11-30-2007, 12:33 AM
Nice post Jim!...all very pertinent and relevant. Polybius points out that the legionary is more 'flexible' than the phalangite, and not just on the battlefield, and that the Macedonian phalanx in all it's glory on the battlefield is rather a "one-trick pony".
...if we move off the Pydna battlefield and look at the campaign, Aemillius Paullus' seems to have had the better of the campaign, to which Perseus' reply was to offer battle on the relatively flat Pydna, which Paullus wisely refused ( why play to your enemy's strengths?), but the battle seems to have come about accidently ( a skirmish that escalated..)
It should be remembered too that Polybius was writing afterward with '20-20' hindsight, and seeking a simple 'explanation' of why the Romans seemingly always succeeded. A closer examination, thanks mainly to Poybius himself, reveals that, like all generalisations, it is not exactly true, but it was certainly 'flexibility', of mind as well as drill-wise, that underlaid Roman victory in each case, as I said ( and Polybius too ! ).
8)
The reality was not so simple, as Aemillius Paullus knew that afternoon at Pydna, when, against his intentions, he had been drawn into a battle with a Phalanx on flat ground, watched his legions pushed back, and stared defeat, disgrace and possibly death in the face.....
hock:
...if we move off the Pydna battlefield and look at the campaign, Aemillius Paullus' seems to have had the better of the campaign, to which Perseus' reply was to offer battle on the relatively flat Pydna, which Paullus wisely refused ( why play to your enemy's strengths?), but the battle seems to have come about accidently ( a skirmish that escalated..)
It should be remembered too that Polybius was writing afterward with '20-20' hindsight, and seeking a simple 'explanation' of why the Romans seemingly always succeeded. A closer examination, thanks mainly to Poybius himself, reveals that, like all generalisations, it is not exactly true, but it was certainly 'flexibility', of mind as well as drill-wise, that underlaid Roman victory in each case, as I said ( and Polybius too ! ).
8)
The reality was not so simple, as Aemillius Paullus knew that afternoon at Pydna, when, against his intentions, he had been drawn into a battle with a Phalanx on flat ground, watched his legions pushed back, and stared defeat, disgrace and possibly death in the face.....
hock:
"dulce et decorum est pro patria mori " - Horace
(It is a sweet and proper thing to die for ones country)
"No son-of-a-bitch ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country" - George C Scott as General George S. Patton
Paul McDonnell-Staff
(It is a sweet and proper thing to die for ones country)
"No son-of-a-bitch ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country" - George C Scott as General George S. Patton
Paul McDonnell-Staff
