RomanArmyTalk

Full Version: The accuracy of game terms?
You're currently viewing a stripped down version of our content. View the full version with proper formatting.
In my online research for a project of mine I have run across all kinds of terms in articles and forum posts that tend to be very much unsourced. These are usually on forums dedicated to table-top gaming or game modification. I was wondering how accurate a lot of these terms are and where they can be sourced. If you don't mind I'd like to run some by you:

Hysteroi
Pheraspides
Phyletichoi
Deuteroi
Paraktioi
Aichmetai

I am sure people got these terms from somewhere, but I have a feeling they are being stretched quite a bit in order to make them into actual troop-types.
I have no clue on this but perhaps the translation of some of them might be useful to you?
Hysteroi = The Last
Pheraspides = Shield bearers
Phyletichoi = ?
Deuteroi = The Second
Paraktioi = Coastal
Aichmetai = Bearing aichmes (blades/spears)
Khaire
Giannis
The translation of Giannis is excellent.

Yet you will see use of many poetic terms (some Homeric i.e Aichmetai)for the creation of fantastic units for digital games.

"Phyletichos" comes from an inscription if memory serves me right.

Kind regards
Right, it seems like a lot of people try to come up with new and interesting troops for their table top armies or for their video games and grasp at just about any term they find in the ancient literature and make a troop-type out of it.
The word aichmophoroi is a real Greek word used by Herodotus and meaning "spearmen" or "bodyguards" (literally "spear-bearers", a translation of a Persian word). See Herodotus 1.103.1; 5.49; 7.40.41; 7.103.5 and an article by Nicholas Sekunda in Archaeologische Mitteilungen Aus Iran Vol. 21. I don't recall seeing aichmetai anywhere, but I can't read Greek.
Probably got it from here:
http://openlibrary.org/b/OL17168075M/vi ... s_of_power

But the author heavily quotes Homer who uses the term to describe peoples skilled in spear use.

Kind regards