Military Adaptablility of Romes Enemies in Western Europe

We would expect that the meeting of two cultures would produce a mutual influence. This influence in turn would put pressure on a society to change and to adapt to any challenges. This line of reasoning would hold even more in military encounters; the pressure of survival trumping most others. I will argue then that this was exactly what happened in the meeting between Rome and its surrounding tribes to the north as Rome expanded its empire into the world of the Celts, Gauls, Britons and Germanic tribes. This mutual changes and adaptations to the pressures of warfare, as these two sides were encountering each other were not even ones. In fact it is my belief that in large part it was the difference in this adaptability of Rome and these tribes in tactics and arms that settled the question of Rome supremacy over them. Of course there were exceptions, the Germanic tribes east of the Rhine are a notable example, but the overall pattern I believe is there.

Let me be clear what I mean by this military adaptability to change in tactics and warfare in general. Also, I should like to say something about the locale and time frame on which I focus. To the first item, the question here is one not only of armament but mostly of tactics and stratagem. This change is mostly driven by adaptation to enemy stratagem and arms. In modern days this can clearly be illustrated by the differences in warfare between WWII and the Vietnam War. American warfare eventually changed drastically to adapt to influences brought about by the different tactics the Vietnamese used. As to the second item, the scope set in this study as to locale and time, I will be speaking specifically of peoples of Western Europe (Celts, Gallic, Britons, and Germanics) and the Late Republic and early Empire, respectively. The one exception is when I look into the later Roman empire to see what happened in Germany and why they never were conquer by Roman arms. I have chosen to narrow the scope to this time because by military adaptability I mean in the time before the peoples of western Europe became either Romanized or full Roman citizens. I am strictly speaking here of a time when these barbaric peoples were initially fighting for their independence. The question then is, were they adapting while fighting to retain their freedom? After all, after they were defeated by Rome, they would have and did change military tactics and arms owing at least in part to them becoming the auxiliaries at first and latter, after citizenship, becoming part of the legions.

Rome did not have a monopoly on this tactical adaptability, in fact it to was slow to change, at least at first during the years of the Republic. One illuminating example is the second Punic war. This is a good illustration for two reasons. First, we can see how some of Rome’s toughest opponents were also ones who were the best at change and adaptation to meet Rome’s warfare. Hannibal is a clear example of this.[1] Secondly, we see how Roman adaptations to fighting this new enemy were slow to take place. It was not until after they eventually took hold that they were used to defeat the enemy. Let us start by seeing if we may glean something from the strategy employed by Rome’s enemy.
An enemy which Livy illustrates by saying:

“Most historians have prefaced their work by stressing the importance of the period they propose to deal with; and I may well, at this point follow their example and declare that I am now about to tell the story of the most memorable war in history: that, namely, which was fought by Carthage under the leadership of Hannibal [2]against Rome. A number of things contributed to give this war its unique character…the final issue hung so much in doubt that the eventual victors came nearer to destruction than their adversaries.”[3]


Both in Livy’s and Lamb’s[4] accounts we see how Hannibal quickly adapts to Roman warfare. Livy says at one point, namely in the battle of Cannae, how if one could have seen both sides as they prepared for battle it would have been difficult for one to tell which side was which as by this time the armies looked much alike in arms. Lamb tells us that after Rome’s two prior disastrous defeats at Tannetuum and the battle of Lake Trasimene Hannibal had taken Roman armor and weaponry and refitted his troops. Also, in the summer after Trasimene he retrained his troops with stratagems adapted to much of what he had learned from fighting the Romans. We see here an example of adaptability against the Roman army which worked rather well for Hannibal, at least through most of this war.

As to our second point we see clearly Rome’s reticence to change at the beginning of the war for the first few years. One gets a sense that these Romans are akin to the Spartans of old, in that they were not quick to change and stayed to their old proven warfare of the phalanx long after it had become ineffectual, starting with the changes made by the Macedonian phalanx. Anyhow, Rome was slow to change against an enemy like Hannibal using, like the Spartans, tried and true tactics. The first signs of change are seen in the tactics of the consul Paullus, who did not rush to battle as was the common way in Rome, but stayed the attack while following and harassing Hannibal and his troops. This an adaptation to Hannibal’s tactic of drawing the Romans into battle and then encircling them to defeat them. This delaying tactic worked against Hannibal’s prior success. Even so we can see in Livy how it did not fare well for this consul back at home or in his popularity within his own troops. When leaving Rome, and speaking in front of these troops Livy says:

“…Paullus spoke only once before the army marched, and in words which though true were hardly popular”[5]

Of course both at sea and in the final battle in Africa between Hannibal and Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus we see how Rome finally adapts to its enemy and using a variation of its manipular formation and Hannibal’s own tactics to defeat Carthage and its general Hannibal. This is a glimpse of how Rome adapted its tactics to meet and defeat an aggressor. Also we do see Rome’s enemy adapting to Roman arms as well.


But how did the Celts, the other tribes and peoples of Gaul, Britannia and Germania behave when Rome encountered them at first? To answer this let us take a look at one of our greatest accounts of Roman incursion into this area. Namely Caesar’s Conquest of Gaul[6]. Here we find example after example of military struggles between Rome and these cultures. By this time there had been some prior encounters, after all there was already the Roman province in southern Gaul and much contact had been made in the second Punic war. But we must remember that Gaul and Germania are at this time independent of Roman rule and Britannia is even little known by Rome.

Anyhow, in Caesar’s account we see many examples of the initial stratagem used by the peoples they encountered in Gaul, Germania, and Britannia. Let’s start with the Helvetti, which were the first people Caesar went to war against, as they were migrating west from the western bank of the Rhine. They will make an illustrative example for most of Rome’s encounters in Gaul.

Caesar tells us something very interesting about them:

“The Helvetii who were following us with the whole of their transport, now parked it all together and, after repulsing our cavalry with a battle line drawn up in very close order, formed a phalanx[7] and climbed towards our first line”[8]

Here we see a first glimmer of adaptation, for the phalanx was a Greek affair. Later it was improved and spread by the Macedonians. [9] So here we have a clear example of at least the Helvetii adapting to other forms of warfare. We must be careful here though, because it is not clear here if this was an adaptation to warfare with Rome in a prior era or not. We can however use this as a starting point and see if in this conflict they adopted new tools or stratagem for warfare after this first encounter. And we do begin to see how the Gauls adapted new techniques in warfare.

It is clear, at least in Caesar’s account of this encounter, that the pressures the Roman legions put on the Helvetii led them into such dire straights that eventually it led to their defeat. But at no time is it clear from our source that the Helvetti attempted to adapt either in stratagem or weaponry in order to meet this threat. The best we can say here is that they may not have had enough time to adapt since this war, and their eventual defeat, took place in only one season. However, this does set the stage for later encounters with the other tribes of Gaul. This was Caesar’s first encounter in the area and it became a lesson in Roman tactics for these Gallic tribes.

Oddly enough there is a passage in which Caesar gives his troops reassurance before fighting the Germans. This passage is a clear sign of Germans adapting to Gallic warfare on the circumstance of a prior defeat of the Helvtii:

“Ariovistus had remained for many months under cover of his camp and the surrounding marshes, so that they had no chance of fighting him, and then he attacked suddenly, when in despair of bringing him to battle they had broken up into scattered groups. This victory resulted from his cunning strategy rather than the bravery of his troops.”[10]

And he goes on to say:

“The employment of such strategy was possible against inexperienced natives, but even Ariovistus can have no hope of being able to trick our armies by such means.”[11]

A clear sign that at least the Romans did not think that these barbarians were up to the task of adapting to and defeating the Romans. I guess fate proved them right. However, the fact that this happened does not mean that before the eventual ‘pacification’ of these barbarians they did not attempt to adapt to Roman warfare.

