Left handed warriors in biblical times.

[Flavius Clemens]

On another forum I frequent there's a discussion about left-handed characters in the bible, which brought out this comment:

"Judges 20:16 describes a Benjaminite army - "Among this army were seven hundred specially-trained left-handed soldiers. Each one could sling a stone and hit even the smallest target".

Some argue that these were men specially trained to use their left-hands by restricting the use of their right hands from childhood so that the left hand became dominant. Left-handed men would have a distinct military advantage because their opponents would be less used to fighting left-handed opponents. My bible commentary says that left-handed warriors were more effective at storming city gates but fails to give any reason or back up the statement in any way."

I did reply that a right-hander attacking clockwise up a castle's spiral staircase is at a disadvantage because they have less room to swing their weapon, but I didn't know if this design was used in biblical times. Does anyone here have any info which would explain, or refute, the idea that left-handers were best for 'storming city gates'? (I guess the term may be being used loosely in the commentary and might cover climbing walls, sapping etc.)

[Martok]

Why would lefties be better at storming gates even in general, though? Even setting aside the stairs issue, I fail to see what advantage they would have.

[Uesugi Kenshin]

Why would lefties be better at storming gates even in general, though? Even setting aside the stairs issue, I fail to see what advantage they would have.

They'd generally be attacking an opponents unshielded side? Then again their opponents would be attacking their unshielded side so really I see no reason why lefties would rock righties in the AT.

[Husar]

They'd generally be attacking an opponents unshielded side? Then again their opponents would be attacking their unshielded side so really I see no reason why lefties would rock righties in the AT.

Their opponents were trained to attack their opponent's shielded side while the lefties were trained to attack the unshielded side, so the lefties do what they learned while the opponents have to mirror or rethink every of their moves, I guess.

[Sarmatian]

Their opponents were trained to attack their opponent's shielded side while the lefties were trained to attack the unshielded side, so the lefties do what they learned while the opponents have to mirror or rethink every of their moves, I guess.

So? That doesn't mean that right handed soldiers will somehow try to attack the other side where there is a shield. They will still attack the same side, and the fact that there isn't a shield there would make things easier.

[Ramses II CP]

The advantage could come if you trained lefties to work with righties in pairs or lines during melee. You could work with partners on either side for combined defense or offense. Biblical era combat was not well known for that sort of extraordinairy discipline, however, so it seems like a 'Well, it seems true' kind of story.

Anyway, in this particular story it talks about men using slings with their left hands. Changing the angle of attack with that type of ranged weapon could very likely increase it's effectiveness because most opponents would be carrying a shield on the other side, thus making it harder to block missiles across their body. I imagine storming a gate would be a situation where the advantage of the left handed slingers is cumulative, allowing them to open a wedge or gap in the enemy's concentrated defensive formation more rapidly than right handers.

It all sounds rather apocryphal, however, keeping in mind that it was always in a nation or army's best interest to make their tactics sound extremely effective no matter what their actual results on the field.

[Flavius Clemens]

It all sounds rather apocryphal, however

Indeed, in the absence of any firm evidence turning up I'm inclined to take this with a pinch of salt.

[Kadagar_AV]

Lefties has a distinct advantage is small fights, as mentioned.

However, in the mass combat that taking a city gate is, that advantage becoems extinct in the mass slaughter.

Previous posters have allready stated the ebnefits of being lefty though...

[Mount Suribachi]

If you ever visit Lincoln Cathedral, see if you can go an a behind-the-scenes tour. I was lucky enough to go on one and I found out that the spiral staircases there are "wrong" handed, and that the guards were recruited from a scottish clan that was (and still is) almost exclusively left-handed. The result being that if attacked, they as the defenders were at an advantage. When the guide was telling us this, I instantly thought of the story of the tribe of Benjamin. He talked about it in terms of the men and their shields being interlocked wall-to-wall during the fighting, made sense as he was describing it (and was able to do actions to demonstrate! )

And FWIW my wifes family are almost exclusively left-handed, so the idea of an entire tribe being left-handed isn't so far fetched.