10-17-2009, 11:17 PM
Quote:By "peltasts", do you mean the elite Hellenistic sarissaphoroi, or the earlier troop type ? I am inclined to agree with Luke Ueda-Sarson that traditional 'peltasts' had disappeared among Greeks, hence Alexander's light infantry were Thracian/Balkan types......he argues that 'mistophoroi' were a hybrid peltast/hoplite of the 'Iphicratean' style rather than the earlier strict division among Greek mercenaries of Xenophon's day into heavy spear and aspis armed 'Hoplites' and light javelin and 'pelte' armed'Peltasts'....
I mean the Hellenistic peltasts, i.e. the elite troops of the Antigonid army who were capable of fighting in ambushes but also of fighting in the Macedonian phalanx.
I have some issues with Luke's conclusions about Hellenistic infantry. It's clear from Asclepiodotus, Aelian and Arrian, at any rate, that peltast - at least in the military manual tradition - was a term which could be applied to anyone who wasn't a hoplite or phalangite, but who also wasn't one of the psiloi. So in that tradition, at least, thureophoroi, thorakitai, and elite peltasts were all "peltasts" (or the latter was at least when not fighting in the phalanx).
Ruben
He had with him the selfsame rifle you see with him now, all mounted in german silver and the name that he\'d give it set with silver wire under the checkpiece in latin: Et In Arcadia Ego. Common enough for a man to name his gun. His is the first and only ever I seen with an inscription from the classics. - Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
He had with him the selfsame rifle you see with him now, all mounted in german silver and the name that he\'d give it set with silver wire under the checkpiece in latin: Et In Arcadia Ego. Common enough for a man to name his gun. His is the first and only ever I seen with an inscription from the classics. - Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
