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The Homeric Way of War: the Iliad and the Hoplite Phalanx (I)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2009

Hans Van Wees
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Extract

Old warriors of the New Guinea highlands used to regale the anthropologist Margaret Mead with tales of battles they once fought. Their stories ran

something like this: ‘We met on the mountainside near Wihun. A man of our side, named Maigi, threw a spear at a man of their side, named Wea. He missed. Then a man of their side threw a spear and hit my cross-cousin from Ahalaseimihi. Then I was angry and threw a spear at Wena, a big man of their side, and missed…’, and so on.

Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , April 1994 , pp. 1 - 18
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1994

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References

Notes

1. Mead, M., Introduction to Gardens of War, eds. Gardner, R. and Heider, K. G. (Harmondsworth, 1974; 1968 1), p. viiiGoogle Scholar.

2. For the common view, see e.g. Finley, M. I., The World of Odysseus 2 (London, 1977; 19541), p. 74Google Scholar. Latacz presented his view in KKK; a batch of largely enthusiastic reviews, and some of the earliest works to accept Latacz' central conclusions are listed in KC, 1–2 n.3. More recently, Latacz' reconstruction has been accepted by the various contributors to The Iliad: a Commentary (ed. Kirk, G. S.; Cambridge 1985–1993)CrossRefGoogle Scholar: by himself, Kirk, in the introduction to Books V–VIII, pp. 21–2 (1990)Google Scholar, by Edwards, M., ad 20.353–72 (1991)Google Scholar, and especially, though often implicitly, by Janko, R., throughout the commentary on BooksXIII–XVI (1992)Google Scholar, as ad 13.126–35,312–14,330–44,496–501,502–75. Others who follow Latacz include: C.Ulf, Die hmerische Gesellschafi (Munich, 1990), pp. 139–49Google Scholar; Hanson, V.D., Hoplites, pp. 80–1 (nn.11–12)Google Scholar; and Raaflaub, K. in Zweihundert Jahre Homer-Forschung, ed. Latacz, J. (Stuttgart/Leipzig 1991), pp. 225–30Google Scholar.

Different interpretations of Homeric warfare: Pritchett, GSW 4, pp. 7–33Google Scholar; Van Wees, LM and KC; Singor, H. W., Mnemosyne 44 (1991), 17–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bowden, H. in War and Society in the Greek World, eds. Rich, J. and Shipley, G. (London, 1993), pp. 45–63Google Scholar.

3. Pritchett, SAGT 7, pp. 182–3Google Scholar; Singor, , op. cit. (n.2), 17–18Google Scholar.

4. See the discussion in SW, pp. 10–23. The dangers are perfectly exemplified by Pritchett and Singor themselves: Pritchett imposes a preconceived model of warfare upon Homer with scant regard for the evidence (‘Before Homer and after Homer, men have fought battles in mass formations, and there is no reason to believe that the warfare of pitched battles was different in the period covered by the epic’, SAGT 7, p. 188; cf. p. 183), while Singor proceeds to an overly arbitrary dissection of Homeric battles scenes into ‘layers’ and ‘stages’.

5. Latacz, KKK, esp. pp. 68–95Google Scholar; 116–212; cf. LM, 286 and KC, 15. This crucial point had in fact been made long ago by Albracht, F., Kampfund Kampfschilderung bei Homer, Part I (Naumburg, 1886), p. 28Google Scholar, but has since been much ignored.

In addition to Latacz' arguments to the effect that mass-participation in battle is continually assumed in the Iliad, I have suggested that, when Homer says that a leading hero stands ‘alone’, he means ‘alone with his followers', i.e., without the company of other leaders (LM,288–90). Moreover, while Latacz explains the focus on a few heroes as merely a literary expedient (‘zooming in’ on the action), I have suggested that the poet deliberately focuses on a few leaders and gives them a disproportionally large role in determining the course of battle in order to justify the hereditary high status and formal power of such men (KC, 15–22; SW, pp. 78–89).

Note that, whereas in KC, 23, 1 warned that the participation of large numbers of men does not necessarily mean that the lower classes are involved, I have subsequently argued that the multitude of warriors are in fact ‘commoners’, as opposed to the leading heroes who are aristocrats, ‘princes’ (SW, pp. 31, 78–80, 274–6).

6. As pointed out by Pritchett, , GSW 4, p. 44Google Scholar; Morris, I., Burial and Ancient Society (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 196–200Google Scholar; KC, 1 (cf. SW, p. 313 n.l). The theory had been formulated by Nilsson, in Klio 22 (1929), 240–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar; for recent theories, see Part II, Conclusion.

7. In the remainder of this section, I shall run through the main points of a reconstruction argued in greater detail in LM and KC, in order to explain and defend points which have been criticized or misunderstood by scholars. An important confusion to be cleared up at the outset is due to my apparently insufficiently clear usage of the phrases ‘mass combat’ and ‘massed combat’ in KC. Mass combat I used (and will use here) to mean strictly combat which involves a large number of men, regardless of the nature or density of their formation, while massed combat is meant to refer only to many men fighting in a close formation. Kirk, , op. cit. (n.2), p. 21 n.8Google Scholar, cites me as claiming that there is no mass combat in Homer, and finds my argument inconsistent on the matter; what I actually wrote was there is no evidence for massed combat KC, 12) and I think that my argument will be found consistent on this point. Similar misunderstandings presumably underlie the comments by Wheeler, E. L., Hoplites, p. 158Google Scholar n.33 (‘Denial of mass combat… is too extreme’), and Pritchett, , SAGT 7, pp. 187–8Google Scholar (‘It seems strange to reject the evidence for mass battles’).

The most extensive criticisms of KC have been advanced by Pritchett, , SAGT 7, pp. 181–90Google Scholar: many of these are concerned with the inevitability, as he sees it, of inconsistency in epic warfare (pp. 182–3, 187–8; see above). His other criticisms will be tackled in due course, but at this point I should like to stress that KC was written, not as Pritchett, claims ‘in support of a theory of “hoplite democracy”’ (pp. 181–2)Google Scholar, but, if anything, against it (KC, 22–4).

8. Latacz, KKK, esp. pp. 45–65Google Scholar, and cf. Pritchett, GSW 4, pp. 21–5Google Scholar. It should be noted that some of the other passages regularly cited as evidence for a phalanx-formation (such as 4.446–51, cited by Pritchett, SAGT 7, pp. 185–6Google Scholar) in fact show only that many warriors join battle; in other words, that there is mass, but not necessarily massed, fighting (see n.7).

9. Cf. KC, 8–9; LM, 292 with n.39, 293–5, 298–9 with n.66; Wheeler, , Hoplites, p. 128 with n.35Google Scholar; Leimbach, R., Gnomon 52 (1980), 420–2Google Scholar. H. W. Singor has suggested that phalanges may originally have meant ‘spears’, and by extension ‘a group of spear-men’ (Oorsprongen beiekenis van de hoplieunphalanx in het archaische Griekenland, Ph.D. dissertation, Leiden, 1988, pp. 16–19Google Scholar; also op. cit. [n.2], 26–31). This etymology is probably to be preferred to the one I had suggested (LM, 295), but it does not imply that a phalanx is a line, rather than merely a group, as Singor goes on to assume.

