Postby Paralus » Sun Dec 13, 2015 12:12 pm
Xenophon wrote:Yes, that is precisely the point; that they would no longer serve anyone else in the same way they had served Alexander – i.e. as Royal Bodyguards.
Again, that is no more than a surmise. The passage is a rhetorical construct by Trogus/Justin and is used to frame a 'speech' by Eumenes to the Argyraspides. The entire point is to paint the Argyraspides as contumacious group to whom Eumenes must grovel as a suppliant. The much fuller Diodorus mentions nothing of this although he treats the subject in far greater detail and length.
If we put together Justin’s evidence [XIV.2.7] with the fact that the ‘Agema’ disappears after Alexander’s death, and that Eumenes forms a new ‘Hypaspist’/Guard unit, the evidence is consistent, and there is no real reason to doubt what he says. That Diodorus doesn’t happen to mention it may be because he thought it self-evident, or a matter of minor interest or some other explanation.
Xenophon wrote:The actual unit that performed this duty was the ‘Agema’. Further evidence as I have previously mentioned, is that we no longer hear of a Foot ‘Agema’ of the Hypaspists/Silver Shields after the death of Alexander
As they'd been discharged from the Royal Army - this is in fact part of Heckel's argument but you seem unaware of it. That argument also does not support Perdikkas collecting 4,000 troops in Kilikia and distributing them to Neoptolemos and / or Alketas.
As i have pointed out previously , they had NOT been ‘discharged’, as they complain to Eumenes, according to [Justin XIV.3].
As to Crateus leaving behind four thousand of his veterans in Cilicia, I have already quoted Heckel in my post of Dec 9, top of page 6:
“I don’t think so ! For a start, Hammond’s firm view, repeated in several works, was that Craterus brought 6,000 veterans only across the Hellespont ( e.g. “Alexander's Veterans After His Death” p.55) and supported by Walbank (Hammond and Walbank “History of Macedonia 336-317 BC” say Craterus brought 6,000 of his veterans across the Hellespont, and that on the march he raised 4,000 infantry and 1,500 cavalry [p.113] )
Heckel too is of this view: Heckel p.69 “ The Wars of Alexander the Great” says of Craterus’ veterans“...Some of them would indeed reach their homeland but only to fight some more. Others would not advance beyond Cilicia before becoming embroiled in the Wars of the Successors.”
Xenophon wrote:or any other Foot 'Agema' ( though cavalry ‘Agemas’ of Companion cavalry do continue ). The ‘Agema’/Royal Bodyguard disappears from History.
The foot agema clearly existed in the Antigonid army.
Come off it ! That's pedantry taken to an extreme.
We are talking about Alexander’s agema and the ‘Hypaspists/Silver Shields. The fact that the Agema as an institution was re-raised around 100 years later and appear in the army of Philip V is neither here nor there....
Xenophon wrote:‘Res Ipsa Loquitur’/the facts speak for themselves, and ‘absence of (positive) evidence is not evidence of absence’. Eumenes clearly wanted an infantry Bodyguard unit. The ‘Silver Shields’ evidently would not oblige him, and he raised his own ‘Hypaspists’.
The source evidence stating that Eumenes "clearly wanted a bodyguard unit" and that the Argyraspides refused him would be interesting.
Why do you think I raised ‘Res Ipsa Loquitur’, and pointed out the lack of positive source evidence? The Silver Shields were present in Eumenes army – Alexander’s Guards. The fact thatEumenes raised his own ‘Hypaspists’ tells us both that he wanted such a Guards unit, and that the Silver Shields would not fulfil this role for him.
Xenophon wrote:Further evidence lies in the fact that the ‘Silver Shields’ even accepted a downgrading of status, for the new ‘Hypaspists’ as a Guard unit stood on the right of the line, and took precedence over the ‘Silver Shields’, - who now served as an ‘ordinary’ line unit, albeit ‘senior’ line unit taking their position to the immediate left of the new ‘Hypaspists’. Military facts you seem to have overlooked.
Downgrading of status? The Argyraspides certainly insisted on their 'corporate identity' - to differentiate themselves from later hypaspists, and keep their (in)famous reputation, almost certainly. What they did not do was accept any downgrading. Diodorus and Plutarch are plain that these men were the most important in the satrapal army (they were the "spear point") and it is they who make decisions over command along with their general. Far more militarily important a fact.
....Except it is not a fact. Our Sources do not refer to the Silver Shields or even their commanders Antigenes and Teutamus being involved in “command decisions” at all in the campaign against Antigonus, nor at the battles of Parataikene or Gabiene [see e.g. Diod XVIII.21-31 and 39-43 ]. They no longer had the status of ‘Royal Guards’ and yielded precedence to Eumenes new ‘Hypaspists.’They were still ‘crack’ troops, and the most experienced in the army though.
Xenophon wrote:
Paralus wrote:“we must, perforce, believe that the three major Phoinikian cities named possessed no shipyards before Antigonos constructed them. It beggars belief that a city such as Sidon had no such facilities - nor the others for that matter.”
That is an illogical ‘Straw Man’argument. No-one suggests that “Phoenician cities possessed no shipyards.”
