a vivid portrait. The speaker is a fictional Cretan (one of Odysseus’ own false identities), the illegitimate son of an aristocrat named Castor, who shared with his half-brothers in the division of the estate after his father’s death.

To me they gave a very small portion, and allotted a dwelling. But I took to me a wife from a house that had wide possessions, winning her by my valor, … Such a man was I in war, but labor in the field was never to my liking, nor care of a household, which rears comely children, but oared ships were ever dear to me, and wars, and polished spears, and arrows…. For before the sons of the Achaeans set foot on the land of Troy, I had nine times led warriors and swift-faring ships against foreign folk, and great spoil continually fell to my hands…. Thus my house at once became rich, whereupon I became feared and honored among the Cretans…. then to Egypt did my spirit bid me voyage with my godlike companions [
hetároisin
], when I had fitted out my ships with care. Nine ships I fitted out, and the host [
laós
] gathered speedily. Then for six days my comrades [
hetaîroi
] feasted, and I gave them many victims.
⁵⁶

As Homer reminds us in this passage, the Greek aristocrat needed a following of armed companions or
hetairoi
, not only for the sake of his own prestige and glory, but also for very practical purposes of security, survival, and military success. He and his family attracted these followers by offering them hospitality, sustenance, entertainment (including the singing of bards), weapons, and a share in the profits. The existence of a common source for shields and other arms—namely, the aristocratic leader, who also patronized smiths, bronze workers, and other craftsmen—may help account for the startlingly uniform appearance of early hoplite companies in Greek art. Fortune-seeking young men were eager to find a place in such a retinue, for the great halls were jumping-off places for all sorts of opportunities. The hosts planned overseas expeditions not only for warfare but also for trade and new settlements, ceremonial
visits to guest-friends, and religious missions to remote sanctuaries. Homer admired the men who crowded into these noble halls, provided they honored their obligations. Hesiod, the farmer-poet of the
Works and Days
, despised them.

Some seaborne expeditions involved coastal raiding, piracy, and mercenary service abroad—the domain of the soldier of fortune. Because early Greek warships were galleys propelled by rowers—thirty, fifty, or even more being required for each vessel—the owner of the ship had to attract large numbers of men for every expedition. A company consisting of an aristocratic leader and his followers would launch one or more
makra ploia
or “long ships” from a beach near the great hall. In these galleys, which were rowed
auteretai
(by the soldiers themselves), the adventurers set out on their voyages. The men formed a “company” in both senses of the English term—a fellowship of kindred spirits, and an entrepreneurial partnership.

Once aboard, the soldiers hung their circular shields along the ship’s railings, making a fearsome and very Viking-like show of strength. Round shields are ideal for use at sea, as they have no sharp corners to chip or cause damage or injury. Unlike long oblong shields (which are in other respects better suited to phalanx formations), round shields can also be lifted clear of the water as the men wade to the beach. Assyrian artists depicted Phoenician warships with rows of circular shields in the eighth century. As noted earlier, Vikings followed the same tradition. On reaching land, Vikings typically formed a
schildborg
or “shield wall” for the initial collision with the defending enemy force. Among Greek soldiers of fortune, the Athenian commander Iphicrates shows exactly how the maneuver was carried out.

Iphicrates was sailing with 100 thirty-oared ships near Phoenicia, where the beach was covered with standing water. When he saw the Phoenicians marshaling on the shore, he gave orders, when he raised the signal, for the steersmen to drop anchor from the stern and to make the landing in formation, and for each of the soldiers [
stratiôtais hoplisamenous
] to lower himself armed into the sea at his oar and to preserve this formation. As soon as he [i.e., Iphicrates] thought the water shallow enough, he raised the signal for disembarking. The thirty-oared ships landed in formation because of their anchors, and the men, throwing themselves in formation before the ships, advanced. The enemy, amazed at their formation and daring, began to flee. Iphicrates’ men in pursuit killed some, captured others, seized a great deal of plunder, which they put on the ships, and encamped on land.
⁵⁷

This forming of a phalanx in the sea belongs to the fourth century BC, but similar “D-Day” and Normandy-like conditions must have faced Iphicrates’ predecessors three centuries before, and may have generated the same response from those earlier “Bronze Men.” Certainly it is a truth, universally acknowledged, that a landing on a beach held by enemy troops constitutes one of the most difficult of all military challenges.

