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[German version] (λιποταξίου γραφή; lipotaxíou graphḗ) in Attic law was a legal action for leaving the line of battle without authorization. The crime was punished like other military offences with atimía (Dem. Or. 15,32; cf. for Sparta Isoc. Or. 8,143). Aeschines attributes the corresponding law to Solon (Aeschin. In Ctes. 175f.), which however remains uncertain. According to Andocides (And. 1,74; cf. Lys. 14,5-7), the prosecution of military offences like the graphḕ astrateías (failure to obey a call-up), the deilías graphḗ (legal action for cowardice) and the graphḕ toû apobeb…

[German version] (ταξίαρχος; taxíarchos). In Greek and Macedonian armies he was commander of a τάξις/ taxis ; in Athens, the highest military rank after the strategos I (e.g. Aristoph. Ach. 569; Aristoph. Av. 353; Thuc. 4,4,1; 8,92,4; Dem. Or. 4,26; Aeschin. Leg. 169). He commanded the members of his phyle, appointed lochagoi (Aristot. Ath. Pol. 61,3; lóchos), and probably maintained the roll of the phyle (Aristoph. Pax 1172 ff.). The closest Roman equivalent of the taxiarchos is the centurio. Burckhardt, Leonhard (Basle)

[German version] Hetairoi (ἑταῖροι/ hetaîroi, ‘companions’) constituted the king's retinue in Greek monarchies, even on the battlefield (e.g. Hom. Il. 1,179). In the Classical period hetairoi were especially important in Macedonia: selected by the king himself, they made up his immediate entourage as his closest advisers and as the next generation of leaders. The king went to war at the head of their unit, which probably resulted in the original, military meaning of the term. Hetairoi (often supplemented by βασιλικοί, basilikoí) are attested for the Macedonian cavalry with …

[German version] (Χιλίαρχος). Commander of a 1,000-man contingent in the Macedonian and Ptolemaic armies (e.g. Arr. Anab. 1,22,7). At the same time, the term serves as a Greek translation for the commander of the royal guard in Persia, the 1,000 μηλοφόροι ( mēlophóroi) (Aesch. Pers. 304). After the conquest of Persia the expression came to apply to the most important office in the new imperial order after Alexander's death (Diod. Sic. 18,48,4). The military and political powers attached to it are unclear. With the emergence of the kingd…

[German version] (ῥομφαία/ rhomphaía). A big, double-edged iron sword similar to a halberd. It had a long wooden handle and was worn over the right shoulder. In the Hellenistic Period, it was the characteristic weapon of the Thracians (Plut. Aemilius 18,3; Liv. 31,39,11: rumpia); Phylarchus FGrH 81 F 57; Arr. FGrH 156 F 103; Gell. NA 10,25,4; Val. Fl. 6,98). In Jewish-Christian literature, however, rhomphaia refers to any big double-edged sword (LXX Gn 3,24; 1 Sam 17,51 (Goliath's sword); Lc 2,35; Ios. Ant. Iud. 6,190). Burckhardt, Leonhard (Basle) Bibliography H. O. Fiebiger, s. v. ῥ…

[German version] (πεζέταιροι; pez(h)étairoi). Pezhetairoi, 'foot companions', are first mentioned in Demosthenes (Demosth. Or. 2,17). In the Macedonian army the term pezhetairoi designated heavy infantry equipped with pikes ( s aríssa ) and small shields (Shield), but not breastplates, which was the most important branch of the army. Although, according to Theopompus (FGrH 115 F 348), under Philip [4] II only the elite troops of the royal guard were so called, Alexander [4] the Great then gave the whole  ph…

[German version] (σάρισσα/ sárissa or σάρισα/ sárisa). Long pike of the Macedonian infantry and cavalry, weighing 6-7,5 kg and having a length of 4,5-5,4 m (Theophr. Hist. pl. 3,12,2; Asclepiodotus 5,1; Pol. 18,29; [1]). It consisted of a wooden shaft, preferably made of European cornel, and had pointed metal tips at both ends. The bottom point served as spare part, as a counterweight and for fixing the sarissa on the ground against a cavalry attack. Since the sarissa was held with both hands during the fight, the foot soldiers armed with it could carry only a small ro…

