Macedonian Soldier Stele

[Paullus Scipio]

Carefull there Paullus: you're taking on the glow of the religious "only I know the truth..."

....that's a bit snide and uncalled for....and one of the silliest things you've posted!....to state the obvious, the whole point of posting is to encourage discussion and elicit information that one doesn't have, in order to expand one's views.... :roll: :roll:

I’m afraid that what Paul Mac has written above is a clear misrepresentation of the passage in Polybios (which, I note, is not referenced). Polybios (18.29.1-2) clearly states that the length of the sarissa had altered:

It is not a "misrepresentation" at all ! We may trust Polybius for his own day, but hardly for whatever story he had heard about the 'original design' when we have the contemporary Theophrastus. I agree with Connolly here....to refer to Polybius' obviously unreliable '16 cubits originally' simply causes un-necessary confusion and 'muddies the waters' to no end...or rather, just for mischief ! :x

Clearly the existence of shorter sarissae is implied by such a statement......It is often assumed that in the years following Alexander’s death that the sarissa – in something akin to an arms race – lengthened due to sarissa-armed phalanxes engaging one another. I still think this makes sense and that eventually, in Greece where such confrontations would appear to be less common (the Spartans, for example, not adopting the formation until the time of Sellasia), it came back to a more manageable length?

That would certainly be a reasonable hypothesis - but there is no evidence at all for it, or for Polybius' "16 cubits", and against the idea is Theophrastus, and the fact that when the 'sarissa/pike' was revived in late mediaeval/renaissance times, it's maximum length was not much more than 20 feet......

It is also worth noting that Borel Noguera, as noted in the Hatzopoulos / Juhel paper (n 42, p113), has demonstrated that the term sarissa was a general term in the Macedonian language for “lance” and was not used to exclusively denote the infantry pike.

..that idea is based on the fact that there were Macedonian cavalry 'sarissaphoroi'/pike carriers, who clearly weren't wielding 18 foot pikes or anything close to that (contra Markle's views)...but it is equally possible that to the slangy Greek/Makedones, it was merely a nickname for the Macedonian light cavalry properly called 'Prodromoi' who like their Macedonian heavy brethren, were armed with a 12ft 'xyston'......and that technically the true 'sarissa' was the 18-19 ft infantry pike.

What is interesting is that it is the cavalry guard only who are xystophoroi and that the hetairoi, who are described separately, are not carrying the xyston as Diodorus clearly makes the distinction.

Possibly, but I don't think it necessarily follows that just because two distinct units are referred to, they were necessarily differently armed. There is nothing to suggest they didn't carry the 'xyston'.....in fact there is no hint as to how the 'Hetaroi'/Companions were armed in this passage. The fact that the cavalry action is described with the generic term 'fighting was with spears' which also might indicate that the various units were differently armed, but that is certain anyway, because it included 'Tarantines'.( "most of which were shattered" might be a clue that most of these were 'long lances'/xysta) ......

I too agree with the words of John Conyard above. Personally (and I’m no rider), I find it difficult to conceive of a rider – at the gallop – successfully wielding a lance over twelve or so feet long.

...although Connolly demonstrated that a lance/xyston up to 15 ft long could be wielded, as per the sources, I would agree with you and John here ( I am an infrequent rider, but have tried 'tent-pegging' with a 9ft lance, and that was extremely difficult, and I would say , impossible with anything longer, so I reckon 12ft to be pretty close to a practical limit for accuracy against a man-sized target....FWIW).

It is noteworthy that mediaeval lances were seldom more than 10 ft in length, carried by shielded cavalry ( though with handier kite shields) .