Time and again, as we read Caesar, we see how he encounters a tribe up in arms as he conquers the whole of Gaul. We witness through his eyes how he defeats them before they had time to change or adapt their arms or tactics to better suit warfare with the Romans. And here we begin to see one of the possible causes of the lack of innovation and adaptation against Rome, at least within our scope of study: the Gallic nations did not have the time or chance to innovate enough in their stratagem to meet the Roman threat. Instead we see the speed of which the Roman cohorts adapt to their enemies. This was at least true at the beginning, but then things began to change.

We start to see from before the second summer of Caesar’s Gaul campaigns, while he is wintering in Rome, that a change begins to take place. We get a glimpse of the first clear adaptation to the size of the Roman army. Namely, they begin to form armies coalesced from many of the Gallic tribes who typically fought against each other. This was by far one of the most important and first adaptations to the Roman incursion in Gaul, and later in Britannia as well. This point cannot be stressed enough. And we see it carried on for the remainder of Caesar’s Gaul campaigns.

There are many examples of this throughout the campaigns but here I will highlight only a few, simply because they are the best examples of what takes place in Gaul:

“The Suessiones…had been ruled within living memory by Diviciacus, the most powerful king in Gaul, who controlled not only a large part of the Belgic country, but Britain as well. There present king was Galba, to whom, as a just and able man, the supreme direction of the war was being entrusted by common consent; he possessed twelve strongholds, and undertook to furnish 50, 000 troops. An equal number was promised by the Nervii, who were considered by the Belgae themselves to be their fiercest fighters…The Atrebates were to provide 15,000 men, the Ambiani 10,000, the Morini 25,000, the Menapii 9,000, the Caleti 10,000 the Veliocasses and the Viromandui 10,000 between them, and the Atuatuci 19,000…the Condrusi, Eburones, Caerosi, and Paemani thought they could raise about 40,000. ”[12]

This example is wonderful for its illumination of the peoples of Gaul and their adaptations to Roman warfare. In the first place, as stated above, this joining of forces in such numbers was unprecedented and came as a direct result of the Gallic peoples trying to adapt to a new type of enemy. But just as important is what it tells us of these peoples armies in juxtaposition to the Roman army. We see here that Rome is not fighting one large centralized government. This is no Republic or Empire. These are a loose band of tribes and cultures and hence their armies are not professional ones. These are citizen soldiers, not the professional army Rome has. So in order to fight Rome they would have had to adapt. There was no other way to fight an established professional military from an organized political state like Rome. And the joining of their forces then would have been one of the first innovations to take place in their warfare.

This then is clearly an adaptation by the Gauls to Caesar’s invasion in the first year. Sure, he did encounter some smaller confederacies in his first summer, like the one created by Orgetorix[13] or Diviciacus’ brother Dumnorix, but even Caesar made note of this one, indicating a sudden change in strategy for his opponents.

Later, while Ambiorix speaking with the Roman envois before the destruction of Sabinus’ army:

“I am not so ignorant as to imagine that my army by itself is strong enough to defeat the Romans. The whole of Gaul is united in this attempt, and they have arranged to attack all the camps today simultaneously, so that the legions shall not be able to help one another.” [14](page 116)

This of course is said to Sabinus to trick him into leaving his fort. However, it was true that all across Gaul there was planning of this sort.

In the last chapter that Caesar wrote of his account to the Gallic wars, he tells us about the war against Vercingetorix. He is described by Caesar as a young and powerful Arvernian[15]. Here again we see by now one of the most repeated and prominent features of Gallic adaptability to the Roman incursion; that of the alliances created by disparate tribes in fighting the Roman oppression. In this instance we are told:

“In a short time he had secured the support of the Senones, Parisii, Cadurci, Turoni, Aulerci, Lemovices, Andes, Pictones, and all the other tribes of the west coast, who unanimously elected him commander-in-chief.”[16]

Once again we see not only the cooperation of different peoples in time of war but also their ability to understand the need for central control and leadership in fighting the Romans. They cannot fight together as independent units. We see this happening everywhere Rome invades in this part of the world throughout our period of study. In Brittan for example, years later Tacitus tells us after losing a battle to Agricola:

“The Britons were, in fact, in no way broken by the outcome of the previous battle: they were awaiting either revenge or enslavement. They had at last learned the lesson that a common danger could only be warded off by a united front. By means of embassies and alliances they had rallied the forces of all their states.”[17]

Tacitus quoting a Briton as he explains Rome’s success to his troops:

“Or do you believe that the Romans’ bravery in war matches their license in peace? It is by our quarrels and disunion that they have gained fame. They have exploited the faults of their enemies to win glory for their own army. That army has been put together from peoples that are very different from one another…”[18]

This is clearly the main aspect of the barbarian adaptability to the Roman incursion. This understanding that in numbers and in unison lies their only hope of saving themselves from Rome.

Adjusting their military tactics is something else we see in the Gauls as the war progresses. To name just one, we can look at what happened again in Caesar’s second summer. Namely, when he was trying to subdue the tribes who lived in the coast they adapted a unique stratagem. This was to garrison at the edge of peninsulas surrounded by marsh, and if the Romans were able to close in on them anyhow, they just simply embarked in their ships and fled. This was another way in which these people adapted their warfare to better deal with Rome. Let’s look at some other illustrations of this Gallic adaptability in military tactics.

A good example of this comes to us from the destruction of Sabinus’ army. In this account Caesar describes a change in strategy, one of more troop cohesion in battle:

“The Enemy for their part, showed no lack of resources. Their leaders passed word along the whole line that no one was to leave his post; all the plunder that the Romans left would be theirs, and should be kept for them alone, so they must realize that everything depended on victory.”[19]

This an adaptation from their former ways of warfare in which the aim was to attack fast and carry off some booty, while earning glory in the old Greek tradition of one-on-one battle. None of these organized battle tactics are seen before. Let’s examine this next bit of strategy, which also takes place later in the same tale of Sabinus’ demise. This also is very new and different for the Gauls:

“Ambiorix ordered his men to throw their javelins without going too close, and to give ground before the Roman charges; being lightly armed and trained by daily practice to execute such maneuvers, they would still be able to inflict heavy casualties. As soon as the Romans began to retire to their main body, they were to give chase…These instructions were carefully obeyed.”[20]

In the siege of Avaricum[21] we see a wonderful example of the adaptability and flexibility of the Gauls in meeting the Roman threat.


“After this series of reverses at Vellaunodunum, Cenabum, and Noviodunum, Vercigetorix summoned his followers and followers to a council of war and told them that their plan of campaign must be completely changed”[22]

He goes on to explain:

“We must strive by every means to prevent the Romans from obtaining forage and supplies. This will be easy, since we are strong in cavalry and the season is in our favor. There is no grass to cut; so the enemy will be forced to send out parties to get hay from the barns, and our cavalry can go out every day and see that not a single one of them returns alive. What is more, when our lives are at stake we must be prepared to sacrifice our private possessions. Along the enemy’s line of march we must burn all the villages and farms within the radius that their foragers can cover. We ourselves have plenty of supplies, because we can rely upon the resources of the people in whose territory the campaign is conducted; But the Romans will either succumb to starvation or have to expose themselves to serious risk by going far from their camp in search of food. We can either kill them or strip them of their baggage – which will be equally effective, since without it they cannot keep the field. We should burn all the towns except those which are rendered impenetrable by natural and artificial defenses; otherwise they may serve as refuges for shirkers among our own numbers, and give the enemy the chance of looting the stores of provisions and other property that they contain. You may think these measure harsh and cruel, but you must admit that it would be a still harsher fate to have your wives and children carried off into slavery and be killed yourselves – which is what will inevitably befall you if you are conquered.”[23]

Notice how the awareness of their predicament is making them think in ways hitherto not seen. For one, they are not fighting raids against one another. They are fighting against a professional army that is not native to the area. They begin to see this as an advantage for them and a disadvantage to Rome in realizing that an invasion force is weakest in its need for supplies. And them, being local to the area, have less need of baggage or supplies. What is clearly illustrated in this wonderful example is a rapidly growing movement toward innovation in order to defeat the pressures of the Roman threat and occupation. A new way of seeing warfare that is only apparent because of having to contend with a professional Roman army.