10. For more detailed discussion of this and similar passages, see KC, 8–9; LM, 294 n.51.

11. Cf. LM, 285, 288–92; KC, 5–7; Wheeler, , Hoplites, p. 127 with n.32Google Scholar; Janko, op. cit. (n.2), ad 16.168–97. On the nature of Homeric war-bands, see also SW, p. 48 (esp. n.81). Latacz ignores the existence and mobility of such bands, which to my mind is a serious flaw in his argument. Singor acknowledges the warriors’ mobility and suggests that, since it is incompatible with a tight formation, it is a poetic survival from a much older style of warfare (op. cit. [n.9], p. 73). Ulf, Christoph, op. cit. (n.2), pp. 150–3Google Scholar, argues that strict formations are kept in the first two battles of the Iliad, but that lack of success then forces the Greeks to adopt different, more mobile, tactics and abandon formation altogether in the third battle; the Umbruch supposedly takes place at 11.91. Unfortunately for this theory, most of the evidence that has to some suggested a rank-and-file formation in the first place, appears after the alleged change of tactics.

12. Latacz analyses the course of Homer's third battle in great detail (see KKK, pp. 96–115) and discusses general patterns of flight and recovery (pp. 212–15), but does not appear to recognize that a constant scattering and rallying of troops is incompatible with maintaining a tight formation, until in a belated footnote, at the prompting of Burck, Erich (KKK, p. 228 n.9Google Scholar), he rejects the repeated ebb and flow of battle as an ‘unrealistic’ element.

13. Latacz, KKK, esp. pp. 116–19Google Scholar, also 119–29 and 178–209; cf. Kirk, , op. cit. (n.2), p. 21Google Scholar, and Janko, op. cit. (n.2), e.g. ad 13.312–14; 15.318–19,405–591; 16.772–5. Leimbach, , op. cit. (n.9), 422Google Scholar, points out the difficulties with Latacz' view. My own interpretation, explained below, is argued at length in KC, 2–3, 7–12.

14. Latacz, KKK, pp. 129–78Google Scholar; KC, 4–7.

15. Latacz, KKK, esp. pp. 118, 140, 159–60Google Scholar; Pritchett, GSW 4, pp. 14–15, 28–30Google Scholar (based on Lang, A., The World of Homer [London 1910], pp. 55–6)Google Scholar.

16. KC, 7–12, esp. nn.26, 32. Janko, op. cit. (n.2), regularly points out passages where the use of missiles and hand-weapons appears confused (e.g. ad 13.134–5, 177–8,190–4, 554–5, 570–3), but he explains these away or merely expresses puzzlement.

17. KC, 9–10; pace Pritchett, , SAGT 7, p. 186Google Scholar ‘Such scenes describe a situation which is deliberate and implies careful training’).

18. Pritchett, , GSW 4, pp. 25–6Google Scholar and SAGT 5 (1985), pp. 18–19Google Scholar = 26–7. Contra: KC, 12 n.40; Wheeler, , Hoplites, pp. 127–8Google Scholar with n.36.

19. Singor, , op. cit. (n.2), 19Google Scholar; op. cit. (n.9), pp. 79–82. Contra: KC, 11–12.

20. KC, 12–14; cf. Edwards, op. cit. (n.2), ad 19.233–7; Wheeler, , Hoplites, p. 127Google Scholar. Contrast Latacz' notion that such exhortatory speeches (Kampfpardnesen) are to be taken as a signal for the promakhoi to fall back into line and for the hitherto passive multitude to advance in formation and join massed hand-to-hand combat (KKK, esp. pp. 172, 177).

21. This account is based mainly on Heider, K. G., Grand Valley Dani: Peaceful Warriors (New York, 1979)Google Scholar; quotations are from pp. 94–6; see next note.

22. Gardner, and Heider, , op. cit. (n.l), pp. 139, 141Google Scholar. This work provides excellent photos of the Dani at war; footage of Dani battles features in Robert Gardner's film Dead Birds.

