The Ancient Greeks
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Infiltrator
Member # 5754
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 15:24
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I found an interesting article in New Scientist, a science/history magazine that I'm subscribed to, about the Ancient Greeks. Apparently they were stronger than us. For instance, historians rebuilt a trireme and found 170 muscular people, trained them in rowing, and tried to row a trireme as fast as the Greeks did. They failed miserably. They managed a maximum endurance speed of 5 knots, while the Greeks endurance speed was 7 or 8 knots. The modern trireme could row 9 knots for a matter of seconds, while the Greeks rowed 9 knots throughout an entire naval battle(a lot longer than a couple of seconds). This was the average pace of Greek oarsmen, and that means that there were thousands upon thousands of oarsmen that could row that fast. If that is true, than it's entirely possible the Legend of Pheidippides is true, except for the Pan part. It is entirely possible that one of the best runners of Greece could run 150 miles in two days, if others could keep a rowing pace of 2 or 3 knots faster than the modern rowers. So is this true? Or is it an exaggeration of historic fact. I think that it is true. Posts: 626 | Registered: Monday, April 25 2005 07:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 15:48
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Eh, 150 miles in two days is 75 miles per day. I'd be perfectly willing to believe 25 miles per day; that's easy for anyone living prior to modern slothdom. I'd even believe 50 miles per day for a world-class athlete of the ancient world. But 75 miles per day means running three and a half marathons (!) in a day, which would probably mean at least eight hours of running even for a world-class athlete, which... er... has an outside chance of being possible, but if it were accomplished, it would be a spectacular athletic feat. The fact that Herodotus doesn't make much of how long it took is pretty damning to the story. He was very fond of recording any story of accomplishment, even if he thought it was spurious, as he notes. Either he had heard of the runner (who he names) but hadn't heard the full story — which seems unlikely — or that part wasn't made up until later. Then again, the survivals of things resembling fact in what was once thought to be mere folk-tale or fiction have been pretty shocking (i.e. the Iliad and the Trojan War). [ Wednesday, February 14, 2007 17:59: Message edited by: Kelandon ] -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Guardian
Member # 5360
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 17:30
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Remember, he was supposed to have died from exhaustion as soon as he delivered the message. -------------------- May the fires of Undeath burn in your soul, and consume it. Posts: 1636 | Registered: Wednesday, January 5 2005 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5754
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 17:32
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Actually he supposedly ran for 48 hours. Each form of the story seems to be different. It makes it more reasonable when considering the fact that in many tellings he died immediately after telling the Athenians. The thing is, he had the fact that the future of Greece was at stake driving him. Knowing that the future of your family, and many other families is under your control adds a lot to the run. Posts: 626 | Registered: Monday, April 25 2005 07:00 |
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Guardian
Member # 5360
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 17:34
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Also, he began his run immediately after pitched battle. -------------------- May the fires of Undeath burn in your soul, and consume it. Posts: 1636 | Registered: Wednesday, January 5 2005 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 17:51
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There are two aspects to the story, of course: there's the pre-battle 150-mile 2-day journey and then there's the post-battle marathon all at once. I was objecting to the former, not the latter (which is obviously possible, and could well be fatal due to dehydration, particularly after a battle). I retract my previous objection, though, based on the fact that some utter freaks can apparently pull this off. If we can, there's no doubt that the ancients could have, too. In other words, it's possible. And Herodotus does mention how long it took, but he doesn't make a big deal of it the way that he does of many other feats of athletic prowess. [ Wednesday, February 14, 2007 17:59: Message edited by: Kelandon ] -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 6785
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 22:03
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Going back to the start of this topic, the ancient Greeks were used to more manual labor than us. After several years of rowwing you would be able to do it for longer and at a higher speed. Especially with the incentive of the whip to pick up the pace. Posts: 4643 | Registered: Friday, February 10 2006 08:00 |
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Apprentice
Member # 8093
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 22:11
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I have to ask; Are we talking Spartans, Athenians, or Greeks in general? I could totally see the Spartans being that strong since they were an oligaichic society built on war, but it's hard to see the Athenians having that increased strength. Then again, this is a time where the air was much purer than what would become. Compared to our modern society, Greece would have been an environmental landscape fit for healthly beings of all kinds. -------------------- "Hi, I'm Spider!"- The funniest, most insane part of all Avernum/Exile. Kudos to Vogel. RIP Mortax. I will always remember you. Always looking for a scenario to take a look at. A pretty good player who is looking to become a game reviewer. More than happy to help out designers with some player reaction, if they want it. Posts: 10 | Registered: Wednesday, February 14 2007 08:00 |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Wednesday, February 14 2007 23:07