There is also the archeological evidence to the period which is highly suggestive of Gallic experimentation with Roman weaponry, unlike what we see with the Germans in Tacitus[24]. This I explain more fully below.

Lastly, as the war progresses we see an incredible move toward innovation, especially when in comes to siege warfare. This had never been done before by the Gallic tribes, but the Romans had use siege warfare against them early on. Obviously they had learned from their previous encounters with the Romans and added siege warfare as an adaptation to the Roman army.

A great example of the Gauls doing siege warfare can be seen in this next passage. This takes place with the Gauls siege of Cicero’s winter camp:

“…the Nervii surrounded the camp with a rampart ten feet high and a trench fifteen feet wide. They had learned something of the art of entrenchment by observing our methods in previous years, and also got hints from prisoners belonging to our army whom they had taken… in less than three hours they completed a fortified line three miles in circumference and during the next few days set to work, under the prisoners’ instruction, to erect towers high enough to overtop the rampart of the camp, and to make grappling-hooks and sappers’ huts.”[25]





Seven days into the siege after starting to burn the town in the fort, Caesar tells us:

“…as if victory was now a certainty, and began to move up their towers and sappers’ huts and to scale the rampart with ladders.” [26]

Further still we see in the rebellion of Vercingetorix some very interesting aspects to the Gauls adaptation to siege warfare and craft. Not only was the adaptation to siege warfare on the part of the offensive tactics as clearly illustrated above, but we also see adaptation in fighting siege warfare from a defensive perspective:

“To baffle the extraordinary bravery of our troops the Gauls resorted to all kinds of devices; for they are a most ingenious people and very clever at borrowing and applying ideas suggested to them. They pulled aside our wall hooks with lassoes, for example, and when they had made them fast hauled them inside with windlasses. They make our terraces fall in by undermining, at which they were expert because they have extensive iron mines in their country and are thoroughly familiar with every kind of underground working. They had also equipped the whole circuit of the wall with towers, furnished with platforms and protected by hides. They made frequent sorties by day and night, either to set fire to the terrace or to attack our soldiers at work. As our towers were raised higher by the material added each day to the terrace, they increased the height of theirs correspondingly by inserting floors between the upright posts forming the framework. They countermined the subterranean galleries that we were digging towards the walls, and prevented their continuation by throwing into them stakes sharpened and hardened in the fire, boiling pitch, and very heavy stones.[27]”[28]

It is clear that things have certainly changed by the time of Vercingetorix’s rebellion. We do not see here a people who are unwilling or unable to innovate. This is an extraordinary passage for many reasons, but clearly one is the witnessing of this adaptability in the making. It says a lot that even Cesar notices how innovative these Gauls have become. Clearly these examples illustrate a willingness to do what ever it takes to defeat the enemy. Notice for instance in a former passage that working together they are even supplying their combined army by using the food in the district in which the army might be fighting in at any given time. This is a major form of cooperation not seen before. It hints at a cooperative struggle, one in which not only do they have to band together in a fighting force, but also to assist with their economic resources to support a large fighting force. This is as if we are seeing the dawning of a professional army, one in which a State would normally have to provide for. They are beginning to act as a united State, even if only temporarily. It seems that intuitively Caesar, as he mentions to us in the passages above and many others, is recognizing this trend of the Gauls to change, learn and improvise while fighting Roman arms.

The story is much the same for Britannia. Here the story is repeated for the most part. And as mention above, it starts in the same way. The adaptation to the size and professionalism of the Roman army by the banding together of tribes. Tribes who were in a typical state of warfare against each other and which on the coming of the Romans for the second time put aside these wars and elect a leader to command their efforts:

“On arriving there he found that larger British forces had now been assembled from all sides by Cassivellaunus, to whom the chief command and direction of the campaign had been entrusted by common consent… Previously he had been continually at war with the other tribes, but the arrival of our army frightened them into appointing him their supreme commander”[29]

We will encounter other stratagems adapted in Britannia to fight Rome. What we have next is an example of another adaptation to Roman warfare. It seems that even Caesar noticed this himself with no small amount of stress.

“…but the men were unnerved by the unfamiliar tactics, and the enemy very daringly broke through between them and got away unhurt…Throughout this peculiar combat, which was fought in front of the camp in full view of everyone, it was seen that our troops were too heavily weighted by their armor to deal with such an enemy: thy could not pursue them when they retreated and dared not get separated for their standards. The cavalry, too, found it very dangerous work fighting the charioteers; for the Britons would generally give ground on purpose and after drawing some distance from the legions would jump down from their chariots and fight on foot, with the odds in their favor… a further difficulty was that they never fought in very close order, but in very open formation, and had reserves posted here and there; in this way the various groups covered one another’s retreat and fresh troops replaced those who were tied.”[30]

What I see here are numerous wonderful adaptations to Rome’s style of Cohort fighting. One could say that it was per chance that these ‘unfamiliar tactics’ worked so well and were not adaptations to fighting the Roman Cohorts. But I would disagree based on the record of the year prior when Rome had fought the people of this region and won battles more easily, even if it ultimately did not gain any permanent foothold. Also, Caesar makes no mention of these tactics being employed in the prior summer. That is, the ones mentioned above and the that of bands of different tribes coming together to fight for a common cause. No, I believe these were direct adaptations to the tactics the Romans used the prior year against them.

Only two days later we see Cassivellanunus, the leader of this band of tribes, changing tactics again:

“Cassivellanunus had now given up all hope of fighting a pitched battle. Disbanding the greater part of his troops, he retained only some four thousand charioteers, with whom he watched our line of march. He would retire a short way from the route and hide in dense thickets, driving the inhabitants and cattle from the open country into the wood wherever he know we intended to pass. If ever our cavalry incautiously ventured too far away in plundering and devastating the country, he would send all his charioteers out of the woods by well-known lanes and pathways and deliver very formidable attacks, hoping by this means to make them afraid to go far afield…”[31]

We not only see here how quickly they adapt their tactics, but something much more important can be gleaned here. Again, the fact that these are not states with a professional army puts more pressure on changing tactics. Here we see one of the problems with not having a professional army. This band of tribes gather to fight off a larger and professional invading army, but as they are not a single political state or a professional army, they cannot retain their forces together for long. These people have to get back home and take care of harvesting, families, internal squabbles and more. And old enmities among the various groups must also play a part in the length these tribes can stay together. We see this problem also in Gaul. Eventually this leads to other tactics like the one above, but eventually it weakens their cause.

This second incursion into Britannia by the Romans did not fare nearly as well as their first one the year prior, I believe in part because this time around the stratagem of the tribes had adopted to Roman arms. And as Handford tell us, the size of the Roman army Caesar crossed the channel with indicates that he was on a campaign of conquest not an exploratory expedition:

“In that case, the failure of the enterprise must be counted as a serious reverse for him and the Roman arms.”[32]

In any case the continual adaptations seen both in Caesar’s account as well as in Tacitus’ work Agricola[33] do indicate a definite willingness and ability to change and adapt to the common Roman threat. It appears to me, however, that the Britons and the tribes of Gaul were never to get enough time to adapt to Roman warfare and arms. It is my belief that the reason lies in the cultural differences in the descriptions given by Caesar and Tacitus on the respective cultures of the Gauls and Germans. That is, how did these communities differ culturally in their daily living? The Gaul’s were a more settled people. That is, they where more agrarian and therefore more tied to the land. The Germans on the other hand where less so, and depended more on forest living, being more hunters than agrarian. This ultimately means that the Germans could hit and run, the tactics or guerrilla warfare, thus being able to avoid a Roman occupation. The occupation of farms and land not being as important to them. On the other hand, the Gauls being more agrarian would fight for the possession of their land. Warfare that the Romans were more adept at. Rome being able to occupy the land quickly thereby not allowing their enemies, who were in essence stationary, time to adapt their arms and tactics. With the Germans however we do see a different story. At any rate they were not conquered, even though they did have some serious military setbacks. We also do see some very interesting tactics employed by the German tribes. Caesar points out one of their tactics:

“The Germans were trained in the use of a special battle technique. They had a force of six thousand cavalry, each of whom had selected from the army, for his personal protection, one infantryman of outstanding courage and speed of foot. These accompanied the cavalry in battle and acted as support for them to fall back upon. In a critical situation they ran to the rescue and surrounded any cavalryman who had been unhorsed by a severe wound. They acquired such agility by practice, that in a long advance or a quick retreat they could hang on to the horses’ manes and keep pace with them.”[34]

He also describes the German horsemen as having trained their horses to stand by while they dismounted and fought on foot. If they needed to retreat they would then mount their horse and run off.[35] Also, Tacitus tells us some interesting facts about Germanic tactics:

“Generally speaking, their strength lies more in their infantry. That is why they fight in mixed formations. The speed of the foot soldiers, picked out of the whole body of young men and placed in the front of the battle-line, is such that they can easily keep up with a cavalry encounter.”[36]

These are good accounts of how the Alemanni adapted their tactics. Caesar in his relations of the conquest of Gaul keeps telling us again and again about the speed and ferocity of these Germans as they attacked and how it nearly caused them their victories time and again. Caesar also talks about a vast dark forest which extend from just east of the Rhine to the Black Sea. He is reticent to go too far into Germania, citing that the Germans know too well how to fight in those conditions. So we see favorable conditions for the Germans as well as general fighting prowess. However, unlike the Gauls, they seem not to have adapted to siege warfare. To illustrate this let us examine what happens when the Germans attack a Roman fort by surprise resulting in complete havoc until the Romans can retreat into the fort:

“As the Germans saw that the Roman troops had now manned the fortifications, they gave up hope of taking the camp by storm, and retired across the Rhine with the booty that they had hidden in the woods.”[37]

There is an interesting aspect to this last quote. Perhaps even a good explanation as to why the Germans never seem to develop siege warfare as there neighbors in Gaul do. In this last example we see that the Germans are more interested in raids for glory and booty; it is Gaul that is occupied and not Germania. German battles are not for liberty. The Gauls having much more pressure to beat the Romans off their land, unlike the Germans who are not an occupied people, have to develop a means of using siege warfare to their advantage. And so the Gauls have greater pressures to evolve militarily to meet the Roman challenge and more opportunity to experience siege warfare. The Germans never really having to contend with Rome in any real siege warfare.

Another example which illustrates the differences between the Gallic experience and the Germanic one can be seen in Tacitus when describing the arms and military tactics of the Germans he states:

“Even iron is not plentiful, as is inferred from the way they are armed. Only a few use swords or large lances. They carry spears…with a short and narrow iron point, which are, however, so sharp and easy to handle that they fight with the same weapon at close quarters or long range, as required.”[38]

We know by Caesar’s accounts that the Gauls did have plenty of ore from their mining operations. Mining usually a trait of a more stationary people, as the Gauls were. Tacitus continues by explaining that they had very little armor as in breast armor or leather caps and that:

“their horses are remarkable neither for beauty nor or speed and are not trained…”[39]

An agrarian stationary people like the Romans and Gauls would have more time to breeding better horses. These are good accounts to illustrate some of the differences between the Gauls agrarian life style and the mobility of the non-agrarian German people. A stationary people earning their keep and creating wealth through an agrarian base is usually wealthier materialistically than a society that is not. The Germans having to gain their material wealth through raiding; this making them better fighters.

Against the Romans, however, we begin to see some of the main advantages that the Germans had: numbers. This can clearly be seen by the Late Republic. Rome has not the power of numbers to fight its enemies:

“From another direction Barbatio, who had been promoted master of infantry after the death of Silvanus, brought 25,000 men from Italy.”[40]

This is by no means the numbers we see in earlier accounts, such as Caesars. In fact we see that when Julian is attacked by the barbarians at Strasbourg he is indeed well undermanned.

“[the] kings of the Alemanni…collected their whole strength together and advanced towards the city of Strasbourg, believing that the Caesar[Julian] had retreated for fear of the worst…These chiefs held their head high and acted with increased confidence because a deserter from the Scutarii, who had come over to them after the departure of his defeated general to avoid punishment for an offence, informed them that Julian as left with only thirteen thousand men, the number in fact of the troops that were with him.”[41]

The Germans on the other hand seem to have vast numbers:

“But one man on foot, who could not keep up with them, was captured through the nimbleness of our men, and revealed that the Germans had been crossing the river for three days and nights. When our commanders saw them a short way off forming themselves into dense wedges, they halted”[42]

It is clear to me from this description alone that there were masses of Germans. Just think of how long it took for their entire force to cross; three days! This is one example of the discrepancy in numbers. The Roman troops numbers can’t keep up to the numbers of Germans fighting. This is seen in Ammainaus Marcellinus’ account of the later roman empire. It looks as though the tables had finally turned on Rome, no longer could they produce the numbers or troops required of them to fight their foreign wars, and it seems that here the Germans had the upper hand. Still, until the very end what saved Rome for sometime was that theirs was a professional army:

“The Alamanni had the advantage of strength and height, The Romans of training and discipline.”[43]

We must not overlook, however, that the Germans by the end of the Roman empire had adapted somewhat. For instance, centuries before Ammianus, we are told by Tacitus that the Germans wore furs, and are basically savages, as the example above shows. Now we find them wearing armor:

“Chnodomar…he was a bold fighter…His gleaming armor marked him out from the rest”[44]

This surely an adaptation to Roman arms.

Another advantage the Germans had, and it could be argued that this is also another reason the Germans did not feel as much pressure to adapt to Rome as the Gauls did, is highlighted in this passage:

“After an advance of some ten miles our men reached a dark and dreary forest, where Julian pause from some time in doubt, because a deserter had informed him that a large force was lurking in some subterranean tunnels and a maze of trenches, ready to burst out at an appropriate moment. Our men, however, had the hardihood to make a resolute approach, only to find the paths blocked with felled oaks and ashes and a great mass of fir trees. So they withdrew cautiously, scarcely able to contain their anger as they realized that further progress could only be made by a long and rough detour.”[45]

This is not unlike what we saw earlier in the account of Caesar. He also seems to dread this geographic advantage of the Romans. Namely the densely wooded area in which they lived.

These relations on their tactics, their physical nature, and there geographical location are very interesting and illuminate what could be a very interesting question. What was the reason to the apparent success of the Germans in staying a permanent victory for Rome over them? Could it have been that the physical capacities and existing tactics of these German tribes were enough in and of themselves to explain their successes against Roman arms and tactics? Could it have been a geographic advantage that did much to quell Rome’s intent upon conquering the German peoples? And are these possible answers to why they never adapted much to meet the Roman threat, yet were able to keep off the yoke of Rome? I do not believe this can be the whole answer. It does not take into account the fact that they did to some extent evolve their warfare and tactics, as these last examples show. Also it does not take into account Rome’s own responsibility for its own inability or desire to conquer the Alemanni. I do believe there is some truth in these questions, but it is not the whole story. Instead, I will reveal a more complex answer to the question of why Rome never conquered Germany. As I have hinted to above there are two sides to the question.