23. According to Gardner, and Heider, , op. cit. (n.l), p. 138Google Scholar, about a hundred men out of ‘several hundred’ are active at any one time. Compare L. G. Vial on Chimbu battles in which about 65 to 75 out of 200 men are actively fighting (Walkabout 9 [1942], 1, 5–9, as quoted in Brown, P., The Chimbu [London 1973], pp. 58–9)Google Scholar. For forms of combat among other New Guinea tribes, see Pospisil, L., The Kapauku Papuans of West New Guinea (New York, 1963), pp. 58–60Google Scholar; Meggitt, M. J., Blood Is Their Argument (Palo Alto, 1977), esp. pp. 17–21Google Scholar (and 190 n.2). It may be noted that the Melpa (Ongka. A Self-Account by a New Guinea Big-Man, transl. Strathern, A. [London, 1979], pp. 61–2Google Scholar) and the Chimbu (Vial, loc. cit.) also used an alternative tactic of forming a single line of men with locked shields.

24. Finley, , op. cit. (n.2), p. 149Google Scholar; Latacz, KKK, pp. 215–23Google Scholar.

25. On Latacz’ view (as cited n.24), chariots would have to be left behind the lines, since a massed infantry formation would leave no room for them near the front. For the chariot-problem, see e.g. Singor, , op. cit. (n.2), 112–18Google Scholar; Kirk, G. S., The Iliad: a Commentary. Books I–IV (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 360–3CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Greenhalgh, , EGW, esp. pp. 7–17Google Scholar; Detienne, M., ‘Remarques sur le char en Gréce’, Problémes de la guerre en Gréce ancienne, ed. Vernant, J.-P. (Paris, 1968), pp. 313–18Google Scholar; Delebecque, E., Le chevaldans I'lliade (Paris, 1951)Google Scholar.

26. Wooden chariots: 4.486; 5.838; 21.37–8 (cf. Wiesner, J., ‘Fahren und Reiten’, Archaeologia Homerica F [Göttingen, 1968], p. 13)Google Scholar. The wood is sometimes overlaid with metal foil ornaments (e.g. 23. 503; Wiesner, , op. cit., pp. 13–14)Google Scholar, which adds an element of display (see n.38 below). For three-and four-horse chariots, see n.32.

The lower status of the charioteer is obvious in most cases, and this may explain why, when circumstances bring two leaders of roughly equal status together on a single chariot, a tactful discussion is required in order to settle which of them is to drive (5.221–38).

27. Cf. 4.365–6; 5.494–6, 794–5; 6.103–5; 13.749.

28. Advancing: 6.120–1 with 232–3; 8.312–15; 16.727–8. Fighting from chariot: 5.9–21, 217–443, 835–67; 8.118—29 (both sides mounted). To these cases one may add the instances – in battle as opposed to rout – where both fighter and driver are killed in their chariot: e.g. 5.608–9; 11.320–2, 328— 35; cf. 16.810.

29. E.g. 3.29–31; 4.418–21; 5.106–34; 8.316–29; 11.423; 15.447–57; 16.426–7, 733, 755; 17.481–3.

30. Retreating to chariot with spoils: 17.129–30,540–1; wounded: 5.106–34; 11.191–2, 206–7,273–4, 399–400, 487–8; 13.535–7; 14.428–39; in flight: 5.249–50; 8.157–8; 11.354–60; 16.367–8, 657; in pursuit: 11.755–60; 16.684; 20.498–502 (cf. 394–5); to cross the field: 11.527–37; and, presumably, 8.105–8; 11.512–20; 17.609–25, too.

31. Men killed while mounting or turning chariot: 5.38–40, 43–7; 7.13–16; 8.256–60; 16.343–4. Wilcock, M. M., ‘The Fighting in the Iliad‘ in Spondes ston Omiro, Proceedings of the Sixth Conference on the Odyssey, 1990 (Ithaki, 1993), pp. 141–7Google Scholar, points out that such incidents in Homer always indicate the beginning of a general rout.

32. Spare horses: 8.80–7; 16.466–76 (both killed); cf. Hektor's four horses (8.185): two spares? Charioteers leaving fighters: 5.9–21, 576–8; 13.384–96; 16.864–7; 20.487–9; fighters leaving charioteers: 8.118–29, 312–15; 15.447–57. In three cases, the survivor does unsuccessfully attempt to defend the corpse (5.217–443 [Aineias]; 11.91–8 [Oileus]; 16.737–9 [Hektor]), and there is also the case of Sarpedon, who had already dismounted and continues his fight (16.462–5). Aineias loses his chariot, Oileus and Sarpedon lose their lives as well.

