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Accuracy of Slingers (Read 16601 times)
Thearos
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #30 - Nov 12th, 2009 at 5:33pm
 
Here's the passage. Great piece of writing re. combat, and tactical analysis



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As soon as day broke, the rest of the army landed, that is to say, all the crews of rather more than seventy ships, except the lowest rank of oars, with the arms they carried, eight hundred archers, and as many targeteers, the Messenian reinforcements, and all the other troops on duty round Pylos, except the garrison on the fort. The tactics of Demosthenes had divided them into companies of two hundred, more or less, and made them occupy the highest points in order to paralyse the enemy by surrounding him on every side and thus leaving him without any tangible adversary, exposed to the cross-fire of their host; plied by those in his rear if he attacked in front, and by those on one flank if he moved against those on the other. In short, wherever he went he would have the assailants behind him, and these light-armed assailants, the most awkward of all; arrows, darts, stones, and slings making them formidable at a distance, and there being no means of getting at them at close quarters, as they could conquer flying, and the moment their pursuer turned they were upon him. Such was the idea that inspired Demosthenes in his conception of the descent, and presided over its execution.

Meanwhile the main body of the troops in the island (that under Epitadas), seeing their outpost cut off and an army advancing against them, serried their ranks and pressed forward to close with the Athenian heavy infantry in front of them, the light troops being upon their flanks and rear. However, they were not able to engage or to profit by their superior skill, the light troops keeping them in check on either side with their missiles, and the heavy infantry remaining stationary instead of advancing to meet them; and although they routed the light troops wherever they ran up and approached too closely, yet they retreated fighting, being lightly equipped, and easily getting the start in their flight, from the difficult and rugged nature of the ground, in an island hitherto desert, over which the Lacedaemonians could not pursue them with their heavy armour.

After this skirmishing had lasted some little while, the Lacedaemonians became unable to dash out with the same rapidity as before upon the points attacked, and the light troops finding that they now fought with less vigour, became more confident. They could see with their own eyes that they were many times more numerous than the enemy; they were now more familiar with his aspect and found him less terrible, the result not having justified the apprehensions which they had suffered, when they first landed in slavish dismay at the idea of attacking Lacedaemonians; and accordingly their fear changing to disdain, they now rushed all together with loud shouts upon them, and pelted them with stones, darts, and arrows, whichever came first to hand. The shouting accompanying their onset confounded the Lacedaemonians, unaccustomed to this mode of fighting; dust rose from the newly burnt wood, and it was impossible to see in front of one with the arrows and stones flying through clouds of dust from the hands of numerous assailants. The Lacedaemonians had now to sustain a rude conflict; their caps would not keep out the arrows, darts had broken off in the armour of the wounded, while they themselves were helpless for offence, being prevented from using their eyes to see what was before them, and unable to hear the words of command for the hubbub raised by the enemy; danger encompassed them on every side, and there was no hope of any means of defence or safety.

At last, after many had been already wounded in the confined space in which they were fighting, they formed in close order and retired on the fort at the end of the island, which was not far off, and to their friends who held it. The moment they gave way, the light troops became bolder and pressed upon them, shouting louder than ever, and killed as many as they came up with in their retreat, but most of the Lacedaemonians made good their escape to the fort, and with the garrison in it ranged themselves all along its whole extent to repulse the enemy wherever it was assailable. The Athenians pursuing, unable to surround and hem them in, owing to the strength of the ground, attacked them in front and tried to storm the position. For a long time, indeed for most of the day, both sides held out against all the torments of the battle, thirst, and sun, the one endeavouring to drive the enemy from the high ground, the other to maintain himself upon it, it being now more easy for the Lacedaemonians to defend themselves than before, as they could not be surrounded on the flanks.

The struggle began to seem endless, when the commander of the Messenians came to Cleon and Demosthenes, and told them that they were losing their labour: but if they would give him some archers and light troops to go round on the enemy's rear by a way he would undertake to find, he thought he could force the approach. Upon receiving what he asked for, he started from a point out of sight in order not to be seen by the enemy, and creeping on wherever the precipices of the island permitted, and where the Lacedaemonians, trusting to the strength of the ground, kept no guard, succeeded after the greatest difficulty in getting round without their seeing him, and suddenly appeared on the high ground in their rear, to the dismay of the surprised enemy and the still greater joy of his expectant friends. The Lacedaemonians thus placed between two fires, and in the same dilemma, to compare small things with great, as at Thermopylae, where the defenders were cut off through the Persians getting round by the path, being now attacked in front and behind, began to give way, and overcome by the odds against them and exhausted from want of food, retreated.

