Exploiting the abundant primary sources available, this book examines the diverse ways in which war shaped the Hellenistic world. An overview of war and society in the Hellenistic world. Highlights the interdependence of warfare and social phenomena. Covers a wide range of topics, including social conditions as causes of war, the role of professional warriors, the discourse of war in Hellenistic cities, the budget of war, the collective memory of war, and the aesthetics of war. Draws on the abundance of primary sources available.
Pietrykowski analyses the Macedonian art of war from its development under Philip II, perfection under Alexander the Great, and further adaptation under the Successor States. Focussing on twenty battles spanning the era of Macedonian primacy, we see the evolving just the forces, strategies and tactics employed by Hellenistic generals and gain an understanding of their successes and ultimate failures when facing new foes such as the Romans. Clear diagrams make the action easy to follow.
This Companion volume offers fifteen original essays on the Hellenistic world and is intended to complement and supplement general histories of the period from Alexander the Great to Kleopatra VII of Egypt. Each chapter treats a different aspect of the Hellenistic world - religion, philosophy, family, economy, material culture, and military campaigns, among other topics. The essays address key questions about this period: To what extent were Alexander's conquests responsible for the creation of this new 'Hellenistic' age? What is the essence of this world and how does it differ from its Classical predecessor? What continuities and discontinuities can be identified? Collectively, the essays provide an in-depth view of a complex world. The volume also provides a bibliography on the topics along with recommendations for further reading.
Diplomacy is a neglected aspect of Hellenistic history, despite the fact that war and peace were the major preoccupations of the rulers of the kingdoms of the time. It becomes clear that it is possible to discern a set of accepted practices which were generally followed by the kings from the time of Alexander to the approach of Rome. The republican states were less bound by such practices, and this applies above all to Rome and Carthage. By concentrating on diplomatic institutions and processes, therefore, it is possible to gain a new insight into the relations between the kingdoms. This study investigates the making and duration of peace treaties, the purpose of so-called 'marriage alliances', the absence of summit meetings, and looks in detail at the relations between states from a diplomatic point of view, rather than only in terms of the wars they fought. The system which had emerged as a result of the personal relationships between Alexander's successors, continued in operation for at least two centuries. The intervention of Rome brought in a new great power which had no similar tradition, and the Hellenistic system crumbled therefore under Roman pressure.
The world that Alexander remade in his lifetime was transformed once more by his death in 323 BCE. His successors reorganized Persian lands to create a new empire stretching from the eastern Mediterranean as far as present-day Afghanistan, while in Greece and Macedonia a fragile balance of power repeatedly dissolved into war. Then, from the late third century BCE to the end of the first, Rome’s military and diplomatic might successively dismantled these post-Alexandrian political structures, one by one. During the Hellenistic period (c. 323–30 BCE), small polities struggled to retain the illusion of their identity and independence, in the face of violent antagonism among large states. With time, trade growth resumed and centers of intellectual and artistic achievement sprang up across a vast network, from Italy to Afghanistan and Russia to Ethiopia. But the death of Cleopatra in 30 BCE brought this Hellenistic moment to a close—or so the story goes. In Angelos Chaniotis’s view, however, the Hellenistic world continued to Hadrian’s death in 138 CE. Not only did Hellenistic social structures survive the coming of Rome, Chaniotis shows, but social, economic, and cultural trends that were set in motion between the deaths of Alexander and Cleopatra intensified during this extended period. Age of Conquests provides a compelling narrative of the main events that shaped ancient civilization during five crucial centuries. Many of these developments—globalization, the rise of megacities, technological progress, religious diversity, and rational governance—have parallels in our world today.
Violence had long been central to the experience of Hellenistic Greek cities and to their civic discourses. This volume asks how these discourses were shaped and how they functioned within the particular cultural constructs of the Hellenistic world. It was a period in which warfare became more professionalised, and wars increasingly ubiquitous. The period also saw major changes in political structures that led to political and cultural experimentation and transformation in which the political and cultural heritage of the classical city-state encountered the new political principles and cosmopolitan cultures of Hellenism. Finally, and in a similar way, it saw expanded opportunities for cultural transfer in cities through (re)constructions of urban space. Violence thus entered the city through external military and political shocks, as well as within emerging social hierarchies and civic institutions. Such factors also inflected economic activity, religious practices and rituals, and the artistic, literary and philosophical life of the polis.
“A detailed, insightful survey of Greek warfare” with illustrations and “many well-informed and highly perceptive observations” (Choice). In this book, historian and archaeologist Simon Elliott considers the different fighting styles of Greek armies and discusses how Greek battles unfolded. Covering every aspect of warfare in the Ancient Greek world from the beginnings of Greek civilization to its assimilation into the ever-expanding world of Rome, it begins with the onset of Minoan culture on Crete around 2000 BC, then covers the arrival of the Mycenaean civilization and the ensuing Late Bronze Age Collapse before moving on to Dark Age and Archaic Greece. This sets the scene for the flowering of Classical Greek civilization, as told through detailed narratives of the Greek and Persian Wars, the Peloponnesian Wars, and the rise of Thebes as a major power. The book then moves on to Macedonian domination under Philip II, before focusing on the exploits of his son Alexander the Great, the all-conquering hero of the ancient world. His legacy was the Hellenistic world with its multiple, never-ending series of conflicts that took place over a huge territory, ranging from Italy in the west all the way to India in the east. Topics covered include the various Wars of the Successors, the rise of the Bactrian-Greek and Indo-Greek kingdoms, the wars between the Antigonid Macedonian, Seleucid, and Ptolemaic kingdoms, and later the clash of cultures between the rising power of Rome in the west and the Hellenistic kingdoms. In the long run the latter proved unable to match Rome’s insatiable desire for conquest in the eastern Mediterranean, and this together with the rise of Parthia in the east ensured that one by one the Hellenistic kingdoms and states fell. The book ends with the destruction of Corinth in 146 BC after the defeat by Rome of the Achaean League—and concludes by considering the legacy of the Ancient Greeks in the Roman world, and subsequently. “A comprehensive survey, smoothly written by an expert popularizer of ancient history. A tour de force.” —NYMAS Review
The role of warfare is central to our understanding of the ancient Greek world. In this book and the companion work, War and Society in the Roman World, the wider social context of war is explored. This volume examines its impact on Greek society from Homeric times to the age of Alexander and his successors and discusses the significance of the causes and profits of war, the links between war, piracy and slavery, and trade, and the ideology of warfare in literature and sculpture.
