Ancient Siege Warfare: Persians, Greeks, Carthaginians and Romans 546-146 BC

Osprey Elite #121

by Duncan B. Campbell, Adam Hook (Illustrator)

Sieges played a central role in many conflicts of the ancient world and generals, including Darius, Alexander the Great, Hannibal and Scipio Africanus successfully used siegecraft to gain their objectives. As siege tactics became integral to success in war, generals employed the minds of engineers and scientists to develop tactics which ranged from penetrating the defences or blockading the city through to tricks and deception. This fascinating study tracks developments in siege warfare from Ancient Persia in the 6th century BC through to the Roman sieges of the second century BC, describing the range of equipment and techniques which evolved during this period.

Genres: History, Military History, Ancient History, Nonfiction

64 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Dr Duncan B Campbell is a specialist in Greek and Roman military history. He first became fascinated by Roman archaeology after a childhood visit to Hadrian's Wall. He published his first academic paper in 1984, as an undergraduate at Glasgow University (Scotland), and produced a complete re-assessment of Roman siegecraft for his PhD.
He has made some of his research accessible to a wider readership through Osprey's New Vanguard, Elite, and Fortress series, and he is a regular contributor to *Ancient Warfare* magazine. Besides writing occasional academic articles, he is a frequent reviewer for *Bryn Mawr Classical Review*.
In his latest book, *The Fate of the Ninth*, he discusses the curious disappearance of Rome's Ninth Legion.

Reviews

[Joe Krakovsky · Rating 5 out of 5]

ANCIENT SIEGE WARFARE: PERSIANS, GREEKS, CARTHAGINIANS AND ROMANS 546 - 146 BC explains how these armies conquered fortified cities of their enemies.

In ancient times your city was not free unless you could train for warfare and/or fortify your city. In the Second Chapter of Nehemiah in the Bible, Nehemiah is given permission by Artaxerxes, the Persian King, to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the walls. His jealous enemies saw the repairing of the fortifications as a sign of the first step of rebellion against the King. Had the King changed his mind, how would he retake the city?

There were basically five ways to take a fortified city. You could go over the walls, through them, or under them. The other two ways were by siege or treachery. Going over the walls required ladders or some other means of doing just that, such as building up a ramp against the wall or using a siege tower with a ramp on it so your soldiers could go over the wall and close with the defenders for hand to hand combat. Going through the wall meant using a battering ram to make a hole in a section of the wall so your soldiers could get in. Going under the wall actually meant digging tunnels under the wall foundation and then causing a cave in which would collapse the wall above. If you had the time or were running out of options you could encircle the city with your own fortifications and not let anybody in or out. Some such sieges lasted two years or more and once the food ran out and sickness took its toll the city would fall. A version of treachery was trickery, such as sneaking in somehow and opening the gates from the inside (Troy). Treachery was simply bribing someone. Alexander the Great's father, Philip, was known to take cities by treachery as well as by force of arms. He was quoted as saying that any fortress could be taken, if only a little donkey laden with gold could make his way up to it. Political rivalry often had a hand in treachery.

Each of the armies listed in the title had their own variations of the methods used to take a city. By conquering cities your own city grew stronger and eventually became an empire. Some armies invented new tactics and technology, and sometimes they had to be reinvented what was forgotten.

This book was richly embellished with illustrations and worthy of 5 stars.

I will close with a passage I found amusing. "Demosthenes, the great Athenian orator, railed against the Macedonian style of warfare: fighting was no longer a fair and open contest reserved for a summer's day; on the contrary, Philip might arrive outside a town at any time of year, set up his machinery, and lay siege."

[Banbury · Rating 3 out of 5]

My interest in the subject matter is not intense, but I did find this book somewhat interesting. Because I have no expertise in archeology, I struggle sometimes with understanding some of the terms and descriptions. This book, like every other book I have read on archeology, has indistinct photographs where I have difficulty descrying the features which are supposed to illustrate the structures of the past. This book was a nice distilling of ancient and modern descriptions about ancient siege warfare, and descriptions of some of the ancient sieges. The amount of physical labor involved in creating siege walls, ditches, and machinery is striking. Most amazing is the incredible size of some of the machinery.

[Almantas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Osprey Publishing Fortress publication.