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BATTLE DESCRIPTION IN THE ANCIENT HISTORIANS, PART II: SPEECHES, RESULTS, AND SEA BATTLES*

(continued from Greece & Rome 64.1)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 October 2017

Jon E. Lendon
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Extract

If Herodotus borrowed from Homer the way the later tradition of historical battle description described fighting, adapted the array of the armies from the Homeric catalogue, and himself invented the ‘weighing’, the historian's declaration about why one side defeated the other, Thucydides was the creator of the battle speech – the paraklēsis or parainesis, cohortatio in Latin – that so frequently became a part of the depiction of ancient battles. There is, of course, a great deal of incidental talking and encouragement during fighting in Homer, and many of the sentiments that later authors were to use can be found in Homer as well. Herodotus borrowed from him the habit of including incidental snippets of encouragement before or during battles by the way (6.11, 8.83, 9.17–18, 9.42), and the habit was adopted here and there in later authors, and especially by Livy. So similarly the epipōleēsis, the general's going along the ranks of his army and addressing a few appropriate remarks to each different contingent: this imitated Agamemnon's tour of his forces in Book IV of the Iliad, and was to have a long life in historical authors.

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Research Article
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Greece & Rome , Volume 64 , Issue 2 , October 2017 , pp. 145 - 167
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Copyright © The Classical Association 2017 

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Footnotes

*

In addition to those thanked in Part I, my thanks are due to J. C. Iglesias Zoido and D. Carmona Centeno for their kind responses to queries and for making papers available prior to publication. Unattributed translations are my own.

References

1 For a concise history of the battle speech (extending into modern times), see Hambsch, B., ‘Feldherrnrede’, in Ueding, G. (ed.), Historisches Wörterbuch der Rhetorik, 12 vols. (Tübingen and Darmstadt, 1992–2015), iii.225–38Google Scholar, gathering older literature on the role of Thucydides in the tradition at 236 n. 23. More recently on the importance of Thucydides, see Carmona, D., La escena típica de la epipólesis de la épica a la historiografía (Rome, 2014), 7, 69–97 Google Scholar (with 1–10 for a general introduction to the topic of battle speeches); Zoido, J. C. Iglesias, ‘La arenga militar en la historiografía griega. El modelo de Tucídides y sus antecedentes literarios y retóricos’, in Zoido, J. C. Iglesias (ed.), Retórica e historiografía. El discurso militar en la historiografía desde la antigüedad hasta el renacimiento (Madrid, 2008), 238–57Google Scholar. These volumes also usefully collect other recent scholarship on battle speeches, which has become considerable: much of it grows out of the projects undertaken by J. C. Iglesias Zoido's Grupo de investigación arenga (see <http://areng4.wixsite.com/arenga>, accessed 6 May 2017). Older literature is conveniently gathered by Woodman, A. J. and Martin, R. H., The Annals of Tacitus. Book 3 (Cambridge, 1996)Google Scholar, ad loc. Tac. Ann. 3.45.2.

2 Keitel, E., ‘Homeric Antecedents to the Cohortatio in the Ancient Historians’, CW 80 (1987), 154–60Google Scholar; she points out (160) that there is even a precedent for paired speeches, those of Hector and Achilles in Book 20. Also Zoido, J. C. Iglesias, ‘The Battle Exhortation in Ancient Rhetoric’, Rhetorica 25 (2007) 142–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 E.g. Livy 2.45–6; Plathner, H.-G., Die Schlachtschilderungen bei Livius (Breslau, 1934), 13 Google Scholar; Gómez, J. Bartolomé, Los relatos bélicos en la obra de Tito Livio (Estudio de la primera década de Ab urbe condita) (Vitoria, 1995), 216–20Google Scholar. For an extremely full list of generals’ utterances of all types, see D. Carmona Centeno, M. L. Harto Trujillo, J. C. Iglesias Zoido, and J. Villalba Álvarez, ‘Corpus de arengas en la historiografía grecolatina’, in Iglesias Zoido (n. 1), 537–64.