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In the first place I really wonder how we got this data about the speeds of ancient triremes. I'd bet there's a fair amount of squishiness to the figures. Last I read, we were still kind of fuzzy on exactly what ancient length units even meant. The possibility that those supposed ancient speeds are high by a few knots seems very plausible to me. But secondly, we are trying to compare ancient triremes, that were made and crewed by expert teams with many years of experience, to a first modern prototype with a crew that had no experience with triremes. The rowers may have been trained, but trained how? There have been no expert trireme crew trainers for a long time. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5754
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 03:37
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There are pieces of historic fact that were put together to come up with the speed and size of these ships and how the Greeks rowed them. They did more manual labor than us, but the people rowing the prototype exercise a lot. They are as strong as most athletes, who should be as strong as the Greeks. We are discussing all Ancient Greeks. Those numbers are the historians best guess, so for the purpose of the argument put trust in them. They could be wrong, but they have the highest chance of being right. Once again, they are trained with the historians best guess, and piecing together historic fact. Posts: 626 | Registered: Monday, April 25 2005 07:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 03:46
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quote:How can we be discussing all Ancient Greeks when the experiment you describe is relevant only to the ones who rowed triremes? Rowing is one of the most intense sports there is; even athletes have difficulty with it without a lot of training and excellent upper-body strength. I'd be more impressed if these "muscular people" had already been trained rowers before the experiment began. Plus, there's the fact that with experimental archaelogy, a small mistake in reconstructing how the ancients did things can throw you right off. Consider the atlatl; experimental archaeologists found it almost impossible to use effectively until they realised that the dart had to be made of highly flexible wood. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 03:51: Message edited by: Cryptozoology ] -------------------- The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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By Committee
Member # 4233
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 06:16
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Actually, modern rowing is all about lower body strength - all shells used in competitive rowing these days have slide seats, so you can propel the boat with your quads as well as with your arms and backs, which really take a secondary role. That said, technique matters an incredible amount. In modern rowing, a boat with ridiculously strong rowers could still be easily beaten by a boat of rowers 3/4 as strong that had good form. I would say it's likely then that the folks they found to crew the "modern" trireme, though capable atheletes in their own right, were nevertheless not optimized for crewing it, and that could explain the discrepancy. It certainly is the case today that being accomplished in one sport doesn't necessarily translate to strong ability in another. I'm probably in the best aerobic shape of my life right now, having trained for and run a marathon in under four hours, but I guarantee that if I sat down on a rowing machine, I probably wouldn't come close to my best 2000m time from when I rowed in undergrad. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 06:20: Message edited by: Drew ] Posts: 2242 | Registered: Saturday, April 10 2004 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 06:21
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quote:The only problem I have with this is that using slave labor is generally not the most efficient way to get maximum performance from an "employee" (although MY boss thinks so). Oh, and lol. -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 06:31
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Kel, there are freaks out there even more worse than the Greeks fools (and even much worse than the English just above used. Ultramarathoners - some races are 3100 km in length (record is just over 41 days) or 6 day races (record is just over 1000 km in that time) - see Wiki - ultras :eek: -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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By Committee
Member # 4233
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 07:09
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Please use the "edit" button as an alternative to double-posting. Thanks! As for the whip, having someone goading the rowers on doesn't necessarily imply slavery. Bosuns in the British Royal Navy, for example, would frequently use the end of a rope to inspire crews to work faster and harder. (Of course, exactly how free the sailors really were is a matter for debate.) At any rate, Athens had what was widely regarded as the best navy for its day, and its navy was crewed by free men. Posts: 2242 | Registered: Saturday, April 10 2004 07:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 07:24
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quote:No. This distinction is made to sound more than it actually was by history books. The Athenians were pretty darn strong and athletic too. Competitive sports were huge throughout Greece, and everyone did everything by hand, because there was no other way. The Athenians went to war often, too. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 08:00
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quote:With all due respect to history as a discipline, every discipline has its weak points. I'm pretty sure this is one of them. No doubt the figures we have are the current best guesses of historians, but that doesn't make them good guesses. From the kind of evidence I'm guessing these guys must have used, I'd say their best guess ought to be reliable within a factor of 2, but not much better. In which case there is no point in us pouring much thought into the question of why ancient Greeks were so much stronger than us, because most likely they were nothing of the kind. Very likely they had a lot more practice in building and rowing triremes, but that's no shock. Here's an example of what I mean: I bet we don't really know what a trireme was. That is, I'd be willing to bet a beer that no-one really knows the size or design of the ships used in any particular famous ancient sea battle. The actual evidence we have would be maybe a couple of weathered paintings or carvings, whose relevance and accuracy would be hard to establish; and at most a couple of written texts, probably composed long after the battle from earlier sources that are now lost, and probably not giving much detail at that. Now it might be that I'm wrong; perhaps we do have convincing evidence about some ancient fleet. But I figure my odds are worth risking a beer on. Ancient history is a tough, tough field. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 08:02: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