First, we shall look at the question from the side of the Alemanni. Aside from their ability to modify their warfare to Roman arms and tactics, there are other factors to consider. As stated before, there were many advantages the Germans had over other peoples who were conquered by Rome. Yes, geography did play a role in this. To understand why lets examine the Roman way of fighting. The Manipular and then more importantly the Cohort army of the Romans was less able to adapt to fighting in the dense forests of Germania than German guerrilla warfare. The Cohort army, although flexible and adaptable, still needs room to maneuver and flat ground to be most effective. Not something common in dense woodland. Hit and run tactics do not have these needs, and are more suited for this environ. Another important advantage we can attribute to the Germans, and one we have seen before is worth mentioning again. That of the Germans not being a wholly agrarian folk. If you live mainly in a wooded area and are not farmers in the main, then your definition of victory or defeat is wholly different than that of peoples who are by necessity tied to their lands. If you are defeated in a battle and the enemy occupies your land you are now defeated and conquered. You must surrender and hope in the mercy of your enemy. If you are not tied to the land your ability to relocate is much better that those of an agrarian society, then your enemy holding a parcel of land means nothing to you. For Rome, ostensibly and agrarian society from the start, the definition of victory was one of taking and holding ground. Once you held the battle field, as in Greek warfare, your enemies would surrender and ask for their dead and your mercy. The losers would then be subjugated to the victors and the question of victory would be clear and final. To the Gauls defeat was defined by the loss of there land, which was equivalent to the loss of their freedom, and hence became subjects of Rome. This was not so for the Germans and so frustrated the attempts of Rome to conquer Germannia. One last important advantage the Germans had, and perhaps ultimately the most important was the numbers of men they could muster against Rome, especially at the time of the Late Empire. Rome advantage throughout its history against its enemies had been the number of troops it could send against them. This was not true in dealing with the Germans from the start, and especially true in the later part of the Empire. Ultimately the number of hoards the Germans could use against Rome would prove fatal to the Eternal City.

Now let us look at the other side of the equation. Namely, what if anything did Rome have to contribute to the their own inability to conquer Germannia. And this is key in understanding why Rome never did subjugate the Alemanni. I believe the reason Rome never conquered Germannia was one of overexpansion. By the Late Republic we see symptoms of this overexpansion of the Roman Empire. Rome’s expansion eventually leads to having a border that is just too long to adequately defend even with all its economic might. It is a question of administration. The Empire is over-extended in its ability to administer and protect all of its vast lands. This is witnessed by the unending wars of conquest it must continually carry out in order to help pay for the administration and defense of the State and its men in arms. It is a classic case of the economic law of Diminishing Returns. The more one reinvests the more one gains, but slowly the returns per amount of investment get smaller and smaller until the curve flattens out and you have no more gains. In the case of Rome, the more it conquer the more it gained in wealth. However, eventually the cost of administration outstripped the net gains which led to its inability to either invest in more wars of conquest or to protect and administer what it already had. In our case this can be seen by the Empires inability to provide the adequate benefits to its troops ultimately hurting its ability to recruit the amount of troops needed for defense and conquest. This then changes the dynamics of Roman warfare in general, and against the Germans in specific. Germannia now, and not Rome as before, had an over abundance of men to populate its fighting ranks. Rome was now doomed to fail against Germany in the same way Rome’s enemies had failed against her: The inability to supply enough troops for triumph.

We may conclude then from this analysis that Germannia’s military successes were neither gained from superior arms nor wholly from new tactics but from a combination of German ferocity and numbers, a non agrarian warlike society, and geographic advantages; as well as from Rome overall and eventual inability to defend and administer its Empire do to overexpansion and its inability to recruit and provide the adequate amount of troops to either conquer Germannia or, at the end, defend itself against the Alemanni and all its other enemies round its borders.

Considering these and many more examples from Caesar, Tacitus and Amminaus’ descriptions of the Germans I would have to conclude that there is evidence of the Germans adapting to Roman warfare to some extent. But the fact that there is no essential change in Caesar’s account of the German tactics and arms from Tacitus many years later and even later in Amminaus’ is enough to convince me that there were few adaptations made. Strictly, I believe this is mostly do to the different types and degrees of pressures Rome inflicted to Germania versus what pressures Gaul and Britannia would have to deal with as agrarian societies.

In taking all this into account, I can conclude then that there is enough evidence of an adaptation to Rome as an enemy by the Celts, Gallic tribes, Britons, and the Germans. Also, as most things are more complicated than what first meets the eye, the conclusion to this study is no different. In that what is true for the Celts, Gaul, and Britannia is not quite true for Germania. In Germania I would suggest that what kept them free from Roman rule was not wholly their adaptations but a combination of original tactics that worked well against Roman cohorts, the robustness and numbers of the Germanic tribes, and as explained above a lack of resources and will on the part of the Romans for a protracted war against an enemy that fought very well in their woodland environment. I believe then that our current record, as shown by the examples above and many others which do not appear here,[46] show clear evidence of a military adaptation of these barbaric tribes of Western Europe in meeting the Roman threat. Unfortunately for them Rome was able to adapt very quickly to any new threat, especially after the first and second Punic wars. This might be one reason why Rome was victorious against these peoples, with the Germans being a notable exception.

[1]Harold Lamb, Hannibal One Man against Rome ( NY, Robert Hale, 1959) 206
[2] My emphasis.
[3] Aubrey De Selincourt, Livy The War with Hannibal, (London: Penguin Books Ltd., 1965) XXI.1.
[4] Lamb, Hannibal.
[5] Selincourt, Livy The War with Hannibal, XXII.39.
[6] S.A. Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul (London: Penguin Books, Ltd., 1951)
[7] My emphasis.
[8] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, I.24.
[9] Compact as this small line might be, it really pack a wallop. First of all was this line really a phalanx in the true since of the word. Or was this just phalanx like by the way the men were tightly packed. I have given Caesar and the translator here the benefit of the doubt and I will assume that indeed it was as Betty Radice, the translator of this edition states in her end notes: “A phalanx was a closely packed mass of troops, formed up in considerable depth and – at any rate in the original form used by the Macedonians- armed with vary long pikes, so as to present to an enemy…..When this formation was adopted by the Gauls and the Germans, the men in the front rank held their shields overlapping one another in front of their bodies.”

[10] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul IV.12
[11] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul IV.15
[12] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul IV.7
[13] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, I.3
[14] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul V.25
[15] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul VII2.3
[16] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul VII.5
[17] Anthony R. Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999)I.29
[18] Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany I.31
[19] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul V.34
[20] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul V.34
[21] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul VII.14
[22] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul VII.14

[23] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, VII.14
[24] Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany
[25] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, V.42
[26] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul V.43
[27] I love the ingenuity shown in this passage.
[28] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul VII.22
[29] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, V.11
[30] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, V.15
[31] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul,V.19
[32] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, 231
[33] Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany,
[34] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul, I.48
[35] Interestingly enough this sound very similar to the way Homer describes the Greek and Trojan use of the chariots. We know now that at the time of the actual Iliad we can be fairly certain that this was not the way chariot warfare really was conducted, but it fit Homer’s time better in that it was more in keeping with the hand to hand combat and honor of the phalanx.
[36] Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany, I.6.
[37] Handford, Caesar The conquest of Gaul VI.41
[38] Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany, I.6
[39] Birley, Tacitus Agricola Germany, I.6
[40] Walter Hamilton, Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire (London: Penguin Press, Ltd., 1986)XI.1
[41] Hamilton, Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire XII.1
[42] Hamilton, Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire XVI.12.16
[43] Hamilton, Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire XVI.12.41
[44] Hamilton, Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire XVI.12.21
[45] Hamilton, Ammianus Marcellinus The Later Roman Empire XVII.12.1
[46] There are many more examples in the sources I used for this study, but for the sake of clarity I have used only what in my judgment where the most germane.

Counter voices to the Hellenic ideal of the hero...

The Greek heroic ideal is one that is well known to us. What is not so well known is if there were voices of dissent, an opposing voice to or opposing ideal from the heroic view. I will argue that there were, and that they can still be heard in the voices of Greek writers of Classical times. Not just from the quarters of society that we would typically expect, but from all walks of life and across the whole of this period. As pervasive and practical as the heroic ideal was in their society the voices of dissent can still be heard.

For anyone, be they a casual reader of classical history, an historian of Ancient history, or even to some degree a fan of pop culture’s perspective of classical warfare, there is a recurrent theme that is inescapable: The cult of the Hero. Even in today’s world, cynical as some may say it has become, this ideal is understood. And to some degree what we learn from fiction books and movies is produced out of the echoes of our western cultural tradition. All cultures and their sub-cultures have their own ideal interpretation of the heroic ideal.[1] Most cultures, whether they be from our western tradition or some other part of the world, embody this heroic character in oral traditions, epic, and mythology.[2] This ideal embodied in a hero or heroine is a large part of every culture’s mythological narrative. [3] The hero is a recurring character and the hero mythology which is embodied by him is only second to the creation mythologies in importance throughout cultures around the world.[4]

Today this can be seen in our own culture through the movies we watch, books we read, the stories we tell our children. Witness the block buster movies such as ‘Star Wars’, ‘The Gladiator’, ‘The Last Samurai’, and ‘Braveheart’. Books such as Beowulf, the Iliad, Ivanhoe, King Arthur, are just a few of our classics. This is clearly an ideal we hold, this cult of the hero. But just like an echo is not a perfect reproduction of the original voice so to the fidelity of our modern cult to the heroic ideal of the Hellenic vision of the hero.

If we were to do a comparative analysis of the heroic ideals across cultures and time we would probably find much overlap and a common thread that would be most human. After all the human condition must be alike in some ways across times and cultures. Hence, “human nature”.[5] And I believe especially so when dealing with warfare and the hero, since warfare has been a part of this “human nature”, for better or worst, at least since humans have recoded their history[6], and probably much earlier than that[7]. As fascinating as this study would be, however, my task here is really a study of the heroic ideal, and more importantly, the dissenting voices in Greek History.

Since before one can discuss and analyze the opposing views to the heroic ideal in Classical Greece I should like to clearly define what the heroic ideal in this classical period was, as I understand it. To begin with, just as someone studying any one of our present cultural traits would have to look at the historical influences, so we must now look back to the Archaic[8] and pre-Archaic times. Here we will find the voices that inspired Classical period.

Thucydides’ history of the Peloponnesian war between Athens and its allies against Sparta and its Peloponnesian allies is a good place to start. I believe we must begin by putting some geographic context into our inquiry. In other words, facets of human cultures cannot be separated and understood out of the context of the overall cultural mix within a geographic location. In order that we may understand more fully how the over all cultural and environmental influences affect or help to create the heroic ideal, we should see if we can find something that will help put the hero into context for that culture and era. In this Thucydides might help. In his introductory chapter he gives a good account of what he perceives to be the history of the Hellenes before and during the Hellenic era. In book one of his history,[9] we begin to get a glimpse or to make out a shadow of the features that at least by his own time might give us some clues as to where the heroic ideology of the classical time period came from. It is fair to say that the whole region might have been very warlike. He gives us a hint of this:

“For in early times the Hellenes and the barbarians of the coast and islands, as communication by sea became more common, were tempted to turn pirates, under the conduct of their most powerful men; the motives being to serve their own greed and to support the needy. They would fall upon a town a town unprotected by walls, and plunder it; indeed, this came to be the main source of their livelihood, disgrace not being yet attached to such an achievement, but even some glory[10].”[11]

Again:

“The whole of Hellas used once to carry arms, their habitations being unprotected, and their communication with each other unsafe; indeed, to wear arms was as much a part of everyday life with them as with the barbarians.”[12]

One last example:

“What enabled Agamemnon to raise the armament was more, in my opinion, his superiority in strength, than the oaths of Tyndareus…”[13]


These examples[14] are illustrative, I believe, of the culture in the Hellenes that, do to its warlike nature, developed the heroic ideal for classical Hellas. There are many such examples, but these are enough to deduce the overarching element of life in the pre-Hellenic and Hellenic periods. This was a period fraught with danger for the average people of the area, which as shown here was one of warfare, destruction and uncertainty.

Now that we have briefly touched upon the possible reasons and causes of the development of this ideal, let us see what this ideal was that was handed down to the classical Hellenes. A good way to approach this is to see if the classic work of Homer can illuminate what this ideal was. As we understand it today, the account of Homer’s Trojan War is an epic and as such we should be careful not to treat it as an historic account of an actual event. Even thought it might have some historical foundations. It is however obvious that before the time of Thucydides and even after it was very much thought of as real history. As J. E. Lendon has argued that the Homeric poems have been called the Bible of the Greeks. He stresses that in fact the early Greeks used Homer as at least the foundation of their education.

At any rate, I believe that we can understand Classical Greek thought if we understand the values that are enshrined in Homer’s works. Homer’s Iliad is nothing if not the defining embodiment of heroic values of that time.

Lendon states[15] that there are ultimately two ways in which one earns glory (the legal tender of heroism). It is gained by attending to both. That is, on the one hand it is of the utmost import how one comports himself in battle and on the other the fame and renown of the person one defeats in battle. He also states that this was the driving force behind the hoplite and the phalanx of the time, albeit a competitive heroism that was born of historical necessity. The very period of this idyllic value system in heroic action we are discussing. Throughout the Iliad[16] one can find many examples of its achievement in the epic.[17]

It is important that we delve here a bit longer. This glory [kleos] is after all the defining principle or rather the tender that buys us heroic immortality. So we have to make clear what this is before we can discuss and analyze any dissenting voices to this ultimate form of expression of how one lives life.

This heroic ideal, was for males[18] at least, the grandest of all cultural ideals in Hellenic and Classical Greece. Beyond all others, including skill in any manual art form [Techne[19]] or even the accumulation of wealth though is some ways related. It would be helpful to also consider some things that to moderns might seem to be part of this value system, but were not in this era. Namely, today the hero is also noble and kind. This did not have anything to do with the Classical Greek ideal of the hero. As a matter of fact, he could be ruthless, non-empathetic, unsympathetic, and non-merciful. The only thing that counted was to be victorious over once enemy. We clearly see this in the behavior shown by Achillus after he kills Hektor. As Thucydides has the Athenians state when while condemning the Melians:

“since you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.”[20]

This was not a merciful society, it was one of might. And the hero was expected to comport himself the same, to vanquish his enemies harshly.

This was note an era of compassion. Ultimately the values embodied in the Classical Hellenes heroic glory [kleos] can be summed up by an oft mentioned refrain attributed to the Greeks. “Come home with your shield or on it!”

The question then arises, where there were any dissenting voices to this idyllic view of life and warfare? I will argue that there where, if only faint ones. Across times and cultures we tend to see opposing ideas to any ideal, and this period was no different. One question that would be interesting to look at is to see if the voices from this period where coming from one area of the population. Be it the poor, the aristocrats, women, the middle class, merchants or from across all stations in society. We know that this was a very hierarchical society. We will assume then that since it was ruled by the law of force that the powerful would have to believe in this heroic ideal. Typically, what we see in most historical writing is that it was written by the powerful. Another question we will try to discern is; was this opposing view evolved through time, or was just an amalgam throughout the whole period?

In order to see if there are some patterns to discern with respect to these questions, I am going to approach my argument in a chronological manner using mostly primary sources. I believe this will give us a better vantage point from which to view our subject matter. Then we may find that there was a development though time of this contra idyllic view. In so far as using there own voices, I hope we can get a clear view of which part of society is influencing this opposing view. In short, I will be using their own voices in the order in which they appeared onto the world’s stage.

In the beginning there are the gods. Or at least it seems that Homer tells us that glory is granted from the gods (i.e. Zeus). He grants both Hektor and Achilleus this. Hesiod also attests to the Fates and gods as being the cause of things. Good and bad.


