How did the Greeks fight in the RTW timeframe?

[Ano2]

My question is simply what type of heavy infantry did the Greeks use in the RTW timeframe?

Did they use the classical phalanx?
Did they adpot the Phalangite phalanx?
Did they use the Iphictrate's phalanx? ( If you believe they used this please inform me on how the Hell it actually was used in open field battles.)

Please stay on topic, and back up your argument with either sources, or good common sense.

[Kaiser of Arabia]

Many greeks switched to a more Phalangite phalanx style without adopting phanangites themselves, AFAIK.

[Watchman]

The Macedonians pretty much rolled over them with their pike-phalanx, didn't they ? The Greeks would've been fools not to copycat a good thing, all the more so as their opinion probably wasn't even asked to begin with - whichever Successor it now was who lorded it over them no doubt wanted to be able to field infantry equivalent to his competitors'.

[Seleukos]

Actually sooner or later the other Greeks adopted the Macedonian-phalanx.
First to proceed to this transformation,outside the Macedonians was Pyrrhos the king of Epirus.
Phoilopemen in Achaean Sypoliteia and Cleomenes in Sparta followed.

ps:what do u mean by "iphicrates phalanx" ? Iphicrates was responsible for major revisions i nmilitary tactics of the 4th cent-mainly the use of peltasts.
Maybe u mean the "loxe phalanx" (aslant). which used bu Epaminondas too.in this the one part of the line was consisting of more men in depth ,so as to beat the opposite part of the enemy,and then turn to its flanks.

[Kralizec]

Sparta eventually adopted the sarissa, though much later then the starting date of RTR. I'm not sure about the other Greek city states, though any hoplites they used were different from those used centuries before that- the shields had become somewhat smaller and the spears longer, Ipicrathes used this sort of equipment but probably wasn't the one that started the trend.

[Ludens]

The Macedonians pretty much rolled over them with their pike-phalanx, didn't they ? The Greeks would've been fools not to copycat a good thing, all the more so as their opinion probably wasn't even asked to begin with - whichever Successor it now was who lorded it over them no doubt wanted to be able to field infantry equivalent to his competitors'.

As I understand it there were fundamental differences in the way the Greeks and the Macedonians (under Philip II and his successors) fielded an army. The Macodonian pike phalanx was a proffesional force that was properly organized. The Greek cities on the other hand embraced a spirit of extreme amatuerism in war. They had no professional soldiers (the Spartans and a few elite units being the exception) and almost no organizational back-up.

I've got most of this out Hans van Wees' "Greek Warfare". He argues that Greek states were unable to field a professional army due to organizational and social constraints and were too attached to their hoplite ideals to rapidly change their military doctrine. However, the way he puts it Iphicrates seems the inventor of the Pike Phalanx.

I am no historian, so I cannot say how credible these claims are.

[Rosacrux redux]

As I understand it there were fundamental differences in the way the Greeks and the Macedonians (under Philip II and his successors) fielded an army. The Macodonian pike phalanx was a proffesional force that was properly organized. The Greek cities on the other hand embraced a spirit of extreme amatuerism in war. They had no professional soldiers (the Spartans and a few elite units being the exception) and almost no organizational back-up.

I've got most of this out Hans van Wees' "Greek Warfare". He argues that Greek states were unable to field a professional army due to organizational and social constraints and were too attached to their hoplite ideals to rapidly change their military doctrine. However, the way he puts it Iphicrates seems the inventor of the Pike Phalanx.

I am no historian, so I cannot say how credible these claims are.

Despite what Mr. van Wees says (sounds like he's reading too much VD Hanson ) all Greek city-states fielded professional forces. The Athenians had a standing army of 1.000 and a force of "policemen" (over some periods the famed Skythian archers, those many'o'times fought in the battlefield), the Thebans had the Sacred Band, the Spartans... well, they were all full-time pros, and ALL city states (even Sparta, after one point) fielded mercenaries. Some fielded exclusively mercenaries (usually kingdoms or oligarchies) but only few. OTOH, the standing army of the Macedonian state were, practically, only the Hypaspists (3.000 in Alex's times, probably 2.000 under Philipos) and to an extent the Heteroi cavalry.

Because of the way the Macedonian state was structured, it was easier to drag the citizen from their fields for longer times, but that doesn't mean the 9.000+ pezheteroi or the rest of the contigents of the Macedonian army were "professionals" or whatnot.