33. Littauer, M. A. and Crouwel, J. H., Antiquity 57 (1983), 189CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. nn.34, 40 below.

34. Kirk, G. S., The Songs of Homer (Cambridge, 1962), p. 124Google Scholar; Greenhalgh, EGW, pp. 7–10Google Scholar, and id., Antiquity 54 (1980), 201–5. Such chariot tactics are rejected as physically impossible by Littauer, and Crouwel, , op. cit. (n.33), 187–92Google Scholar, and Singor, , op. cit. (n.2), 113Google Scholar.

35. So already Couissin, P., Les institutions militaires el navales (Paris, 1931), p. 19Google Scholar; also Finley, , op. cit. (n.2), p. 45Google Scholar; Kirk, , op. cit. (n.34), p. 124Google Scholar; Snodgrass, EGAW, p. 162Google Scholar; Greenhalgh, EGW, p. 7Google Scholar (‘No conception of the proper tactical role of massed chariotry’). The passages supposedly describing true Mycenaean practice will be discussed presently.

36. Unnamed leaders (agoi): 12.61; 17.335. Chariots: 5.159–60; 11.101–12; 13.535–7 (Priamös); 15.447–57; 16.809–11 (Panthoos); 5.9–13 (Dares); 11.122–42 (Antimakhos); hegemones: 12.87–9 (Poulydamas); 12.87, 94 (Deiphobos). See on lesser leaders: LM 287–8 (with unfortunately mistaken references to Trojan leaders in n.14: read 12.86–100); Janko, op. cit. (n.2), ad16.168–97. Note that Pandaros was told by his father to ‘lead from his chariot’ (5.195).

37. At the start of the first battle, the chariots are ‘held back at the mass’ (3.113), and there is nothing elsewhere to suggest that chariots engage the enemy before the infantry does. In pursuit, the chariots go ahead of the mass, so that they have to turn and rejoin it when the enemy stops fleeing (5.502–5), and, in flight, Hektor in his chariot ‘leaves the men behind’ (16.367–9). Compare: 6.37–43; 8.177–9, 213–15, 253–5; 11.150–4, 289–90, 755–60; 15.258–9, 352–4, 385–7; 16.370–93; 21.16.

38. See Wiesner, , op. cit. (n.26), pp. 11–29Google Scholar, on the construction and functions of the Homeric chariot, and esp. p. 28 on its role as a status symbol. Greenhalgh, EGW, pp. 37–8Google Scholar, shows that chariots in Homer and in Greek vase-painting are no different from ‘light, railed racing chariots’. He accepts that such chariots might hold an armed passenger as well as a charioteer when driven in processions, but denies that they were used thus in battle (ibid. p. 39), because a ‘technical’ vocabulary for two-man chariots is lacking. This is not, I believe, a tenable argument: see n.45 below.

Since the heroes do not use purpose-built war-chariots, the ‘economic’ argument against the historicity of Homeric chariots, viz. that in reality the Greeks would not have been able to 'afford the luxury of a “war”-chariot from which they would seldom if ever actually fight’ (Snodgrass, EGAW, p. 160 and n.6)Google Scholar, falls down. The Greeks used the all-purpose chariots which they owned already, and did not have to spend an extra fortune on additional war-chariots. (Note that the horses, not the car, constitute the greatest expense.)

39. Latacz, KKK pp. 215–23Google Scholar.

40. It has in fact been plausibly argued by both Wiesner, , op. cit. (n.26), pp. 95–7Google Scholar, and Littauer and Crouwel, , op. cit. (n.33), 190Google Scholar, that Mycenaean chariot-fighters, too, descended from their chariots and fought on foot. It remains likely, though, that the Mycenaeans operated in battalions rather than on single chariots (Wiesner, ibid.). On the general differences between Homer and Mycenae, see e.g. SW, pp. 53–8.