“…Zeus, through whose will men
are exalted by the speech of others or remain unknown..[21]”

This then is a time when the gods are directly involved with individual lives. At least if we are to believe the key authors of their time, Homer and Hesiod.[22] There is however at least one distinction between the two, that is germane to this discussion at any rate. In Homer’s Iliad we see nothing if not the heroic ideal on display. In Hesiod I believe we begin to see the first musings, at least in written form, of a different way to see ones life.
In his work Works and Days, written c. 700 B.C.,[23] in which he gives a very different account of life in the Hellenes, than one of only war and heroic glory, he seem to be telling us that there are two ways to live. He starts right of by saying:

“And I will speak to Perses the naked truth: There was never one kind of Strife. Indeed on this earth two kinds exist. The one is praised by her friends, the other found blameworthy. These two are not of one mind. The one-so harsh-fosters evil war and the fray of battle. No man loves this oppressive Strife[24], but compulsion and divine will grant her a share of honor. The other…the son of Kronos…planted her in the roots of the earth and among men. She is much better, and she stirs even the shiftless on to work…This strife is good for mortals[25].”[26]

Already here we see that a life lived at home tending to one’s crops is one preferred and loved by man, no matter that war will get her share of honor. Throughout this work we see Hesiod arguing against the heroic ideal. He seems to prefer one of home and hearth. Also the attainment of wealth not through plunder, which is much a part of the heroic ideal, but through hard work and the market:

“Not much time for brawls and gatherings can be spared by the man in whose house the season’s plentiful harvest, Demeter’s grain, fruit of the earth, has not been stored.”[27]

Hesiods Works and Days then, although a poem in dactylic hexameter like the Iliad[28], is not an epic but an almost mundane view of a different form of life than the attainment of glory. One in which hard work, diligence, and practicality is esteemed over plunder, killing, and glory.

Now let’s listen to the voices that followed Hesiod. Is there anything they might be trying to tell us that would also go against the heroic ideal?

Archilochus, who lived between 680 and 640 B.C. and probably died at war,[29] has some excellent things to say:

“Some barbarian is waving my shield, since I was obliged to
leave that perfectly good piece of equipment behind
under a bush. But I got away, so what does it matter?
Let the shield go; I can buy another one equally good.”[30]

This almost comical poem really flies in the face of the ideal behavior in gaining glory. One is to bring back ones shield as in the refrain mentioned above. One way that Homer shows a man shamed is by the lost of his armament, even after death. There is much antagonism between the warring parties simply over this armament. Just remember the insult to Achilleus when his armor is taken off the dead body of his friend Patroklos and Hektor parades around in it. This is a way to be diminished in glory. To Archilochus, there is no glory ascribed to his armament, no shame at all. It’s just a practical matter. It would seem this is a drastic deviation from heroic honor. But the more we read of Archilochus the more we see that this is truly what he feels, and that war is just a means to gain his daily bread, no mention of glory here:

“By spear is kneaded the bread I eat, by spear my Isamric
wine is won, which I drink, leaning upon my spear”[31]

So here even in warfare the thought of glory seems to be gone. Now it is only a pragmatic form of livelihood. Again, in Homer we see this form of living as something much grander. You gain not your daily bread but fame and riches thought the use of your spear and plunder.

Lest we might start to think after these past examples, coming as they are from these great writers, that this counter culture has become the main stream thought of its time let me give an example of the heroic ideal being alive and well. There are several authors that would serve us well here but for brevity sake one will suffice.[32] Tyrtaeus of Sparta, who lived about the time of the second Messenian War[33], has written quite a bit about the heroic ideal. Two such poems are Courage: heros Mortuus: hores vivus and To the soldiers after defeat. These are nothing if not homage to the heroic ideal embodied in Homer. I believe this will suffice to give a good account of there tenor:

“I would not say anything for a man nor take account of him
for any speed of his feet or wrestling skill he might have,
not if he had a size of a Cyclops and strength to go with if,
not if he could outrun Boreas, the North Wind of Thrace,
not if he were more handsome and gracefully formed then Tithionos, ….or had the power of speech and persuasion Adrastos had, not if he had all splendors except for a fighting spirit.”

Of course our job here is to show the dissent from this heroic view. So whom better to get us back on track than the renowned reformer Solon (630 – 650 B.C.)[34]. In his poem Prayer to the Muses he says:

“…Each keeps his own personal notion within until he suffers. Then he cries out, but all until such time we take our idiot beguilement in light-weight hopes, and one who is stricken and worn out in lingering sickness has taken measures and thinks he will grow healthy and one who is a coward expects to turn into a warlike hero[35]. Another, ugly, thinks of the day when his looks will charm…”[36]

He finds fault in man’s romantic hopes and aspirations, not shying away from the hero cult.

As for Pindar who lived from 518 B.C. unit 446 B.C. the historian Lattimore in his book Greek Lyrics tells us about the few known fragments found:

“…These fragments show many flashes of original thought, of humanity and generosity, which are sometimes thought to be wanting in the victory odes.”[37]

One such example could be taken to go against the booty gained in looting, much a part of the heroic ideal of the times:

“What is near home, city and hearth and kinship, this gives a man something to stay and love, and the passion for what is far away belongs to vain fools.”


Women cannot be discounted even in a male-dominated society for they can have great influence indirectly though the intimacies of motherhood, marriage and friendships. And in Sappho’s case she did it directly thought her prolific writing. Sappho who was the first woman writer of her times, lived in the second half or the 7th century B.C.[38]. Her writing, mostly love poetry, casts a light on another opposing voice. For she is not solely the voice of women of her times, but casts an opposition to warfare through her examples of a life well lived thought love. Let us see an example of this:

“A handsome man now looks handsome.
A good man will soon take on beauty”[39]


This is a direct assault on another one of the heroic elements. That of physical beauty being ascribed innately to the hero. Here she clearly degrades the beautiful as being an indication of a man’s glorious character. Once again let’s listen:[40]

“Some say cavalry and others claim
infantry or a fleet of long oars
is the supreme sight on the black earth.
I say it is

the one you love. And easily proved.
did not Helen, who was queen of mortal
beauty, choose as first among mankind
The very scourge

of Trojan honor? Haunted by Love
she forgot kinsmen, her own dear child,
and wandered off to a remote country.
Weak and fitful”

woman bending Before any man!
So Anaktoria, although you are
far, do not forget your loving friends.
And I for one

would rather listen to your soft step
and see your radiant face – that watch
all the dazzling chariots and armored
Hoplites of Lydia.”[41]

I think this is clearly a dissenting voice to the supremacy of the heroic ideal. After reading much of her poetry we see that she does not in anyway promote the heroic ideal. In fact, as in the poem above, she clearly refutes it as being as important as love. You really do get the since that she is much more interested in the internal personal life of a person than the external adulation that glory brings. Her overall ideal could be summed up as one of love not war. Aside from the intense love Achilleus has for Patroklos we really see noting of the internal dialog or person in any of the characters. This must have not been an important part of the heroic ideal.[42]

There are many more examples that could be given from these and other authors. Still, we can begin to see that there were many opposing voices to the Greek heroic ideal. How influential where these writers on there contemporaries might be hard to tell, but the fact that we are still reading them today and that they where known to there contemporaries is a clue. I believe that the influence that these ideas and voices had can be seen in Thucydides’ words as he describes Pericles’ Funeral Oration:

“We cultivate refinement without extravagance and knowledge without effeminacy; Wealth we employ more for use that for show, and place the real disgrace of poverty not in owning to the fact but in declining the struggle against it.”[43]

It seem to me that by this time, at least in Athens being a good citizen, with all of its responsibilities was becoming more idyllic that being just a hero. Warfare is still a great part of Athens and other Greek poleis. But in this same speech you hear how war is to be fought for the polis, and not simply for glory. It seems, in Athens anyhow, the idea of a man being a good citizen is overtaking the idea of a man being a hero. Not something you hear in Homer at all.