The Athenians were already masters of the approaches when Cleon and Demosthenes perceiving that, if the enemy gave way a single step further, they would be destroyed by their soldiery, put a stop to the battle and held their men back; wishing to take the Lacedaemonians alive to Athens, and hoping that their stubbornness might relax on hearing the offer of terms, and that they might surrender and yield to the present overwhelming danger. Proclamation was accordingly made, to know if they would surrender themselves and their arms to the Athenians to be dealt at their discretion.

The Lacedaemonians hearing this offer, most of them lowered their shields and waved their hands to show that they accepted it. Hostilities now ceased, and a parley was held between Cleon and Demosthenes and Styphon, son of Pharax, on the other side; since Epitadas, the first of the previous commanders, had been killed, and Hippagretas, the next in command, left for dead among the slain, though still alive, and thus the command had devolved upon Styphon according to the law, in case of anything happening to his superiors. Styphon and his companions said they wished to send a herald to the Lacedaemonians on the mainland, to know what they were to do. The Athenians would not let any of them go, but themselves called for heralds from the mainland, and after questions had been carried backwards and forwards two or three times, the last man that passed over from the Lacedaemonians on the continent brought this message: "The Lacedaemonians bid you to decide for yourselves so long as you do nothing dishonourable"; upon which after consulting together they surrendered themselves and their arms. The Athenians, after guarding them that day and night, the next morning set up a trophy in the island, and got ready to sail, giving their prisoners in batches to be guarded by the captains of the galleys; and the Lacedaemonians sent a herald and took up their dead. The number of the killed and prisoners taken in the island was as follows: four hundred and twenty heavy infantry had passed over; three hundred all but eight were taken alive to Athens; the rest were killed. About a hundred and twenty of the prisoners were Spartans. The Athenian loss was small, the battle not having been fought at close quarters.
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funda_iucunda
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #31 - Nov 13th, 2009 at 6:23am
 
I don't want to interrupt this interesting discussion. But in addition to my comparison to modern long range weapons I remember that I read somewhere that in the  Korean war around 1950 the US Army found out that statistically 1 kill of an enemy took 50,000 shots of US infantry weapons. (I admitt that this figure is of an epoche when automatic weapons and related to this tactics had been invented exchanging accuracy by pumping the terrain full with masses of projectiles. So it might not be directly comparable to the discussed defeat of the Spartans.)

@ Thearos ("yes but that's 50% improvement ? ")
It depends on our exspectations. Today we are used to gain 100% accuracy with computerized weapons. Today a tank gunner has to justify a failed shot. So we can say the improvement between the 1980'ties and today is from 33 to 99% that ist 200% within 25 years!

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Thearos
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #32 - Nov 13th, 2009 at 6:56am
 
Can modern tanks really score first shot hits at eg. 2000 m range ?
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David Morningstar
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #33 - Nov 13th, 2009 at 10:50am
 
Thearos wrote on Nov 13th, 2009 at 6:56am:
Can modern tanks really score first shot hits at eg. 2000 m range ?



Looks like it: http://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/2-5534.aspx
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #34 - Nov 14th, 2009 at 11:21am
 
Quote:
Can modern tanks really score first shot hits at eg. 2000 m range ?

yes, what's more they can do it while moving, while in midair (modern tanks can travel fast enough to get air time over sharp bumps) and while moving can fire a series of shots at different trajectories that arrive on target at the same time.

when you consider that modern ordnance costs tens of thousands of dollars per round. You don't want to miss !

But what i really wanted to add to this thread was about the spartan thing.

half a dozen staff slingers with firepots would have ended that battle in about half an hour.
why didn't they use staff slings and incendiaries more against infantry?

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funda_iucunda
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #35 - Nov 14th, 2009 at 1:00pm
 
Probably they weren't prepared to that kind of warfare. To my current knowledge the ships didn't use fire for catapults or so at that time. Fire was rather used for siege purposes. The so called Greek fire was invented much later.

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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #36 - Nov 14th, 2009 at 2:57pm
 
Curious Aardvark wrote on Nov 14th, 2009 at 11:21am:
Quote:
Can modern tanks really score first shot hits at eg. 2000 m range ?

yes, what's more they can do it while moving, while in midair (modern tanks can travel fast enough to get air time over sharp bumps) and while moving can fire a series of shots at different trajectories that arrive on target at the same time.

when you consider that modern ordnance costs tens of thousands of dollars per round. You don't want to miss !

But what i really wanted to add to this thread was about the spartan thing.

half a dozen staff slingers with firepots would have ended that battle in about half an hour.
why didn't they use staff slings and incendiaries more against infantry?


From whatI know about the greeks, they couldn't make fire very easily. Perhaps slinging firepots was too technologically costly to use often?
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Pikåru wrote on Nov 19th, 2013 at 6:59pm:
Massi - WTF? It's called a sling. You use it to throw rocks farther and faster than you could otherwise. That's all. 
~Engineers like to solve problems. If there are no problems handily avialable, they will create their own problems.~
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Thearos
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #37 - Nov 14th, 2009 at 6:41pm
 
Short reply: either the ancient Greeks were too unimaginative and stupid, or the idea of slinging firepots is, well, ever so slightly naff.
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Fundibularius
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #38 - Nov 14th, 2009 at 7:51pm
 
Sounds like an ancient equivalent of the Geneva Convention.
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #39 - Nov 20th, 2009 at 2:53pm
 
Okay, first off, we must realize that the ancient sources, especially those of the Greeks, tend exaggerate very much. An example would be the 1,000,000 Persians in the Battle of Thermopoylae mentioned when, in real life, the numbers should have been 200,000; the Greeks exaggerated the number by a wooping factor of 5.

Now, if I'm not mistakened, Thucydides did seem to be a more reliable person. However, this does not mean that he was not guilty of wild assertions in some of his works. And there certainly is something suspicious about the event.
The most suspicious would be the harmlessness of 800 peltasts. Since javelins were mostly used at around 30 meters, accuracy should not have been a problem and should have been much greater than 22%. More importantly, in the European world, the javelins have more power than the arrows. The bronze shields of the Spartans might have still blocked out the projectiles, but one hit in the body by the javelin would have severely injured them. But, how much of body parts were not covered by the shields? The answer is shown below.

Curious Aardvark wrote on Nov 12th, 2009 at 6:20am:
yeah but we're talking about spartans here not ordinary troops.
basically the rock hard ninja of the ancient world.


I agree that they were very professional and well trained. However, if you are implying that they can withstand arrows that had bypassed the shields with only naked flesh, then I would say that you have watched too many movies like 300. They might have performed a shield lock formations, but, if I remember correctly, those did not cover as much as the testudo formation of the Romans. This meant that that a lot of important organs were only protected by the flesh. And, contrarily to the move 300, the Spartans did not have any Arrow-Proof Abs  Grin
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Thearos
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #40 - Nov 20th, 2009 at 3:33pm
 
Yes, maybe Thuc. was wrong (in spite of painstaking enquiry, as he claims, and his very careful tactical writing), or lazy; or maybe the text, as transmitted, is wrong (I mean a mistake has crept into the text as copied and recopied during antiquity and the Middle ages). But is the grounds for saying so that we think the peltasts ought to have been more effective ? If so, on what grounds ?

Actually, rereading the text, I see that the Spartans are not unarmoured besides shield, but are armoured.

The 8000+ stone throwers come from the crews of 70+ ships (180 rowers per ship, minus the lowest rank of rowers, roughly one third of each crew, so 120 rowers)= 8400 rowers. The figure for ships we assume to be reliable-- i think it shows up elsewhere (the ships on on their way to Sicily), and I suppose these figures were matter of public record, since the forces were decided by public decrees.

Archers and peltasts ? Earlier, 400 archers are mentioned, and (no number given) peltasts from Ainos.


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Thearos
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #41 - Nov 21st, 2009 at 12:39pm
 
Further thoughts.

"Wild assertions" is not quite right for Thucydides-- selectivity and reshaping the material for analytical and artistic purposes, yes; but on the whole, his tactical narratives are extremely careful.

The account of the battle on the island of Sphakteria tells us that the Spartans actually came forth to engage the Athenian hoplites, with light infantry (8000 rowers, 800 peltasts, 800 archers) getting good flanking fire. The figure of 292 Spartans captured was presumably well known, since the Athenians kept them as hostages. If the text of Thuc. is secure, I suggest the figure is trustworthy.

A comparandum: in 390 BC, Iphikrates' peltasts killed 250 out of 600 Spartan hoplites-- 41% KIA; but those were very good conditions, and ended in a rout of the Spartan regiment being tormented by the lights. (Xen. Hellenica 4.5). No figure given for the Athenian peltasts.
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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #42 - Nov 26th, 2009 at 3:58am
 
Hague Convention actually

Geneva Convention was strictly about POW treatment

Fundibularius wrote on Nov 14th, 2009 at 7:51pm:
Sounds like an ancient equivalent of the Geneva Convention.

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Re: Accuracy of Slingers
Reply #43 - Nov 26th, 2009 at 5:48am
 
Ooops, sorry, yes, The Hague of course.

It was just a test. And the rest of the class has been sleeping.  Wink
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