4 Carmona (n. 1).

5 For ancient awareness of the artificiality of such speeches, see Polyb. 12.25.7–9; Cic. Orat. 66.

6 See Iglesias Zoido (n. 1), 234; Trujillo, M. L. Harto, Las arengas militares en la historiographía latina (Madrid, 2008), 51 Google Scholar; Carmona (n. 1), 6.

7 For the battle speeches in Thucydides, see Luschnat, O., Die Feldherrnreden im Geschichtswerk des Thukydides (Leipzig, 1942)Google Scholar; Leimbach, R., Militärische Musterrhetorik. Eine Untersuchung zu den Feldherrnreden des Thukydides (Stuttgart, 1985)Google Scholar; Iglesias Zoido (n. 1); Tsakmakis, A. and Themistokleous, C., ‘Textual Structure and Modality in Thucydides’ Military Exhortations’, in Tsakmakis, A. and Tamiolaki, M. (eds.), Thucydides Between History and Literature (Berlin, 2013), 391–400 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8 For battle speeches as narrative retardation, see Harto Trujillo (n. 6), 66–7. On the marking of important battles in Homer and the historians, see Keitel (n. 2), 166–71. It presents an interesting literary puzzle when a speech or speeches are absent from a historian's description of a major battle (Plathner [n. 3], 51, gathers such absences in Livy, Books 21–42, pointing especially to Cannae). One reason is the reluctance of some authors to write their own versions of the speeches already written by their predecessors (see Marincola, J., ‘Speeches in Classical Historiography’, in Marincola, J. [ed.], A Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography, 2 vols. [Malden, MA, 2007], i.129)CrossRefGoogle Scholar: Livy may have decided not to give Hannibal a speech before Cannae because his source, Polybius (3.111), had done so.

9 On tactical analysis in Thucydides’ speeches, see Luschnat (n. 7). For the influence of Brasidas’ speeches in Thucydides upon later battle-speech writing, see Zoido, J. C. Iglesias, ‘La incitación a la batalla en Tucídides. Brásidas y la creación de un modelo de arenga militar’, in Gómez, J. Bartolomé (ed.), Los desastres de la guerra. Mirada, palabra e imagen (Madrid, 2010), 53–75 Google Scholar.

10 Keitel (n. 2), 166–7.

11 Luschnat (n. 7), 21–32. de Romilly, J., Histoire et raison chez Thucydide (Paris, 1956), 138–50Google Scholar (trans. Rawlings, E. T. as The Mind of Thucydides [Ithaca, NY, 2012], 80–7Google Scholar), notes how well the following events conform to Phormio's predictions, and the similar agreement of events in Thucydides’ narrative to preceding speeches (even echoing their diction) is a theme of Hunter, V. J., Thucydides the Artful Reporter (Toronto, 1973)Google Scholar.

12 Leimbach (n. 7) contended that Thucydides’ speeches were intended to be exemplary.

13 See Gowing, A. M., ‘Appian and Cassius’ Speech before Philippi (Bella Civilia 4.90–100)’, Phoenix 44 (1990), 158–81CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This speech is given considerably before the battle.

14 For a catalogue of the literary functions of battle speeches, see Harto Trujillo (n. 6), 63–73.

15 For the speeches of Calgacus and Agricola, see Woodman, A. J., Tacitus. Agricola (Cambridge, 2014), 236–8, 256–7Google Scholar.

16 For catalogues of these topoi, see Albertus, J., Die ΠΑΡΑΚΛΗΤΙΚΟΙ in der griechischen und römischen Literatur (Strassburg, 1908), 46–93 Google Scholar; Pritchett, W. K., ‘The General's Exhortations in Greek Warfare’, in Pritchett, W. K., Essays in Greek History (Amsterdam, 1994), 101–5Google Scholar; Harto Trujillo (n. 6), 99–134. For the pie chart, see Ventura, M. V. Manzano, Los discursos de exhortación militar en la Farsalia de Lucano (Madrid, 2013), 251 Google Scholar. For analysis of battle speeches in terms of ancient rhetorical theory (in which they did not, however, feature largely, and into the categories of which they fit poorly), see Cruz, F. Romero, ‘Sobre las arengas de Tucídides’, Minerva 4 (1990), 93–104 Google Scholar; Harto Trujillo (n. 6), 74–86; Carmona (n. 1), 183–231. For the topoi of battle speeches finding their way into speeches of other genres, see Keitel, E., ‘Otho's Exhortations in Tacitus’ Histories’, G&R 34 (1987), 73–82 Google Scholar.

17 For Tacitus’ Agricola as a symbol of the better values of the Roman past, see Kraus, C. S., ‘Long Ago and Far Away…The Uses of the Past in Tacitus’ Minora ’, in Ker, J. and Pieper, C. (eds.), Valuing the Past in the Greco-Roman World (Leiden, 2014), 228–37Google Scholar.

18 Earl, D. C., The Political Thought of Sallust (Cambridge, 1961), 93 Google Scholar, calls this a ‘perversion of the political vocabulary’, and notes that both of Catiline's speeches, and the letter Sallust quotes, are expressed in entirely traditional Roman terms (93–5).

19 On Pompey and Labienus, see Brown, R. D., ‘Two Caesarian Battle-Descriptions: A Study in Contrast’, CJ 94 (1999), 346–8Google Scholar; Batstone, W. W. and Damon, C., Caesar's Civil War (New York, 2006), 104, 108–9Google Scholar. Harangues intended by their authors to be interpreted as failures are rare in prose, for reasons that will become clear below, and there is often scholarly dispute about whether allegedly ‘weak’ speeches were actually so. For other harangues that their authors arguably intended to be understood as weak, see Glücklich, H.-J., ‘Rhetorik und Führungsqualität. Feldherrnreden Caesars und Curios’, AU 18 (1975), 33–64 Google Scholar (sed contra Batstone and Damon [this note], 98–101); Lateiner, D., ‘Nicias’ Inadequate Encouragement (Thucydides 7.69.2)’, CPh 80 (1985), 201–8Google Scholar (sed contra Hornblower, S., A Commentary on Thucydides, 3 vols. [Oxford, 1991–2008]Google Scholar, ad loc. 7.69.1–2); Hornblower (this note), ad loc. 7.77; Bartolomé, J., ‘Una aproximación al estudio de las arengas fallidas. Livio, Lucano y Silio Itálico’, Talia Dixit 10 (2015), 1–27 Google Scholar.

20 Cf. Arr. Anab. 2.7.9; Cass. Dio 41.57.1–3, 47.42.2. For why some battle speeches are in direct and some in indirect discourse, see Albertus (n. 16), 43–5; Touhari, O. [sic; error for Touahri], ‘Harangue de chef avant la bataille. Comparaison entre Tite-Live (Histoire Romaine, livre XXVII) et Silius Italicus (Punica, XV, 320–823)’, VL 171 (2004), 122–4Google Scholar; Zoido, J. C. Iglesias, ‘The Pre-Battle Speeches of Alexander at Issus and Gaugamela’, GRBS 50 (2010), 227–31Google Scholar. Speeches are noted as being in direct or indirect discourse in the list of Carmona Centeno et al. (n. 3).

21 For battle speeches in historical works as the compositions of the authors, see n. 24 below. There was a celebrated controversy concerning the historical reality of ancient generals’ giving speeches before battle: see Hansen, M. H., ‘The Battle Exhortation in Ancient Historiography. Fact or Fiction?’, Historia 42 (1993), 161–80Google Scholar; Pritchett (n. 16), 27–109; Hansen, M. H., ‘The Little Grey Horse: Henry V's Speech at Agincourt and the Battle Exhortation in Ancient Historiography’, Histos 2 (1998), 46–63 Google Scholar (reprinted in C&M 52 [2001], 95–116); Pritchett, W. K., ‘Ancient Greek Battle Speeches and a Palfrey’, in Pritchett, W. K., Ancient Greek Battle Speeches and a Palfrey (Amsterdam, 2002), 1–80 Google Scholar. Other contributions were Ehrhardt, C. T. H. R., ‘Speeches Before Battle?’, Historia 44 (1995), 120–1Google Scholar; Clark, M., ‘Did Thucydides Invent the Battle Exhortation?’, Historia 44 (1995), 375–6Google Scholar; Hornblower (n. 19), ii.82–6; and Hammond, N. G. L., ‘The Speeches in Arrian's Indica and Anabasis ’, CQ 49 (1999), 250 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The controversy is ably summarized by Anson, E., ‘The General's Pre-Battle Exhortation in Graeco-Roman Warfare’, G&R 57 (2010), 304–18Google Scholar. There are three main arguments decisive for the historical reality of the practice of giving such speeches (which has no direct bearing on the historical accuracy of the battle speeches in the historians). The first is that ancient authors, even when not writing such a speech, refer to giving them as a custom and point to failures to give such speeches, they being expected (Thuc. 7.69.2, with Zoido, J. C. Iglesias, ‘¿Se pronunciaron realmente les arengas de Tucídides? El testimonio de Th. 7.61–70’, Athenaeum 88 [2000], 515–28Google Scholar; Caes. B Gall. 2.20–1, 5.33; Caes. B Civ. 3.90, cum militari more; Onasander 1.13–16; Tac. Hist. 4.33.1; Veg. Mil. 3.12), and allude to or enter into controversy about their efficacy (Thuc. 5.69 and Xen. Cyr. 3.3.44–55, both with Zoido, J. C. Iglesias, ‘Sobre la verdadera utilidad de la paraínesis en la historiographía de la época clásica. Tucídides y Jenofonte’, Veleia 32 [2015], 47–61 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Onasander 13.3). Second, such speeches have a prominent role in ancient technical military literature ( Aguilar, D. Paniagua, ‘La arenga militar desde la perspectiva de la tradición polemológica grecolatina’, Talia Dixit 2 [2007], 1–25 Google Scholar), which takes their reality for granted, as did the Byzantine tradition of military handbooks (Hambsch [n. 1], 230; Eramo, I., ‘A Word from the General: Ambrosianus B 119 sup. and Protreptic Speeches in Byzantine Military Manuals’, in Zoido, J. C. Iglesias and Pineda, V. [eds.], Anthologies of Historiographical Speeches from Antiquity to Early Modern Times [Leiden, 2017], 98–9, 110–12Google Scholar). A Byzantine treatise on the composition of such speeches survives, the Rhetorica militaris of Syrianus Magister (now conveniently accessible in Eramo, I., Siriano. Discorsi de guerra [Bari, 2010])Google Scholar, as do anthologies of such speeches (Eramo [this note (2017)], 100–9, 113–14). Third, there are also many Roman artistic depictions of the practice, especially on the Columns of Trajan (L. E. Baumer, ‘Adlocutio. Ikonographie und Programmatik der kaiserlichen Heeresansprachen an den Trajanssäule’, in Baumer, L. E., Hölscher, T., and Winkler, L., ‘Narrative Systematik und politisches Konzept in den Reliefs der Traianssäule. Drei Fallstudien’, JDAI 106 [1991], 278–87)Google Scholar and Marcus Aurelius ( David, J.-M., ‘Les contiones militaires des colonnes Trajane et Aurélienne. Les nécessités de l'adhésion’, in Scheid, J. and Huet, V. [eds.], Autour de la colonne Aurélienne [Turnhout, 2000], 213–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar), and on coins (J. Gómez Santacruz, ‘La iconografía del discurso militar [adlocutio] en Roma. Arquitectura conmemorativa y numismática’, in Iglesias Zoido [n. 1], 367–404). Auxiliary arguments are the archaeological attestation of structures for addressing troops (tribunals etc.) in Roman camps ( Polo, F. Pina, Las contiones civiles y militares en Roma [Zaragoza, 1989], 229–36Google Scholar); and, finally, that the practice of giving speeches before battle (and collecting them) has existed in every recoverable period of Western history and continues to the present ( Yellin, K., Battle Exhortation. The Rhetoric of Combat Leadership [Columbia, SC, 2008]Google Scholar; for medieval and early modern collections, see the essays in Iglesias Zoido and Pineda [this note]).

