Of the later tactic writers, Leo (Tact. vi. 39) and Constantine Porphyrogenitus, repeat the double measurement of the sarissa as given by Polybius. Arrian (Tact. c. 12) and Polyænus (ii. 29, 2) state its length at sixteen cubits—Ælian (Tact. c. 14) gives fourteen cubits. All these authors follow either Polybius, or some other authority concurrent with him. None of them contradict him, though none state the case so clearly as he does.
Messrs. Rüstow and Köchly (Gesch. des Griech. Kriegswesens, p. 238), authors of the best work that I know respecting ancient military matters, reject the authority of Polybius as it here stands. They maintain that the passage must be corrupt, and that Polybius must have meant to say that the sarissa was sixteen feet in length—not sixteen cubits. I cannot subscribe to their opinion, nor do I think that their criticism on Polybius is a just one.
First, they reason as if Polybius had said that the sarissa of actual service was sixteen cubits long. Computing the weight of such a weapon from the thickness required in the shaft, they pronounce that it would be unmanageable. But Polybius gives the actual length as only fourteen cubits: a very material difference. If we accept the hypothesis of these authors—that corruption of the text has made us read cubits where we ought to have read feet,—it will follow that the length of the sarissa, as given by Polybius, would be fourteen feet, not sixteen feet. Now this length is not sufficient to justify various passages in which its prodigious length is set forth.
Next, they impute to Polybius a contradiction in saying that the Roman soldier occupied a space of three feet, equal to that occupied by a Macedonian soldier—and yet that in the fight, he had two Macedonian soldiers and ten pikes opposed to him (xviii. 13). But there is here no contradiction at all: for Polybius expressly says that the Roman, though occupying three feet when the legion was drawn up in order, required, when fighting, an expansion of the ranks and an increased interval to the extent of three feet behind him and on each side of him (χάλασμα καὶ διάστασιν ἀλλήλων ἔχειν δεήσει τοὺς ἄνδρας ἐλάχιστον τρεῖς πόδας κατ᾽ ἐπιστάτην καὶ παραστάτην) in order to allow full play for his sword and shield. It is therefore perfectly true that each Roman soldier, when actually marching up to attack the phalanx, occupied as much ground as two phalangites, and had ten pikes to deal with.
Farther, it is impossible to suppose that Polybius, in speaking of cubits, really meant feet; because (cap. 12) he speaks of three feet as the interval between each rank in the file, and these three feet are clearly made equal to two cubits. His computation will not come right, if in place of cubits you substitute feet.
We must therefore take the assertion of Polybius as we find it: that the pike of the phalangite was fourteen cubits or twenty-one feet in length. Now Polybius had every means of being well informed on such a point. He was above thirty years of age at the time of the last war of the Romans against the Macedonian king Perseus, in which war he himself served. He was intimately acquainted with Scipio, the son of Paulus Emilius, who gained the battle of Pydna. Lastly, he had paid great attention to tactics, and had even written an express work on the subject.
It might indeed be imagined, that the statement of Polybius, though true as to his own time, was not true as to the time of Philip and Alexander. But there is nothing to countenance such a suspicion—which moreover is expressly disclaimed by Rüstow and Köchly.
Doubtless twenty-one feet is a prodigious length, unmanageable, except by men properly trained, and inconvenient for all evolutions. But these are just the terms under which the pike of the phalangite is always spoken of. So Livy, xxxi. 39, “Erant pleraque silvestria circa, incommoda phalangi maximè Macedonum: quæ, nisi ubi prælongis hastis velut vallum ante clypeos objecit (quod ut fiat, libero campo opus est) nullius admodum usus est.” Compare also Livy, xliv. 40, 41, where, among other intimations of the immense length of the pike, we find, “Si carptim aggrediendo, circumagere immobilem longitudine et gravitate hastam cogas, confusâ strue implicatur:” also xxxiii. 8, 9.
Xenophon tells us that the Ten Thousand Greeks in their retreat had to fight their way across the territory of the Chalybes, who carried a pike fifteen cubits long, together with a short sword; he does not mention a shield, but they wore greaves and helmets (Anab. iv. 7, 15). This is a length greater than what Polybius ascribes to the pike of the Macedonian phalangite. The Mosynœki defended their citadel “with pikes so long and thick that a man could hardly carry them” (Anabas. v. 4, 25). In the Iliad, when the Trojans are pressing hard upon the Greek ships, and seeking to set them on fire, Ajax is described as planting himself upon the poop, and keeping off the assailants with a thrusting-pike of twenty-two cubits or thirty-three feet in length (ξυστὸν ναύμαχον ἐν παλάμῃσιν—δυωκαιεικοσίπηχυ, Iliad, xv. 678). The spear of Hektor is ten cubits, or eleven cubits, in length—intended to be hurled (Iliad vi. 319; viii. 494)—the reading is not settled whether ἔγχος ἔχ᾽ ἑνδεκάπηχυ, or ἔγχος ἔχεν δεκάπηχυ.
The Swiss infantry, and the German Landsknechte, in the sixteenth century, were in many respects a reproduction of the Macedonian phalanx: close ranks, deep files, long pikes, and the three or four first ranks, composed of the strongest and bravest men in the regiment—either officers, or picked soldiers receiving double pay. The length and impenetrable array of their pikes enabled them to resist the charge of the heavy cavalry or men at arms: they were irresistible in front, unless an enemy could find means to break in among the pikes, which was sometimes, though rarely, done. Their great confidence was in the length of the pike—Macciavelli says of them (Ritratti dell’ Alamagna, Opere t. iv. p. 159; and Dell’ Arte della Guerra, p. 232-236), “Dicono tenere tale ordine, che non é possibile entrare tra loro, né accostarseli, quanto é la picca lunga. Sono ottime genti in campagna, à far giornata: ma per espugnare terra non vagliono, e poco nel difenderlo: ed universalmente, dove non possano tenere l’ ordine loro della milizia, non vagliono.”