From Warriors To Soldiers

By Ruben Ygua

Military History is a discipline of the humanities that focuses on recording the armed conflicts of human history and their impact on societies, their cultures, economies and changes in international relations. It is not limited to the study of battles and wars, but is also interested in the evolution of materials, weaponry, tactics and strategy. It is composed of all those events in human history that can be considered as belonging to the category of generalized social conflicts. This can range from fights between two tribes, to wars between two organized armed forces, including at their maximum scale the world wars that affect the majority of the human population. Military activity has been a constant process for thousands of years, and the tactics, strategies and goals of military operations have remained basically unchanged over the millennia. For example, a notable military maneuver still studied today is the double wrap-around clip used by Hannibal Barca in the Battle of Cannas in 216 BC. - Some 2,200 years ago. That same maneuver was already described by the Chinese military theorist Sun Tzu, who wrote about the same time as the foundation of Rome, approximately 2,750 years ago, and 500 years before the Battle of Cannas.The main areas of military history include the history of wars, battles and combat, the history of military art and the history of each specific military service...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Clube de Autores
• Release date: Dec 17, 2025

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RUBEN YGUA

From Warriors to Soldiers

The Evolution of War

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Ruben Ygua- 13/10/2024

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The content of this work, including the spelling check, is the sole responsibility of the author.

Dedicated to my family

Introduction

Traditional methods of studying the past have always given greater importance to nationalist, religious and moral interests, which subordinated the historical fact to the System point of view.

That’s how we have been educated.

The time has come to simplify and show respect for our ancestors, striving to know what really happened in the past, and not just what they want to inform us about.

After so many years of studying History, I came to the conclusion that the best study system is through an impartial, objective Chronology that just put each event in its exact place in time, revealing History without manipulation.

This Chronology contains not only purely political facts, such as the foundation of cities, the birth of kingdoms and empires, scientific and geographical discoveries, natural disasters and epidemics; it also includes information on the most different fields of human activity: chemistry, astronomy, geography, mathematics, and so on. In parallel, the chronology is complemented by data that do not belong to a specific date, but to an entire epoch, they are each society generalities, curiosities, customs, the religion of each civilization, inventions or discoveries that cannot be placed in an exact date, etc.

The result of all this set is one of the most complete chronologies within its reach, periodically updated with the latest archaeological and scientific discoveries, and that transforms the reader into an eyewitness of the past, understanding the relation of geographically distant facts to each other, but closely connected in time and influencing unexpected consequences. This is something that traditional history has generally ignored when it was not usable.

A work of this magnitude could not be published in a single book, so I have divided it into several collections, and the Spanish originals are being translated into French, English, Italian and Portuguese.

The chronology goes from prehistory to the present day year by year, as far as possible.

For those who prefer a deeper and more detailed study, I have prepared a second chronology, day by day, this for now covers from 1789 to 1946, divided into five collections.

Ruben Ygua

MILITARY HISTORY

Military History is a discipline of the humanities that focuses on recording the armed conflicts of human history and their impact on societies, their cultures, economies and changes in international relations. It is not limited to the study of battles and wars, but is also interested in the evolution of materials, weaponry, tactics and strategy.

It is composed of all those events in human history that can be considered as belonging to the category of generalized social conflicts. This can range from fights between two tribes, to wars between two organized armed forces, including at their maximum scale the world wars that affect the majority of the human population.

Professional historians usually concentrate on the military events that have had the greatest impact on the societies involved, while amateur historians pay more attention to details of battles, equipment or uniforms. Historians are responsible for narrating these events, through writing or in other ways.

Military activity has been a constant process for thousands of years, and the tactics, strategies and goals of military operations have remained basically unchanged over the millennia. For example, a notable military maneuver still studied today is the double wrap-around clip used by Hannibal Barca in the Battle of Cannas in 216 BC. - Some 2,200 years ago. That same maneuver was already described by the Chinese military theorist Sun Tzu, who wrote about the same time as the foundation of Rome, approximately 2,750 years ago, and 500 years before the Battle of Cannas.

By studying history related to their profession, the military aims to avoid repeating the same mistakes of the past, and thus improve their performance by instilling in their commanders the ability to perceive historical parallels during a battle, and thus to maximize the lessons learned from it. The main areas of military history include the history of wars, battles and combat, the history of military art and the history of each specific military service.

There are several ways to categorize war. One of them is the distinction between conventional and unconventional warfare, where conventional refers to well-identified armed forces fighting each other relatively openly and directly, without weapons of mass destruction. Unconventional warfare refers to other types of warfare, including raids, guerrilla warfare, insurgency, and terrorism. Alternatively it can include nuclear warfare, chemical warfare, or biological warfare.

All of these categories are usually integrated into two other higher order categories: high and low intensity warfare. High intensity warfare is warfare between two superpowers or large nations fighting for political and/or economic interests. Low-intensity warfare refers to insurgency against a dominant army, guerrilla warfare, and special types of troops fighting a revolution.