That is rather disingenuous. What was written was "the three major Phoinikian cities named possessed no shipyards" not that Phoenician cities possessed no shipyards. That is your truncated construct.
No, I’m afraid not....just a simple copying error !....which doesn't really matter to anything.
While on shipyards:
Xenophon wrote:I didn’t ‘invent’ a rebellion in Cilicia, merely suggested it was a possible and likely reason Craterus and his army remained there so long, when they were keen to get home. Certainly more likely than Craterus supervising ship-building, which couldn’t occur along the rugged Cilician coastline, with its small coves so suitable for pirates to hide in. The nearest decent harbours were in Phoenicia, or far to the west.
The author of An Ancient Shipyard: Silifke Dana Island, presented at 19th Symposium on Mediterranean Archaeology in Turkey last month, is clearly unaware of your certainty in this matter:
"During the underwater survey of the town of Silifke, Mersin-Turkey in the summer of 2015, a previously unknown ancient shipyard was found by Selcuk University Underwater Research Center. The site of this shipyard is on the coast of an island which is termed Dana Island (Pithyussa) in ancient region of Cilicia.
This shipyard contains about 100 slipways, available to construct at least 100 ships within a year. Some of the entrances of the slipways
are visible from the bottom of the sea. The main parts of these slipways are cut into the rock of the coastline and some of them contain a special unit to enable the construction/repair of the rams of warships. These warships termed “bireme” and “trireme” were the main naval warships of antiquity employed from about the 8th century B.C. into the 5th century A.D. One iron ram was also found in the course of this research at a depth of 35 m. on the west side of the island. These slipways were constructed side by side along approximately 1500 m. of the coastline and some had broken and fallen into the sea due to past seismic activity. Some slipways were constructed extending partly into the sea through the use of special architectural methods. Working on these slipways will enable a greater understanding of ship construction in antiquity and the engineering involved in ram production and of the process of the attachment of the ram to the warship."
It would seem these Kilikian pirates were alarmingly cashed up and well heeled when it came to furnishing themselves ships!
You have quoted the Abstract/E pitome of the paper, I see. I too was unable to find the whole paper, though I was able to find some archaeological stuff about the island. It is quite small, just 2.5 km or so x 0.9 km – basically a large rock sticking out of the water, and there doesn’t seem to be any archaeology before Imperial Roman times, and though there are a number of shipwrecks, they are all Roman or later:
ANMED Issue:
The Cilician Coast Archaeological Underwater Surveys - 2005: Tisan (Aphrodisias) - Dana Adasi - Mavikent - Borsak Coastal Survey
“
With its strategic layout and fresh water resources, Dana Adasi (Pithyussa Island) has a few Roman and early Byzantine churches, graves, sarcophagi, acquaducts, houses, harbour establishments and a Roman bath on the more wind-protected northern coast facing the South Anatolian coast.”
If these slipways date to Roman times, then they are irrelevant....
That Abstract also just doesn’t seem quite right – the reference to the “iron ram” for instance. An iron ram survived after over 2,000 years in salt water? It would long since have completely rusted away! Further, I know of around 20 extant rams, and all are cast bronze. Worse still, although invented in China in the 5 C BC, techniques for casting iron did not reach Europe until Mediaeval times – not to mention that cast iron would be too brittle to work as a ram. Either ‘iron’ is a mistranslation or else the Abstract is wrong.
Also the ship slipways referred to cannot be for ship-building – they are clearly the type of slipway I referred to earlier in an
epineion/port or
neorion/dockyard i.e. storage slipways/sheds for drying out ships etc. Those for triremes were all no wider than about 6 metres, and since a trireme was about 5.5 m in beam over the outriggers ( 4m or so in the hull) there was simply no room on a slipway/shed to build a vessel. ( see attached reconstruction – a picture being worth a thousand words, apologies for the quality). Ships were normally built in the open on beaches, after ‘establishing’ a (temporary) shipyard ( Mediterranean wooden fishing vessels and caiques /coastal trading vessels are built this way to this day) with its thousands of workers and artisans - many more than Antigonus’ 8,000 wood workers - for ropemakers, sailmakers, bronze casters and a myriad of other trades were needed.
The 100 slipways (if correct) is also a surprisingly large number for a small island that was basically a transit harbour – for example Carthage had a maximum number of 220 slipways, Syracuse 310 in two harbours and Athens reached a maximum of 372 circa 330 BC in three harbours.
Until we can get to see the full report, one must be cautious with this evidence, of which I'm rather skeptical at present.....
One might also enquire of Kleitos. He is last heard of in the company of Krateros in Kilikia in 323.
Polyperchon too was with Craterus too, but by 322 BC is in command in Macedon [DiodXVIII.38.6]. Cleitus must have returned also, since he commands the Macedonian fleet of 240 vessels as you say in that year.[XVIII.15.9] and defeats the rebel Athenians at the Echinades islands, off the west coast of Greece in the Ionian sea.( not the Aegean)
At the crisis of the Lamian war, late in the archonship of Kephisodoros, he sails into the Aegean with the"Macedonian Fleet" of 240 ships. Whence came these ships?
Obviously from Macedon, though perhaps some were Greek allies. There simply hadn’t been time for Craterus to arrive in Cilicia, ‘establish’ a construction yard and build hundreds of ships......
