04-21-2006, 02:52 PM
Imagine, your name is Xerxes and imagine you want to conquer Greece. Imagine an army of 200,000 soldiers and 8,000 horses (based on Herodotus, divided by ten; cf. Peter Greene and several other authors). Add 20,000 baggage animals (mules, dromedaries...). Then you need 400 metric ton of grain per day (880,000 lb, if I convert correctly). So you need a fleet of grain ships (number of sailors: very low; neglectable), and to protect your grain fleet, you add 650 triremes = 130,000 rowers = 175 ton of grain.
So, all in all you need 575 metric ton of grain per day.
Imagine you have one big granary in Miletus (no evidence; just a hypothesis but this is unimportant). Assume you need, on average, seven days for a ship to cross the Aegean from Miletus to the army. How many grain ships do you need?
Any help is appreciated. I can not even discover the tonnage of ancient grain ships.
(I may not be able to answer to postings here, because I am on a brief trip to Oxford.)
So, all in all you need 575 metric ton of grain per day.
Imagine you have one big granary in Miletus (no evidence; just a hypothesis but this is unimportant). Assume you need, on average, seven days for a ship to cross the Aegean from Miletus to the army. How many grain ships do you need?
Any help is appreciated. I can not even discover the tonnage of ancient grain ships.
(I may not be able to answer to postings here, because I am on a brief trip to Oxford.)
