AW XV.3

Ancient Warfare Magazine

Warfare in the age of myth and heroes

Ancient Warfare Magazine1 min read
EDITORIAL - The Beginning Of All Warfare
When I was little, we had at least one volume of Greek myths for children in which some of the Homeric epics were included. There was undoubtedly the story of the Trojan horse and probably some of the Odyssey as well. It’s just an example, but I imag
Ancient Warfare Magazine1 min read
Ancient Warfare Magazine
Editor-in-chief: Jasper Oorthuys Assistant editor: Murray Dahm News editor: Lindsay Powell Proofreader: Naomi Munts Image research: Lauren van Zoonen Design & Media: Christianne C. Beall Design © 2016-2021 Karwansaray Publishers Contributors: Alessan
Ancient Warfare Magazine1 min read
Have You Read?
Author Whately asks if we can understand the experience of ancient battle through a new approach of ‘Sensory History’, exploring the sights, sounds, smells, feel and tastes a soldier may have experienced in kind of a ‘face of battle plus’ approach. T
Ancient Warfare Magazine9 min read
Mutiny And Murder
Perhaps even more significantly, the Social War marks the first murders by mutinous troops of consular commanders in Roman history. More than marching legions on the city of Rome, the ability of proconsular commanders to incite troops personally loya
Ancient Warfare Magazine3 min read
A Soldier’s Message From The Grave
This particular tombstone was dedicated to one Titus Flaminius, a soldier in Legio XIV Gemina. He was originally from Faventia (modern Faenza, Italy) but died while stationed in Britain. He was buried in Wroxeter, making it likely that he died some t
Ancient Warfare Magazine1 min read
Sulla’s Siege Of Pompeii
During the Social War, the Oscan-speaking population of Pompeii naturally took the side of the Samnites. Thus, the town was targeted by the proconsular forces of Lucius Cornelius Sulla. The siege of the town, which possibly included a young Marcus Tu
Ancient Warfare Magazine3 min read
How War Chariots Performed
The horse-drawn war chariot remains a subject for passionate debate. From the second millennium BC onwards, it was a high-tech element on the battlefields of the Mediterranean and the Middle East until about the ninth century BC. But how were differe
Ancient Warfare Magazine5 min read
The Warriors Of Ancient Sardinia
A large amount of this Sardinian material survives from the Bronze Age. It depicts various figures in society as well as animals, objects and monuments. These bronzetti date to a time following the construction of Sardinian nuraghi (the dry-stone tow
Ancient Warfare Magazine3 min readArchaeology
Homer's Boar-tusk Helmets
In Book 10 of the Iliad, Odysseus, assisted by Meriones, prepares himself for the night-raid with Diomedes. Among his accoutrements is a boartusk helmet (10.260-270): The artefact’s history is then detailed: how it had been stolen by Autolycus from A
Ancient Warfare Magazine6 min read
Chariots For A King
The Homeric poems were written down perhaps five centuries after the fall of the Mycenaean palaces of the Late Bronze Age (LBA) Aegean. Although they cannot be taken as historical sources, they do contain LBA ‘fragments’. Homer’s description of Odyss
Ancient Warfare Magazine9 min readArchaeology
One Final Siege
THE CAPSTONE OF A TEN-YEAR EXPEDITION The Trojan War is best known from its earliest source in Greek literature, Homer’s Iliad (ca.800 BC). Subsequent literary, documentary, and material sources provide evidence of the importance of the war for the G
Ancient Warfare Magazine6 min read
Preliminaries
A team of archaeologists has found tangible evidence for the premature abandonment of Roman Armenia. Archaeologists from the University of Münster, Germany, and the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia discovered remains of a Roman
Ancient Warfare Magazine8 min read
War Of Alliances
The strategy underpinning Homeric warfare, that of the period of the Trojan War, finds its basis in the Hittite records regarding Wilusa (Troy), Western Anatolia, and the Mycenaean Greek-speaking Kingdom of Ahhiyawa (Achaea). The records suggest that
Ancient Warfare Magazine3 min readWars & Military
The Homeric Warrior
Whilst the poetry of Homer was composed later, there are many elements within it that accurately echo aspects of Mycenaean warfare. Teucer stands for an integrated archer (toksotas). Armed with his composite bow, clothing limited to a kilt (or drawer
Ancient Warfare Magazine7 min read
Across The Wine-dark Sea
A proper starting point for this discussion is the famous passage in book 2 of the Iliad containing a catalogue of ships. Homer offers a long list of vessels with which the Greek soldiers travelled to Troy. The passage contains some 300 lines: Homer
Ancient Warfare Magazine8 min read
The Ancient Art Of Armatura
Vegetius, writing during the reign of Theodosius I or of Valentinian III, composited a treatise from multiple earlier sources to create the model of an ‘ideal legion’ in keeping with the expectation of innovation seen in contemporary treatises. His d
Ancient Warfare Magazine6 min read
Reviews
By Murray Dahm ISBN: 978-1472843517 Osprey Publishing (2021) – £15.99 www.ospreypublishing.com (Full disclosure: Dahm is a friend and uses several of the photographs I took of the battlefield in the book.) Osprey’s newest addition to its Campaign ser
Ancient Warfare Magazine9 min read
Fluent In Both Languages
In the summer of AD 70, as the Roman siege of Jerusalem entered its final phase, the rebel leaders requested a parley with their conqueror, the future emperor Titus. “Titus ordered his soldiers to keep control of their temper and their missiles,” wri
Ancient Warfare Magazine2 min read
Warfare In The Age Of Homer
By Josho Brouwers Karwansaray Publishers, 2017 ISBN: 978-9490258078 An overview of Greek warfare from the Mycenaean Bronze Age down to the Persian Wars, this volume covers (and acts as an introduction to) the period of Homeric warfare (including the
Ancient Warfare Magazine1 min readArchaeology
The Warrior Vase: Armour Of The Homeric Hero?
Found during his excavations at Mycenae in the 1870s by Heinrich Schliemann, the Warrior Vase (p.20) is a krater, used for mixing wine with water, and dated to the 12th century BC (although the precise dating is still debated). It may therefore be co

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