The Makedonian phalanx -- why such depth?

[Paralus]

I’m returned….a little worse for wear and tear (in the words of Mick Jagger).

We are not disagreeing on much in this. My contention is that Polybios has, in his need to justly tear apart Kallisthenes, overlooked other possibilities. Firstly, Polybios' main concern is the "not more than fourteen stades" and so, for me, this is the battlefield.

AAs I understand it, you are postulating that the '16 deep' formation was in close order - but that flatly contradicts what Polybius says, namely that the Macedonian Phalanx was in open order when at this depth -"For with the proper intervals for marching order a stade, when the men are sixteen deep, will hold sixteen hundred, each man being at a distance of six feet from the next"

I do not find it strange that the Macedonian lined deployed into to close order as it debouched onto this “isosceles triangle” (to borrow Peter Green’s description of the field). It has, by the description we’ve been left, marched through a pass via a none too wide road onto a slowly widening coastal strip. The forces are clearly enumerated and the heavy infantry is in the van with the cavalry following. There will have been intelligence of what was in the field awaiting. It would appear that Alexander was intent on placing phalangite boots on the ground before covering his wings with cavalry.

At the approach of dawn he began to descend from the pass along the road; and as long as the space was narrow everywhere, he led his army in column, but when the mountains parted so as to leave a plain between them, he kept on opening out the column into the phalanx, marching one line of heavy armed infantry after another up into line towards the mountain on the right and towards the sea on the left.

The enemy’s cavalry (30,000!) along with attendant light infantry (20,000!!) are deployed across the river as the Macedonians come up the beach…so to speak.

You would say that 16 deep is the “normal marching order” for the phalanx and that 8 deep is, by implication, “close order”. Now, I have contended that the phalanx deployed in close order. There is the possibility that it did not but there is the possibility that it did as I do not see this as the “usual” situation. The army is marching from the pass (where it is likely no more than four to six in column – more likely four) and the infantry – the Macedonian heavy infantry alone – will have been some 3.6 - 5.5 kilometres long. Either way, it is of little moment as Alexander deploys his phalanx as the ground permits. When, at yet another “rest stop”, he reforms into eight deep, he does so – occupying some 1,500 yards of the available space – leaving some 600 or so yards on each wing for his cavalry and their attendant light troops.

[ Polybius has here chosen to refer to the 16 depth, because, as the manuals tell us, this was the standard depth of a Macedonian Phalanx. Note here that Polybius takes it as read that the stated depth applies to ‘open ’order, with each man on a six foot front…[/i]

Except that at 17.29.2-30.1 he contradicts that by describing the charge of the phalanx 16 deep:

For since, when it has closed up for action, each man, with his arms, occupies a space of three feet in breadth […] The consequence is that while the pikes of the second, third, and fourth ranks extend farther than those of the fifth rank, those of that rank extend two cubits beyond the bodies of the men in the first rank, when the phalanx has its characteristic close order as regards both depth and breadth […] From this we can easily conceive what is the nature and force of a charge by the whole phalanx when it is sixteen deep. In this case those further back and the fifth rank cannot use their pikes so as to take any active part in the battle.

So it is entirely possible that the phalanx, 16 deep, was deployed “closed up”.

The last point is that there exists no description of allied Greek hoplites forming a part of the heavy infantry line. All descriptions of the “majors” show the battle line made up of the same national forces. I have already listed Arrian’s description here which clearly enunciates Macedonian forces only and allows for the usual Agrianes with the cavalry wing (as well as Grecian peltasts), the Thracians and archers and other light armed to deal with those “behind” on the foothills.

Granicus:
Close to these (the cavalry of the right) were posted the Companions who were shield-bearing infantry under the command of Nicanor, son of Parmenio. Next to these the brigade of Perdiccas, son of Orontes; then that of Coenus, son of Polemocrates; then that of Craterus, son of Alexander; then that of Amyntas, son of Andromenes; finally, the men commanded by Philip, son of Amyntas.

Gaugamela:
Of the phalanx of Macedonian infantry, nearest to the cavalry had been posted first the select corps of shield-bearing guards, and then the rest of the shield-bearing guards, under the command of Nicanor, son of Parmenio. Next to these was the brigade of Coenus, son of Polemocrates; after these that of Perdiccas, son of Orontes; then that of Meleager, son of Neoptolemus; then that of Polysperchon, son of Simmias; and last that of Amyntas, son of Andromenes, under the command of Simmias, because Amyntas had been despatched to Macedonia to levy an army. The brigade of Craterus, son of Alexander, held the left end of the Macedonian phalanx, and this general commanded the left wing of the infantry. Next to him was the allied Grecian cavalry under the command of Erigyius, son of Larichus.

And on it goes enumerating the other cavalry units making up the left wing under Parmenio. In all battles the main battle line is held by the Macedonian national levy bracketed by its cavalry wings – often bolstered with archers and javelin men. Thus Polybios needs only to account for 12,000 heavy infantry – eight deep – in the main line. The others are off in the hills, out front with slings, javelins and bows (Curtius) or likely behind, as Jona has them in his description, in the event that the left fails to hold – as at Gaugamela. Those “off in the hills” are those troops we find amongst the right wing cavalry at Gaugamela (Agrianes and Greek light armed).

So then, it would seem, by Polybios’ own description a charge by a 16 deep phalanx – its normal depth – was something to behold. Further, it seems the phalanx did not have to reduce to eight deep to “close up for action”; it could do that 16 deep with the rear rankers adding their weight and so adding to “its force”.

Your “box” or “square” description of Gaugamela is intriguing. Devine? I’ve always leant towards Marsden myself. I cannot envisage the baggage in the centre of a battle ground. I believe the Greeks (assuming that it was them) were arrayed in the second line to protect the rear in the near certain event of a breakthrough or wing being enveloped before Alexander has rolled left. The wings are echeloned back from the main line. But that is another discussion….