05-11-2005, 10:57 AM
I agree with Vincula, that we can't trust Homer on this. According to him, most of the named heroes at Troy were capable of hurling rocks it would have taken five men of homer's own time to lift, or other such superhuman stuff. Their ability to pierce armour doesn't imply that ordinary mortals could do it.
I suspect that people like Epaminondas were wounded before being killed and the historians only record the killing blow or the death itself. In my experience of fighting in Viking shieldwalls, you need to avoid the shield, rather than go through it and this is done either by feinting; relying on someone else to draw the shield out; or by wounding the opponent so that he loses control of his shield.
Perhaps we need to look at the thickness of actual metal cuirasses and consider how much protection they were likely to give. I really don't think they can have been very thick when they were to be worn by infantry all day in Mediterranean heat. I was in Crete in 1987 when people all over Greece were dying in the heat in ordinary clothes. I believe one of the chief benefits of metal armour was its ability to "turn" and "slip" blows, rather than the metal's ability to resist penetration directly, hence the popularity of war hammers in an age of complete armour; you don't cut with them, you "peck". And that is also the most effective way of using a spear, when it is carried overhand - you strike downwards in a stabbing motion like a heron spearing fish. (Getting all Shao-Lin, now!)
I suspect that people like Epaminondas were wounded before being killed and the historians only record the killing blow or the death itself. In my experience of fighting in Viking shieldwalls, you need to avoid the shield, rather than go through it and this is done either by feinting; relying on someone else to draw the shield out; or by wounding the opponent so that he loses control of his shield.
Perhaps we need to look at the thickness of actual metal cuirasses and consider how much protection they were likely to give. I really don't think they can have been very thick when they were to be worn by infantry all day in Mediterranean heat. I was in Crete in 1987 when people all over Greece were dying in the heat in ordinary clothes. I believe one of the chief benefits of metal armour was its ability to "turn" and "slip" blows, rather than the metal's ability to resist penetration directly, hence the popularity of war hammers in an age of complete armour; you don't cut with them, you "peck". And that is also the most effective way of using a spear, when it is carried overhand - you strike downwards in a stabbing motion like a heron spearing fish. (Getting all Shao-Lin, now!)
