Philip II and Alexander the Great: Father and Son ... - Historia Antigua

84 PHILIP AND ALEXANDER AT WAR
men (Xen. Anab. 5.2.14–15), the hoplites captured the ramparts and
the palisades (Xen. Anab. 5.2.15). 32
Markle maintains that Macedonian forces were typically crosstrained
to fight with both hoplite armament and with sarisai and
peltai. 33 I would argue that this sort of broad training was at fi rst found
only in the hypaspist corps. Initially, the cost of the weaponry would
have been prohibitive. In all likelihood, Philip adopted the sarisa, in
part, because this form of warfare was inexpensive. Also, training in
both weapon panoplies would have required more time than was typically
available to the nonprofessional soldier. This would be especially
true with regard to sarisa training.
Later, in Asia, as the army became increasingly professional with
each passing year, cross training became more common. Over time
Alexander switched more of his forces from the ranks of the sarisa
bearers into that of hoplites. This was made necessary by Alexander’s
dismissal of his League forces, amounting to several thousand hoplites
(Arr. Anab. 3.19.6; cf. Diod. 17.17.3); by his need for speed; and
by the collapse of the Persian grand army after Gaugamela. Diodorus
(17.65.4) speaks of Alexander making improvements in the army after
this third victory. The taxeis of Attalus, Amyntas, and Polyperchon,
now appear on expeditions requiring mobility and fl exibility (Arr.
Anab. 4.25.1, 5; 3.18.5).
After Alexander’s death, when war was waged by the armies of his
Successors, the trend reversed itself with increasing use of sarisa
bearers. Polybius describes the two opposing phalanxes at Sellasia in
222 B.C. (2.69.7) and again at Mantinea in 207 B.C. (11.15.6, 16.1) as
armed with pikes, with no clear evidence of the presence of hoplites.
The lessons of Philip and Alexander regarding the advantage of the
coordination of differently armed units were lost. Nowhere is this
more apparent than in the decline in the importance of cavalry. At
Sellasia, the Macedonian army consisted of ten thousand pikemen,
three thousand peltasts, and three hundred cavalry (Polyb. 2.65.2).
The proportion of infantry to cavalry had changed from approximately
6:1 in the time of Alexander to 25:1. 34
Initially only one of Alexander’s brigades was specifi cally designated
as astheteroi the one led by Coenus. The fi rst reference to
this brigade occurs during the siege of Tyre (Arr. Anab. 2.23.2). 35
Arrian states, “One of the ships was manned by the hypaspists, . . .
the other by Coenus’s brigade, the so-called asthetairoi.” 36 From the
ships these forces exited by gangplank and launched an attack by
climbing through a breach in the wall (Arr. Anab. 2.23.2,4). It is
unlikely that these troops were armed with pikes. Moreover, Coenus’s
brigade is often found in circumstances requiring great mobility