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This portal is dedicated to the knowledge of ancient warfare in ancient times, focusing on the early antiquity up to the fall of the Western Roman Empire, roughly 3500 years of warfare. With the help of the best web sources, ancient authors, archaeological evidences, recreations, illustrations, maps, animations, and screenshots from the highly praized Total War video game serie, choosed by history channel (Sega(r) - Creative assembly(r))

Scythian Horse Archer

January 2019: The nomadic Saka-Skythoi Hippotoxotai

Scythian woman horse archer

The emblematic nomadic culture horse archer for centuries (8th - 3rd centuries BC) has been the Scythian. Identified with one of the most amazing ancient nomadic culture in history, honored by the British Museum, the Scythian horse archer was the ultimate mounted warrior, undefeated, the flagbearer of a tradition that will endure until the late medieval era and allow the Mongols to create the largest known empire. What were their weaponry, tactics, and who were these men, women and their culture, which so brillantly empregnated our subconscious and imagination, from the Amazons to the feared skin collectors, bone eaters the Greek threatened their childrens with ? What was their legacy and did civilization reached them in the end ?

More on the Scythian horse archer

Ancient-battles peeks into the ancient "sea peoples" or the achaeans and minoans from the bronze age and homeric times, but also the Mauryan empire and T'sin armies, the steppe peoples, the Celts, as the early, or at the opposite, very late romans, like the western "barbarized" ones, or the Byzantine, "Hellenized" romans. What we know apart the famous "triplex acies" of pre-marian times, triarii, principes, hastati, equites, and velites? Before this was the very early roman army composed of aristocratic cavalry or Celeres, derived from the Etruscan nobility, and a heavy phalanx composed mainly on spearmen by classes, and a reformed army by Dictator and general Marcus Furius Camilius, with six Censes classes, with rorarii, leves and accensii...

Agris helmet

Amfreville-sous-les-Monts helmet - Santons Gauls

Two splendid examples of cross-culture in the IVth Century BC, two ceremonial Gallic helmets of the era, widely decorated in Greek and Celtic patterns.

And what we know about the greek classic armies at this time, with hoplites and meprised psiloi and hippiko, and their opponents, the persians, and beyond the sparabara, takabara, kardaka and other troops ? -The greek-city states age became, with the Macedonian rise, the Hellenistic era, which created terms like "phalangitai, hypaspistai, chalkaspidai, argyraspidai, Leucaspidai, akontistai, peltastai, thureophoroi, toxotai, sphendonetai, thorakitai, hetairoi, prodromoi" were known and became a model for all combined army from the Herakles columns to the Indus river... A true encyclopedia of ancient warfare.