(φάλαγξ; phálanx). [German version] I. The phalanx of hoplites As early as in Homer the word phalanx is used to describe a battle-line or a lined-up army section (cf. e.g. Hom. Il. 11,214f.; 13,126f., cf. 16,215-217). Phalanx is used, like στίξ ( stíx, '(battle-)rank'), almost always in the plural, phálanges; after Homer the expression is not used again until Xenophon (Xen. An. 1,8,17; 6,5,27; Xen. Cyr. 1,6,43; Xen. Hell. 4,3,18; 6,5,18). Today it is recognised that by the Homeric period (8th cent. BC) mass fighting was already decisive; the phalanx as a uniformly equipped and centr…

[German version] (ἱπποτοξόται; hippotoxótai). Hippotoxotai were mounted archers. The Scythians and Getae fought as hippotoxotai (Hdt. 4,46,3; Thuc. 2,96,1; Arr. Anab. 3,8,3). Hippotoxotai are documented for the Persian, Athenian, Macedonian and Hellenistic armies (Hdt. 9,49,2; Arr. Anab. 4,24,1; 5,12,2; 6,6,1; Diod. Sic. 20,113,4). During the Peloponnesian War, Athens had a squadron of 200 hippotoxotai (Thuc. 2,13,8); of these 20 served on the island of Melos, 30 in Sicily (Thuc. 5,84,1; 6,94,4), probably as skirmishers (Xen. Mem. 3,3,1). Hippotoxotai were citizens and p…

[German version] (ἐπιβάται; epibátai) were initially passengers on board ship (Hdt. 8,118,3), or an armed escort of soldiers serving on warships in antiquity; in Greece the epibatai were normally recruited from among the hoplites. Their numbers varied: in 494 BC ships from Chios each carried 40 epibatai (Hdt. 6,15,1), Persian ships in 480 BC carried 30 epibatai (Hdt. 7,184,2); in the Athenian fleet during the Peloponnesian War, 10 epibatai was the normal complement (Thuc. 3,94,1 and 3,95,2; cf. IG II2 1951,84f.: 11 epibatai). More epibatai were necessary on the bigger Hellenist…

[German version] The Latin term 'Optimates', found only in the plural and derived from opti mus, means 'the best'; in the works of Cicero, by far the most important source for the evidence, but also in other authors such as Livy (3,35,4; 3,39,9; 6,39,6), the word 'Optimates' is used to refer to the Roman leadership class, especially when emphasizing the difference between senatores and plebs or between Optimates and Populares . In his speech on behalf of Sestius, Cicero invests the term with considerable moral and political significance and coun…

[German version] The wall of Media (Μηδίας τεῖχος, Mēdías teîchos) is only mentioned with this designation by Xenophon in his Anábasis, initially just in passing in connection with a defensive ditch at the Euphrates, built at the order of Artaxerxes [2] II (Xen. An. 1,7,15). Xenophon gives a comprehensive description of the wall in his report of the events following the battle of Cunaxa in 401BC (An. 2,4,12): it was supposedly 20 feet ( c. 6 m) wide, 100 feet ( c. 30 m) high, and 20 parasangs ( c. 80 km) long, built from fired bricks placed in asphalt. According to Xenophon (An. 2,1…

[German version] The helepolis (ἑλέπολις; helépolis, literally ‘city-taker’) was a large mobile siege tower, fitted with wheels, designed to bring up soldiers and catapults to the walls of a besieged city. The term is first attested for a tower built by Posidonius for Alexander the Great (Biton 52f. Wescher; cf. for the siege of Tyre, Arr. Anab. 2,18-24), helepoleis were probably also already used by  Dionysius [1] I of Syracuse (Diod. Sic. 14,51,1). They may be of oriental or Carthaginian origin (Diod. Sic. 13,55). The helepoleis used by  Demetrius [2] Poliorcetes for the sie…

