Ancient Greek army storms CU’s Norlin quad

It’s one thing to study Alexander the Great and the rise of Macedonia. It’s another to re-enact the battle tactics of his day. University of Colorado students of classics experienced the latter as they marched around the Norlin quad with PVC spears recently.

“It’s all very educational, but it’s also a bit of a spectacle,” notes Peter Hunt, associate professor and chair of classics.

Students moved in formation as a hoplite phalanx, then tried out the Macedonian phalanx, a superior formation that facilitated Alexander’s defeat of the Persian Empire and his creation of one of the largest empires in ancient history.

Alexander’s soldiers generally wore much smaller shields strapped to their shoulders.

Before the exercise began, Hunt explained the pre-battle ritual of animal sacrifice.

“When students read their literature or history, the ancient Greeks can seem familiar, almost kindred spirits,” Hunt notes. “A few things remind us that they were not. Slavery is one, and blood sacrifice was another.”

A special sacrifice, sphagia, was conducted immediately before battle, when the lines were perhaps a few-hundred yards apart, Hunt notes. This involved stabbing the victim in the throat and perhaps deciding from the way the blood spurted whether the gods favored going into battle.

“They almost always decided that the gods approved,” he notes adding that a stuffed buffalo seemed the appropriate sphagia at CU.

Hunt has conducted this exercise twice in another class, but he decided to add it to the Alexander course this time, “given the necessarily military focus in any course about Alexander the Great.”

“There are many aspects of ancient battle that students can understand much better after a more vivid and concrete experience than the classroom can provide,” Hunt adds. “For example, students can understand how difficult and crucial it is merely to stay in a formation and, thus, why the amateur armies of the early classical period rarely attempted to do anything more complicated tactically that lining up and advancing.”

Additionally, Hunt adds, students can consider the range of an arrow and how it would feel to try to get through it quickly and in formation.  “Or they can look at the buildings around the quad—most of which are about the same height as city walls—and more vividly understand the dangers of siege warfare and why the Greeks developed it so late.”

Hunt notes that he’s met former students years after they’ve taken the class, and they “remember vividly and smile about the spear and formation exercises.” Course evaluations very often mention it too—always favorably.

This year, one student quipped, “It was a very enjoyable experience, and I hope we instilled fear on campus today!” One student immortalized the event on YouTube; see below: