Ancient Warfare
Fire-spears, fire-tubes, and the true gun Part I
The military treatise of Jiao Yu and Liu Ji went into a great amount of detail on the gunpowder weapons of their time. The fire lance and fire tube (i.e. a combination of a firearm and flamethrower) came in many different versions and were styled with many different names by the time Jiao Yu edited the Huolongjing. The earliest of…
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Ancient Siegecraft
Military engineers invented the techniques for overcoming the defenses of fortified cities. One of the earliest inventions was the battering ram, which dates from at least 2500 b. c. e. 15 By 2000 b. c. e. the battering ram was found in almost all armies of the ancient world. The…
MILITARY STAFF DEVELOPMENT IN ANCIENTÂ ARMIES
The two officers in the background are tribunes; that on the right the artist rendered as being a tribunus laticlavius. The two in the foreground are the Legate, and the primus pilus. Contrary to HBO, the thinking amongst most historians is that term means something like “first pillar,” not “first…
Agricola’s governorship
Non-contemporary statue of Gnaeus Julius Agricola, leader of the first major Roman expedition in Hibernia. In AD 74 Cerealis was recalled and replaced by Julius Frontinus, who is better known in Roman history for being appointed curator aquarum in Rome by Nerva in AD 96 and for writing a two-volume…
Rome versus Persia
Maneuvers before and after the Battle of Nineveh The wars between Persia and Rome came to a climax between 603 and 628, with significant consequences for each empire and for subsequent world history. Sparked by mutual interference in each other’s dynastic disputes, Chosroes II of Persia opened the wars against…
THE CANAANITES (1500-900 b. c. e)
A Maryannu warrior, elite of the Canaan army The period between 1800 and 1550 b. c. e. is called the Middle Canaanite period, when climatic conditions improved and cultural development flourished, permitting the people of Canaan to rebuild their old fortified villages into powerful new urban centers. During this time…
Armament and Fighting Style – Greek vs. Persian
Herodotus refers to Greek hoplites as `men of bronze’ in a reference to the armour that they wore and this is a perfectly apt description. The equipment carried by a Greek hoplite was designed for only one thing-straight-up, hand-to-hand, combat. To fight as a hoplite only two pieces of equipment…