Pikemen and the Phalanx

[Prinz_Karl]

Hey man you don't believe I wrote a post in a forum on the internet cool man.   That's your right.   Why it matters I don't "get" but do you have a counter point to my posts?  If so let's get this back on track.

Your argument is rubbish, sorry to say that.

Anyway the point was that you claimed this text, if it said in the copied text "I have to say..." for example you just left it that way which is plagiarism because it wasn't your "I". I didn't say the text itself was informative or irrelevant (except the parts you wrote they were misleading) or that you did a bad research in fact the research was good but next time don't claim the texts.

[Sarpton]

Well I was going for expedience because, most people don't nit pick about copy paste stuff.  Also

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paraphrase

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphrase

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http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Plagerism

   And what parts are misleading?   

Besides friend I'm not writing a term paper for you, nor for a doctorate.  And frankly I think your just mad because of what I posted disagreed with what you posted.   And I will humor you with any references you'd like as to why your idea doesn't hold water.  In fact if you give me a time frame I can get more accurate if you like. 

Also when you say pike do you actually mean pike, or do you mean a partisan, volgue, what about a sarissa?   What time period are we talking about for the ?/shield?  There are many factors that honestly I didn't feel the need to get into to answer a simple question.   But if you want to treat this like some SUPER important paper rather than a friendly discussion I'm more than happy to do it.   Or would you , like me prefer to drop my "plagerism" and move on with the friendly debate?

But if you need to win HEY EVERYONE, I COPY PASTED SOME STUFF IN THIS THREAD.   Now can we go back to being adults and have a civil debate about what is in essence a make belive battle?

[Penitent]

excellent post!  I've learned a lot.  Thanks!

[Prinz_Karl]

(click to show/hide)

Well I was going for expedience because, most people don't nit pick about copy paste stuff.  Also

(click to show/hide)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paraphrase

(click to show/hide)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphrase

(click to show/hide)

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Plagerism

   And what parts are misleading?   

Besides friend I'm not writing a term paper for you, nor for a doctorate.  And frankly I think your just mad because of what I posted disagreed with what you posted.   And I will humor you with any references you'd like as to why your idea doesn't hold water.  In fact if you give me a time frame I can get more accurate if you like. 

Also when you say pike do you actually mean pike, or do you mean a partisan, volgue, what about a sarissa?   What time period are we talking about for the ?/shield?  There are many factors that honestly I didn't feel the need to get into to answer a simple question.   But if you want to treat this like some SUPER important paper rather than a friendly discussion I'm more than happy to do it.   Or would you , like me prefer to drop my "plagerism" and move on with the friendly debate?

But if you need to win HEY EVERYONE, I COPY PASTED SOME STUFF IN THIS THREAD.   Now can we go back to being adults and have a civil debate about what is in essence a make belive battle?

You won't get it. You're even exposing yourself by pointing to links that define what you did wrong. And you did not paraphrase or metaphrase the original text you simply copied it word by word, do you know that or why did you post them?

I have no problem if you point to interesting stuff that will help us in the discussion about pikes and phalanx but I have a problem if you steal the text from other people and claim it under your name by not qouting it and not changing the personal pronouns, that's all.

[Penitent]

well I, for one, knew this was copied/pasted from another work. 
It is polite practice to cite your source though, very true.

[Prinz_Karl]

well I, for one, knew this was copied/pasted from another work. 
It is polite practice to cite your source though, very true.

Some people didn't know it on first look, I only recongnized it when I saw weird numbers in [] brackets that simply do not fit and started searching for some parts of his text.

[Zerran]

So... back to the original topic.

The reason the phalanx/pikeman formation was "lost", if I remember correctly, was due to the fact that in order to perform one properly you need very disciplined full time soldiers that had trained rigorously together. In the period from the fall of the Roman Empire to the Late Medieval Era most militaries were comprised of militias and part-time soldiers. Generally during this period one would only become a soldier either because they were drafted or in order to gain lands, not to do it as a full time thing. Because of this, it just wasn't viable to use "hard" formations (by which I mean rigorous, where if part of it breaks, the whole thing shatters) such as a pike wall.

A Pikeman without a formation is basically just a lightly armored footman with only a sword. As such, it was more effective for them to use soldiers that could hold their own even without a tight formation.

Now admittedly this is all off the top of my head from a European History class I took a few years back.

[CrazyCracka420]

From what I've read the phalanx formation was vulnerable to being flanked or hit from behind.  It was a very "forward" oriented fighting formation.  If it had cavalry or some other lighter/more mobile infantry on the flanks it was less vulnerable. 

Spear and shield classes of fighters were still very common up through the end of the middle ages, just not necessarily in the phalanx formation.

[Prinz_Karl]

That's is definitively one of the reason the phalanx of hoplites in the Thermopylae was so succesful. In a frontal attack on them they could be devestating.

[Joseph Porta]

Phalanxes whe also used as a manner of pinning the enemy down, whilst cavalry broke through their flanks.

But i think Crazy already poined that way. 

[Lange]

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EDIT: That was harsh. And it's not even the second page (though only because this forum is abandoned.) I'm sorry.

[Weewum]

Downblock

[Peasant Warrior]

Cavalry suddenly became the dominant force on the battlefield, so there needed to be a quick, cost effective way of countering them, without years of training. Phalanxes would not have been much use against the catapults and heavy infantry of the Romans, and once they were wiped out, spearmen became that much more useful.

[Thucydides]

Cavalry suddenly became the dominant force on the battlefield, so there needed to be a quick, cost effective way of countering them, without years of training. Phalanxes would not have been much use against the catapults and heavy infantry of the Romans, and once they were wiped out, spearmen became that much more useful.

Not True. Though the consensus is that Roman infantry was superior to the Phalanx one on one, Accounts of confrontations between the two shows a prolonged stalemate between the two until the Romans forced the pikes over uneven ground or if they ambushed the phalanx before they were set up. The Phalanx were intended to be a complementary force that pinned the enemy so that Heavy Cavalry would crushed the flanks and rear of the enemy formation. The Macedonian Phalanx only became the main force of destruction due to the wars between successors of Alexander, where Phalanx pushes determined the battlefield rather than cavalry, as well as  their relative cheapness compared to maintaining a retinue of Companions.

[Thucydides]

From what I've read the phalanx formation was vulnerable to being flanked or hit from behind.  It was a very "forward" oriented fighting formation.  If it had cavalry or some other lighter/more mobile infantry on the flanks it was less vulnerable. 

Spear and shield classes of fighters were still very common up through the end of the middle ages, just not necessarily in the phalanx formation.

Mostly true, with the exception of the Argyraspides, where during the Battle of Gabiene they proved that a well trained and high morale group of Phalanges can form  a battle square that prevents them from being outflanked.

While Eumenes' camp was being plundered and his left flank dissolving into rout, the Argyraspides advanced on Antigonus' phalangites. Completely smashing them, the Argyraspides routed Antigonus' entire phalanx killing five thousand men without a single loss. Eumenes ordered Peucestas to go back into combat with his cavalry and pursue the advantage, but the latter refused to move. Seeing this, Antigonus then ordered his light horse under Peithon, just finished plundering Eumenes' camp to attack the Argyraspides in their rear. However, the Argyraspides were not ordinary soldiers, instead of panicking and fleeing, they calmly formed a large square and safely marched off the field.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gabiene