Monday, 5/4: The Roman Army; The Second Macedonian War and the War with Antiochus

The Roman Army

• Digression: Romans and elephants
  
  • in the first encounters with Pyrrhus in the 270's, the Romans didn't deal at all well with the elephants, and in fact it was Pyrrhus' elephants that won him some of his victories
  • Romans attempted to deal with elephants by fighting on ground that was unfavorable to elephant deployment; pressing an engagement fast to decide the battle before the elephants could be brought into action
  • ultimately learned to deal with elephants by trying to disable the drivers, or harm the elephants enough to put them into a panic (as at Beneventum 275), or even disturbed the elephants with a pandemonium of shouts and trumpet-blasts (as at Zama against Carthage in 202). Elephants that couldn't be routed would be allowed to pass through the ranks, thanks to the flexible formation of the Roman infantry
  • In the Carthaginian wars, had the aid of African allies who were more familiar with elephants
  • After the defeat of Carthage, Rome has elephants of its own, is able to train its cavalry to the elephants and use them in war
• The Roman infantry
  
  • standard soldier carried a heavy, long shield, 2 spears (one heavy, one light), and a short, straight, cut-and-thrust sword; armor generally consisted of a helmet, breastplate, and greaves
  • basic fighting unit was the maniple
    
    • advanced in open order, with alternate ranks displaced laterally to give room for throwing spears
      • first two ranks would throw their spears, then close order and draw their swords
      • third and fourth then do the same, and so on, until the whole unit is in closed order, six ranks deep
      • maniples would be drawn up in three lines, with supporting light-armed troops and cavalry
  • Roman army employed a sophisticated signalling system
    • trumpeter would call attention to the standard-bearer, who would in turn direct movements
    • Fully developed command heirarchy
  • All this naturally evolves over time (and this brief picture is of course extremely simplified), but it gives us a good idea of what Greco-Macedonian armies were dealing with in the period we're concerned with

200-197: the Second Macedonian War

• after decisively wiping out Carthage in 201, Rome is induced to return to Greece to settle conditions there and deal with the threat Philip posed, on the pretext of freeing the Greeks from the Macedonian tyranny
  • Philip V, the Macedonian king, had allied himself with Antiochus III, the Seleucid king, in an attempt to pry away some Ptolemaic overseas possesions
    • Rome had been on good terms with the Ptolemies for some time by now
    • 'neutral' states like Pergamon and Rhodes appealed to Rome for help in settling these disturbances
    • Rome already annoyed with Philip over his alliance with Carthage
• The Romans intially got involved reluctantly
  • raised legions consisting only of volunteers, who conducted three years of indecisive campaigns
  • in 197, forces were sent under a dynamic new commander, Titus Quinctius Flamininus
• Flamininus decisively defeated Philip at Cynoscephalae ('Dogs heads', after the shape of some hills in the region) in Thessaly, in 197
  
  • Relative forces:
    • Romans had 8,400 of their own infantry and 10,000 Italian allies; 4,000 phalangites and 2,000 peltasts from the Aetolian league; a total of some 2,600 cavalry (including 400 Aetolian); and around 20 elephants\
    • Philip had 16,000 phalangites, 1,500 mercenaries, 4,000 peltasts, 2,000 light armed Thracians and 2,000 Illyrians, and about 2,000 cavalry total
  • Topography:
    • exact location of the battle somewhat disputed
    • but in any case the battle was fought on the Cynoscephale ridge itself, so terrain was certainly a factor
  • Preliminaries
    • before the battle itself, skirmishers from both sides met
      • Philip's forces were intitially prevailing, until Roman reenforcements arrived and pushed the Macedonians back
      • Philip's cavalry then arrived and turned things again, bnut the Romans were able to make an orderly retreat under the cover of the Aetolian cavalry, and once at a safe distance turn and hold their ground

      

  • Both armies are led out in full
    • Philip not happy about fighting with his phalanx on such difficult terrain, but inspired by the reports that the Roman skirmishers had been driven back, sees an opportunity to defeat the Romans while they are dealing with this setback
    • Philip marched half his phalanx, with Thracian light-armed troops, up to the summit and deployed them on his left
    • Flamininus in response orders his right to hold their ground, and leads his left (4,200 infantry plus allied support) to relieve his light troops near the summit
      • Roman troops force back the Macedonian light infantry, and the light infantry on both sides retires
    • Philip puts his phalanx and light-armed troops in double-depth, thus halving his front to leave room for his left wing to move up the pass in column
      
      • Philip's right charges downhill on the Romans, and begin to force them back
      • But while his left wing is still deploying across the ridge, Flamininus orders his right wing, with the elephants, to attack
        • the Macedonian left, still in echeloned formation as it deploys, is easily pushed back by the Romans and their elephants
        • But the Roman left is still in trouble
          • a Roman commander on the right, seeing that the issue has been decided on that side, detaches a force from the center-right to move left, and hit Philip's phalanx in the rear (since it had already moved farther forward than the right)
            • great slaughter of the exposed Macedonian phalanx
              
  • Results of the battle:
    • The Macedonians in retreat raised their pikes as a symbol of surrender, but the Romans didn't understand the signal
    • 7-8,000 Macedonians killed, 4-5,000 captured
    • c. 1,000 Romans killed
  • Inability of the Macedonian phalanx to deal with an attack on its rear reflects the trend in the years since Alexander toward a heavier-armed phalangite, with less flexibility than it had had when developed by Philip II; and the consistent development of the Roman maniple toward flexibility

Aftermath of Cynoscephalae

• Philip's influence in Greece proper is broken, and he's essentially confined within Macedonia
  • Flamininus conducted some mopping-up campaigns after Cynoscephalae to push back Macedonian influence
• in 196, Flamininus proclaimed at the Isthmian games that the cities of Greece were to be free, with no garrisons and no Roman control, and Flamininus was hailed as the liberator of Greece

Hostilities Renewed, 192-188

• The Aetolians were not particularly happy with Flamininus' settlement after Cynoscephalae -- they had expected to win a number of Philip's former possesions
  • Antiochus III at the time was advancing into the Hellespont region
  • and Aetolia in 192 called upon Antiochus to come liberate Greece and arbitrate between the Aetolians and the Romans
  • led to a war between Rome (with allies like Pergamon) on the one hand and Antiochus and the Aetolians on the other
    • Roman fleet was able to overcome Antiochus' navy using thier techniques of grappling and boarding
    • Two major land battles fought in the war at Thermopylae (191) and Magnesia (190)
• Thermopylae 191
  • Antiochus made a defensive stand at the pass of Thermopylae, fortified the natural defenses
  • The Roman commander remembered his history, and knew that the Persians so many centuries ago had used a mountain path to outflank the pass
    • led an expedition at night which got lost but, by chance, stumbled upon the guard-post that Antiochus had placed to guard the path
    • managed to caputre one of the Greeks there
      • found out the location of Antiochus' main force, and learned that the guard on the path amounted to 600 Aetolians
  • The Romans attacked this small guard-post, putting them to rout as soon as they saw the Romans pouring down
    • Meanwhile the main Roman army attacked Antoichus' main army
    • and when Antiochus himself was hit in the mouth with a stone, knocking out his teeth, he fled and his army gave way
      • very difficult retreat over steep cliffs and deep marshes, resulting in massive slaughter
• Magnesia 190
  • by the fall, the Roman army had crossed over into Asia, offered Antiochus an ultimatum which he failed to accept
  • Battle took place in mid-December, near Mt. Sipylus in western Asia Minor
    • Romans had about 30,000 troops and 2,800 cavalry, including 800 from Pergamon, under king Eumenes II; Antiochus' army numbered some 70,000, and had among it elephants, scythe-chariots, and heavily armored cavalry
  • Orders of battle
    • Roman
      • infantry (c. 22,000) in the center
      • on the right were some 3,000 light-armed Achaean and Pergamene infantry, then most of the cavalry (including the Pergamene contingent), and finally 500 more light-armed infantry
      • on the left they posted a small cavalry force and relied on the steep banks fo a river for protection on that side; kept their 16 African elephants behind the lines as a reserver, since they knew Antiochus had a far greater number of Indian elephants (54)
    • Antiochus
      • put his phalanx of 16,000 in the center, 32 ranks deep, divided into 10 sections with 2 elephants in each gap
      • on the right, he put 1,500 Galatian infantry, 3,000 heavily armored cavalry, and another 1,000 regular cavalry, followed by 16 elephants, the royal bodyguard, 1,200 mounted archers, 3,000 light infantry and 2,500 archers, and finally 4,000 slingers and archers
      • on the left, 3,500 allied infantry; 2,700 light-armed auxilliaries; 3,000 heavily armoured cavalry and 1,000 regular, and in front of that his scythe chariots and camel-mounted Arab archer-swordsmen; then a mass of light-armed troops and 16 elephants
    • Eumenes at the outset disposed of the scythe-chariots and camels by sending in archers, slingers, and dart-throwers, with some cavalry support, to shower the horses with missiles
      • ended up throwing the horses and camels into a panic, disposing of that threat before the battle proper began
      • the paniced chariots also caused most of the supporting troops on Antiochus' left to take flight, leaving the armored cavalry holding that wing
    • Romans took advantage of this disturbance on the enemy's left and sent their cavalry against the flank
      • Antiochus' heavy cavalry, without its proper auxilliary support, was broken immediately (many of them cut down because their heaviness prevented effective evasion), and the Romans proceeded to hit the light-armed troops between the cavalry and the phalanx
      • when these were broken, panic began to spread into Antiochus' phalanx
    • Romans moved their infantry forward, began pelting Antiochus' phalanx with their javelins
      • Roman soldiers moved out of the way of the elephants, cut their hamstrings as opportunity allowed
    • On the Roman left, however, Antiochus was able to press on the enemy's lightly-guarded flank, which had moved away from the river banks to maintain contact with the center
      • drove the Roman cavalry and some of the infantry back to the Roman camp
      • when they approached the camp, they were ordered to return to battle, and reenforced by reserves from the camp and a detachment of cavalry from the right (where Antiochus by now was routed) turned to make a stand
      • When Antiochus saw the soldiers he had been pursuing turn about to face him again, with reenforcements approaching, turned and fled
    • By now, all of Antiochus' army was in a dangerously chaotic rout
      • Antiochus' pursuit on his right meant that now both flanks of his phalanx were pretty much unprotected
      • Romans pursued, slaughtered, and took Antiochus' camp
      • Antiochus' losses said to be some 50,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry, with 1,400 captured along with 15 elephants
      • Roman losses were only 300 infantry and 49 cavalry
• Magnesia left Antiochus more or less completely impotent
  • Established the Attalid dynasty of Pergamon as the dominant power in Asia Minor
  • Philip V of Macedonia had been allied with Rome in its war against Antiochus, and expected to be rewarded
    • from the end of that war down to his death in 179 his relations with Rome turned more and more sour
    • his successor, Perseus, was never much liked by the Romans
    • and by 172 the Romans find themselves again facing a military campaign against Greece, which we'll talk about next time

