Download PDF | Shaun Tougher, Richard Evans - Generalship in Ancient Greece, Rome and Byzantium_ The Art of Generalship-Edinburgh University Press (2022).
377 Pages
Introduction
Richard Evans and Shaun Tougher
The art of generalship or the ability of successful leadership in a military context, as Addison perceptively observed, is not at all dependent on fortune or tyche (meaning in reality good luck) to ensure victory. Victory might be obtained through good luck just happening,1 but the soundest method of ensuring success relies on fastidious management in the camp and while on the march in conjunction with inspiring leadership on the field of battle. How many or how few generals in antiquity measure up to such a stringent assessment of their capabilities, their practice of the art of being a general, and so deserved the successes they obtained and their subsequent immortal fame?
In the following chapters the discussion aligns to this focus. Julius Caesar, for example, makes frequent reference to ‘good fortune’ in his Gallic campaigns (Nolan), but he was an able if not the consummate manager of his military adventures, in Gaul, Italy, Spain and Greece in the first century bc. 2 In political life he perhaps lacked that lightness of touch which his successor Augustus, only a moderately capable military leader, possessed in abundance. Leonidas, the Spartan king (Evans), and the Roman emperor Decius (Potter), on the other hand, no doubt both capable soldiers, found immortality not in success, but in two of the most famous defeats in the history of the Greeks and Romans: Thermopylae in 480 bc and Abritus in ad 251 respectively.
The importance to cultures in antiquity of success in military affairs can easily be measured by noting that Homer’s Iliad, among the earliest surviving literary evidence for the history and civilisation of the ancient Greeks, is essentially a tale in verse about the flawed leadership of the protagonists: Agamemnon, Achilles and Hector. All are active participants in the military campaigning around Troy and the battles that took place there (Kucewicz). None is the perfect general, but Alexander the Great (336–323 bc), probably the greatest warrior general of history, and the most sublime practitioner of generalship, constantly sought to emulate these mythical figures; and he was not an isolated example. On the other hand, the Roman emperor Trajan (ad 98–117), certainly regarded by the Romans as completely equal in ability to Alexander, was, very much like Caesar, a manager of his armies and not a front-line fighter.
In late antiquity, the ambitious eastern campaign of emperor Julian (361–363) can be presented or even understood as a desire to follow in the footsteps of Alexander the Great and the Homeric heroes. Julian’s death on the field of battle on 26 June 363 was in keeping with the by then thousand-year-old tradition of the Graeco-Roman warrior.3 Further, he was certainly not the last, as the following discussions will illustrate. Indeed, Julian’s words are as revealing as his actions. Well known for his writings as much as his political and military career, in his celebrated satire The Caesars – in which the gods undertake to decide who has been the best Roman emperor of all – three of the six finalists were chosen as being the most warlike: Julius Caesar, Augustus and Trajan.4 Further, although Marcus Aurelius was selected as a philosopher,5 and Constantine was thrown into the mix as a lover of pleasure,6 both emperors also played a military role, and as much as Julian sought to downplay it, Constantine was a highly successful general.
The one Greek figure who was allowed to be included in the competition and as one of the finalists reflects the prevalence of the military role of leaders too, for it was Alexander the Great.7 Homeric generalship involved conspicuous participation on the battlefield and could and did result in some of the most memorable leadership qualities displayed throughout antiquity by, for example, not only Alexander the Great, the early Seleucids (McAuley) or Julius Caesar, but also Epaminondas of Thebes (died 362 bc), Agesilaus of Sparta (c. 400–360 bc) and Dionysius I of Syracuse (405– 367 bc). It could also result in disaster, not only for Julian but also, for example, for Antigonus Monophthalmus or Pyrrhus of Epirus, both killed fighting at vital times for the fortunes of their states, in 301 bc and 272 bc respectively. Homeric generalship also belonged to an epoch in which the leader of a state was first and perhaps only a warrior, or portrayed as such: Odysseus, Ajax, even Nestor (when he was a young man). But the increasing sophistication of states and how they operated in the ancient world brought with it a change in the way military governance was conceived.
Civic leadership, which required competencies across a number of vital fields from the juridical to oratorical ability for meetings of citizen assemblies, and civil administration, brought with it a diminution of the purely military career. By the fifth century bc in Athens leaders such as Miltiades, Aristides, Themistocles, Pericles and Nicias possessed as many strengths as administrators as they did as generals. Their successes in peace as in war indicate not only a wealth of talent in Athenian society, but also that those who reached the pinnacle of success were extraordinary all-rounders. From the fifth century on, there were as many generals who directed their armies from behind the front line of fighting as there were Homeric-type warrior generals on the battlefield. While in the first half of the fourth century bc the Theban leaders Pelopidas and Epaminondas were likely to face opponents such as Agesilaus of Sparta, Alexander of Pherae or Iphicrates of Athens on the front line, there were equally successful generals who saw little or no actual combat.8 Philip II (359–336 bc), the Macedonian monarch who was father of a greater son, was highly successful in pursuit of territorial acquisitions, but he is not remembered in the same way as his warrior-king son Alexander the Great.9
The expansion into different areas of concern and the growing complexities of management in military affairs must have been the primary cause for writers such as Aeneas Tacticus and Xenophon in the fourth century bc to circulate reflections on how campaigns might be organised by a general, the sort of training needed to become a good commander, and the various elements of campaigns: from battlefield encounters to armies on the march, and even the preparations and techniques need to besiege or defend a city. It is evident that both the specific problems confronting generals and the wider issues of what was implicit in generalship or leadership began to be a topic of debate among intellectual circles, as can easily be gauged from the extant works of Plato and Aristotle (Rockwell), and remained so even a full millennium later in the Byzantine Empire, as reflected by such texts at the Strategikon ascribed to the emperor Maurice (582–602) and the Taktika of the emperor Leo VI (886–912) (Rance, Tougher, Krallis).
As yet there was no specialised military elite as is found today in the graduates of numerous military academies scattered around the world. The general was very much an amateur, as exemplified by the commanders of armies in the Roman Republic (Taylor), and indeed the phenomenon persisted until the First World War (1914–1918). As such these amateurs could, and often did, scale dizzy heights in their successes: Scipio Africanus at Zama in 202 bc, the younger Aemilius Paullus at Pydna in 168 bc, Gaius Marius at Vercellae in 101 bc; but they might also plumb the depths of catastrophic disasters: Gaius Flaminius at Lake Trasimene in 217 bc, the elder Aemilius Paullus at Cannae in 216 bc, or Augustus’ general Quinctilius Varus at the Teutoburg Wald in ad 9 (Crosby).
By the time of the early Roman Empire, the rulers, although commanders-in-chief of their armies stationed on the far-flung frontiers, rarely ventured from the metropolis. Active generalship roles were therefore the occupation of subordinates, but victories, and by implication defeats,10 belonged to the ruler and reflected either his glory or his lack of talent. By the mid-second century ad Roman emperors had taken to leading campaigns personally if not actually fighting in battles. Marcus Aurelius (161–180) spent much of his rule directing efforts to prevent Germanic tribes from penetrating the Roman Empire’s northern borders. From the rule of Septimius Severus (193–211) onwards it again became almost a rule of thumb that the emperor was active in campaigns. Decius (249–251) was the first Roman emperor to die in battle against invaders. Further, the third century was the age of the soldier emperors, the phenomenon that many of those who became emperor had risen through the ranks of the army.
This began with Maximinus Thrax (235–238) but is exemplified by the famous figure of Diocletian (284–305). This age of emperor generals included Constantine the Great (306–337), Constantius II (337–361), Julian (355–363), Valentinian I (364–375) and his brother Valens (364–378) (Whately), but the death of Theodosius I (379–395) marked a return to the figure of the non-campaigning emperor. This shift began with Theodosius’ young sons and successors Arcadius (395–408) and Honorius (395–423), but is famously exemplified by Justinian I (527–565), who nevertheless presided over the reconquest of North Africa and Italy, reliant on generals such as the celebrated Belisarius and John Troglita (Stewart, de Marre). This trend could fluctuate; witness the campaigns of Heraclius (610–641) against both Persians and Arabs (MacDonald) and the number of non-campaigning emperors who distinguish Byzantium’s Macedonian Dynasty (Tougher).
Noncampaigning emperors could nonetheless lay claim to military authority and divine support for success, as well as the masculine virtue of courage, so key in the identity of the general. In Byzantium even generals who were eunuchs, such as Narses in the sixth century and Basil Lekapenos in the tenth century, could be celebrated for this quality (Tougher). Whilst this volume focuses primarily on generalship in Greece, Rome and Byzantium, it is important to recognise that these cultures did not exist and act in a vacuum, but rather interacted with other cultures and peoples they encountered. Thus, ideas about generals and generalship could come into direct dialogue.
Further, there is scope for comparative approaches. These issues are particularly foregrounded in the chapters by MacDonald and Graff. The former chapter examines narratives of ‘best men’ in relation to the campaigns and conflicts in the Near East in the seventh century ad, considering for instance Persian and Arab views of commanders as well as Roman/Byzantine ones. Graff’s chapter takes us further east, to imperial China during the Tang Dynasty (618–907), yet still to the familiar issue of the speeches of encouragement given by generals. Further, although this volume deals with ideals and specific aspects of generalship across an extensive chronological period, from archaic Greece through to the Byzantine Empire in the twelfth century, common themes and concerns emerge across the chapters.
These include the subjects of speeches of commanders, gender (especially the virtue of courage) and cross-cultural comparisons, as already noted, but also encompass commemoration of both military victories and defeats and the intersection of the political and military roles of leaders. All these themes and concerns feature in the final chapter by Krallis, which thus serves as a fitting conclusion to the set of chapters. While the chronological span of the volume means that not every aspect of the art of generalship, and certainly not every lauded or denigrated general, receives detailed treatment, it does mean that commonalities and divergences emerge clearly and that a more holistic view of the subject is provided. We hope that this proves useful and encourages further research, shifting the focus from the study of the careers of individual generals to the ideas and ideals that underpinned them.
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