THE FIRST WARRIOR IN HISTORY

A long time ago - between 100,000 and 200,000 years in the past - the life of the first Homo sapiens was extremely dangerous in the midst of the wilderness where powerful animals abounded, equipped with natural weapons that our ancestors lacked: horns, claws, powerful jaws, greater speed and better hearing, sight and smell. With his life under permanent threat, punished by hunger and fear, the human hunter had to make use of the only advantage he had: his intelligence and the use of fire, which was used since a million years ago by Homo erectus, a distant ancestor.

Thanks to its intelligence, Homo sapiens was able to have the claws, fangs and horns that gave superiority to animals: the first knife was the horns of the skeleton of antelopes and other animals, which abounded in the African grasslands, the stone mace increased the power of the blow, a resistant wooden stick provided greater reach to the human arm. These were the tools that changed the destiny of Homo sapiens, the first weapons of the warrior who fought to survive and impose himself on his world, not only against the animals, but also against other men.

The meeting of two clans would certainly become a dispute for the resources of the territory, possibly the fight would be between the best warriors of each group. The women and children would be incorporated into the winning clan, the defeated men could be killed during the fighting, expelled from the group, or perhaps they would agree to submit to the winning leader, joining the group of hunters. Individual

combat among the best warriors was born, and that style of fighting would span the millennia into the age of metal.

The champion of each human group will challenge the champion of the rival group, in search of personal prestige, as we can see in the legend of David and Goliath, the battle of Achilles and Hector before Troy and the Horatii and Curiatii of Roman legend. Possibly none of them existed in real life, but their examples show what the individual combat of the first warriors in history was like.

We can define the first warrior as an infantry combatant, armed with maces, spears, bow and arrow, knives, first of stone, then of copper and shortly after of bronze. The combat is protected by a leather shield, and later by a metal one. Certainly in the early days he would not use protection for the body, fighting as the Gauls would, many centuries later facing death with a naked, proud and fierce body. We do not know when protective leather armor, which evolved into metal armor, emerged, but it must have been adopted in later times, when the pride of the hero gave way to prudence. Who knows how the perfection of the bow and arrow had something to do with that change in behavior. The polished stone-tipped arrow and new, more powerful bows must have eliminated many brave champions in the distance, and the same may have been true of slingshot stones, as happened to Goliath. It was no longer enough to be the bravest and most powerful warrior in the clan, now he must be the most cunning and well protected by attacks from afar. Obviously, finishing off a rival from afar did not make the archer any more prestigious, and whoever used that weapon was considered a coward by the other warriors, as Homer states in the Iliad.

With the increase of the population, the clan is transformed into a tribe, which lives in fixed villages, dedicating itself to agriculture and cattle rising. The earliest known archaeological record has revealed a prehistoric battle that took place 12,000-14,000 years ago on the Sudanese Nile in an area known as Cemetery 117.

Already in 8000 BC there are villages surrounded by walls, a sign of war and invasion.

Sedentary societies produced an abundance of food that aroused the envy and greed of those human groups that remained nomadic, leading a harsh life as shepherds and hunters considered wild by the sedentary.

Each city organizes for its protection a privileged class of people: the warriors.

THE AGE OF THE CHARIOT AND THE CAVALRY

The first archaeological evidence of horses used for warfare dates from 4000 or 3000 BC in the steppes of Eurasia, the region currently occupied by Ukraine, Hungary and Romania. In that area, not long after the domestication of the horse, people began to live in community within large fortified villages to protect themselves from attack by horsemen. Horses were used for warfare from the time of the earliest historical records. One of the first representations of horses is found in the panel of the war of the Standard of Ur, in Sumer, dated around 2500 BC, where horses (or possibly onagres or mules) can be seen pulling a four-wheeled cart. Although the horses are not shown in combat, only pulling carts, these horses clearly had an important performance in the victory represented in the Standard.

The horse was such a fearsome part of the army that the mere sound of many horses and chariots was enough to inspire fear and make the enemy think they were outnumbered and panicked (see Second Book of Kings, 7.6-7). The military power of Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Median-Persia, and other nations depended heavily on horses.

From the 18th century BC the chariot was perfected in the Near East. In Sumer these chariots were not fast, being used as support for the infantry, were pulled by donkeys or oxen, but must have caused a decisive psychological effect on the hordes of desert plunderers. In each chariot, there were three persons: the driver, a lancer-squire and an archer, who massacred the enemies at a distance, without allowing them to approach. Behind the chariots, the Sumerian infantry, armed with swords and bronze spears, marched as the infantry of the 20th century would one day march behind their armored vehicles.

This tactic will give superiority to the armies that founded the first empires in history, such as the Akkadians.

The first documented cases of the use of horses for combat belong to chariot battles. Among the evidence of the use of such chariots, we can find the burials of the Andronovo culture (Sintashta culture) in present-day Russia and Kazakhstan, which correspond to approximately 2000 BC. The oldest evidence of chariot fighting in the Ancient Near East is the ancient Proclamation of Anitta, dating from the 18th century BC, which mentions 40 yoke of horses during the siege of Salatiwara. In the ancient world, the Hittites became known for their chariot prowess. The spread of the use of the chariot for warfare in most of Eurasia practically coincides with the development of the composite bow, known since c. 1600 BC.

