Greek Fire, Poison Arrows, and Scorpion Bombs: Unconventional Warfare in the Ancient World

by Adrienne Mayor

The popular, historically accurate 3D video game Rome: Total War was first released in 2003. The game featured realistic war elephants. The following year, inspired by my description in chapter 6 of the best defense against war elephants known in antiquity, a new zoological weapon was introduced by the game’s developers: pigs cruelly set on fire. One reviewer described the demonstration of the new feature on GameSpy.com: “I had waited 12 months for this! I was on the edge of my seat. The elephants came pounding down the hillside toward my legions. ‘All right, let’s send in the pigs!’ the developers hollered. I was sweating with anticipation. At long last! Our superweapon unveiled! ‘Cry Havoc and Let Slip the Pigs of War!’ I bellowed.” But, he continued, “Here’s the thing, the thing to remember about a flaming pig. It doesn’t go where you tell it to … [the pigs] ran through my lines of troops, causing them to break formation. Men were running around, screaming, catching on fire, and howling with pain. The pigs went everywhere, everywhere except toward the elephants, who continued their charge unfazed, then rammed into our panicked troops like freight trains. How many strategy games offer THAT? I must have this game.”21

The idea that plundering a temple or sacred object or site would be punished by plague was a very old one. The capture of the Ark of the Covenant by the Philistines followed by outbreaks of plague is one of the earliest examples. Another example was mentioned in chapter 3, when the Carthaginian army was struck by plague in 396 BC at Syracuse. That plague began after the Carthaginian soldiers pillaged the Greek temple of Demeter and Kore.

Searching for a perfect theriac, a universal antidote to all poisons, Mithradates also tested various pharmaka on prisoners, friends, and himself. Eventually he created an elaborate compound of more than fifty ingredients, including antidotes and tiny amounts of toxins, combining these into a single drug for his own protection. His special theriac became known as Mithridatium.

Vials of Mithridatium continued to be very popular in Europe in the Middle Ages and Renaissance—and they were still dispensed by French and German apothecaries up to the late nineteenth century.

Mandrake was surrounded with ancient lore and danger. As with hellebore, there were two kinds of mandrake, white (male) and black (female), and the plant had to be gathered by shamans who knew the proper rituals. With their backs turned to the wind, the diggers first traced three circles around the plant with a sword and then dug it up while facing west. Some believed the root emitted screams as it was pulled from the ground, and to hear that terrible sound spelled instant death. To avoid hearing the screams, an herbalist tied the mandrake stem to the leg of a dog, which uprooted the plant when it was called from a safe distance. The strong-smelling roots were sliced and sun-dried, and then crushed or boiled and preserved in wine (this practice may have suggested to Himilco the idea of tainting barrels of wine).

An interesting modern plan to play on Japanese folk superstitions about a legendary animal was devised by the US Office of Strategic Services (OSS, forerunner of the CIA) in 1943 during World War II. Code-named “Operation Fantasia” the plot called for destroying Japanese morale by sending eerie replicas of kitsune, fox-ghosts, to frighten soldiers and citizens. One idea was to spray live foxes with radium-containing glow-in-the-dark paint. In a test of the plan, thirty glowing foxes were released in a Washington, DC, park, which did indeed terrify passersby. Ultimately the plot proved impractical and was never implemented in Japan.29