Friendly fire (don\'t use your dory underhanded in a phalanx)

[Robert Vermaat]

First, let me thank you guys for piping in and in fact thank you for the work you guys and Stephanos are doing. I know you spend a lot of time and money on this and don't recieve the credit you deserve in unraveling these questions.

But of course! Thank you!

Two - this grip maximizes the length of the shaft. An overhand grip is only possible roughly in the middle of the shaft, this one allows you (by tucking the end under your armpit) to get the best reach. We use this because we have the complaint by Syrianus in mind that the soldiers found their spears to be too short against cavalry, and this might be part of an answer.

I do love when my predictions are verified. How much of your spear shaft extends back beyond you, or is the end of the spear under your arm?

I think this picture illustrates it better: the spear butt can be even closer held, but the main thing is balancing it with your elbow. You see that my shield cover my body from my ocreae to my shoulder, and when I crouch a bit this cover me from chin to shins.


This one shows how the spear is in fact lower than the top of the shield (the spear should ideally rest on the rim of the shield), while the other shows how the arm protruted with an overhand grip:

Three - It's a matter of protection. Where an overhand grip would expose your arm, this does not, and it allows you to raise your scutum to cover your the lower part of your face. I realize that our LR scuta are larger than your hoplite shields, and that may also account for a difference.

This is probably a bit complex, with the amount of coverage changing during the strike and recovery. It would be nice to have video from the front of warriors doing both to see this. I thought that the overhand grip, allowing the spear to be held higher, would allow the shield to be raised higher as well.

There's no need for that. We can remain covered by our shield at all times and do not need to raise it more.

I'm not sure how much different that would be from your situation, but I think we do not need to be too agile with the spears because our enemies are either heavy cavalry or similarly hiding behind large shields.

Was the driving force behind the adoption of this formation by the later Romans the need to fend off cavalry? I am interested in the evolution of various shield walls, for I think they are functionally far more different than generally accepted.

We do not know that for sure. We have only Syrianus to account for that (cavalry), but somehow there's a development during the 3rd century that ends up like us. Our course it's not new - Arrian proves that it belonged to the Roman battle theories, but the emphasis shifts. It's surely possible that it was the enemy from across the Danube that developed the Roman shield wall, but it might also be civil wars - we always tend to look at an enemy, but overlook what the effects are of similarly equipped forces facing each other. The Romans always loved missiles, so maybe larger shields and a shieldwall were the Roman answer to that Roman threat.

I think the guys in the picture bend the 1st rank will also have a problem with that overhand grip. Especially the ones in ranks 3 and 4 (and I think that you had deeper formations than that, am I right?) will experience problems when the 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranks have to level their spears - the end will no doubt get in the face of the men behind them. How do you cover that problem?

We always have to remember that hoplites had a long history, but hoplites by the end of the 5th c, which is the usual default period when discussing hoplites, were using spears that did not balance in the middle, but much closer to the rear. This limited the length of shaft poking behind them and helped to keep rear rankers safe. I notice that your spears need to be held in the middle. Is there a possibilty of such back-weighting in your weapons as well?

No counterweight for us. I've never seen anything like it. But our spears are shorter I think (7 to 9 foot) and may not have needed it and still be of effective length.

Also, there is some evidence that only the first two ranks of hoplites used their spears in combat. This too keeps the formation simpler and safer.

We know the first 4 ranks all had similar spears, 3 using them underarm and the 4th stabbing overhand.