Florida State University Libraries 2016 The Historicity of Homeric Warfare: Battle in the 'Iliad' and the Hoplite Phalanx, c. 750 to 480 BCE Carlos Devin Fernandez Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact
[email protected] THE FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF ARTS & SCIENCES The Historicity of Homeric Warfare: Battle in the Iliad and the Hoplite Phalanx, c. 750 – 480 BCE By CARLOS DEVIN FERNANDEZ A Thesis submitted to the Department of Classics in partial fulfillment of the requirements for graduation with Honors in the Major Spring, 2016 2 The members of the Defense Committee approve the thesis of Carlos Devin Fernandez defended on April 19, 2016. 3 Chapter One: Introduction The purpose of this thesis is to examine the nature of battle in Homer’s Iliad, and its relationship to the actual practices of the Archaic period. In particular, it aims to focus on the roles of foot soldiers in Homeric battle, and how their features compare to those of hoplites, who first emerged during the poet’s own era. The renowned epos of war relates the story of Achilles’ wrath against his fellow Greeks during the final year of the Trojan War, and as such, contains innumerable scenes of combat. Though the epic tends to underscore the aristeia (‘excellence’) of its heroes, who are often engaged in single-combat with one another, the same episodes also illustrate the participation of the masses on the battlefield. I shall argue that these scenes of battle, and their representations of infantry combat, when examined with supplementary literary and archaeological evidence, are essential tools in interpreting eighth- to sixth-century BCE warfare, particularly the roles of the average citizen and the development of the hoplite phalanx.1 Background: The Dating of a ‘Homeric Society’ The Iliad has been rigorously analyzed in the resurgence of ancient warfare scholarship over the last few decades.