01-18-2012, 10:13 PM
The description for the Spolades/Stolades appears in the Anabasis. And another tidbit of Xenophon where he mentions a Spartan by name who was killed while wearing his Spolas. Case closed. As you'll read, the term Lino thorax only appears a few times and it's not in the context that makes it ever clear it's more than a belly corselet. Xenophon's own description coupled with his further observation of his Pelopennesian infantry never seems to have ever encountered a linen anything! His references to the metal cuirass and the leather Spolas are sharply confined to the cavalry and infantry respectively.
"Soteridas of Sicyon said: "it's not fair, Xenophon. There you sit on your horse, and I struggle along under the weight of my shield." When Xenophon heard this he jumped down from his horse and pushed him out of his rank and took his shield from him and made his way with it as quickly as he was able. But he had his cavalry cuirass on too, so that he was overloaded. So he ordered those in front to lead on and those behind to pass him, and followed with difficulty. But the other soldiers struck Soteridas and threw stones at him and cursed him, until they forced him to take his shield and come on.
Clearly Xenophon was wearing the plate cuirass, and the foot soldierss were relying mainly on their shields, so Xenophon did not carry one on horseback, though (as it seems to have been customary for general officers) he had a shield-bearer to assist him when he led his men on foot. Some, at least, of the infantry certainly wore spolades, for Xenophon records the death of the Laconian Leonymus, shot in the side, through his shield and spolas, by a Kurdish cloth-yard arrow.
The Ten Thousand were not, as far as we can judge from our evidence, equipped differently from other Peloponnesians or Boeotians of the same period. And in Sicily too, at about the same period, Dionysius I of Syracuse provided body armour for his general, cavalry, and guards, but not for the rank-and-file infantry, when equipping an army to fight against Carthage..."
"Soteridas of Sicyon said: "it's not fair, Xenophon. There you sit on your horse, and I struggle along under the weight of my shield." When Xenophon heard this he jumped down from his horse and pushed him out of his rank and took his shield from him and made his way with it as quickly as he was able. But he had his cavalry cuirass on too, so that he was overloaded. So he ordered those in front to lead on and those behind to pass him, and followed with difficulty. But the other soldiers struck Soteridas and threw stones at him and cursed him, until they forced him to take his shield and come on.
Clearly Xenophon was wearing the plate cuirass, and the foot soldierss were relying mainly on their shields, so Xenophon did not carry one on horseback, though (as it seems to have been customary for general officers) he had a shield-bearer to assist him when he led his men on foot. Some, at least, of the infantry certainly wore spolades, for Xenophon records the death of the Laconian Leonymus, shot in the side, through his shield and spolas, by a Kurdish cloth-yard arrow.
The Ten Thousand were not, as far as we can judge from our evidence, equipped differently from other Peloponnesians or Boeotians of the same period. And in Sicily too, at about the same period, Dionysius I of Syracuse provided body armour for his general, cavalry, and guards, but not for the rank-and-file infantry, when equipping an army to fight against Carthage..."
Bill
