I have not studied the battle of Faesulae in detail. I did not mention this battle because it involved a "Roman" side composed of hastily recruited etruscan and samnite allies led by a Praetor. They seem to have been ambushed and badly mauled, the allies seem to have been saved by the arrival of consular legions under Papus.
I don't know if there is any detailed studies or accounts of this battle but as I understand it it didnt have anything to do with roman consular regions of the time. Not to mention that ambushes dont really reflect the impact of arms and armour, I assume Samnites and Etruscans still fought as hoplites, would have had under other circumstances.
Umm, yes Triarii did fight as hoplites, Principes were in a transition phase of going from the hoplite spear to the Pila as main weapon and the Hastati were definately not a hoplite type soldier any more. I tend to think of them as hoplites with Pila hehe
) A bad habit of mine....
Btw, I thought the consensus was that the the "two" armies at Telamon, i.e. the Roman(two armies really..) and the Gaul, were pretty evenly matched with around 70 000 men on each side. Well, maybe the romans had a few thousand infantry more but that would hardly have been decisive when Gaul had ~20 000 cavalry and Rome ~5000-6000.
I think Polybius states that:
1.The Gaesatae fought with small shields and thus had problems with Roman velites
2.The Celtic swords tended to break on Roman armour
The reason why I go on and on about Celtic swords is that I have read what Peter Johnsson said about Celtic swords, after studying MANY. I posted the link above. He thinks that Polybius statement is not propaganda and find it reasonable, as I understood it. Celtic swords were not made for close rank fighting or armoured apponents.
The general idea that Celts invented mail have been criticized and from what I have read it is a shaky theory at best.
I hardly think that the Gauls had many chariots, even though they had 20 000 cavalry, and only the elite of the elite could afford the three horse policy I suspect. Then again the elite of the elite probably were differentiated, i.e. most societies recognize that leaders need more protection than "unimportant" men no? If so, the leaders perhaps would not loose status by using mail? Armour was unusual on Celts, they should have been able to armour themselves better if they wanted, I think.
There is no doubt in my mind that the Gauls had more discipline and organisation, generally, than we give them credit for.
I havent heard that about the celtic charge being developed to break a hoplite line, seems like a bad idea(phalanxes' strength was frontal defense) when they could have used their mobility to outflank the slow phalanx.
I hear that the only thing that required more "cohones" than a frontal assault on a phalanx shield wall is for infantry wo pikes to stand up to a charge of heavy cavalry. I dont know... and I have no intention to find out... :mrgreen: