Ancient Warfare
The New Kingdom Army
The pharaoh headed Egypt’s armed forces as commander-in-chief. As the warrior king he led a highly organised and professional standing army and navy. Tactics and strategies were decided upon by the pharaoh, in consultation with his war council. During the time of Thutmose III there appears to have been only two army divisions: Amun based in Thebes and Ra based…
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Memnon of Rhodes 380 B.C.–333 B.C.
Battle of Granicus Alexander at Troy Memnon was a hired Greek general in service of the Persian king Darius. He just barely escaped his first encounter with Alexander the Great at the Battle of Granicus. Alexander’s army routed Memnon’s mercenaries and Persian allies there, but like all great underdogs, Memnon…
The Dorian Spear
Long delayed it may have been, but there were no half measures about the advance of the Peloponnesians from their bunk-hole when it came. Making good their demolition work of the previous summer, engineers had already repaired the land route to Megara, and it was just as well that they…
The Persian Ruin at Plataea
At a hurriedly convened council of war, the Greeks weighed the unappetising options that now lay before them. To abandon their positions by daylight would clearly be tantamount to suicide: the Persian cavalry would cut them to ribbons. Yet to postpone a withdrawal would be just as disastrous: thirsty already,…
The Battle of Amnias
The turning point of the battle occurred when the Scythed chariots led by Archelaus dived into Nicomedes army. According to Appian, the chariots caused wounds of such a hideous nature that they caused fear and confusion among Nicomede’s troops, “…cutting some of them in two, and tearing others to pieces.”…
Thermopylae
Since their stunning victory in 490 over the Persians at Marathon, the Greeks had not been as focused as the Persians on the upcoming war. Athens, Sparta, and most other poleis (city-states) had returned to their contentious ways and fallen out among themselves. When hearing the news of Xerxes’s oncoming…
Successors to Alexander the Great
The death of Alexander the Great brought a struggle among his subordinates for succession to his throne. As many as 11 of his commanders vied for position, but it finally became a struggle among three: Antigonus controlled Macedon, Seleucus took over most of what had been the Persian Empire, and…