Persian Invasion of 480 BC - articles

[Aryaman2]

I think what he is saying is that before you consider the siege train (this is extra supplies and what not for laying sieges, not necessarily the siege engines themselves), you have to realize how much logistics went into the regular supply train. The fact that you and I both read the same thing and interpreted a different meaning from it will illustrate a point I make further down this post.

Inaki, I think the reason that people aren't seeing eye-to-eye with you is that there is an equal amount of evidence contrary to what your ideas are trying to show. While it seems you have done your research, you seem to discount too many other facets in favour of others which suppport your theories. I think this is one of the main reasons you haven't made a convincing argument in this case.

Add to that is that there is too much "opinion" thrown around in this thread which are, I am sure based on references, but no-one seems to back much up. Some people have given specific book titles and what not, and that is very helpful. But saying I read "a document about such and such", or "a manuscript detailing this and that" does not prove where your sources are coming from. Nor does it allow anyone to cross-reference your claims and refute them, or provide another point of view.

What you may derive from one article, someone else may have a different idea or interpretation of the evidence. For example, you like to quote the pay logs of various armies and use those as evidence for troop numbers and whatnot, but how accurate are they? We live in the 21st century, and there are numerous reasons why modern records are inaccurate, either on purpose or accident.

So while you may be feeling frustrated, realize that there are no absolutes in the research you have done. It's not a math or a science that can be proven.

The post says "siege train similar to those shown on Assyrian reliefs" do you think he is not talking about siege engines?
Of course there is no absolutes, pay rolls and muster rolls can be inacurate, but they provide a picture much closer to reality than literary sources, that in the best of cases have taken their numbers from them, do you know any document more accurate than pay rolls and muster rolls, or their equivalent monthly returns for later ages?
So, what I try to set is a basic frame in which consider literary sources when they talk about numbers. Let´s see, you know that Herodotus is lying when he says 1.700.000, or 5 million Persians, but what would be a reasonable number and on what grounds? do you cut Herodotus figures by 10, 15, 20? Traditionally scholars either use numbers given by literary sources at face value or cut them arbitrarily, as I said I try to set a basic frame for reasonable numbers using a comparative method and taking into account logistics.