To the question at hand, in the 3rd century every Greek state (be it kingdom, city or confederation) had gone its own way regarding military system. The only certainity is that the hoplites were if not a thing of the past, then a marginal and rather small part of the military force any greek state could field. Many had adopted the Macedonian phalanx, some operated as light peltasts mostly (the Aetolian league, for instance, fielded for the most time almost exclusively peltasts and heavy peltasts and peltast-like hoplites) and some tried to retain some of the older customs.

One has to note that all city-states relied on mercenaries in this timeframe - the socioeconomical changes brought forth by the hellenization of the eastern mediteranean and the creation of the large autocratic hellenistic states, brought a growing dependency upon mercenaries, while the citizen became all but eager to serve their duty.

[Kralizec]

Standing armies tended to be small for city states, most soldiers could only campaign for the lenght of a season before they had to return to manage their farms or other business. Doing otherwise would cripple the economy of the city state.

The Spartans were different, even weird in that...they too, had to return after a short while of campaigning, but only to keep their Helote slaves, wich did everything to keep the economy going, from revolting. It always seemed strange to me that people consider the Spartans to be noble and dignified

[Geoffrey S]

Despite what Mr. van Wees says (sounds like he's reading too much VD Hanson ) all Greek city-states fielded professional forces. The Athenians had a standing army of 1.000 and a force of "policemen" (over some periods the famed Skythian archers, those many'o'times fought in the battlefield), the Thebans had the Sacred Band, the Spartans... well, they were all full-time pros, and ALL city states (even Sparta, after one point) fielded mercenaries.

Were the soldiers of various city states actually paid by the state, or was it mostly along the lines of who could afford to dedicate himself to soldiering full-time?

[Kraxis]

Actually the Macedonian phalanx didn't roll over the old hoplite phalanx, it was the tactics of Phillip that resulted in the onesided affair.
He had one part of his army 'reel' back in face of the Athenian phalanx, causing them to proceed too far to 'send them running back to Macedonia.' So a gap appeared in the hoplite phalanx into which Phillip had planned Alexander and the Hetaroi should attack... Which they did. The hoplites had no chance against that.

But hoplites were time and again the strongest opposition to Alexander, though a true calculation is hard to do since the hoplites suffered the trouble of having their flanks stripped or some other non-line reverses. But there can hardly be any doubt as it which was better, it was just not lightyears better as sometimes it is said to be.

[Watchman]

By what I know of it (which, granted, isn't all that much) the Greek city-states generally had very little in the form of taxation and hence a bit of a lack of liquid assets they could invest on something or other - like paying full-time professional troops. Wasn't the hoplite system a specific answer to that - each man obliged to equip himself at his own expense and fight for the community as needed, the costs to the community proper hence about a flat zero ?

'Course mercenaries don't nearly always actually need to be paid as such; they may well be perfectly happy at settling the matter themselves by straight looting of enemy territory, but that's not exactly a workable way to go about maintaining any kind of standing force...

[Rosacrux redux]

Were the soldiers of various city states actually paid by the state, or was it mostly along the lines of who could afford to dedicate himself to soldiering full-time?

If we are talking about the classical timeframe, the standing army of any city state was funded by public means. If it was a hoplite force, the men still had to take care of their equipment by own means, but the city granted them an amount of money (I don't remember how much, but at least for the Athenian standing army this is documented and I might look it upt) to support themselves without having to work.

The police forces (always mercenaries) also got a share of the public fund - some times, when the Demos refused to renew their contracts or tried to reduce payment, the mercenaries would get arms against their employers

Usually, when a city-state employed a standing army, the assembly of the state would also find the means to support that force. Usually it would be the product of some sort of state fund, sometimes even they'd assign certain fields product's to it.
The payment wasn't really good and that's why usually the crop of the Greek mercenaries went on to Persia or other places (Karthage, Egypt etc.), to serve for more money (in the times of Xenophon, a golden "daric"/month was the standard pay for mercenaries serving the western satraps).

The city states contrary to the popular belief, had sources of taxation, direct or indirect. In Athens, for instance, the bulk of the taxes (we are not counting the sponsorhips, the "therorika" and the other indirect taxes - those were furnished by wealthy citizen with full rights) was amassed among the "metoikoi", the inhabitants not of Athenian blood and not with full rights.

[Ano2]

Well okay, at the start of the RTW timeframe, which cities would use which infantry? e.g. Would Athens still use hoplites or would it have switched to phalangites?

