Surprisingly advanced or bizarre tactics from the Ancient Era?
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King Thomas
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The Mongol army had almost modern command and control systems which is one of the reasons why it did so well.
The Aztecs concentrated on taking prisoners rather then killing people.
Spartacus , when besieged on Mount Vesuivius, made ropes of vines, climbed down the mountain, then invaded the Roman camp-the Romans being so overconfident that they had not bothered to fortify said camp.
Not strictly the Ancient Era but in 1746 six Highlanders managed to trick 1700 English soldiers into thinking a whole Highland army was waiting for them in the dark. The 1700 English soldiers ended up running away in a mad panic from six people making a noise, much to their later embarrassment.
The Aztecs concentrated on taking prisoners rather then killing people.
Spartacus , when besieged on Mount Vesuivius, made ropes of vines, climbed down the mountain, then invaded the Roman camp-the Romans being so overconfident that they had not bothered to fortify said camp.
Not strictly the Ancient Era but in 1746 six Highlanders managed to trick 1700 English soldiers into thinking a whole Highland army was waiting for them in the dark. The 1700 English soldiers ended up running away in a mad panic from six people making a noise, much to their later embarrassment.
That's probably fictional.
Not strictly true. Flower Wars were distinct from regular wars and were more "ritualized" and focused on prisoner-grabbing, but Aztecs fought more conventional wars too and could come up with neat tricks of their own. Once they had youths in training disguise themselves as adult soldiers to look like the Aztec army from far away and lure the enemy to a place where the real Aztec army could ambush them. Another time they had elite warriors hide in holes dug in the ground and covered over, so a feigned retreat led the enemy (Huastecs IIRC) right over them where they received an unwelcome surprise. I have also heard of the Aztecs using smoke from burning chili peppers to harass defenders of besieged towns.
People on this thread seem to have a really low opinion of the intelligence of ancient peoples:
This is an example of surprisingly advanced military techniques, i.e. modern command and control.
These are not, climbing or using misdirection and surprise hardly surprisingly advanced techniques, in fact they are something that cavemen would have been able to do.
This is an example of surprisingly advanced military techniques, i.e. modern command and control.
These are not, climbing or using misdirection and surprise hardly surprisingly advanced techniques, in fact they are something that cavemen would have been able to do.
Well I believe he mentioned that as a bizarre tactic rather than advanced one. Using ladders from vines and trees was an unusual, but successful tactic.
Spartans in many way functioned as Green Berets; afraid of losing citizens in an already shrinking base, Sparta tended to fight with armies made up of allies, mercenaries, and freed helots. The function of the Spartiates was typically leadership; they were unique among most Greek states in that they had a detailed officer heirarchy down to the file, as well as drill training. They would impose this structure of organization and training on forces commanded by a standardized staff of thirty Spartiates; while allied forces resented Spartan drill and discipline, it made them considerably more effective in combat.
They were some what effective in open areas and closed formations. Unfortunately not effective outside those conditions.
I think the Siege of Rhodes by Demetrius of Macedon deserves a mention here, if for nothing else than the scale and complexity of the siege engines used. He had constructed for him a massive siege tower, one of the biggest in history, called the helepolis with an elaborate engineering set up necessary to render it moveable, along with iron plates on front to protect from fire and every floor had ballistas or bolt-throwers of varying sizes to keep the defenders pinned as it moved closer. There was also a gigantic battering ram involved in the siege as well as large drills to bore holes through the wall. For the use of all these engines Demetrius was dubbed "the Besieger". Worth noting though that he actually failed to take Rhodes. While his engines were state-of-the-art, his tactics were a bit crude and he was basically just throwing guys at the city, once he remarked that he didn't owe the dead rations. In any case, the metal from the helepolis was salvaged by the victorious Rhodians to construct the famous Colossus of Rhodes.
Tell more of what the Aztecs did to you. Commas matter.
Yes I am notorious for typing mistakes in English.
Sure, if you want to be boring and "factually accurate" about it...
Tell more of what the Aztecs did to you. Commas matter.
"Let's eat grandma!"
As for weird tactics, there was one example I heard of about a King of (IIRC) Vietnam. Basically, for one battle against the Chinese he rounded up a load of condemned criminals and gave them a choice: if they killed themselves, their wives and families would be spared; if not, they themselves would be killed, and their families with them. So he put the ones who accepted the bargain in the front rank of his army. Just as the battle was about to start, these men all drew their swords and cut their own heads off. The Chinese army was supposedly so unnerved by this, and by the prospect of fighting a King whose soldiers were (apparently) so unnaturally obedient, that they retreated forthwith.
The Romans did quite a bit more than just that. During a Roman reenactment event last year I had the privilege of meeting a military surgeon (who BTW had just returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan) who'd studied the history of military medicine as a personal interest and he provided me with some quite interesting facts about how advanced Roman field hospitals already were. They e.g. had patient's rooms equipped with transportable sickbeds (while freshly amputated in Napoleonic and even Crimean war era field hospitals would have to lie on the more often than not damp ground with, if they were lucky, a little straw for insulation); patients were sedated during operations with poppy juice, administered in a small sponge placed in the patient's mouth, so that the deglutition reflex would see to it that the substance was swallowed in small sips (while Napoleonic era amputees would at best get some liquor, but more likely just a piece of wood to bite on) and last but not least there are descriptions of roman surgeons cleaning their instruments between operations by wrapping them into a piece of cloth and placing said cloth with the surgical instruments into boiling water with vinegar (while field surgeons in Crimea would still merely wipe their instruments off their dirty aprons before proceeding to the next patient).
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longsword14
Banned
Any sources on Napoleonic times? Did the Romans have a set belief about infections and acted accordingly or did they just have a method that did not care about the reasoning all that much?
It makes sense to at least ensure that instruments being repeatedly used are free of prominent contamination, so at least surgeons throughout the ages made sure that their instruments were clear of all visible contaminants.
Also, the extent of preparation for casualties varied from place to place and time to time in early 19th century. For example,I have read about prominence of French field hospitals and surgeons in III corps and the 70000 man corps for 1812.
Can I have more information on this? I would love to read in depth on this.