Once formed at the sea’s edge with the purpose of forcing a landing, the phalanx could maintain itself on land whenever the enemy continued to challenge the invading Greeks. The poet Mimnernus (c. 630–600 BC) describes such a scene.

So the men of the
basileus
charged when he gave the word of command, making a fence with their hollow shields.
⁵⁸

The
basileus
(king or lord) in this passage may have been either the aristocratic leader of the Greek force, or the foreign monarch who had engaged them as mercenaries. On flat plains the early hoplites came into their own, and could successfully withstand attacks of a “home team” composed of archers, slingers, lightly armed infantry, cavalry, or even chariots. The horses of Asiatic and Egyptian armies would have been no more able to break the hoplites’ wall of glittering bronze shields than the horses of Marshal Ney’s French cavalry were able to face the squares of British bayonets at Waterloo. Should a horse have come too close, even a lone hoplite stood a chance of fending the animal off with his heavy convex shield, or even inflicting a wound with a slash of the shield’s blade-like rim. Once the enemy forces were driven back behind their city walls, the hoplites’ shields provided superior protection from stones and missiles as the Greeks attacked the gates and fortifications.

To sum up, the Near Eastern and Egyptian evidence suggests that ambitious Greeks may have initially trained as heavily armed fighting men for success in raiding. Ultimately they discovered (or their erstwhile opponents discovered) that, armed and trained as hoplites, they were supremely desirable as soldiers for hire by monarchs throughout the eastern Mediterranean. The aristocratic Greek leader presumably distributed the loot from raids, and negotiated with foreign kings and chiefs for mercenary pay and shares of booty. Rich with these winnings, an upwardly mobile young Greek might dream of one day presiding in his own great hall, and commanding his own warship filled with
hetairoi
.

Greece was a harder land than most. Starting in the eighth century, its sons began to surpass all other dwellers around the Mediterranean in sheer physical strength and toughness, the ability to wield the heavy hoplite arms and carry them over long distances, and a fierce and battle-ready mentality. The cost of this mastery was the physical training required to manage the shield for long stretches of time. From this necessity sprang the masculine Greek mania for physical fitness, the idiosyncratic Greek pride in displaying and depicting their muscular, naked physiques, and the corresponding scorn for the stereotypical pale, soft, untanned bodies of Asiatics. As men who had developed a marketable skill, these early Greeks resembled not only Vikings but also the Swiss pike-men of the Middle Ages, likewise famous as mercenaries, and likewise native to a harsh and rocky homeland. The Ionian mercenaries serving Near Eastern and Egyptian rulers founded a Greek tradition that endured through the campaigns of Xenophon and the Ten Thousand down to the “world wars” of Alexander the Great and his successors.

After the loot from the shore raids and captured towns was divided, the adventurers of early times reboarded their ships for the return voyage to Greece. The homeward passage was enlivened by celebratory toasts and drinking bouts. Archilochus is our eyewitness to the scene.

But come, make many a trip with a cup through the thwarts of the swift ship, pull off the covers of the hollow casks, and draw the red wine from the lees; we won’t be able to stay sober on this watch.
⁵⁹

Archilochus and his fellow soldier-poets expressed a uniquely Greek consciousness of the individual as master of his destiny. The peculiar nature of the newborn Greek polis, so much at variance with the ancient Near Eastern model, reflected the entrepreneurial spirit and worldview of these far-voyaging military professionals as they returned home with their hard-won riches, or created new Greek communities abroad. Their successful exploits became an economic engine that pumped vast wealth and cultural baggage from more advanced cultures into the formerly impoverished Greek heartland. By the sixth century BC these soldiers of fortune had extended the limits of the Greek
oikumene
from the coast of Iberia to the Black Sea, and from the Libyan desert to the northern lagoons of the Adriatic. The armed adventurers of the eighth and seventh centuries BC may have been the true progenitors of Classical Greek civilization. I believe that they were also the first hoplites.