Could the Macedonian Phalanx formation be given a vehicular transposition?

Could the Macedonian Phalanx formation be given a vehicular transposition?

Vehicles tend to be not so fun when you try to pack them into tight formation like that. Take a completely overfilled parking lot, and have the whole thing drive off in unison. Over uneven ground.

Vehicles seldom do melee weapons. Ranged weapons don't like having a bunch of friends in front of them.

Every single soldier on a flying carpet.

Only the first five lines get to actually use their pikes. The other ten lines just stand there. Why are those lines so deep when they could be wider, meaning you get to bring more pikes to the front? What're they afraid of, a cavalry charge that will trample three lines at a time?

People in the front die and need to be replaced without breaking the formation.

No, because this. Also

Probably 16X16 so it can immediately switch its facing or form a defensive hedge with no flanks or rear.

16 ranks is way too deep for just replacing dead and injured. Casualties in actual ancient warfare were nowhere near as high as they are in modern games and media.

Though they might have rotated all 5 or 8 front ranks together.

See:

Oh, that makes sense.

It existed, it was called the Chariot, and for a brief period of time they dominated combat during the bronze age much like heavy cavalry would later during the medieval era

They would charge in formation, using spears and bowmen and sometimes blades on the chariot itself to scythe through infantry

I'm a newfag, but what is it that caused chariots to dominate the field of battle and what is it that phased them out other than the invention of stirrups?

Chariots were never used for charging in the same way as heavy cavalry. It's a mobile missile platform and a form of "mechanized" infantry, but you would never run into an enemy line with it*- that would result in dead horses and a wrecked cart. You might charge infantry, and if they got scared and broke ranks to run away, you could trample them, but otherwise you'd swerve away and attack with missiles. Scythed wheels were never a significant weapon, and pretty much just a minor novelty.

(* to be fair, heavy cav. most likely didn't USUALLY charge directly into the enemy line either, unless the line wavered prior to impact.)

Not sure how they relate to a phalanx in any way.

Chariots were obsolete long before stirrups. Like, by about a millennium or more.

Basically, a chariot is inferior in most regards to cavalry as two horses are even more vulnerable than one, with less mobility and a lot more "parts" and crew involved.

The reason chariots were used prior to cavalry probably comes down to the difficulty in breeding horses with the correct temperament to be ridden (and especially ridden in combat conditions). For instance, there are plenty of animals today which a person COULD ride upon, but they're (the animals) not going to be very cooperative. Another explanation given is that early horses (as in, neolithic and bronze age) tended to be smallish, but you can still ride on a smaller horse, and selectively breeding for size isn't difficult. Ancient peoples could have doubled the size of a given breed in only a few generations if they were inclined to do so.

They were used to basically taxi nobles into battle at their height. The noble would be heavily armored but not that fast or long-lasting because of that. When he got tired he hop back on and rested for a bit.

As a weapon unto itself if allowed for mounted archery before that was as much of a thing with horses or camels and could have blades on the wheels to ow down infantry. Very effective as a terror weapon but fell out of use before the Romans were something anyone but an Italian would know since they stupidly expensive and counters for them had become widespread. Horses took over their roles and Elephants became the new terror animal in the east (though they had their own issues).

>They were used to basically taxi nobles into battle at their height

This idea usually comes from Homer's Iliad, but just because they were used that way in the book doesn't mean they were used that way in real life.

>What're they afraid of, a cavalry charge that will trample three lines at a time?

Among other reasons, they were so deep to allow the use of the mouse trap formation.

This was the technique that spelled the death of the war chariot in massed warfare.

If war chariots were coming at their formation, a block of men 4 wide and 8 deep would raise pikes and squeeze in to the side and make a gap for the horses.

A horse won't intentionally run into pikes when there is a gap right there, so they run into the hole.

Then the /other/ 8 ranks lower their pikes and force the chariot to stop, so the riders can be dragged off and butchered.

Yes, they were also used as mobile missile units and shock cavalry as I stated. The Noble Taxi use makes perfect sense for Greeks of that time in a full Panoply of bronze since you're gonna overheat and tire out REALLY quick in it. If you've reason to believe that's a myth, please show me why. I'd hate to keep spreading wrong info.

>The remark that there is nothing implausible about the Homeric use of the chariot owes a lot to J.K. Anderson’s “Homeric, British and Cyrenaic chariots”, published in American Journal of Archaeology 69 (1965), pp. 349–352, as well as his “Greek chariot-borne and mounted infantry”, in American Journal of Archaeology 79 (1975), pp. 175–187. The standard work for chariots of this period is Joost Crouwel’s Chariots and Other Wheeled Vehicles in Iron Age Greece (1992).

>This idea usually comes from Homer's Iliad, but just because they were used that way in the book doesn't mean they were used that way in real life.

Um, no. This IS how chariots were used, along with being mobile missile platforms.

Nobody would ride a chariot directly into a line of pikes, "mouse trap" or not. That would be fucking idiotic.

You're trying to bring up an example of Alexander's war, but chariots were an insignificant part of the Persian military at the time. Their use was massively exaggerated in later years to make the war seem more dramatic and exotic.

See:

>Could the Macedonian Phalanx formation be given a vehicular transposition?
I read this and all I can think of are armored APC's forming a single line along a particular road.

The absolute best anyone can make use of the macedonian phalanx is in alleys or places where position flanks are absolutely secure.

Ancient warfare was incredibly brutal, and Greeks and their predecessors relied heavily on volunteer and conscript infantry. The Macedonian army was one of the first professional armies of significant size (Sparta and Persia are also famous early examples), and even then most of the army had comparatively little field experience when Alexander first set out. The depth of the phalanx isolates the rearmost ranks from the horrors of the front ranks and adds mass to the formation. This prevents the front ranks from breaking and running, and contributes to the pushing match where the side that loses a bunch of people will be pushed back until they break and run.


tl;dr it's mainly psychological benefits.

All warfare is brutal. The suggestion that it was necessary to have 16-deep formations so as to replenish casualties implies casualty rates of over 50%, even before routing, which is ludicrous, but this is the impression people might get from board games and movies and whatnot.

Actual ancient infantry warfare tended to involve forward drives into the enemy, and if one side didn't break, the lines would disengage, and reorient themselves for a new clash. It wasn't just two hordes of bloodlusting madmen charging into a meat grinder. Again though, this is the impression one could receive from modern media, but we have actual historical accounts of battles lasting many hours or an entire day or more, which would be impossible under the "meat-grinder model." (they'd all be dead well before the first hour).

Also,

>durr pushing match

Nobody would serve in the front ranks under these conditions.

I think we're also all ignoring just how dumb OP's post is.

Put them all on a giant skateboard

>I think we're also all ignoring just how dumb OP's post is.

Of fucking course we are, this thread is now about chariots and how pikes work. Now the "Push of the pike" is a common term from the period to describe the use of pikes in combat, and art reflects this as a horrific mashing of spears together. I get that you can't really rely on art for actual tactics, but what were those? One side would realize it's in the poorer position when the other was advancing upon it and retreat? Would that mean that the pikes rarely even made contact with each other and mostly just maneuvered, because that would honestly fit with what I understand of warfare from that period and immediately beyond it.

Just realized I confused Makedonian pikes with 16th century pikes, my bad. Question still kinda stands, though.

Literal weight of numbers, I guess. The idea was that the ranks in the back would shove the front ranks forwards and the formation would literally push the enemy backwards. Push the enemy enough and you can break their formation, tearing holes in their front line and dividing their forces.

The chariot was only suited to fighting on a small number of landscapes. Anything north of greece is too hilly for a start.

Honestly, pike warfare is difficult to figure out. We have better information on renaissance and baroque pike warfare (generally they didn't engage one another), but these were used differently as they were there to protect other troops and were not as decisive an arm as in ancient pike warfare. Also renaissance pikemen didn't use shields, whereas ancient pikemen did have shields strapped to their forearms, so we might expect that they were more inclined towards direct engagement. It's also important not to confuse pike warfare with hoplite or shieldwall-style combat, as a 18 foot pike operates very differently from a 6-8 foot spear.