[German version] The term máchimoi (μάχιμοι, ‘the pugnacious’; troops fit for action) was used by Greek authors primarily for non-Greek armies. Herodotus differentiates the machimoi from the retinue of the Persian army (Hdt. 7,186,1) and refers with this word to the class of professional warriors in ancient Egypt (2,164f.). In the Ptolemaic army, machimoi were the native soldiers who performed the duties of auxiliary, guard and police units until c. the end of the 3rd cent. BC, afterwards however, at the latest from the battle of Raphia in 217 BC, also constitute…

[German version] (δειλίας γραφή; deilías graphḗ). In Attic criminal law the indictment for cowardice. Although the existence of deilias graphe alongside other military offences (λιποταξίου γραφή, ἀστρατείας γραφή, γραφή τοῦ ἀποβληκέναι τὴν ἀσπίδα) is indicated in various places (And. 1,74; Lys. 14,5-7; Aeschin. 3,175f.; Aristoph. Ach. 1129; Equ. 368), it was disputed by older authorities [2; 5]. However, no concrete case of a deilias graphe is known. Distinction of the generalized deilias graphe from the more precisely defined offences given above is of course probl…

[German version] (τάξις; táxis). In the military sense, the term is primarily used to designate the battle order, the disposition of the army or the individual battle line. As a military unit, it referred at Athens to the army contingent provided by each phyle [1] (431 BC: c. 1,000 men), in Macedonia to the regionally recruited and most imporant tactical unit of the phalanx of the pezhetairoi (Arr. Anab. 3,11,9 f.), and in Asclepiodotus (2,8) to a force of 128 men. The expression was also used for other armies, e.g. that of the Greek mercena…

[German version] (πελτασταί; peltastaí). The πέλτη ( péltē) was a small, light, round shield made of wood or wicker-work that was covered with fur (schol. Eur. Rhes. 311; Aristot. fr. 498 Rose); a type of lightly-armed soldiers was named p eltastai after it (Diod. Sic. 15,44,3; Nep. Iphicrates 11,1,3f.). Aside from the shield, their weapons consisted of one or two javelins, a sword and a thrusting lance. Peltastai could be deployed both in long-range and in short-range warfare because of their weapons. Initially the peltastai in Greece were mainly foreign mercenaries who came p…

[German version] (δεκάς; dekás). From Homeric into Hellenistic times, the basic unit in Greek and Macedonian infantry and cavalry armies (Hom. Il. 2,126; Hdt. 3,25,6; Xen. Hell. 7,2,6; Hipp. 4,9; Arr. Anab. 7,23,3; Anaximenes FGrH 72 F4; P. Cairo Zen. 1,7-11; 2,22-24; Frontin. Str. 4,1,6), which was commanded by a decadarch (Xen. Hipp. 2,2-6). Normally, the unit comprised ten men with a possible further division into groups of five; deviations from this practice occurred. Burckhardt, Leonhard (Basle) Bibliography 1 Kromayer/Veith 90f. 2 M. Launey, Recherches sur les armées …

[German version] (λόχος; lóchos). The lochos is attested in many Greek armies as a military unit of varying size; in general the commanders of the lochoi were the lochagoi. 7 lochoi that probably each had 512 men fought on the Spartan side at Mantinea in 418 BC (Thuc. 5,68,3; cf. Hdt. 9,53,2f.; 9,57,1f.); in the 4th cent. BC, Sparta had twelve lochoi (Xen. Hell. 7,5,10). The Boeotian infantry, the táxeis (táxis) of the Athenians and mercenary armies were also divided up into lochoi (Thuc. 4,91; Xen…

[German version] ‘The Silver Shields’, an elite corps of heavy Macedonian infantry, which can be identified with the hypaspists of Alexander the Great. It is not known if the name was already used by the end of his rule (no earlier than the India campaign) or only under the Diadochi. Considered to be particularly loyal to the king, they became part of the army of Eumenes in 318/17. After his end, to which their faithlessness contributed, they were sent to Arachosia by Antigonus and then dissolved. Later a unit in the Seleucid army was called by this name after their example. Burckhardt, Leonhar…