Othismos: Classical vs Crowd Theory Othismos

[PMBardunias]

Yes, it is not at odds with any theory. You guys are more concerned about the stance and I about the order of things. But as a parameter, rank cohesion should be a factor in any experiments about the most effective othismos stance. You could propose, I guess, that your "crowd theory" could also be applied as a stance to only be implemented to gain one or two steps and then stop the pressure, why not?

As I have said before there is no "crowd-stance". There is only a crowd and whatever stance they get into when pushing in unison. What seems to keep getting confused is that my description of what a phalanx would look like when in full othismos is being taken as starting condition for othismos. It is like my saying that when you ride a motorcycle your hair gets blown back, so someone sits on an immobile bike and applies a hair dryer to his hair to make it look like he's moving. The process is what is important, not the form.

The reason stance is critical though, is that the stance your files are in will indicate the amount of force transfered. Just like coins could be stacked flat on a table one on top of another, hoplites can stack frontally. It is concievable that you can place a coin standing on its edge on a table, then stack a whole tower of coins edge to edge. This is analogous to stacking hoplites side-on. Under exactly the right conditions this can work, but any slight deviation from pushing straight down collapses the whole tower. For this reason I do not believe it can have been used in full othismos.

Now if we found a lost text by Xenophon describing side-on pushing in detail, this would pretty much cause me to disbelieve in othismos as we know it. The reason is that a crowd of hoplites face-on can produce, and more importantly survive, pressures that may not have been possible for any other troop type. A phalanx side-on cannot do much that was not also done by a great many other cultures. If hoplites did not do something that a later shield wall could not, then the special designation of "othismos" becomes frivolous, and the phalanx is simply a wall of shields that pushes against its opposite at times an might even find itself acting a bit crowd-like for short periods like every other shield wall in history.

It is not a question of applying a "crowd" to gain one or two steps and reduce pressure, what you describe is what has to occur in a crowd. If you want to advance any faster, you have to link together such steps, which leads to a shuffling advance, but even here the pressure reduces as you advance.

Othismos did not only happen when both phalanxes agreed to it. I believe that hoplites would have some kind of countermeasures which might have included a counterothismos of sorts but in many cases this would have happened if the protostates were not constantly concerned with his place among the ranks and at the same time able to keep it.

The transition from doratismos to othismos is one of the most uncertain phases on this type of battle. It is unclear exactly how the lines came together, (piecemeal, all in unison?) or how the foes could counter such a move to keep out of othismos. Obviously it need not happen the same way each time. My feeling is that the only way to avoid othismos is to be willing to give ground, or get some sarissa.

Actually those overlaps cannot really stop you from exiting the line if too much force is exerted upon you or if you exert too much force, they mostly remind you when you do. I had no problem exiting the line, but one could argue that we were not tight enough in the formation. I don't think we were and this is also an aspect worth researching, how much force is necessary to break the lines in close order (60 cm per man) with the use of an average (D 80+ cm) aspis and an overlap of something like 20 cm. My guess is (from my experience), not really much. With the overlap you are hindered just enough to open yourself to the enemy, but if pushing forward, it can't really stop you if for any reason the force you exert forward is greater than the force exerted by the man on your right (maybe because he meets with a greater resistance than you).

In a true crowd this does not happen because you are all acting too much like one big fluid mass. You would have to really want to do it to make it happen. You touched on the most important thing about overlapping shields, they provide what we call "local information". This is close range, touching, that gives you knowledge of exactly where you are compared to the rank at all times. It is very similar to the type of information used by fish schools and bird flocks to keep such perfect order as they move in groups.

Also the fabled step backwards could also be used to help such instances happen. You mentioned a "Thessalian backstep" or something? Where did you find it in the sources? We have talked about it in the past but I am not aware of any mentioning of something like that being described as at tactic in primary sources.

Once actually in othismos, there would be no room to step back- the whole file would have to do so in unison. But such a feignt could be used as a man attempted to close with you to begin othismos because the file could be more opened. The Thessalian feignt comes from Euripides description of combat between two men in "the Phoenician women" about line 1415.