Romans and Swords

[dbarger58]

From what i understand sword and more expensive, harded to master, and have a short range that spears and especialy short swords favored by the romans would have been a disadvantage agiasnt calvary, so what cause the romans to so wholeheartedly adopt swords

[mcantu]

Pila can be, and were, used as spears


http://www.roman-empire.net/army/pics/repel-cavalry.jpg


The order to repel cavalry by Roman army officers brought about a defensive formation, in which the front rank formed a tight wall of shields with their pila protruding to form a line of spearheads ahead of the wall. Undoubtedly it would be very hard to bring a horse to break into that formation. The most likely occurrence would be that it would come to a halt of its own will ahead of the spearheads. It was at that moment that horse and rider would be at their most vulnerable against the ranks behind the first line of infantry which would then hurl their spears at them. Given the short distance and the training legionaries received, it is likely such halted cavalry, frantically trying to turn their horses around to retreat, whilst colliding with horses following in the charge, would prove very easy targets.
If one further considers the likely possibility of archers being present, as is the case on the photo above, the effect of this formation could indeed be devastating.

http://www.roman-empire.net/army/tactics.html

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Pila can be used but in reality the Legions never stopped using the spear. By the time the Roman citizen soldiers were all using swords they also had large numbers of spear-armed auxillaries.

[blank]

From what i understand sword and more expensive, harded to master, and have a short range that spears and especialy short swords favored by the romans would have been a disadvantage agiasnt calvary, so what cause the romans to so wholeheartedly adopt swords

Roman tactic was to get very close to the enemy in tight formation, where there wasn't much room for spears or even longswords

[Bootsiuv]

Plus, the Hispanicus Gladius (or whatever it's called) just looked cool. A Roman has his appearance to think about, after all... :P

[bovi]

Since the pilum was designed to bend on impact, I'd guess it wasn't very good in prolonged fighting, but it would scare a horse I'm sure. Hitting a shield would probably render it nearly useless?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Since the pilum was designed to bend on impact, I'd guess it wasn't very good in prolonged fighting, but it would scare a horse I'm sure. Hitting a shield would probably render it nearly useless?

The pila wasn't actually designed to bend on impact, Hispanic and Britainnic ones don't. With that said it's not great as a thrusting weapon, the principle is the same as the later infantry square of the Napolionic wars. Horses don't charge a walls of steal for the same reason men don't. As a thrusting weapon though the narrow iron shank would probably vibrate on impact, going through anything other than flesh in hand-hand combat would be difficult at best.

[russia almighty]

pila phalanx!

[Reno Melitensis]

It the same tactic Arian, legate of Cappadocia used against the Alani, a Sauromatae people. The first ranks where in a shield wall like that one, while the legionaries behind throw javlins over the heads of their comrades, behind which where archers and horse archers. The stratagem worked because it was a great victory for Arian.

Cheers.

[bovi]

The pila wasn't actually designed to bend on impact, Hispanic and Britainnic ones don't.
Shame on me for believing Wikipedia, vanilla RTW, and... EB's Hastati/Principe/Triarii description :oops:? Cohors Imperatoria's description says it can be used as a normal spear though, even though it's not designed for it. As you say.

Should we change the description for the roman units then?

[Bootsiuv]

So the Romans improved the design of the Pila? I wonder what technique they used to make it bend on impact. A soft iron, I'm sure, but how did they make it softer?

EDIT: I'm also interested in hearing the answer to Bovi's question of if a shield made them nearly useless. Wouldn't a soft iron be rather useless against a metal shield. Were most of Rome's enemies employing wooden, leather, or wicker shields, so this was seen as not much of a problem? Or did it just slice right through a metal shield, softer iron and all? *waits for a Romani expert to chime in*

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Shame on me for believing Wikipedia, vanilla RTW, and... EB's Hastati/Principe/Triarii description :oops:? Cohors Imperatoria's description says it can be used as a normal spear though, even though it's not designed for it. As you say.

Should we change the description for the roman units then?

No, don't worry about any descriptions. They did bend on impact but the haft was also designed to shatter. I can't remember exactly, I think Latin and Etruscan ones bend because of the poor iron. Hispanic ones generally don't.