Wednesday, 5/6: The Third Macedonian War and the Battle of Pydna

The Third Macedonian War

• Perseus' attempts to recover influence in Greece led to the Roman Senate making the decision, in 172, to eliminate him once and for all
  • the war that ensued was more difficult than they had probably expected
  • ends in 168 with the decisive defeat of Perseus at the battle of Pydna
• Pydna (168)
  • Perseus had originally been holding the west banks of the Elpeus river near the coast of the Thermaic Gulf, south of Pydna
    
  • The Roman army under Aemilius Paulus moved in opposite, and after originally deploying in battle-line and fortifying a camp behind it, withdrew into the camp to avoid a battle with travel-weary forces
    • Aemilius then sent a force under Scipio Nasica over a pass through Pythium and Petra, in order to turn Perseus' forces
    • When Perseus learned of the turning movement, he was forced to withdraw north of the outlet of the Petra
      • took up a position probably not far south of ancient Pydna
  • Question of actual site of the battle:
    
    • most scholars put the battle just to the north of the outlet of the Petra pass
      • but this location, with a wide open plain behind it, would have exposed Perseus to an attack from Roman forces landed on the coast
    • More likely that Perseus advanced to the narrow plain just below Pydna, which would have given him a protected rear and a secure city for provisioning behind him
      • topography of the region corresponds well with the details in the ancient sources, with a plain for deployment of the phalanx, and continuous ridges to give the light-armed skirmishers room for withdrawls and encirclements
    • In front of Perseus' position were two minor streams, and ridges to his left
  • Scipio's forces, coming down the pass, avoided Perseus' retreating army and rejoined with Aemilius' main army
    • the Roman army advanced, and halted upon seeing Perseus' forces in formation
    • moved onto the foothills to make a fortified camp
  • In response, Perseus has to swing his battle-line from a southward orientation to a westward one, in order to face the Roman camp
    
