06-01-2005, 07:52 PM
Herodotus may have been well informed about Athenian casualties, perhaps from documents existing in his time. This does raise a question, though: who counted the Persians, and how would Herodotus get such numbers? As Aryaman2 noted, even if the army was supposed to be 500,000 (or 5 million), it would not be that number when finally mustered, and would be less by the time it reached Thermopylae. The nicely rounded figures (to the 10,000) cannot correpsond to the exact number of men eating rations/carrying weapons on a given day.
We know from medieval data (i.e. 14th century England) that the numbers of men called up always exceeded the number assembled, and the numbers gathered always exceeded the number at a day of battle.
Another question- if the final defeat of the Persians led to over 250,000 corpses (I think my math is right), what happened to them? They had to be disposed of, since the battle took place in an inhabited area; leaving them to rot would have produced some health problems. Burning this many bodies would have taken a stupendous amount of wood - and the logistics of amassing that much wood are difficult to envision. If they were buried, one can imagine the labor involved - and all quarter-million corpses left no trace, nor did their graves.
One other point: the calculations about losses en route to Thermopylae likely severely underestimate the losses. The problem is, once the numbers of men exceed the readily available food, all of the excess men starve. If a valley can feed 100,000 men marching through it, then 200,000 men are on half-rations, and 400,000 men are on quarter-rations. 400,000 starving men are likely to suffer huge losses from disease - far more than 200,000 men who are hungry, and compared with minimal losses for 100,000 men. If the army were increased to 600,000 men, it is likely that pretty much all the extra 200,000 will die. The logistical problem is quasi-exponential once the carrrying capacity of the land is exceeded.
We know from medieval data (i.e. 14th century England) that the numbers of men called up always exceeded the number assembled, and the numbers gathered always exceeded the number at a day of battle.
Another question- if the final defeat of the Persians led to over 250,000 corpses (I think my math is right), what happened to them? They had to be disposed of, since the battle took place in an inhabited area; leaving them to rot would have produced some health problems. Burning this many bodies would have taken a stupendous amount of wood - and the logistics of amassing that much wood are difficult to envision. If they were buried, one can imagine the labor involved - and all quarter-million corpses left no trace, nor did their graves.
One other point: the calculations about losses en route to Thermopylae likely severely underestimate the losses. The problem is, once the numbers of men exceed the readily available food, all of the excess men starve. If a valley can feed 100,000 men marching through it, then 200,000 men are on half-rations, and 400,000 men are on quarter-rations. 400,000 starving men are likely to suffer huge losses from disease - far more than 200,000 men who are hungry, and compared with minimal losses for 100,000 men. If the army were increased to 600,000 men, it is likely that pretty much all the extra 200,000 will die. The logistical problem is quasi-exponential once the carrrying capacity of the land is exceeded.
Felix Wang