In any case it's only the shank that bends, the head is hardend steel and diamond shaped. The idea is that is goes through the shield and into the body, that's why the shank is so long.

Soft is also very much a relative term here, as anyone hit with an iron bar will tell you.

[NeoSpartan]

Well the pilum MAY funtion as a spear in "Initial concact" with cavarly after that is no good. HOWEVER that is IF the horse doesn't stop before reaching the shield wall (which they usually do).

Also remember the pilum will NOT be used as a spear against infantry.

[Cataphract_Of_The_City]

I 've read that pre-Marius pila (sp?) used soft iron shafts and were designed to bend on impact but making soft iron shafts took a lot of time and effort. Marius changed the pilum design to use a wooden pin which would break on impact and render the pilum useless for throwing back. Thus no need for soft iron. That's "my" version, but it seems it is wrong/inaccurate?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

That's an excessively complicated version. The iron for the shank was "soft" in that it was unhardened, i.e. it wasn't steel and had a very low carbon content. I've never heard of any process used to actually soften the iron. In fact it has been suggested that pila could be used a cooking spits because the iron was untempered and would not suffer from the heat.

[alatar]

I think the reason the romans used the swords is because in there tight formations it was easier to use than longswords, or spears, hence the conquest of the hellens and celts.
On the pillia, I belive the idea was that the head went into sheild/body, then the half bent, making it hard to pull out of your sheild (which makes it very unweildly) or unable to pull out of yourself, ethier way, your going to be in trouble when that cohort of legonaries charging and screaming at you get close.

It was more of a shock weapon, designed to make a enemy unit weaken (by death or routing).

[Spoofa]

but dont romans use a looser formation? :inquisitive:

[NeoSpartan]

but dont romans use a looser formation? :inquisitive:

It depends on the enemy they are facing...

[antisocialmunky]

Well, variation in equipment throughout the empire would sometimes largely depend where you're talking about(since you can't fly out supplies from Rome to Judea in those day). For example, some Pila in Britannia have holes punch in the heads to create a whistling sound.

[alatar]

but dont romans use a looser formation? :inquisitive:
For cohorts, yes, there is more space between each cohort, but each man is closer together.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

For cohorts, yes, there is more space between each cohort, but each man is closer together.

Quite possible not. The idea of the Romans standing "shoulder to shoulder" is based on the length of the Gladius, which its irrelevant, the Greeks and Celts used longer swords for close in tight fighting and did fine. It has been suggested, by Peter Connolly and others, that the Roman manipules were in fact orderded the same way internally as externally. In other words the soldiers moved in a checkerboard formation. Polybius tells us there were about 5 feet between each legionary and Tacitus seems to tell us in the Agricola and elsewhere that the Romans moved through each other when advancing or retiring.

If this is true then the secret to Roman success may hve been a sort od perpetual advance with the front two ranks constantly passing each other.

So is goes like this.

Front rank andances, stabs, goes to guard.

Second rank advances through front rank, stabs, goes to guard.

Rather like the fire and movement practiced by musketeers later.

[Bellum]

Wouldn't it be rather easy for the enemy to move through the front rank?

EDIT:
M2TW comes to mind. In city assaults when troops spread out to ungodly lengths and become almost completely ineffective, I find myself charging my infantry several ranks into the enemy, oftentimes killing nearly half of their men at once.

[The Internet]

Quite possible not. The idea of the Romans standing "shoulder to shoulder" is based on the length of the Gladius, which its irrelevant, the Greeks and Celts used longer swords for close in tight fighting and did fine. It has been suggested, by Peter Connolly and others, that the Roman manipules were in fact orderded the same way internally as externally. In other words the soldiers moved in a checkerboard formation. Polybius tells us there were about 5 feet between each legionary and Tacitus seems to tell us in the Agricola and elsewhere that the Romans moved through each other when advancing or retiring.

If this is true then the secret to Roman success may hve been a sort od perpetual advance with the front two ranks constantly passing each other.

So is goes like this.

Front rank andances, stabs, goes to guard.

Second rank advances through front rank, stabs, goes to guard.

Rather like the fire and movement practiced by musketeers later.


I quite like that theory and it sounds about right too, intresting. Also remember that a Roman "foot" is shorter than that of todays measurement, i think it'd be closer to 3 foot in our terms, which sounds right to me in terms of spacing.