Also bear this in mind, although the Greek Cities may have been conquered by Macedonia, to train professional pike phalanx's would require extensive training, and equiptment would have to be provided by the state. Therefore would the Greek cities have maintained their cheap, every man equipts himself hoplites?

Also Alexander used Macedonian's almost exclusively at the start of his conquest of the East, and the only "Greeks" were mercenary HOPLITES.

[hellenes]

Rosacrux pretty much nailed the thing for me.
A small correction for the rest though:
There were no "Greeks" and "Makedonians" there were Makedonian, Athenian, Spartan etc. Greeks, I have never seen anyone saying: "Spartans where defeating the Greeks" or "Athenians where more civilised than the Greeks" it wont harm anyone to put the words "the rest" or "other" in the middle.

Hellenes

[Rosacrux redux]

OK, Ano2, from the top of my head (if you wait until tommorow for more comprehensive data, I can look one of the 1.000 books I got @home):

- Macedonia: pike phalanxes, few light infantry, medium cavalry, heavy cavalry

- Aetolian league: Peltasts (light and heavy) few hoplites

- Achaean league: Pike phalanxes, light infantry (mostly peltasts)

- Sparta: Hoplite phalanx and (after ...260 I think?) pike phalanx

- Cretan cities: light infantry, exceptionally good archers

- Epirus (Molossian kingdom): pike phalanxes, medium cavalry, light infantry (peltasts)

- Athens: few hoplites, mostly mercenaries (peltast and peltast-likes).

Can't remember data on the other states, but apparently the citizen armies were dying off in this era, so the all-hoplites armies were definitely past. Not extinct, but reduced nevertheless.

And I would like to second Hellenes and his notion about Macedonians. They were Greeks as Spartans or Athenians or Syracuseans or Massilians or Rhodians or Cypriots were. Why the distinction?

[conon394]

Rosacrux redux

Achaean league: Pike phalanxes, light infantry (mostly peltasts)

I would not be so definite. Before Philopoemen’s reform of the Achaean army it seems pretty clear the bulk of the Achaean army was either peltasts or ‘medium’ infantry using a thureos. After Philopoemen, besides a heavy infantry phalanx the Achaeans also clearly deploy heavy cavalry (drawn from the league) and light ‘Tarantine’ cavalry (mercenaries?) as well.

few hoplites, mostly mercenaries (peltast and peltast-likes).

That’s a bit of an understatement. Considering how substantially the Athenian citizen body had been reduced after the Lamina war, the force 1000 select hoplites Athens maintained was not exactly a few. A relatively small force compared to the past, but they were certainly high quality hoplites who served with distinction under Demetrious in his battles and against the Celts.

The police forces (always mercenaries) also got a share of the public fund - some times, when the Demos refused to renew their contracts or tried to reduce payment, the mercenaries would get arms against their employers

I don’t understand why you asserting police forces were always mercenary. Given Athens provides the only really solid example, what were the dockyard guards, the ehebes, and the cavalry; but citizens and all doing what you might call police duty.

The city states contrary to the popular belief, had sources of taxation, direct or indirect. In Athens, for instance, the bulk of the taxes (we are not counting the sponsorhips, the "therorika" and the other indirect taxes - those were furnished by wealthy citizen with full rights) was amassed among the "metoikoi", the inhabitants not of Athenian blood and not with full rights.

I can’t agree with your example, an Athens or a Rhodes was the exception: they had the commerce to support harbor taxes and the large metric populations to tax, luxuries most polis lacked.

Kraxis

it was the tactics of Phillip that resulted in the onesided affair.

What onesided affair? The Macedonian battle mound at Chaeronea was rather large. Diodorus is clear the battle was long and could have gone either way. It was Philip’s diplomacy that won the war not his tactics. In the Lamain War Greek hoplite armies won 4 of 5 battles and fought a hard loss at Crannon even though they were massively outnumbered.

[Geoffrey S]

If we are talking about the classical timeframe, the standing army of any city state was funded by public means. If it was a hoplite force, the men still had to take care of their equipment by own means, but the city granted them an amount of money (I don't remember how much, but at least for the Athenian standing army this is documented and I might look it upt) to support themselves without having to work.

Thank, that does make sense. Were commanders, right up to the highest ranks, also generally paid by the state or were they expected to pay for themselves? And would there be examples of richer citizens hiring mercenaries on a personal basis to fight alongside them in a war, rather than the mercenaries being hired by a state?

