raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 15, 2018 14:05:44 GMT
No problem but do remember I'm a enthusiastic amateur so could be off on some details, suggestions. Well i like naval battles, but i am trying to remember what naval battle i saw in the second 300 movie, that is if anybody saw it. That would have been Salamis, I guess. Perhaps Artemisium. I have to confess that I didn't really watch it because it's not that good. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 15, 2018 14:07:48 GMT
Well i like naval battles, but i am trying to remember what naval battle i saw in the second 300 movie, that is if anybody saw it. That would have been Salamis, I guess. Perhaps Artemisium. I have to confess that I didn't really watch it because it's not that good. Thanks raunchel, i do wonder, did they already have all the ships ready before this battle ore did they needed to wait until they where build. |
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 15, 2018 14:18:20 GMT
That would have been Salamis, I guess. Perhaps Artemisium. I have to confess that I didn't really watch it because it's not that good. Thanks raunchel, i do wonder, did they already have all the ships ready before this battle ore did they needed to wait until they where build. Generally, they would have a bunch of ships in storage or ready, but on inspection, they would find that a part of them wasn't good enough anymore, so new ones had to be built. The real bottleneck tended to be manpower, because galleys really need sickening amounts of crew and provisions. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 15, 2018 14:30:41 GMT
I find 50,000 men killed or captured on both sides a lot, even these days i doubt there is a naval battle with that many deaths ore wounded.
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 15, 2018 15:36:07 GMT
I find 50,000 men killed or captured on both sides a lot, even these days i doubt there is a naval battle with that many deaths ore wounded. They worked in ratger different conditions. Keep in mind that every five would have had 300 rowers on board, and that damaged ships didn't have it easy (if they had been rammed properly, they were sinking). The ships were deadly but vulnerable, leading to massive casualties. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 16, 2018 16:02:40 GMT
Maneuvering is an obvious approach and given that the Carthagians were a lot more experienced that is something they could have done. Reading the Wiki article on it the Romans had used the corvus before so the Carthaginians obviously knew about it. In fact it says that they tried to attack ships from their sides to avoid it. Possibly with so many ships the degree of maneuvering required was impossible. The other factor is that their flanking forces, which attacked the transports and the 3rd fleet defending them, seems to have put a lot of effort into attacking the transporters. As such when the 1st two Roman forces defeated the Carthaginian centre and returned they were able to overwhelm the flanking forces. Possibly if they had concentrated on the military units and defeated the reserve fleet before the Roman van units returned they would have been able to win then? Even if most of the transports had escaped they would have posed less of a threat without the warships to escort them. I'm less certain about more marines to be honest. As I understand it the Roman 'marines' were largely normal legionary men, just operating at sea once the corvus had fixed a Carthaginian ship so it couldn't move. Not sure if the Carthaginians could carry that many extra troops without seriously encumbering their movement, or to train that number of men up to the necessary standards to fight Roman HI in such a battle? The quality of the legionaries shouldn't be overstated I think. Yes, they were good heavy infantry, but other heavies could go toe to toe with them and have a decent chance. The big thing was their massive number. Which again hurt speed and the like, but tactically,the Romans did well enough to counteract that weakness. Very true. Some were actually better, such as Greek phalanx, as long as it was on fairly flat ground and face to face. As the Roman maniples tended to be more flexible in maneuvering and able to operate quite well on broken or forested areas say which seriously handicapped the phalanx. Also since many Greek and other armies of organised states were profession one with experienced officers the Romans often had problems with what were basically amateur leaders who were political appointment. However the Romans were highly disciplined, had a lethal method of tactical combat, especially as it gained experience and being a mass army [in the bulk of the republican period anyway] could moblise a lot of men and replace heavy losses. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 16, 2018 16:21:27 GMT
The quality of the legionaries shouldn't be overstated I think. Yes, they were good heavy infantry, but other heavies could go toe to toe with them and have a decent chance. The big thing was their massive number. Which again hurt speed and the like, but tactically,the Romans did well enough to counteract that weakness. Very true. Some were actually better, such as Greek phalanx, as long as it was on fairly flat ground and face to face. As the Roman maniples tended to be more flexible in maneuvering and able to operate quite well on broken or forested areas say which seriously handicapped the phalanx. Also since many Greek and other armies of organised states were profession one with experienced officers the Romans often had problems with what were basically amateur leaders who were political appointment. However the Romans were highly disciplined, had a lethal method of tactical combat, especially as it gained experience and being a mass army [in the bulk of the republican period anyway] could moblise a lot of men and replace heavy losses. So the Romans had the best (marines) men to fight on ships. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 16, 2018 21:20:29 GMT
Very true. Some were actually better, such as Greek phalanx, as long as it was on fairly flat ground and face to face. As the Roman maniples tended to be more flexible in maneuvering and able to operate quite well on broken or forested areas say which seriously handicapped the phalanx. Also since many Greek and other armies of organised states were profession one with experienced officers the Romans often had problems with what were basically amateur leaders who were political appointment. However the Romans were highly disciplined, had a lethal method of tactical combat, especially as it gained experience and being a mass army [in the bulk of the republican period anyway] could moblise a lot of men and replace heavy losses. So the Romans had the best (marines) men to fight on ships. They have a lot of good quality heavy infantry than, if it can be turned into basically a land battle at sea by locking the ships together can be very effective in such combat. |
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 17, 2018 5:07:36 GMT
So the Romans had the best (marines) men to fight on ships. They have a lot of good quality heavy infantry than, if it can be turned into basically a land battle at sea by locking the ships together can be very effective in such combat. Locking together isn't really a thing that was done in the classical context. It basically destroys all ability to move, or to use any kind of weapon. It also becomes impossible to board anyone, leaving your fleet as a bunch of sitting ducks. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 17, 2018 9:59:12 GMT
They have a lot of good quality heavy infantry than, if it can be turned into basically a land battle at sea by locking the ships together can be very effective in such combat. Locking together isn't really a thing that was done in the classical context. It basically destroys all ability to move, or to use any kind of weapon. It also becomes impossible to board anyone, leaving your fleet as a bunch of sitting ducks. As I understand it that was the basic purpose of the corvus? To nullify the greater Carthaginian skills at actually rowing and maneuvering and enable two interlocked ships to become a 'land' battle between the marines on both sides. Yes this means both ships are vulnerable to being rammed by others. However that assumes that a Carthaginian ship is not too busy dodging other corvus. Also if one ship is hit so badly its left sinking wouldn't there be a danger that it drags the other down with it? Hence your likely to sink one of your own ships even if you take out a Roman. As I say my knowledge is a bit basic, going back to what I learnt as a child, which unfortunately is a bloody long time ago. Could have it all wrong but that's what I learnt of the tactics from assorted books. |
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 17, 2018 10:23:23 GMT
Locking together isn't really a thing that was done in the classical context. It basically destroys all ability to move, or to use any kind of weapon. It also becomes impossible to board anyone, leaving your fleet as a bunch of sitting ducks. As I understand it that was the basic purpose of the corvus? To nullify the greater Carthaginian skills at actually rowing and maneuvering and enable two interlocked ships to become a 'land' battle between the marines on both sides. Yes this means both ships are vulnerable to being rammed by others. However that assumes that a Carthaginian ship is not too busy dodging other corvus. Also if one ship is hit so badly its left sinking wouldn't there be a danger that it drags the other down with it? Hence your likely to sink one of your own ships even if you take out a Roman. As I say my knowledge is a bit basic, going back to what I learnt as a child, which unfortunately is a bloody long time ago. Could have it all wrong but that's what I learnt of the tactics from assorted books. I'm sorry, that's true. I thought that you meant it like tying a bunch of your own ships together like you sometimes saw in the medieval era. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 18, 2018 15:59:46 GMT
As I understand it that was the basic purpose of the corvus? To nullify the greater Carthaginian skills at actually rowing and maneuvering and enable two interlocked ships to become a 'land' battle between the marines on both sides. Yes this means both ships are vulnerable to being rammed by others. However that assumes that a Carthaginian ship is not too busy dodging other corvus. Also if one ship is hit so badly its left sinking wouldn't there be a danger that it drags the other down with it? Hence your likely to sink one of your own ships even if you take out a Roman. As I say my knowledge is a bit basic, going back to what I learnt as a child, which unfortunately is a bloody long time ago. Could have it all wrong but that's what I learnt of the tactics from assorted books. I'm sorry, that's true. I thought that you meant it like tying a bunch of your own ships together like you sometimes saw in the medieval era. Ah no. It was basically a means of pinning the Carthaginian ships so they couldn't maneuver and ram easily and the Romans could use boarding actions to defeat the enemy. The Carthaginians were an experienced naval power and the Romans have virtually no naval experience at the start of the 1st Punic war. There is a story that they were losing heavily at sea until a Carthaginian ship was beached on their coast and they basically copied it wholesale and had rowers practicing at benches on land to teach them the basics. Even then I think they continued to struggle until they developed the corvus. Basically a simple move for a army based power to counter a naval one at sea. There were probably some disadvantages such as the extra weight of the device probably made the Roman ships slower and less stable. Although if they were using 5's i.e. ships with 5 banks of oars those are pretty large compared to the biremes and triremes of the earlier Greek and Persian wars. [Rowing warships designed primarily for ramming tended to be slim and lightly built to reduce weight so they could move faster but did make them somewhat fragile to both battle and other damage.] |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 20, 2018 9:48:39 GMT
Looking at this picture, the battle is a mess.  Also is this how storming a enemy ship was done.  |
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 20, 2018 23:31:57 GMT
Nice find raunchel , very interesting to read. For people who do not like to read, i have found a YouTube clip about the battle. For those who like to read, here is a article about the battle.  Agh! Graphics! Pictures! It burns! Pretty cool, though. I remember seeing this on history class WAY back, and it just reminds me of college. Probably not a good reminder. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on Apr 21, 2018 9:23:18 GMT
Found this nice artile called Roman Navy, what period is the Roman navy during the Battle of Ecnomus. |
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