As for the pila being used as a sort of temporary wall of spears, keep in mind that it was probably just used to stop the horses in their tracks (and thus denying them of their greatest asset) which then could be swamped by the troops who could go back to using their swords or they could just stab the horses with the pila and then kill the rider with whatever means they see fit.

[geala]

Polybios speaks about a room of 1,80 m/6 feet for the Roman legionaries. That is 4 cubits, a Greek cubit equal to 45 cm. Polybios says that the Roman soldier has two phalangites in front of him, which is totally coherent to the normal attack order (pyknosis) of the sarissai phalanges given by Asklepiodotos, measuring 2 cubits or 90 cm/3 feet per soldier.

We have no hint wether the Roman legionaries attacked with the two first rows changing. I'm of the opinion that we would have when it were the normal tactic, because it would have been a very remarkable exception to normal fighting and interesting for the Greek reader. But this is only my subjective view.

The sword is a very good weapon for close combat fighting, esp. in combination with the big Roman scutum. You don't have the reach of the spear but are much more flexible.

[Olaf The Great]

I always though spears were more about pushing that bastard off the horse, rather than scaring the horse.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

If I'm right about how Romans fought then the key would be perpetual movement. The Romans would always be moving fowards so that the enemy would effectively be facing two rather than one fighting line. In the case of a shoving match or prolonged melee the Romans would probably have closed ranks and stood shoulder to shoulder at which point they would basically have become a phalanx.

[Roy1991]

On the pillia, I belive the idea was that the head went into sheild/body, then the half bent, making it hard to pull out of your sheild (which makes it very unweildly) or unable to pull out of yourself, ethier way, your going to be in trouble when that cohort of legonaries charging and screaming at you get close.

Someone on a forum about the Roman army made serveral reconstructions of pila, as authentically as possibly, and tested them.
His conclusion was that pila wouldn't bend if they hit a shield - the long thin shank would go right through it, and would be almost impossible to remove.
If the pilum missed however, and it hit the ground, then it would bend.

[Conqueror]

That would make a lot of sense, if it's true. If the pilum is so hard to remove from a shield then it doesn't matter whether it's bent or not, while one that ends up sticking on the ground could be picked up and thrown back at you by the enemy... unless it was bent.

[Roy1991]

Found the thread :)

http://romanarmy.com/rat/viewtopic.php?t=10815

[NeoSpartan]

Found the thread :)

http://romanarmy.com/rat/viewtopic.php?t=10815

EXELENT LINK!

[CaesarAugustus]

I'm curious as to how many pila the average Roman soldier carried into battle. And did he throw them all at the enemy as they charged? Or did he keep one to repel cavalry attacks? Did Marian legionaries (and legionaries later in the future) use the hasta anymore, or was it just carried by auxiliaries?

[Decimus Attius Arbiter]

2 in the beginning and by Julius Caesar's time, I believe it was only one. They threw them all before making contact because it's impossible to hold the scutum and pila while fighting.

[geala]

But not all legionaries of a maniple/cohort actually fought. Please forget the change of the rows during fight with the centurio using a whistle or something like this. The soldiers in the back rows could keep their pila. We have some reports that suggest a constant use of pila also during prolonged battles. When one of the frequent pauses of the close combat occured, pila could be given to the front lines or soldiers from behind could throw. Or perhaps even the soldiers could change rows, but that would have been a very dangerous manouevre.

I've not much knowledge about the later -boring- Roman professional armies. But in the legionary forts lots of heads of lances were found, so I believe of a constant use of the hasta not only in the auxilia. But experts could tell you better.

[Watchman]

I recall reading that most legionaries had two pila, but each would only carry one in battle at a time - already for the rather practical reason the scutum had a horizontal grip, so you couldn't really hold something long and pointy in the same hand (as conversely the Celts and Germans tended to with their vertically set grips). But since infantry slugging matches tended to take a long time and there were many lulls when both sides stepped back th catch their breath and reorder the ranks, resupplying fresh ones should have been easy enough.

[Zaknafien]

In the age of overseas expansion that we are most familliar with, the standard seems to be two pila per legionary, one light and one heavy which replaced the hasta for all except the triarius. Both were hurled with good effect in most of the accounts we have of the period.