As a final illustration I’d like to present an anonymous source. If humans today are in anyway indicative of those that came before, then picture a modern bar. And with this I mean a real pub, say in England for example. If on was to observe common behavior one would see that after the men get a bit drunk, they usually let there inhibitions down and really sing from the heart. Be they happy songs, sad songs, or a number of other choices. We could imagine a gathering of men in Greece back in time and try and listen to their songs. In fact we have a good one written down in the form of an anonymous drinking song:

“Oh that it were given to us to open
up the heart of every man, and to read his
mind within, and then to close it,
and thus, never deceive, be assured of a friend”

We might conclude that friendship here is king, and not glory [kleos].

In a time such as this, with all its violence and warfare, it is not hard to understand the importance of the heroic ideal[44]. A people, a culture would be hard pressed to survive without one. It would be hard to imagine a strong heroic culture not arising in a time and place as this. Even so, I think it is clear that there was a strong cultural current of dissent by Classical times in Greece. However, it is hard to tell within the confines of this limited study if this dissent was something that developed over time on not. It certainly seems to have been there all along and only seems to have become more mainstream in Athens, as the writing of Thucydides hints at. As the polis developed into a more complex society, and in Athens democracy flourished, this might have been the case. We can imagine that a society like Athens based as it was on its reliance on tribute from its allies could begin to have a more complex society, one in which there would be more specialization in its population. We still see a city of citizen soldiers, but warring against their neighbors is becoming less of an interest. Keeping their allies is more important strategically for them than finding new conquests or fighting there neighbors.[45] I believe ultimately the effects of the Peloponnesian war on Athens, as well as the other poleis, probably invigorated the dissenting voices against war and its ideals.

As to the question of whether or not this opposition to the heroic ideal was limited to just a section of society in Classical Greece or was prevalent across all stations, I believe it can be argued as we have seen by the multitude of examples above that it was more than likely prevalent across all sections of society: Archilochus son of a slave woman who earned his keep thought mercenary work; Pericles, practically a head of state; Sappho the lovely poet and a great woman of her times; Solon the reformer; Hesiod man of means and lover of fields; The drunken sailors and soldier; and Pindar the accomplished poet. All from different walks of life, representing both the female and male, and spread throughout the Hellenes. These are the voices that across time have illuminated and preserved for us, to examine another way of life, the voice of dissent to the heroic ideal.

[1] Joseph Campbell, The Hero With A Thousand Faces (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1973)
[2] There is a large body of written cultural traditions known to us that embody some or other heroic ideal. Some of my favorite examples are: The Kalevala and Beowulf from the Nordic regions; The Tain from the Irish Celtic region; The King Arthur stories from the British Isles. The history and mythology embodied in the Japanese Samurai; The Jaguar and Eagle warrior cults of the Mexica peoples (Aztecs).
[3] Campbell, Hero
[4] Marie-Louise Von Franz, Creation Myths: Revised Edition (Boston: Shambhala, 1995) 1 ; Here, she asserts that the creation myths are of central importance above all other myths, such as hero myths and fairytales.
[5] Although the idea of human nature is in and of itself a fairly common idea in current times there are some very interesting ideas about the fallacy of this proposition. On such argument is expressed rather well and in detail in Paul R. Ehrlich’s book, Human Natures (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2000). In this he purports to explain that there is really no such thing as a universal human nature, but there are as many human natures as there are humans since everyone has there own genetic makeup. But for the current argument I am assuming that the term “human nature” will be sufficient to explain a common human action to external conditions, and I am using the colloquial understanding of this term, not the scientific.
[6] One only has to look at the number of books published every year about warfare, or read any account of any past civilization or culture to see account of warfare described in them. I could list an assortment of them here, but suffice it to say that there is a raging debate in Science as to whether warfare is a genetically innate part of our character.
[7] This is attested to by several Neolithic finds in the last 100 years. Along with Jane Goodall’s, as well as others, discovery of warfare in chimps our closest biological relatives suggest that warfare has been with us for a long time.
[8] The Archaic period is defined as 900 – 509 B.C.
[9] Robert B. Strassler , Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide To The Peloponnesian War (New York: Simon & Shuster, 1998)
[10] Italics are mine.
[11] Strassler, Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide To The Peloponnesian War. 6.
[12] Strassler, Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide To The Peloponnesian War. 7.
[13] Strassler, Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide To The Peloponnesian War. 7 .
[14] There are many good examples in Thucydides history of The Peloponnesian War which I could have given, but I wanted to give just a sample and not to be to redundant in making the point.
[15] Lendon, Soldiers & Ghost
[16] Richmond Lattimore, The Iliad of Homer (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1961)
[17] Lattimore reminds us in his introduction to his translation of Homer’s Iliad that “So the Iliad is the story of Achilleus.” A tragic one at that. But of course it is much more that that. And he alludes to that when he says “It is a story of a great man who through a fault in an otherwise noble character (and even the fault is knowable) “. By great I assert that this is great as seen thought the lens of the heroic ideal of those times. He is the embodiment of glory as seen through this idyllic view. This is why I believe it is important, because this I believe is what Classical Greek also believed as the ideal.
[18] I say this because there was no viable way for women of the period to participate in war and to attain this glory. A woman, as we hear Pericles say (as recoded by Thucydides) in the funerary eulogy he gives after Athens buries the first fallen in the Peloponnesian war, is best not talked about and must go and replace the fallen by having more children. I assume males of course.
[19] As Professor Melissa Dowling has stated, and I am paraphrasing here, “that Techne was look down upon at this period of history”.
[20] Strassler, Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide To The Peloponnesian War. 352.
[21] Apostolos N. Athanassakis, Hesiod : Theogony, Works and Days, Shield (Baltimore : The John Hopkins University Press, 1993) 67
[22] We know that they were not contemporary, Hesiod being the latter. But we can think of them as contemporary none the less.
[23] T. Walter Wallbank et al, Civilization : Past & Present volume, 1 – to 1774, Eighth Edition (NY : Harper Collins College Publishers, 1996) 40
[24] My emphasis.
[25] Again, my emphasis.
[26] Athanassakis, Hesiod. 67.
[27] Athanassakis, Hesiod. 68 I believe this is a very important insight for this study. In that even thought war, alluded to as “brawls and gatherings” is mentioned as something you still do, here he has actually placed them in the order in which he sees them. That is, harvesting and home life being more important in a man’s life. War is something that is unavoidable, but not primary in the way one lives his life.
[28] Athanassakis, Hesiod. 59.
[29] Richmond Lattimore, Greek Lyrics (Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 1970) iii
[30] Lattimore, Greek Lyrics, 2.
[31] Lattimore, Greek Lyrics, 1
[32] Callinus writing, a Contemporary of Archilochus, would have also made for a good example.
[33] Lattimore, Greek Lyrics, 13. The best information I can gather for the actual dates of this second war is from Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, The Oxford Classical Dictionary : Third Edition Revised (Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2003) 964, which states that the first Messenian war was fought in c. 700 B.C. and the last one in 464 B.C. . So we must assume the second being somewhere in between.
[34] Lattimore, Greek Lyrics, 18.
[35] Italics are mine.
[36] Lattimore, Greek Lyrics, 19.
[37] Lattimore, Greek Lyrics, 57.
[38] Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, The Oxford Classical Dictionary : Third Edition Revised (Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2003) 1355
[39] Willis Barnstone, SAPPHO: Lyrics in the original Greek with translations by Willis Barnstone (New York: Anchor Books, 1965) 69.
[40] I could not bear to edit this in any way, even if a bit long for this work, for it would be a crime as beautiful as this is. I also feel it being most illustrating to our theme.
[41] Barnstone, SAPPHO. 7.
[42] There is the wonderful description of Hephaistos shield being made. Here he really tell us what he thinks of war and you see ‘his’ inner feelings. It might even be argued that that in itself is a dissenting voice to the heroic ideal.
[43] Strassler, Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide To The Peloponnesian War. 113.
[44] One could argue the same of today, but the average person in modern American, is not as intimate with violence and warfare as the Greeks where then.
[45] This did not stop completely however.