41. On the use of chariots by the Celts (and Cyrenaeans), see Anderson, J. K., AJA 79 (1975), 175–87CrossRefGoogle Scholar, answering Greenhalgh's, criticisms (EGW, pp. 14–17Google Scholar) of an earlier paper (Anderson, J. K., AJA 69 [1965], 349–52)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Admittedly, Celtic usage differs significantly from Homeric practice, but the point here is that there are cultures which do not use chariots in the ‘proper’ manner. Greenhalgh's argument that they do not do so because they are not ‘real chariot-powers’ holds little water: if one accepts its validity at all, one can simply answer that Homeric society apparently does not represent a ‘chariotpower’.

42. So e.g. Kirk, , op. cit. (n.34), p. 124Google Scholar, and op. cit. (n.25), pp. 360–3; Wiesner, , op. cit. (n.26), pp. 26–7Google Scholar; Greenhalgh, EGW, pp. 1–9Google Scholar.

43. Apo is explicitly used with the meaning ‘leaving’ their chariots in Xenophon, , Kyrou paideia 3.3.60Google Scholar (as cited above). This meaning would also be applicable to 15.386, where men are said to fight aph' hippôn, but none of the combatants is actually on his chariot. On the other hand, aph’ hippoiin in 5.13 must mean ‘on the chariot’. For oregô, see Trümpy, H., Kriegerische Fachausdrücke im griechischen Epos (Basle, 1950), pp. 118–19Google Scholar.

44. That Nestor, in his account of the battle against the Epeians (11.743–5), is not talking about massed chariot combat is clear from the fact that he takes his first chariot as a foot-soldier, and subsequently takes his place with it ‘among the promakhoí’. In 3.115, plêsion allelôn refers to the pieces of equipment, not to the charioteers (cf. 3.326–7 and 10.471–3). In 15.353, sun autôi may refer to ‘shouting’ with him or ‘steering their horses’ with him; even in the latter case this only means that they advance at the same time Hektor does, not necessarily that they do so en masse. Chariots are fairly numerous: 11.748–9 (cf. 2.615–19); 2.775–8; 4.297; 10.473.

45. I should mention one more alleged inconsistency, first noted by Delebecque, , op. cit. (n.25), esp. pp. 90–3Google Scholar, and followed up by Greenhalgh, EGW, p. 39Google Scholar (cf. n.38 above). Both these scholars have said that Homer's lack of a technical vocabulary for chariot combat betrays unfamiliarity with the use of chariots in battle. The answer to this, however, is simple: there is no specialized vocabulary because there are no specialized chariot-fighters and no massed chariotry manoeuvres. Homer does have an ample vocabulary to describe jumping on to and down from chariots, or causing an enemy to crash from his car, and all the other actions that do feature in Homeric chariot combat (as is clear from Delebecque's, own list of expressions and formulae, op. cit., pp. 91–2)Google Scholar. Note that, although the technical term paraibales for the ‘passenger’ on the chariot occurs only once (23.132), as Delebecque stresses (ibid. pp. 166–7), the technical verb parbainôoccurs thrice (3.262, 312; 11.522).

46. Shouting at and talking to the enemy is not in itself unrealistic: it is the length of some of the speeches that seems implausible. Gruesome wounds: e.g. 13.442–4 (spear fixed in heart, and shaking because heart continues to beat); 13.616–18 (blow on the head makes eyes pop out and fall to the ground). Spectacular falls: e.g. 5.584–8 (man crashes from chariot head first; corpse remains standing upside down, head in the sand); 12.394–6; 16.401–10 (man hauled out of chariot by spear stuck in his mouth); 16.736–50.

James Whitley points out to me that Sergio Leone once claimed that his spaghetti Westerns were in fact inspired by the Iliad!