Hoplites Outdated?

[conon394]

Urnamma:

I have read C. Nepos and Diodorus (of course now we are back to the Iphicrates’ reform).

The problem with both is that they are late historians, and hardly considered the A team of ancient historians at that (and neither have as far as I know the military experience of say Arrian to add credibility to their statements with respect to military equipment). Diodorus often gets an overly bad rap, but he remains a somewhat careless compressor of earlier historians and lacks the critical judgment of a Polybius or even Plutarch. Nepos is of course a writer of biography, not history, and is both sloppy and inaccurate to boot.

Taking Nepos for example: He presents in very brief form (a couple of lines) the ideal that Iphicrates carried out a reform of some kind on troops under his command. However he appears to have both a confused understanding of what kind of shield these troops had and what armor they wore (note references to mail, etc.) He is clear on suggesting a doubling of the spear. If you think he means hoplites then he is suggesting not a 12 ft spear but a Macedonian style pike. Lost in all of this is the fact that neither Nepos nor Diodorus appears to be suggesting this ‘reform’ applied to any thing but Ipricatrates’ troops. The Epaminondas section of Plutarch’s “Saying of Kings and Commanders” provides a rather strong counter to the ideal that Ipricatrates’ reforms were anything but a local and singular (or at most limited) occurrence.

My reservations steam from the fact that the alleged reform either gradual or Iphicrateian rely on these late sources (there is a tendency to call Nepos period, but that makes me a period source for the American Revolt from Great Britain). No new hoplite type appears on grave stele or pottery images. No fragment from the acropolis at Athens suggest the “Council and the People decreed 5000 of the new type of spear should be purchased by the officials in charge of the public arms and stored ….” No Attic Orator suggests that he participated in such and such battle armed in the modern fashion. Xenophon does not mention any new style of equipment (contra Thucydides who notes how the Athenian navy fought in a modern fashion, while Corinth and the other Peloponnesians fought in the old fashion way). Also, I don’t see why Hoplite would need to light any more than they had. The mostly Hoplite armies of the 5th century had demonstrated they were the masters of Persian light infantry, cavalry and archers. In the famous Athenian victories (light infantry over Spartans), what is generally ignored is that the Athenians also deployed Hoplite forces in those victories of at least (if not greater) strength than the Spartans. Contrast that with the inability of light troops deployed in isolation (even thiose commanded by Iphicrates) to ever close the isthmus to Epaminodas and his hoplites. Epaminondas clearly learned the right lesson; not I need lighter Hoplites, but rather just bring my own peltasts and cavalry…

I would suggest the Both Diodorus and Nepos do indeed provided evidence of a reform; but one that involved improving peltasts from pure skirmisher to multi-faceted light to medium infantry. Hoplites remained much as they were in the 5th century and continued to be heavy infantry. As for spear length I would not be surprised if they are not simply projecting the Macedonian style pike backward in time.