    • Next day, the armies waited until the afternoon, when fighting actually began
      • exact reason for initiation of battle not entirely clear (the sources differ), but it is clear that the Romans were on the defensive at first
        • One story is that Aemilius waited until late enough in the day for the sun not to be in the eyes of his troops, and then sent an unbridled horse forward to bring about alarm and conflict
        • More likely it was the result of some Roman forages getting a little too close and being attacked by some Thracians in Perseus' army
  • The Macedonian advance met the Roman army a short distance from the Roman camp
    • In the opening stages, the dense Macedonian phalanx pushed the Romans back
      • Romans tried to beat down the enemy pikes or hack off their points, but with little success
    • But as the Macedonian phalanx pushed forward, the ground became more and more uneven, and the line lost its cohesion
    • As gaps began to open, the flexible Roman maniples charged in
      • once they were at close quarters, the longer Roman sword and heavier shield easily prevailed over the short sword (more of a dagger) and lighter army of the phalangites
      • managed to slaughter the Macedonian phalangites in the center (some 25,000 casualties out of 40,000 infantry total!)
      • cavalry on the wings were put to flight by Roman elephants and light-armed troops, and managed to escape to Pydna largely intact, among them Perseus, who was captured by the Romans some time later
  • The battle provides another excellent illustration of the limitations of the fully-developed Macedoninan phalanx in the face of the more flexible Roman maniples
    • also reflects Aemilius' superior ability to control his forces in great detail, as opposed to Perseus' apparent loss of control almost immediately

The End of Greek Independence

• In the wake of Pydna, Rome finally adopts some formal control over Greek lands
  • punished the Achaean League for its lukewarm support of Rome bytaking 1,000 leading men as prisoners to Rome (Polybius among them)
  • Macedonia itself was broken up into four republics, at first independent, but after a revolt in 149 it was made a Roman province, under the direct rule of a governor supported by an army
  • in 146, the Achean League made a vain attempt at revolt
    • the result was the Roman destruction of Corinth and the crushing of any hopes the Achaen league had
      • most of mainland Greece becomes attached to the Roman province of Macedonia
  • and in 133 King Attalus III of Pergamon died, leaving his kingdom to Rome in his will!
    • after the suppression of a minor revolt, the kingdom becomes the Roman province of Asia
• Meanwhile, the Seleucid kingdom had been gradually decaying
  • decay accelerated in 173 and following by the Maccabean revolt in Judea
  • Shortly after Pydna, Rome had established Delos as a free port in the Aegean, thus very much eclipsing the commercial power of Rhodes

The Mithridatic Wars

• The last major threat to Roman supremacy in Greece and Asia Minor came from Mithradates, king of Pontus in northeastern Asia Minor; we'll talk about him and Rome's response next time.

Friday, 5/8: The Mithridatic Wars; Conclusions

The Mithridatic Wars

• Pontus -- kingdom in northeast Asia Minor, south of the Black Sea
  • had been a satrapy of the Persian Empire, but since Alexander's conquests had managed to carve out an independent kingdom
  • population was a mix of Thracians, Scythians, and Celts, dominated by an Iranian upper class, whose royalty for some time had adopted a sort of Greek culture
• King Mithradates VI presented himself as a champion of Greek civilization
  • began giving military protection to many of the Greek cities dotting the shores of the Black Sea, and consolidating his power over the region
  • next turned his attention to the south, to Asia Minor
    • started to press against territories that were friendly to Rome, or under Roman control
    • in 88 BC won a series of victories against Roman allies and Roman forces themselves
      • pushed into Asia Minor and the Aegean
        • many of the Greek cities welcomed him as a liberator from the opression (mostly financial) of Rome
        • In the course of his campaigns, slaughtered thousands of Roman civilians doing business in these Greek cities
    • The Roman governor in Macedonia was able to keep Mithradates' armies out of Northern Greece, but in central Greece, some cities welcomed him, among them Athens
  • In 87 BC, Sulla arrived on the scene
    • laid siege to Athens
    • good account of developed poliorcetics
      • elaborate mining and counter-mining operations, culminating in a subterranean melee
    • Once the city fell, Sulla allowed his men to partially sack the city, but spared it from total destruction out of respect for Athens' noble past
  • Moved into Boiotia, where he could be better provisioned
    • fought two battles with Mithradates' forces at Chaironeia and Orchomenos
      • not really our subject, since they were fought between non-Greek armies (though there were of course Greeks in Mithradates' army).
• Greece will, of course, continue to be the scene of many important battles in the ancient world
  • many of the decisive battles in the civil wars that shook Rome in the first century BC were fought on Greek lands
  • but for our purposes, at this point the ancient Greek cities and kingdoms are more or less firmly under Roman control, and most of the military events that take place are not dominated by ancient Greeks

Musings and Conclusions

• 'Bird's eye view': armaments, strategies, tactics, generalship, etc.
• But also a human side
  • Violence
    • Greek response
    • agonistic nature of Greek society
    • rejection of excess
      • comparison with eastern and Roman empires
  • Greek rejection of excess as an enduring legacy in the history of warfare in the western world