22 Pritchett (n. 16), 82–4; Carmona Centeno et al. (n. 3); and Harto Trujillo (n. 6), 34–40, categorize battle speeches thus, incidentally showing that the provision of such details was conventional. There is material for a whole book (Carmona [n. 1]) on speeches specified as being given by generals passing along the ranks (epipōleēsis), and Buongiovanni, C., ‘Il generale e il suo “pubblico”. Le allocuzioni alle truppe in Sallustio, Tacito, e Ammiano Marcellino’, in Abbamonte, G., Miletti, L., and Spina, L. (eds.), Discorsi alla prova (Naples, 2009), 67–75 Google Scholar, collects other details of the staging of such speeches included by historians: the structure from which the general spoke (see also Pina Polo [n. 21], 229), what he sat on, how he called for silence, etc.

23 On the Pharsalus speeches in Lucan, see esp. Goebel, G. H., ‘Rhetorical and Poetical Thinking in Lucan's Harangues (7.250–382)’, TAPhA 111 (1981), 79–94 Google Scholar. Manzano Ventura (n. 16), 67–8 nn. 201–4, gathers other literature.

24 Both Polyb. 12.25a–b and Lucian, Hist. conscr. 49, want the historian to find out and report the real words spoken by generals in their harangues, but Polybius himself did not achieve that goal in his speeches (see Marincola [n. 8], i.125). Later historians writing a harangue for the same general in the same battle where an earlier historian had already written one (where they did not simply decline to do so – see n. 8 above) appear to have felt somewhat constrained by the outlines of the earlier speech (Marincola [n. 8], i.129), but usually remodelled the speech heavily to create their own work of art and to stress themes that they favoured: ibid.; see also Gowing (n. 13); Centeno, D. Carmona, ‘ Variatio en el discurso exhortativo. La batalla de Zama’, Anuario de estudios filológicos 28 (2005), 5–19 Google Scholar; Iglesias Zoido (n. 20), 232–9; L. Ballesteros Pastor, ‘The Speeches in Justin's Corpusculum Florum: The Selection and Manipulation of Trogus’ Historiae Philippicae’, in Iglesias Zoido and Pineda (n. 21), 79–94. This suggests that they did not consider the earlier speech to represent something close to the actual words spoken, nor did they themselves expect to approach the words the historical general pronounced in writing their own version.

25 See Marincola (n. 8), i.122. Kemper, S., ‘Livius voor coaches. Redevoeringen van generaals bij Livius’, Lampas 38 (2005) 364–92Google Scholar, compares battle speeches to the stereotyped remarks made by modern athletic coaches before a game.

26 The tendency of Greek and Roman historians to avoid writing their own versions of surviving speeches by historical figures (Marincola [n. 8], i.129) and also of speeches written by previous historians (n. 8 above) flies in the face of the ancient habit of aemulatio, trying to do the same thing as a predecessor, only better. But note that within works of history the giving of such speeches by leaders could be considered to be a competition between those leaders, e.g. Hdt. 8.83; Xen. Hell. 1.1.30–1, with L. Miletti, ‘Contesti dei discorsi alle truppe nella storiografia greca. Erodoto, Tucidide, Senofonte’, in Abbamonte et al. (n. 22), 47–61.

27 We end our survey advisedly with the sixth-century ad Procopius; the battle speeches of the seventh-century Theophylact Simocatta are baroque indeed: 3.13, 5.4.

28 For competitive fighting in the Iliad, see Lendon, J. E., Soldiers and Ghosts. A History of Battle in Classical Antiquity (New Haven, CT, 2005), 20–36, 397–8Google Scholar, with references and literature; for competitive speaking, see Schofield, M., ‘ Euboulia in the Iliad ’, CQ 36 (1986), esp. 9–10CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For the ancient controversy about the role of morale in battle, see Lendon, J. E., ‘The Rhetoric of Combat: Greek Military Theory and Roman Culture in Julius Caesar's Battle Descriptions’, ClAnt 18 (1999), 290–304 Google Scholar; Whately, C., Battles and Generals. Combat, Culture, and Didacticism in Procopius’ Wars (Leiden, 2016), 25–31 Google Scholar.

29 Breitenbach, H. R., Historiographische Anschauungsformen Xenophons (Freiburg in der Schweiz, 1950), 70–87 Google Scholar; Lendon (n. 28 [1999]), 290–5; Lendon, J. E., ‘Xenophon and the Alternative to Realist Foreign Policy: Cyropaedia 3.1.14–31’, JHS 126 (2006), 88–91 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30 See the works of Frontinus (first century ad), Polyaenus (second century ad), and Julius Africanus (third century ad). On this tradition, see esp. Krentz, P. and Wheeler, E. L., Polyaenus. Stratagems of War, 2 vols. (Chicago, IL, 1994) i.vi–xxivGoogle Scholar; Wheeler, E. L., Stratagem and the Vocabulary of Military Trickery (Leiden, 1988)Google Scholar; Wheeler, E. L., ‘Polyaenus: Scriptor Militaris ’, in Brodersen, K. (ed.), Polyainos. Neue Studien/Polyaenus. New Studies (Berlin, 2010), 19–36 Google Scholar.

31 Onasander 1.13, 6.5, 9.3, 10.9, 10.20, 10.25–6, 13, 14.1–3, 22.2–4, 23.1–2, 24, 28, 29.2, 34, 35.5, 36, 38.3, 39.6–7, 41.2, 42.1–2, 42.12–13, 42.17. For this author, see the very learned commented edition of Petrocelli, C., Onasandro. Il generale. Manuale per l'esercizio del comando (Bari, 2008)Google Scholar. And compare, at the end of our era, the similar sentiments of Procopius, as noted by Whately (n. 28), 134–9.

32 See also Tac. Hist. 3.17.1 for the same emphasis on the psychological; but contrast Livy 9.17.15 for a more tactically minded list of a general's duties in battle.

33 See David, J.-M., ‘Le chef et sa troupe’, in Dupont, F. (ed.), Paroles romaines (Nancy, 1995), 35–42 Google Scholar.

34 Ibid., 38–9; Oakley, S. P., A Commentary on Livy Books VI–X, 4 vols. (Oxford, 1997–2005)Google Scholar, ad loc. Livy 9.13.1.

35 See also Hdt. 7.224–32, 8.11, 8.93, 9.71–5, 9.105. For Homer's epitaphs, see Mueller, M., The Iliad (London, 1984), 89–95 Google Scholar. For Herodotus’ imitation of Homer's epitaphs, see Miniconi, P.-J., Étude des themes ‘guerriers’ de la poésie épique greco-romaine (Paris, 1951), 48 Google Scholar; Boedeker, D., ‘Pedestrian Fatalities: The Prosaics of Death in Herodotus’, in Derow, P. and Parker, R. (eds.), Herodotus and His World (Oxford, 2003), 34–5Google Scholar, but also pointing out that Herodotus’ epitaphs are usually far less extended than Homer's.

36 On competition between wings, see Oakley (n. 34), ad loc. Livy 9.40.8–11. For Roman decorations and Greek awards for courage, see Lendon, J. E., ‘Battle Description in the Ancient Historians, Part I: Structure, Array, and Fighting’, G&R 64.1 (2017), 57 n. 51Google Scholar.

37 For Dionysius, see Gaida, E., Die Schlachtschilderungen in den Antiquitates Romanae des Dionys von Halikarnaß (Breslau, 1934), 40 Google Scholar, with e.g. Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 9.13.3, 20.2.4. For Procopius, 1.18.38, 4.21.26–8, 5.18.29–33, 8.29.22–8; also Amm. Marc. 31.13.12–19.

38 On numbers killed, see Oakley (n. 34), ad loc. Livy 7.17.9. For the recording of the dead, see, for the Greek tradition, Rzepka, J., ‘The Casualty Figures of Alexander's Army’, in Howe, T., Müller, S., and Stoneman, R. (eds.), Ancient Historiography on War and Empire (Oxford, 2017), 169–76Google Scholar; for the Roman, see Peretz, D., ‘Military Burial and the Identification of the Roman Fallen Soldiers’, Klio 87 (2005), 123–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

39 On standards captured, see Oakley (n. 34), ad loc. Livy 7.37.16; Erdkamp, P., ‘Valerius Antias and Livy's Casualty Reports’, in Deroux, C. (ed.), Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History XIII (Brussels, 2006), 166 Google Scholar n. *, 169–77, 180–1. On the number of hours a battle lasted, see Oakley (n. 34), ad loc. 8.38.10. Livy had a source – usually identified as Valerius Antias ( Laroche, R. A., ‘Valerius Antias: Livy's Source for the Number of Military Standards Captured in Battle in Books XX–XLV’, Latomus 47 [1988], 758–71Google Scholar) – who gave very full lists of things captured in Roman battles – not only standards taken, but prisoners, wagons, horses, and elephants both killed and captured. But not even Livy regularly reproduced all the details that that source gave him, and the larger tradition chose not to go in that direction.

40 On the absence of casualty figures in Tacitus, see R. Ash, ‘Tacitus and the Battle of Mons Graupius: A Historiographical Route Map?’, in Marincola (n. 8),  ii.439. Subsequent to the results passage there might – rarely but strikingly – be a passage describing the stricken field, usually being inspected by the winning leader (Hannibal's tour of the field of Cannae at Livy 22.51 is perhaps the most famous); for the topoi of such scenes, see Pagán, V. E., ‘The Mourning After: Statius Thebaid 12’, AJPh 121 (2000), 423–52Google Scholar (and n. 14 for their rarity). A short portrait of the victorious general dealing with the consequences of his victory is also sometimes present: see Hau, L. I., ‘The Victor after the Victory: A Narrative Set-Piece in Greek Historiography from Herodotus to Diodorus of Sicily’, in Bragg, E., Hau, L. I., and Macaulay-Lewis, E. (eds.), Beyond the Battlefields. New Perspectives on Warfare and Society in the Graeco-Roman World (Newcastle, 2008), 121–43Google Scholar.

41 Polybius thought that the challenges of describing land and sea battles were sufficiently different that one historian – Ephorus – could be said to be good at the one and bad at the other (12.25f.1).

42 On hostility to psychology, see Keegan, J., The Face of Battle (New York, 1986 [London, 19761]), 27–36 Google Scholar. Kagan, K., The Eye of Command (Ann Arbor, MI, 2006)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, comes to a similarly positive evaluation of ancient battle descriptions, but from different premises than mine.

43 On literature moulding reality, see Lendon (n. 28 [2005]); Whitby, M., ‘Reconstructing Ancient Warfare’, in Sabin, P., van Wees, H., and Whitby, M. (eds.), The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Warfare, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 2007)Google Scholar, i.59, with i.60–4 on author-participants in battle.

44 Hdt. 6.12–15, 8.9–11, 8.15; cf. Libanius, Prog. 12.11.1 (Foerster viii.489). When a sea battle is not dynamic, but the ships raft up and soldiers fight it out on the decks, Thucydides  marks that as odd (1.49), and in imitation of Thucydides the ‘land battle on the sea’ became a topos: see Gowing, A. M., The Triumviral Narratives of Appian and Cassius Dio (Ann Arbor, MI, 1992), 219 n. 32Google Scholar.

45 On material for the description of a sea battle borrowed from other authors, including from Thucydides’ battle in the Great Harbour at Syracuse, see Reggi, G., ‘Cesare e il racconto delle battaglie navali sotto Marsiglia’, RIL 136 (2002), 71–108 Google Scholar.

46 De Romilly (n. 11 [1956]), 150–72 (= n. 11 [2012], 87–102); also translated as de Romilly, J., ‘A Highly Complex Battle-Account: Syracuse’, in Rusten, J. S. (ed.), Oxford Readings in Classical Studies. Thucydides (Oxford 2009), 359–77Google Scholar. For this battle, see also Tenuta, E. Avezzú, ‘Il racconto di battaglia in Tucidide. Lo scarto stilistico come costante della disfatta in Sicilia’, Bollettino dell'Istituto di Filologia Greca dell'Università di Padova 4 (1977–78), 89–102 Google Scholar; Rutter, N. K., Thucydides Books VI and VII. A Companion to the Penguin Translation of Rex Warner (Bristol, 1989), 55–6Google Scholar; Centeno, D. Carmona, ‘La batalla del Puerto de Siracusa. Tucídides o el imitador de Homero’, SemRom n.s. 3 (2014), 95–115 Google Scholar.

47 See Hunter (n. 11), 113–15.

48 De Romilly (n. 11 [1956]), 162–4 (= n. 11 [2012], 95–7); Finley, J. H., Three Essays on Thucydides (Cambridge, MA, 1967), 47 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Avezzú Tenuta (n. 46), 89–94, 99–101. For Aeschylus on Salamis, see Pelling, C., ‘Aeschylus’ Persae and History’, in Pelling, C. (ed.), Greek Tragedy and the Historian (Oxford, 1997), 1–19 Google Scholar.

49 Carmona Centeno (n. 46) traces the many Iliadic allusions in this battle description.

50 Again, Aeschylus’ Persae may have been his inspiration here; see n. 48. For Thucydides’ description of emotion in battle descriptions as a literary escape mechanism, see Paul, G. M., ‘Two Battles in Thucydides’, EMC 31 (1987), 311–12Google Scholar.

51 For ancient critical praise, and the suggestion that this description ought to be emulated, see Dion. Hal. Thuc. 371; Plut. Mor. 347a–c. For lists of imitations, see Hornblower (n. 19), ad loc. 7.71.1; Walker, A. D., ‘ Enargeia and the Spectator in Greek Historiography’, TAPhA 123 (1993), 353–77Google Scholar.

52 For Romulus, see Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 2.41.3; cf. 3.19–20; for Cynoscephalae, see Polyb. 18.25.1; cf. 1.44.5, 3.43.6–8; Livy 33.9.4; for the Jugurthine War, see Sall. Iug. 60.3–4; for Massilia, see Caes. B Civ. 2.4–7; for Naulochos, Cass. Dio 49.9–10. For this topos in general, see Bucher, G. S., ‘Fictive Elements in Appian's Pharsalus Narrative’, Phoenix 59 (2005)Google Scholar, 59 n. 26. Carmona Centeno (n. 46), 109–11, traces Thucydides’ description of the experience of the watchers back to the Iliad. On the depiction of Homeric warfare as viewed, see Myers, T., ‘“What if We Had a War and Everybody Came?” War as Spectacle and the Duel of Iliad 3’, in Bakogianni, A. and Hope, V. M. (eds.), War as Spectacle (London, 2015), 25–42 Google Scholar.