[Kralizec]

Btw, can somebody shed some light on the nature of Greek mercenaries? They always seem to be equated to peltasts, but on at least one source I've read about Ipicrathes equiping them with longer then usual spears (but not full length pikes) that were so long they had to be weilded dual handed, and they were equiped with a shield smaller then the hoplon strapped to the arm.
Did this type of "imitation hoplite" really exist, and were they widely used

[conon394]

Germaanse Strijder

The equation of either peltast = mercenary or Greek mercenary = peltast are both not really valid.

In general a few data points worth mentioning

The Athenians hired greek mercenaries for the attack on Syracuse, but they are explicitly described as hoplites and slingers. The 10,000 were Greek mercenaries but were hired (largely) as hoplites. Given Xenophon’s description the peltasts commanded by Ipicrathes in the Corinthian war, were peltasts and not some kind of quasi-sarissa wielding infantry. The army raised by the Phocis for the 3rd Sacred war was all mercenary but certainly included hoplites.

but on at least one source I've read about Ipicrathes equiping them with longer then usual spears (but not full length pikes) that were so long they had to be weilded dual handed, and they were equiped with a shield smaller then the hoplon strapped to the arm. Did this type of "imitation hoplite" really exist, and were they widely used

The supposed Ipicratian hoplite…. My answer is no they were not widely used since they never existed. I’m on vacation so I’m going to be lazy any and repost some text of mine from the TWC…

The problem with the whole concept of an Iphicrates reform or phalanx is that the whole edifice depends on only 2 late sources Diodorus and C. Nepos, neither of whom can really be considered to be in the first rank on ancient historians. To add injury to insult, the two are not consistent on the specifics of the ‘reform’. More importantly this supposed reform has left absolutely no footprint in actual period sources. Neither Xenophon nor the Oxyrhynchus historian (Hell Oxy or P) appear to be aware of any substantial change in hoplite gear. Plutarch (frankly a more thoughtful and careful author then either Nepos or Diodorus) provides evidence to counter the whole ideal of a hoplite reform. His text suggests that A: At best Iphicrates might be connected to Athens deploying citizen ‘heavy’ peltasts; and B: the foremost general of the era (Epaminondas) was not overly impressed with ability of these new style peltasts or their ability counter his traditional hoplites. Finally there is simply not a single period artistic or textual reference to a new style of hoplite. No joke in a period drama, nor text about new and old style spears in a record from Athens or some other democracy, no vase painting, no battle field remains of an butt-spike or spear point that suggest a significantly different spear length (until Philip’s sarissa’s of course).

A couple of popular variants to the Iphicates hoplite are either he only reformed Athenian marines and inspired Philip II, and or he reformed peltasts into a more effective medium infantry. The first case (prominent on the web) fails to address the fact that Athenian marines were hoplites and provided their own equipment. Since the Athenian state did not generally start supplying arms to hoplites until some 60 or 70 years after Iphicrates’ supposed reform it’s hard to see how this works. That is how or where Ipicrates would have gained the authority for such actions. As for the second ideal, there is ample evidence that the traditional Thracian peltast already included both the lighter peltasts and soldiers with both spears and more armor.

[ajaxfetish]

Rosacrux recently posted this article which includes some information on Iphikrates (sp?) and some of his innovations/reforms/etc., along with some additional feedback on him from other members.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=54376

Ajax

[Kraxis]

Kraxis



What onesided affair? The Macedonian battle mound at Chaeronea was rather large. Diodorus is clear the battle was long and could have gone either way. It was Philip’s diplomacy that won the war not his tactics. In the Lamain War Greek hoplite armies won 4 of 5 battles and fought a hard loss at Crannon even though they were massively outnumbered.

I responded to this comment

The Macedonians pretty much rolled over them with their pike-phalanx, didn't they ?

The battle was never really in doubt as the Macedonian force acted perfectly in drawing out the Athenian force. Diodorus is known to be a romantic, the battle could not never become a clearcut victory for the Mecedonians for him. But whatever one thinks of him, the facts that a are laid out says more than any author's personal oppinions. The left flank managed to lure in the Athenians, which got shredded by the cavalry and infantry in unison. The Theban contingent fought hard but were essentially fighting for the sake of fighting at that point as the battle was lost with the break of the Athenians.
Had the Athenians held their positions or something else that had held the line the battle might have been more unsure.
Hannibal's losses at Cannae were heavy, in fact very heavy, but was the battle ever really in doubt when we look at his dispositions? It could have gone wrong but didn't and thus was never in doubt. Losses doesn't mean a battle isn't onesided.
Onesided means that one side has all the initiative and never falters from using this or fails in its operations. Sure the other side might fight long and hard but that doesn't make it less onesided.

