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How the Greeks got Battering Rams
#1
The Greeks were sophisticated in many ways, but they adopted the tortoise and battering ram 2000 years later than the rest of the civilized world. By the first century BCE, some Greeks and Romans were uttering shrill denials that barbarians had anything to do with siege engines, while others were telling vague stories about the Syrophoenicians or the Carthaginians.

My latest blog post brings together some of the Classical and Near Eastern sources.
Nullis in verba

I have not checked this forum frequently since 2013, but I hope that these old posts have some value. I now have a blog on books, swords, and the curious things humans do with them.
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#2
At the time the Greeks adopted the battering ram this "rest of the civilized world" was not much bigger than the Fertile Crescent, Egypt, and Carthage, so the Greeks were still rather early among all the peoples. ;-) Part of the reason why it took so long for them may have been that the ram was used in the Near East, as it seems, mostly for breaking down the mudbrick walls that were typical for regional fortifications. Going by the inlined angle of the rams that were deployed against the beleaguered city they seem to be used against the walls, not the gates where you would expect them to be swung horizontally to bring on their full force.

In Mycenean Greece, however, stone walls seem to be the gold standard, although mudbrick must have been used undoubtedly too (the much later Long Walls were still constructed in this fashion).
Stefan (Literary references to the discussed topics are always appreciated.)
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#3
(01-11-2020, 11:46 AM)Eleatic Guest Wrote: At the time the Greeks adopted the battering ram this "rest of the civilized world" was not much bigger than the Fertile Crescent, Egypt, and Carthage, so the Greeks were still rather early among all the peoples. ;-)
Well, the big question of this period is how the most backwards, piratical fringe of the civilized world in 800 BCE becomes sophisticated, wealthy, and influential across half of Eurasia by 300 BCE. And when we puzzle over that, its good to think about how late some very old technologies reached Greece, and about the stories of cultural exchange which our Roman sources do not want to repeat.

(01-11-2020, 11:46 AM)Eleatic Guest Wrote: Part of the reason why it took so long for them may have been that the ram was used in the Near East, as it seems, mostly for breaking down the mudbrick walls that were typical for regional fortifications. Going by the inlined angle of the rams that were deployed against the beleaguered city they seem to be used against the walls, not the gates where you would expect them to be swung horizontally to bring on their full force.
Yes, in archaic and classical Greece most fortifications were mud brick on a stone foundation, if they were archaeologically visible at all. They were built similarly to fortifications in the neighbouring cultures. So any engineer from Egypt or Syria could have plucked his lips, stared at a Greek site a bit, bumped some pebbles together on a counting board, and quoted how many days and how many men he would require to get over those walls ("but give me another week and a second ramp and I can bring those casualty figures down").

Or to put it another way, the first recorded use of a battering ram in Greece is only 110 years before Alexander's siege of Tyre ... how do things change so fast? (And the answer is probably "hiring a lot of Lydian and Phoenician and Syrian engineers whose Greek apprentices got named in Greek writers").
Nullis in verba

I have not checked this forum frequently since 2013, but I hope that these old posts have some value. I now have a blog on books, swords, and the curious things humans do with them.
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