The answer is probably in between your two proposals. Two pike bodies would approach, then engage with only their front ranks fencing one another, using their shields to defend. Maybe a section of the line would try to drive inside the enemy by lowering themselves or forming a wedge behind their shields so that they could engage with swords at close range. If they succeeded, it would turn into more of a mess with the front ranks fighting in more of a shieldwall style with swords. If one side began to feel disadvantaged, they would attempt an ordered withdrawal. If both sides couldn't gain an advantage, they'd naturally disengage, reorder, and maybe rotate their ranks. Then a standoff until one side drove again or repositioned elsewhere.

So the front rank fencing and back ranks acting as a deterrent. It's very unlikely that it involved a "death march" where both sides would just annihilate one another.

Pikes were only ever decisive when the enemy had no pikes of their own

>Anything north of greece is too hilly for a start.
>Greece
>Not hilly

The front ranks on both sides would be immobilized like canned sardines and they'd all get killed. Good luck getting anyone to willingly fight in the front.

I remember hearing from somewhere that the primary issue was the the horses' backs weren't strong enough to support a person but they were strong enough to pull a vehicle.

I also remember from the same (forgotten) source that the primary source of horses was trading for them from steppe people because they hadn't really figured out how to breed them (or maybe it just wasn't cost effective to feed an otherwise useless animal to maturity). Either way they didn't have any concept of breeding programs so I expect when the horses did breed it was haphazardly.

Macedonian Phalanx on Motorcycles.

Greece itself is almost exclusivly hill

>I remember hearing from somewhere that the primary issue was the the horses' backs weren't strong enough to support a person but they were strong enough to pull a vehicle.

People have ridden ponies in war just fine. (not tiny ones like shetland ponies, but still ponies. These were around the same size as chariot horses).

>I also remember from the same (forgotten) source that the primary source of horses was trading for them from steppe people because they hadn't really figured out how to breed them (or maybe it just wasn't cost effective to feed an otherwise useless animal to maturity). Either way they didn't have any concept of breeding programs so I expect when the horses did breed it was haphazardly.

Domesticated horses originated with steppe peoples, but it's not like the practice didn't spread. It's not difficult to feed a horse. Even if it were the case that it was necessary to acquire horses in trade from steppe peoples, couldn't the steppe people have selectively bred them? They obviously knew a few things about equine husbandry.

...

Not even then I think. In the accounts I've read the pikes were a perfect anvil but a sub-par hammer. It's difficult to press an attack when your men can't break formation to advance on the enemy while also being combat effective. The pikes didn't win the day at Gaugamela, but they held the numerically superior Persian infantry while the cavalry won the battle.

>People have ridden ponies in war just fine. (not tiny ones like shetland ponies, but still ponies. These were around the same size as chariot horses).

But it may not have been a size issue, if the animal doesn't have the strength to support the weight of a man on it's back. Dogs can pull a sled but they just aren't designed to bear weight on their backs.

>Domesticated horses originated with steppe peoples, but it's not like the practice didn't spread. It's not difficult to feed a horse. Even if it were the case that it was necessary to acquire horses in trade from steppe peoples, couldn't the steppe people have selectively bred them? They obviously knew a few things about equine husbandry.

I think the issue was the cost of raising one versus the cost of capturing and breaking one in the wild. I'm pretty sure the same thing happened to elephants. despite being used in war for hundreds of year their was never a breeding program for elephants because it was way cheaper to capture one that it was to raise one.

Funnily enough I was thinking some sort of giant flatbed land ship.

Perhaps propelled by slaves?

In a macedonian phalanx you're spears are generally longer than everyone you're fighting.

In a greek phalanx you've got a shield.

There is literally no reason why that formation can not be performed if all the soldiers are riding segways.
Or those shitting "hoverboard" things