Dragging the entire war into this talk is expanding the issue which I will not jump into, though I agree the war was won by virtue of diplomacy, but the battle was won by tactics and not superior phalangites (which was the point of my former post).

[conon394]

Kraxis

I responded to this comment…

I missed that, but I still think the assumption of an easy Macedonian victory via either avenue troops or tactics is unwarranted.

The battle was never really in doubt as the Macedonian force acted perfectly in drawing out the Athenian force. Diodorus is known to be a romantic; the battle could not never become a clearcut victory for the Mecedonians for him. But whatever one thinks of him, the facts that a are laid out says more than any author's personal oppinions. The left flank managed to lure in the Athenians, which got shredded by the cavalry and infantry in unison. The Theban contingent fought hard but were essentially fighting for the sake of fighting at that point as the battle was lost with the break of the Athenians. Had the Athenians held their positions or something else that had held the line the battle might have been more unsure.

Diodorus may not be the best peg to hang one’s hat on but then again Polyaenus is hardly Thucydides either. There a very little solid evidence about the battle. If you start with the assumption of tactical brilliance by Philip, then it is easy to dismiss the parts of Diodorus that are inconvenient and pick the bits from Polyaenus that support that view (Athenians lured into a trap, etc). Polyaenus, however contradicts himself, the Athenians are either lured into a trap, or are simply caught off guard when a hill provides the mean for Philip to rally his troops, who were being force back. Philip was fallible, he had be beaten by Onomarchus, and had had just suffered a string of defeats at the hands of the Athenians (Byzantium, Megara, Euboea, Ambracia). Before declaring that the battle was never in doubt it also seems worth remembering that most of Philips friends in Greece seem to have found excuses for not showing up, they did not seem to be so sanguine about the odds as is often suggested.

As a sort of counter example, it seems worth considering just how the Battle of Delium might be reconstructed if people generally considered Pagondas a revolutionary tactical genius. Instead of just narrowly snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, I wonder if we might not hear more about how the battle was never in doubt given Pagondas tactical superiority.

[Rosacrux redux]

I would not be so definite. Before Philopoemen’s reform of the Achaean army it seems pretty clear the bulk of the Achaean army was either peltasts or ‘medium’ infantry using a thureos. After Philopoemen, besides a heavy infantry phalanx the Achaeans also clearly deploy heavy cavalry (drawn from the league) and light ‘Tarantine’ cavalry (mercenaries?) as well.

There is an issue on how "heavy" was their "heavy cavalry" excactly, but I must concede you are right. Another point: the nominal thureophoroi didn't make an appearance until after the Celt invasion, no? That's what I remember at least. There's also this issue about what was a "peltast" in the post-classical age (a much discussed one, I might say). Some seem to imply that the term "peltast" was used for any non-hoplite and not-sarissa weilding melee troops...

That’s a bit of an understatement. Considering how substantially the Athenian citizen body had been reduced after the Lamina war, the force 1000 select hoplites Athens maintained was not exactly a few. A relatively small force compared to the past, but they were certainly high quality hoplites who served with distinction under Demetrious in his battles and against the Celts.

A matter of taste, I might say. In Pericles' times Athens could field 14.000 hoplites. 1.000 is a major setback the way I see it...

I don’t understand why you asserting police forces were always mercenary. Given Athens provides the only really solid example, what were the dockyard guards, the ehebes, and the cavalry; but citizens and all doing what you might call police duty.

There are several sources pointing out that in all democratic states (and many oligarchic) police forces (nominal police forces) were mercenaries and for a series of reasons: to prevent corruption due to family or other bonds to the citizen, to avoid having them becoming a vessel for a wannabe tyrant and a few others in the same context.

I can’t agree with your example, an Athens or a Rhodes was the exception: they had the commerce to support harbor taxes and the large metric populations to tax, luxuries most polis lacked.

