One would not want enemy soldiers to be alive or uncaptured in the territory one wishes to control. The enemy might flee after too many volleys, thus not accomplashing a complete victory. The infranty want to get in on the "action".ģ. Why then did they not bombard the enemy lines relentlessly and let the Infantry deal with the remains? The only reasons I can think of are:Ģ. The Romans were smart and had brilliant strategic and tactical minds. Of course archers would stand no chance of winning a battle without the protection of the infantry, but that is not the point I am trying to argue. Yet they still relied on the infantry to fight and win a battle. The knew of the effect that long or medium range weapons could have upon the enemy, both physically and in terms or moral. Romans even had mounted archers, something we associate more with the east. Why go through all this trouble and not utilize them to their maximum effectiveness?įurther examples of Rome's readiness to use missisles is seen by the fact that most infantry troops carried a javelin (the long pilum or the short lancea). The Romans even brought machinery to the battlefield, be it catapults or ballista. This could be in form of days and days of artillary barrage on the trenches in 1918 or precision strikes from a predator drone in Iraq this very year. Modern military tactics, as demonstrated since World War 1, or indeed especially in WW1, try to weaken the enemy as much as possible before the charge. Nevertheless, due to them shooting en mass, they were effective at killing enemy soldiers and demoralising the survivors before the "real" battle began. Due to this visual, but vital, obstruction, archers were basically shooting blind. The Romans seemed not have adopted this philosophy and every major army was accompanied by archers ( sagitarii), who belonged to the auxilliary troops ( auxilia), but operated with and like the legions.įrom what I've read in Adrian Goldworthy's The Complete Roman Army,it seems that, as depicted in movies, that archers were always positioned behind the infantry (common sense). The Spartans in particular deemed archery to be without honour (although rare occasions do exist when they used them, as well as cavalry). The Greeks, in general, viewed archary as cowardly, it being a "barbaric, Eastern thing". Why send in the infantry so soon, risking their lives? What is the reason for this? Is there some underlining moral obligation to face the enemy head on? Can the Romans only achieve glory when one looks one's enemy in the eye? Surely for the Romans a victory is a victory, no matter how it was achieved.
Casualties (Roman) can be minimised and chance of victory increased if the archers exhaust their munitions. I'm currently watching Gladiator for the x-billionth time, and again, I am wondering why, in the opening battle, the archers only fire a few volleys.
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