Improvements in wheels and axles, as well as in weaponry, soon led to chariots participating in the battles of Bronze Age societies from China to Egypt.

The Hyksos invaders introduced the chariot to ancient Egypt during the 16th century BC, and the Egyptians have adopted it ever since. The oldest preserved text that relates to the breeding of war horses in the ancient world is the Hittite manual of Kikkuli, dated approximately 1350 BC, which describes the preparation of horses for chariots.

Chariots were already used in China during the Shang Dynasty (c.1600-1050 BC). The oldest evidence of these chariots in Asia is found in ceremonial burials: as had already happened in Central Asia, horses and chariots were found buried along with their owners to accompany them into the next life.

In the 14th century BC, hordes of cavalry violently burst into the Near East, easily defeating the heavy Sumerian chariot. These invaders bring another novelty: iron weapons, more resistant and effective than bronze weapons. In this way the historical scenario is transformed, the Hyksos enter Egypt, the Mycenaean destroy the Cretan civilization, and numerous Indo-European invaders spread through Europe. Swift hordes of knights triumph everywhere. In Egypt, the Hyksos adapt the chariot of war to be pulled by horses, transforming it into a formidable weapon of war against which infantry warriors can do nothing. The Egyptians learn the lesson and adopt the invader's weapons, creating a very light and fast war chariot for two crew members. Using iron weapons and the horse, the Egyptians expel the Hyksos and found the Second Empire, entering the Golden Age of their civilization. All the civilizations of the time adopt the horse and build their own chariots that vary the number of crew members. While Achilles fights alone in his chariot, the Hittites are three for each chariot, the Egyptians carry two warriors, and in the great Assyrian chariots they fight four people.

On the battlefield hundreds of swift chariots are deployed, raining arrows on the enemy. The approach is brutal, spears and swords are used in the encounter of the chariots, which often collide and their wheels are broken by the knives placed in the axles. The army that loses the order of the chariot line is lost, being surrounded and annihilated by the supporting infantry.

Battles are fought on previously chosen terrain, which allows the chariots to evolve and move, and they will reign as absolute masters of war for several centuries.

One of the first examples of the use of the horse in battle were the archers or spear throwers, which date back to the time of the Assyrian kings Ashurnasirpal II and Shalmaneser III. However, the riders sat on the back of their horses, an uncomfortable position for quick movements; therefore, the horses were usually held by someone on foot who allowed the archer the freedom to shoot. Therefore, it was more like a mounted infantry than real cavalry.

The Assyrians developed the use of cavalry as a response to invasions by nomadic peoples from the north, such as the Cimmerians, who entered Asia Minor in the 8th century BC and took over parts of Urartu during the reign of Sargon II in approximately 721 BC, the Assyrians had already learned to sit later on their horses in the classic riding position that can still be seen today and which could be called true light cavalry. The ancient Greeks used both light horses for exploring and heavy cavalry.

It is believed that heavy cavalry was developed by the ancient Persians. In the time of Darius I (558-486

BC), Persian military tactics evolved to the point of requiring horses and riders in full armor, so a heavier, more muscular type of horse was bred that could carry this additional weight. Later, the ancient Greeks created a heavy armored cavalry, whose most famous units are Alexander the Great's hetairoi. The Chinese in the 4th century BC, during the period of the Fighting Kingdoms (403 BC - 221 BC), began to employ cavalry against rival kingdoms. In addition, in response to attacks by nomadic horsemen from the

north and west, the Chinese of the Han Dynasty (202 B.C.-A.D. 220) created highly effective mounted troops. The Romans also used heavy cavalry within their armies.

The term cataphractus refers to certain tactics, armor and weaponry used by mounted units from the time of the Persians to the middle Ages.

Ancient Indian literature describes several nomadic knightly peoples of Central Asia. Some of the earliest references to the use of horses for warfare in that area belong to the Puranas texts, which relate an invasion of India by the joint cavalry of the sakas, Kamboja, Iavanas, pallava and paradas, called the five groups (Pancha Gana) or groups of warriors (chatria-gana). The invaders captured the throne of the kingdom of Ayutthaya, overthrowing the rule of the Vedic King Baju, perhaps at the beginning of the first millennium BC.

Later texts, such as the Majábharata, written around the third century BC, seem to acknowledge the effort made in breeding battle horses, and state that horses belonging to the Kamboja (in India) and Indus regions were of excellent quality and that the Kamboja, Gandhara and Iavanas (probably Ionians, arrived with Alexander the Great) were considered experts in mounted combat.

THE PHARAOH'S ARMY

In the Ancient Empire, the army was called ''mesh'', grouping of forces: groups that met in case of need to support small permanent units. Its functions were border protection, maritime trade and for all kinds of public