Athens, Rhodes, Corinth, Corfu, Syracusae, the Ionian city-states and many others had the metic population and a thriving maritime commerce to draw adequate taxes. Certainly not all city-states had and that leads us to some interesting actions when a state decides it needs more money to hire mercenaries: from imposing a special one-time flat tax on rich citizen (used many times all over Greece) to the seizure of the riches of some nearby Oracle

As for Chaeronia, one must concede that it was an extremely close victory for Philipos.

About the Iphikratian reforms... Xenophon talks about the iphikratides boots, although he doesn't mention anything about the rest of the stuff Diodorus talks about. Plutarchos also talks about Iphikrates and his reforms. Ah, this is a huge subject and not one we can exhaust as a side-discussion here.

Ditto about the correlation of Greek mercenary and peltast. Most democratic/oligarchic Greek cities would not employ (in the classical timeframe) hoplite mercenaries, because hoplites were citizen. Not to mention that, besides the smallish standing armies, maintaining a large force of hoplite mercenaries was out of question for the financial status of any city state (Cyrus, lord of 1/2 Asia Minor and heir to the Persian throne, had a hell of a time maintaing a 13.000 Greek mercenary force - about 10.500 of them hoplites. Can you imagine a meager city-state trying to do so?). But there are several examples of cities employing hoplite mercenaries, and the most prominent seems to be Syracusae (although a large part of Dionysius mercenaries were not Greek hoplites but Italian hoplites...).

Geoffrey

That depends on the timeframe and citystate we are talking about. I don't remember excactly if the strategos would receive state funds, but I think there was a specific arrangement for his part of the booty if there was some. In Sparta the kings (also acting as strategoi) would receive ample public funding and a large share of the booty too. Don't forget that the Greek cities didn't have standing officers - even the mercenary forces were led by state-elected temporary officers. Some exceptions apply to this rule.

On contrast to the Roman aristocracy which managed after a point to recruit "personal armies" (which, in turn, led to the demise of the Republic) in Greece no man was as rich as to create a personal army. There are some examples of rich and powerful men hiring "somatofylakes" (which was considered a "step towards establishing themselves as tyrants" as a Greek writer puts it) but we are talking about 200 - 600 men, not "armies".

There are notable exceptions (a number of them), and the most known among those is Iphikrates (I don't think Konon would disagree on that too... or would he?) who at a point had managed to create an army of mercenaries, stationed it in Thrace and hired it to the highest bidder (among others, two Persian satraps and one Thracian king) but those exceptions just verify the general rule.

[Kraxis]

Of course he isn't the best, but I'm going with what I know and that is that Diodorus was a romantic.
And of course Phillip wasn't a god of war, but he was good, very good. Looking at his acomplishments says that much.

I won't get into the war itself (as noted earlier) because I simply don't know much about it, but weren't the actions you mentioned either smallish skirmishes or sieges (Megara and the lost eye)?

Anyway the pointer, that erally tells me that it was a planned action that the right wing should fall back (note they were not routing, had that been the case they would have been unable to reform due to lack of pikes), and suddenly the Companions charge through the gap. Given how effective Theban cavalry had shown itself in the past, I think it is far to say that putting the cavalry on the flanks would have been a far more logical choice. Yet that didn't happen, they were infact put behind the center. Of course Phillip could just have been cynical and not wanted to waste his precious Companions in a lost battle, but generally such is not the case in ancient battles.

So now me wonder, why put the heavy cavalry behind the center if not to make use of them when the left flank retires? Had the cavalry been posted to the flanks it coul have been dangerous to pull them back and bhind the stuggling phalanx, epecially as it would open up to the enemy forces there. And I'm not entirely sure the cavalry would be at the flankingposition anymore given the battle had already lasted a while when the left flank gave way. It should have been embroiled in a fight with enemy cavalry or light troops. It is just not likely that such a premium fighting force as the Companions would not engage the enemy if they could do so easily (similarly with the enemy forces opposing them).
And it not even certain that the Companions could have been recalled. And they couldn't themselves see what was going on, it would have been a case of Antiochus and Raphia.

So I conclude that the Companions would not be 'ready' at the right (or left for that matter) flank anymore if they had been posted there. And being posted behind the center would have been a waste if Phillip didn't expect what happened to happen.

[Strategy]

Just to muddy the waters a bit, it is worth pointing out that - IIRC - in none of the descriptions of the battle at Chaeronea are Philip's cavalry mentioned as being engaged at all. You will find it in lots of books and websites, but I have yet to read any of the original sources (Diodorus, Plutarch's Alexander, Frontinus, etc) that mention Philip's cavalry (except in one very poor translation).

