Macedonian Soldier Stele

[Paullus Scipio]

Ruben wrote:

The thureos type is actually fairly rare in representational evidence of Hellenistic shielded cavalrymen. The aspis is by far the most common type found in the evidence where the type of shield carried can be discerned.

...If you look again, you'll notice I was referring to Macedonian cavalry, rather than Hellenistic cavalry generally.....but I have doubts about the statement that "The aspis is by far the most common type.." in any event.

One tends to generalise in short posts on a forum such as this - but it has its hazards, eh? :wink:

The Kazanluk tombs are from Seuthopolis, a city founded by the Thracian King Seuthes III around 320BC, or a little later. Since tombs are hardly likely to be among the earliest buildings, it follows that the tombs probably date after 300 BC - i.e. early third C BC.....

Shielded cavalry didn't invariably use javelins; there are quite a few representations of such cavalrymen carrying xysta, while the shieldless lancer all but disappears after the 3rd c. BC. What evidence do you have for their existence into the 2nd c. BC?

Quite a few representations of xystophoroi with shields? hock: I don't think I've come across any of those, at least any depictions that are unequivocally shielded 'xystophoroi'...either PM me or e-mail me with more information, since we are straying ever more off-topic......

As far as I am aware, there are unshielded 'xystophoroi', generally with body armour, and shielded cavalry with either 'longche' , javelins, [amendment]or the shorter thrusting spears -'Doru/Hastae'.....so I'm most interested.

Evidence for the second century ? As I said, the 'xystophoroi' in Seleucid service seem to become heavier armoured after Antiochus Megas' campaigns (210-206 BC) in the East against Parthians ( becoming 'cataphract' lit: 'covered in' i.e. fully armoured, but still unshielded from around 200 BC) By Magnesia (190 BC), most Seleucid heavy cavalry are unshielded up-armoured 'xystophoroi', increasingly called 'cataphract' - Polybius describes these. Livy (XXXVII.40) descibes the 'Hetairoi'/Companion cavalry at Magnesia as "with lighter protection for riders and mounts, but in other equipment not unlike the 'cataphracts' - i.e. very much like traditional 'xystophoroi'.(and of course the original 'Companions' define 'xystophoroi)

A Roman coin - a denarius minted in 121 BC by Q. Pilipus- clearly shows an un-shielded 'xystophoroi', often interpreted as celebrating ancestral deeds of the Third Macedonian War/Pydna (168) and the figure representing Perseus ( the Romans did not, AFIK, use 'xystophoroi', so if the figure is not Perseus, it must be a Greek/Hellenistic ally)

Will that do for starters? :wink: