The Peloponnesian War ended in 404 and closed out the fifth
century with a surprise attack. Lysander, the Spartan, tricked the Athenians at
Aegospotami, by attacking their vessels at a regular hour and then calling off
his fleet. Once this had become an established procedure, the Athenians dropped
their guard after the Spartans dispersed. Then, when most of the Athenians had
scattered according to their usual pattern, he returned, attacked and slew the
rest, and captured all their vessels. The fourth century was thus ushered in
with the defeat of the Athenian Empire and a Spartan hegemony that took its
place and lasted until the Battle of Leuctra in 371. Sparta found itself
engulfed in the so-called Corinthian war from 395 until 387 against a coalition
of four allied states: Thebes, Athens, Corinth and Argos, which were initially
backed by Persia. Then the Boeotian or Theban war broke out in 378 as the
result of a revolt in Thebes against Sparta; the war would last six years.
There was obviously no shortage of warfare in the fourth
century, and all sides continued to fight with hoplites, but the conditions of
military life were slowly changing. Gone was the era of short military
campaigns that took place only during the summer after the harvest. Cities were
now attacked by night, fighting took place year-round, and atrocities were
committed against civilians. The prolongation of campaigns and a change in
tactics set the stage for the professionalisation of Greek armies. Whereas
hoplite warfare had not necessarily called for very elaborate training, the use
of missiles and the tactics of staging ambushes required training at a higher
technical level. When light-armed troops were utilised everything depended upon
movement. Rapid changes of position, sudden strikes, speedy retreats and
ambushes were all operations that needed to be carefully prepared with accurate
intelligence. Because such operations had to be well directed and executed with
speed and determination, it could mean training one’s own troops or hiring
well-trained mercenaries.
The change from militiamen to paid fighters meant a change
from amateurs to professional soldiers. Foreign mercenaries were expensive and
could not usually be hired in large numbers, but citizens could be recruited
and trained to perform the same specialised functions provided by foreign,
light-armed mercenaries. Athens’ overseas expeditions in the fourth century
were all carried out by mercenaries.
Light-Armed Troops and Peltasts
An increasingly important role was played by light-armed
troops in the fourth century, and they became a significant factor in the
conduct and the outcome of battles. Although hoplites mattered most in set
battle on a large scale, war on land now had a place for other arms and other methods
than those of the hoplite phalanx. Smaller tactical units gave a new
manoeuvrability that had been impossible in traditional hoplite lines. These
new troops became effective in gaining tactical advantage, usually through a
sudden, surprise assault. Small striking forces became especially important in
fifth-column operations.
There were several types of light troops, the most common
being archers, slingers and peltast-javelin men.8 The peltasts became the most
effective of the light-armed troops. Peltasts were a sort of mean between the
extremes of heavy and light-armed men. They had all the mobility of light-armed
troops, and yet sufficient offensive and defensive armour to cope, with a fair
amount of success, with small bodies of hoplite troops (i.e. those not in
set-piece battles). Using peltasts would increase the ability of Greek armies
to stage surprise attacks and ambushes. The name peltast comes from the fact
that they were armed with a pelte (Thracian shield). In place of a dagger, they
might also carry a kind of scimitar, a curved sabre known as a machaira, which
could be used to deal slashing blows. Peltasts were not much help in stopping a
hoplite force head on; their main use was to protect the flanks of an advancing
hoplite army against attacks from the light-armed troops of the enemy. The
majority of Greek states had an organised body of light-armed troops. Athens
was an exception until this was changed by commanders such as Iphicrates and
Chabrias.
Although their weapons might seem simple, these light troops
were specialist soldiers. Their way of fighting entailed a higher degree of
specialisation than the relatively straightforward, spear-and-shield techniques
of hoplites fighting in formation. The accurate use of missile weapons was a skill
acquired and maintained only by regular and constant practice. For this reason,
light-armed troops tended to be professionals. At first, they were foreign
mercenaries recruited in Thrace, Crete and Rhodes; later, they were natives
recruited locally from city-states. Athens was the first to transform some of
the poorer citizens into light troops.
The Athenian general Iphicrates is credited by two ancient
sources – Diodorus and Cornelius Nepos – with reforming the equipment of his
hoplites. These military reforms have long been the subject of scholarly
debate, but what is clear is that they were much better equipped to stage
ambushes. Iphicrates did away with the large hoplite shield – the aspis – and
replaced it with the smaller pelta. He also lengthened the sword (xiphous) and
the spear (doratos). Of course, there were peltasts in use long before this
time in other regions of Greece, but now the reform was coming to Athens.
The defeat of the Athenian hoplites by light-armed cavalry
and peltasts at Spartolus, the successful defence by Acarnanian slingers of
Stratus against Peloponnesian hoplites, or the destruction of Ambraciot
hoplites by Amphilochian light-armed, not only reinforced the lessons learned
from the experience in Aetolia and Sphacteria but also carried them still
further. From the last phases of the Peloponnesian war and, continuing into the
fourth century, armies began to contain significantly higher numbers of
specialised troops than Classical ones had fielded. This included the growth of
a corps of archers, the addition of light-armed troops, the rise of mercenary
troops recruited largely from abroad, and the development of cavalry.
Generalisations about mercenary service can be misleading.
It is commonly assumed that mercenary soldiers did not become a significant
factor of Greek social and political history before the fourth century. In
fact, however, Greek mercenary soldiers had been serving in armies of southeast
Mediterranean powers since the Archaic Age. The reasons for soldiers becoming
mercenaries and their terms of service vary. In Crete, for example, one would
cite demographic developments and military traditions as well as socio-economic
crisis. Another accusation that dogged military operations was that the
systematic use of mercenaries encouraged a selfish inertness at home, a
dangerous licentiousness in the free companies abroad, and that it diverted the
energies of the ablest citizens from patriotic objects to the baser pursuit of
plunder and military fame. The fact is, however, that soldiers did not take up
this line of work because it was so lucrative. Service in places such as Persia
and Egypt might be lucrative, but service in Greece proper was not. Soldiers in
the fourth century accepted military service knowing that there was no money in
it for them unless they looted, stole or won booty.
Hoplite Armour and Hamippoi
Another military innovation that occurred in the fourth
century was the lightening of the hoplite panoply. Some hoplites were still
sporting extensive metal armour in the mid-fourth century, but the overall
trend of the Classical period seems to have been a progressive lightening of
hoplite armour. This made hoplites more mobile and thus better able to cope
with the challenges of difficult terrain, enemy skirmishers and ambushes.
Lighter panoplies were also cheaper. Konrad Kinzel suggests that this enabled
more citizens to equip themselves as hoplites and enjoy the attendant political
status that went with this type of fighting. But were these troops really
hoplites any more? Nick Sekunda also describes the shift in the use of armour
plate in the late fifth century. He seems to think that armour all but
disappeared as the Spartans were depicted wearing only a pilos helmet and
tunic, no cuirass, greaves, etc. and Boeotian hoplites were all but naked. Does
this indicate a change in battlefield tactics? The availability of materials?
And were these soldiers still considered ‘hoplites’, i.e. heavy infantry? It
certainly contributed to them being more mobile and able to counter attacks by
light-armed soldiers.
Another military innovation of the fourth century was the
introduction of hamippoi, a type of light-infantry corps that ran behind
cavalrymen. The hamippoi were trained to fight alongside the cavalrymen. They
would go into battle holding on to the tails and manes of the cavalry horses.
Hamippoi were particularly useful in a straight cavalry fight, where they would
hack at the enemy horsemen. One of their signature manoeuvres was to slip
underneath the enemy horse and rip its belly open with a dagger. This certainly
suggests that service in the hamippoi was not for the faint-hearted. In his
pamphlet On the Duties of the Hipparch, Xenophon recommends that the Athenians
raise a corps of such men from among the exiles and other foreigners in Athens,
who had special reason to be bitter against the enemy. Xenophon saw their value
as being able to deliver a surprise as he points out that they could be hidden
among and behind taller mounted troops.
Hamippoi were first mentioned serving in the forces of the
Syracusan tyrant Gelon, where his 2,000 cavalry were accompanied by an equal
number of hippodromoi psiloi or psiloi who run alongside the cavalry. Hamippoi
are found in the Boeotian army during the Peloponnesian war. When the Spartan
army was reorganised some time after the Battle of Mantinea in 418, the 600
skiritai were not folded into the ranks of the morai but were converted into
the hamippoi and fought alongside the 600 cavalry.
In short, as the fifth century progressed into the fourth,
the trend was to lighten the armour of the hoplites and add soldiers from the
lower classes, who could perform various new duties that required greater speed
and manoeuvrability. This made ambushing more difficult and less likely if each
side had mobile troops that could improvise.
The Generals in the Fourth Century
The need to develop specialised, light-armed troops
encouraged the rise of professional generalship in the fourth century. The
proper handling of such troops required something more than amateur leadership.
Fourth-century generals had to recruit different types of soldiers, who used
different types of weapons and tactics. W. K. Pritchett dedicates a chapter of
the second volume of his comprehensive work, The Greek State at War, to this
new breed of general. Their careers were made possible by the changing
political and military circumstances, and new operating conditions dictated
some new fighting techniques. The military commanders in the late fifth and
early fourth centuries had to conduct military operations more and more
independently, relying on their own skill and talent. They developed
increasingly strong ties with their army rather than just their polis. The
independence of fourth-century commanders was a function of long-term service
abroad and of operating independently of their home authorities. How much
freedom they enjoyed in the field can probably never be precisely determined,
but those who were elected or appointed to office by the larger city-states
seem to have discharged their functions with as much loyalty as similar
officials in the fifth century.
Another motivation for the increased use of novel techniques
and stratagems was that fourth-century military forces were sent out without
being provided with money. The generals were expected to raise funds by
plunder, by contributions from allies or even by foreign service. They and
their troops seem to have had unlimited permission to plunder the enemy’s
country. In the fifth century, mercenaries had been dismissed when the state
lacked funds, but conditions had greatly changed in the fourth century. A great
number of the stratagems that are collected in Polyaenus and assigned to
Athenian generals of the fourth century have to do with the raising of money to
pay their troops. Six of the stratagems preserved in Polyaenus on Jason of
Pherae, for example, deal with means for securing funds.
Even with these new troops, staging an ambush was no easier
to accomplish in the fourth century than it was in the fifth. Naturally, it was
best done with soldiers who were trained by their leaders in the skills needed
for such operations. This is where the light-armed troops, especially peltasts,
excelled. Light-armed troops, unlike hoplites, were trained to be highly
responsive and flexible. They had to be able to close with the enemy and kill
quickly. Light infantrymen could be used to destroy the enemy on his own
ground, make the best of initiative, stealth and surprise, infiltration, ambush
and night operations. Iphicrates trained his light-armed troops by staging fake
ambushes, fake assaults, fake panics and fake desertions so his men would be
ready if the real thing happened. Light infantrymen were not tacticians; they
could not respond mechanically to a set of conditions on a battlefield with a
pre-determined action like a phalanx. Whoever led the ambush had to know how to
use initiative, understand intent, take independent action, analyse the field
of operations, collect intelligence and make rapid decisions. Initiative meant
bold action and often involved risks. Initiative by the tactical leader may
have been independent of what higher commanders wanted done to the enemy. The
men such leaders worked with were soldiers trained to fend for themselves
through hardship and risk in hostile, uncompromising terrain. Such operations
built a greater degree of teamwork and skill than other types of infantry
formations as a result of the stress put on adaptability, close-combat skills
and independent action.
Fourth-Century Ambush
Greek literature in the fourth century contains much more
information on ambush than its fifth-century counterpart. Even didactic works
such as Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, while wholly removed from the context of real
events, give lessons about commanding a Greek army. The ambush against the
forces of Gadatas42 is a classic use of clandestine communications and the
laying of an ambush among a cluster of small villages. We can also see a
classic deception operation, where soldiers are arrayed along with the baggage
train and the women to make their force seem larger than it is. Any enemy
attack would have to make a wider circuit around them and thereby thin out
their own lines.
We cannot always be sure of the dates or even the historicity
of certain stratagems, but they all seem to describe generic situations that
crop up again and again. One of the most common ways to stage an ambush, for
example, was to attack an army on the march. Polyaenus gives an undated example
of the detection of such an ambush. While leading his army, Tissamenus saw many
birds flying above a particular place, but not settling on the ground, and he
concluded that they shrank from settling because they feared men lying in
ambush. After investigating the spot, he attacked and cut down the Ionians who
were waiting in ambush. This is a much repeated story, with several Roman
commanders using the same tactic.
Another piece of good advice was to be ready for an ambush
whether you were expecting one or not. Polyaenus tells a story about Arxilaidas
the Laconian who, around 370/69, was about to travel a suspicious road with his
army. Pretending he had advance intelligence which he did not, he ordered them
to advance prepared for battle because the enemy lay in ambush. But by chance a
large ambush was discovered. He attacked first and easily killed all those in
ambush, outsmarting them by his advance preparations.
Playing on the known habits of barbarian tribes was another
common practice. Polyaenus relates several stratagems used by Clerachus against
the Thracians, which presumably date from a time just prior to his entering the
service of Cyrus. All illustrate the frequency of Thracian nocturnal attacks.
This practice, according to Polyaenus, enabled Clearchus the Spartan to set an
ambush for one of the local Thracian tribes, the Thrynians. He withdrew a
little distance with a number of soldiers, and ordered them to hit their
shields, as was the Thracian habit, putting all the Greeks in camp on alert.
When the Thracians attacked, they expected to find everything in camp peaceful
and quiet, but the Greeks were ready for them and they were beaten off with
severe losses. When the Thracians sent envoys to negotiate a peace, Clearchus
had the bodies of a few dead Thracians cut up and strung from trees. When the
envoys asked about the meaning of the spectacle, they were told that a meal for
Clearchus was being prepared! Such antics as these caused people to question
the ethical aspects of Clearchus’ conduct, but his military qualities are
beyond dispute. He displayed great military insight in critical situations and
this meant using whatever tactics worked.
The instances of surprise attacks, night marches and
ambushes gathered in this chapter show how common ambushes had become in Greek
warfare. This included not only light-armed troops but also hoplites being used
for manoeuvres off the regular battlefield. Against hoplites, the function of
peltasts was so often harassment, and the night was the most advantageous time.
Isocrates equated peltasts with pirates.
Pursuing a fleeing army was a tactic that also became more
common because of the mobility of light-armed troops. Plutarch tells us that
the Spartans thought it ignoble for the Greeks to kill men who were fleeing,
and adds that this policy made enemies more inclined to run away than fight.
The practical reason for doing this, however, was not a lack of morality but
rather a tactic to avoid the kind of thing that happened after the Battle of
Haliartus in 395. The Thebans pursued the Spartans into the hills, where the
Spartans immediately turned on them and attacked back with javelins and stones.
They killed more than 200 Thebans. Practicality played a bigger part in Greek
military policy than moralising.
The shock over the effectiveness of these new soldiers and
their new tactics became apparent when a detachment of peltasts won a brilliant
victory over Spartan soldiers at Lechaeum in 394. The commanders Callias and
Iphicrates, looking down from the walls of Corinth, could see an approaching
mora of Spartan soldiers. The Spartans were not numerous and were not
accompanied by any light-armed or cavalry. The Athenans commanders determined
that it would be safe to stage an ambush with their own peltasts. They could
aim their javelins at the Spartans’ unshielded side when they passed. Callias
stationed his hoplites in the ambush not far from the city walls, while
Iphicrates led the peltasts in an attack, knowing if they lost they could
retreat more quickly. The Spartan commander ordered a group of the youngest
soldiers to pursue the assailants, but when they did so they caught no one,
since they were hoplites pursuing peltasts at a distance of a javelin’s cast.
Besides, Iphicrates had given orders to the peltasts to retire before the
hoplites got near them. Then, when the Spartans were returning from their
pursuit, out of formation because each man had pursued as swiftly as he could,
Iphicrates’ troops turned around and not only did those in front again hurl
javelins at the Spartans but others on the flank also ran and attacked them on
their unprotected side.
Having lost many of their best men, with their returning
cavalry’s support, the Spartans again attempted to pursue the peltasts. Yet
when the peltasts gave way, the cavalry bungled the attack by not pursuing the
enemy at full speed but, rather, kept an even pace with the hoplites in both
their attack and their retreat. Finally, not knowing what to do, the Spartans
gathered together on a small hill about two stades distant from the sea and
about sixteen or seventeen stades from Lechaeum. When the Spartans in Lechaeum
realised what was happening, they got into boats and sailed alongside the shore
until they were opposite the hill. The men on the hill were now at a loss as to
what to do; they were suffering dreadfully, and dying, while unable to harm the
enemy in any way, and in addition they now saw the Athenian hoplites coming at
them. At this point they gave way and fled, some throwing themselves into the
sea, while a few made it to safety to Lechaeum with the cavalry. The total dead
from all the skirmishes and the flight was enormous; the Spartans had lost half
their number in a skirmish with Iphicrates’ peltasts.
Iphicrates, the ambusher, had to beware of ambushes himself.
Polyaenus reports that the Spartan harmost (military governor) set an ambush
that caught Iphicrates off-guard while he was marching towards the city of
Sicyon in 391. Iphicrates immediately retreated by a different, short,
trackless route. He selected his strongest troops, fell on the ambushers
suddenly and killed them all. He admitted that he made a mistake by not
reconnoitring the area, but he exploited his prompt suspicion of an ambush well
by quickly attacking the ambushers.
Iphicrates won several successes in the Corinthian war, such
as the recapture of Sidous, Krommyon and Oinoe from the Spartans. Several
scholars have seen the similarities in the tactics used by Iphicrates’ peltasts
and those that the Aetolians had used against Demosthenes, or that Demosthenes
in turn used against the Spartans on Sphacteria. The success of Iphicrates was
a suggestive sign of the future which might be in store for the professional
peltast. The fact that they could defeat the Spartans boosted their ego and was
a blow against Spartan prestige. As Parke describes it:
This success of the peltasts … was sufficient to make
Iphicrates’ name forever as a general. Moreover it conferred on this type of
light-armed troops a reputation for deadliness in battle which they had never
before enjoyed in popular estimation. To this new esteem may be attributed the
frequent appearance of peltasts in all armies, especially in the Athenian,
during the next half-century. Henceforth, they become the typical form of
light-armed troops and superseded the less-clearly specified, earlier
varieties.
Ambushing, at what some commentators consider ‘inappropriate
times’, now became a habit. Of course, what other time than ‘inappropriate’
could an ambush be? Several surprise attacks are attributed to Iphicrates by
Frontinus. In one, Iphicrates attacked a Spartan camp at an hour when both
armies were accustomed to forage for food and wood.
Another ambush on which Xenophon provides fairly detailed
information took place in 388 in the Hellespontine region. The Spartans sent
Anaxibius to Abydos as harmost (military governor) to relieve Dercylidas. He
immediately took the offensive against the Athenians and their allies. The
Athenians feared Anaxibius would find a way to weaken their position, and sent
Iphicrates with eight ships and 1,200 peltasts to the Hellespont. First the two
commanders just sent raiding parties against each other, using irregulars. Then
Iphicrates crossed over by night to the most deserted portion of the territory
of Abydos, and set an ambush in the mountains. He ordered his fleet to sail
northwards along the Chersonese in order to deceive Anaxibius into believing
they had left the area. Anaxibius suspected nothing and marched back to Abydos,
but made his march in a rather careless fashion. Iphicrates’ men in the ambush
waited until the vanguard of hoplites from Abydos had reached the plain, and at
the moment when the rearguard consisting of Anaxibius’ Spartans started coming
down from the mountains they sprang the ambush and rushed to attack the
rearguard. Anaxibius’ army formed a very long and narrow column and it was
practically impossible for his other troops to hasten uphill to the aid of the
rearguard. He stayed where he was and fought to the death with twelve other
Spartans. The rest of the Spartans fell in flight. Only 150 hoplites from the
vanguard still managed to get away but only because they had been in the front
of the column and were nearer to Abydos. This makes the probable percentage of
losses in the middle of the column somewhere between that of the totally
destroyed rearguard and the twenty-five per cent of the vanguard. Iphicrates
went back to the Chersonese with a successful operation behind him. This
carefully planned ambush, and indeed Iphicrates’ victory, have been compared to
a successful guerrilla operation. With the defeat and death of Anaxibius, the
danger for Athens of Sparta getting supremacy in the Hellespont was over.
Iphicrates continued to operate against the Spartans in these parts until the
Peace of Antalcidas, after which he entered the service of the Thracian kings.
When Iphicrates left for the Hellespont in 388, Chabrias succeeded him as
commander of the peltasts in Corinth. Because he had served under Thrasyboulus
in the Hellespontine region, he was probably trained in the use of peltasts.