As I recall, that is a speculation added by Hammond later - who also invented the "infamous" myth of Alexander charging at the head of the Companion Cavalry in that battle (a theory that has later hardened into fact). IIRC, there is also no mention of Greek cavalry at the battle at all.

A very interesting battle (and I'm not saying your theories are wrong - by no means), but one with a regrettable lack of facts about it.

[conon394]

Of course he isn't the best, but I'm going with what I know and that is that Diodorus was a romantic.

True, but while I agree his romanticism often leads him to cast classical generals in the role of Homeric heroes, I don’t think you can broadly say it leads him to do the same for whole armies. But the larger problem in my view is that the picture of the battle you suggest is essential drawn from bits of Plutarch’s Alexander and Polyaenus. Neither of these two is in my view any more credible than Diodorus.

The only source for a fake withdrawal is Polyaenus. Aside from the fact he is a very late source, I just find it hard to take him at face value. First off he is internally inconstant, providing two potentially conflicting version of the Philip’s successes against the Athenians. More importantly as someone who claimed Macedonia descent, I think he shows a definite bias toward Philip. In another section of his work Polyaenus describes Philip as using a trick to deprive Byzantium of its allies during his siege of that city. The problem being that none of Byzantium’s important allies at the siege (Athens, Chios, Rhodes or Persia) would have been susceptible to the strategy described, nor did any of them in fact abandon their aid to the city. The implication of the whole passage also suggests that once his tricked worked Philip was successful, which of course he was not.

Both Plutarch and Polyaenus could be charged with romanticism in their rather vague descriptions of the battle as well.

As for where the Companions were, why you are so sure they were behind the Macedonian line. As far as I am aware there is simply no mention of them at all.

I would also disagree with the logic for a fake retreat. You seem to be positing a binary choice either the Macedonians withdrew intentionally or they routed. I don’t however think that needs to be the case, at the battle of Solygia both the Athenian and Corinthian lines retreated in turn, but were able to reform as their pursuers became less organized and they came to a more favorable terrain. A scenario like that would fit well with Diodrous long hard battle, and also fit with Polyaenus' other description of the battle: that is in a long fight the all professional Macedonians wore down the Athenians (of whom only the minority of select hoplites and the younger age classes had the equivalent level of endurance and ability to reform in a shifting battle).

[conon394]

Of course he isn't the best, but I'm going with what I know and that is that Diodorus was a romantic.

True, but while I agree his romanticism often leads him to cast classical generals in the role of Homeric heroes, I don’t think you can broadly say it leads him to do the same for whole armies. But the larger problem in my view is that the picture of the battle you suggest is essential drawn from bits of Plutarch’s Alexander and Polyaenus. Neither of these two is in my view any more credible than Diodorus.

The only source for a fake withdrawal is Polyaenus. Aside from the fact he is a very late source, I just find it hard to take him at face value. First off he is internally inconstant, providing two potentially conflicting version of the Philip’s successes against the Athenians. More importantly as someone who claimed Macedonia descent, I think he shows a definite bias toward Philip. In another section of his work Polyaenus describes Philip as using a trick to deprive Byzantium of its allies during his siege of that city. The problem being that none of Byzantium’s important allies at the siege (Athens, Chios, Rhodes or Persia) would have been susceptible to the strategy described, nor did any of them in fact abandon their aid to the city. The implication of the whole passage also suggests that once his tricked worked Philip was successful, which of course he was not.

Both Plutarch and Polyaenus could be charged with romanticism in their rather vague descriptions of the battle as well.

As for where the Companions were, why you are so sure they were behind the Macedonian line. As far as I am aware there is simply no mention of them at all.

I would also disagree with the logic for a fake retreat. You seem to be positing a binary choice either the Macedonians withdrew intentionally or they routed. I don’t however think that needs to be the case, at the battle of Solygia both the Athenian and Corinthian lines retreated in turn, but were able to reform as their pursuers became less organized and they came to a more favorable terrain. A scenario like that would fit well with Diodrous long hard battle, and also fit with Polyaenus' other description of the battle: that is in a long fight the all professional Macedonians wore down the Athenians (of whom only the minority of select hoplites and the younger age classes had the equivalent level of endurance and ability to reform in a shifting battle).