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Apprentice
Member # 8093
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 08:43
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I'm not saying that the Athenians didn't go to battle, I'm saying that they weren't warmongers and incredible tacticians like the Spartans were. They were good, but Sparta was REALLY good. Also, the records of Grecian times seems to point to a civilization filled with philosophy, indulgence, and to be frank, procrastination. (like our modern society doesn't...yeah right.)Of course Socrates' "guardian" was of able mind AND body, but there was really a strict boundary between them. -------------------- "Hi, I'm Spider!"- The funniest, most insane part of all Avernum/Exile. Kudos to Vogel. RIP Mortax. I will always remember you. Always looking for a scenario to take a look at. A pretty good player who is looking to become a game reviewer. More than happy to help out designers with some player reaction, if they want it. Posts: 10 | Registered: Wednesday, February 14 2007 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 08:55
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quote:The archeological evidence for the size and shape of triremes includes the Lenormant Relief (iconographic evidence), ancient harbours, excavations of ship sheds (giving size limitations), inscribed equipment lists for said ships and the bronze rams. Other evidence includes limitations place upon design by the laws of physics. There is also a punic warship that was discovered in 1971. Oh, and apologies for the double post. And also for suggesting that Greeks used slave labor. Checked into that and determined it was free labor powering their warships. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 08:58: Message edited by: moonear ] -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 10:35
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That's a good body of evidence, there, all right. But is it enough to pin down what a trireme was? I don't really think I'm prepared to hand over the beer. Harbors don't really say much, especially as harbors change greatly over centuries. Many ancient ones are now miles inland, for example. Physics does not tell us at all how closely ancient designs approached the limits of the possible. No modern ship approaches those limits, since we need ample safety margins. Ship sheds leave open the question of just which ships used which sheds, or whether larger sheds might have been made of wood. The Lenormant relief is certainly nice, but it looks to me as though the indicated total length of the ship is kind of conjectural, since only a few fragments of the actual relief exist. And it, and the equipment lists, leave one wondering whether they refer to typical or unusual specimens. For that matter, what I know of the history of art makes me think that a carved relief could very well depict an outdated model, because it was traditional or something. It might be that two-tiered ships were everywhere when the Lenormant was carved, but that the single tier of rowers was an accepted artistic convention. Oh, and the Carthaginian ship wreck is wonderful, but it consists of the sternmost ten meters of the vessel only. How long it was originally still requires guesswork. And we still have no idea whether it was a typical vessel even for its place and time, let alone for others. What's a trireme? For my money, and my beer, the jury is still out. One more item: looking up the source of your Lenormant image, the promisingly titled Greek Oared Ships, I found this online first page of a review. (UBB won't let me include the link, but if you google 'Greek Oared Ships', it's the fourth item.) It seems to indicate that the 'trireme question' was controversial for a very long time, and that this one book was a major contribution. Whether the book really answers the question, or only lays out the best that can be said on it, I can't tell from this single page of review. Sounds like a cool book, though. Either way, I think it makes my main point about how hard it is to say anything very precise in ancient history. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 11:01: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 13:01
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SoT, you got me curious so I looked around on the net and apparently in 1996 Mr. Morrison came out with a new book discussing oared boats. I also found this site, The Trireme Trust , which used what evidence there was to create a mockup of an actual trireme, 37 meters long. The pictures of teh boat are quite cool. It also has links to several sites, one of which is course notes discussing the evolution of ships. Quite interesting to explore around - discusses things like the usefulness of iconography and its weaknesses as evidence, etc. Heres a photo from the site:  [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 13:03: Message edited by: moonear ] -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 14:13
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I presume this is the Olympia, which carried the torch for a while for the 2004 Olympics, and which is presumably the vessel in which these recent tests were conducted. I found more about this somewhere on Wikipedia, where it was mentioned that the Olympia was constructed on the (best-guessed) ancient scale, and is therefore awfully cramped for taller modern rowers. And this might also help explain its comparative slowness. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 15:55
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quote:Again, no. Athenians fought as many wars as the Spartans did, and they beat the Spartans in war sometimes. This distinction is something that middle-school history books make, but it doesn't hold up in real research. There was definitely a big cultural difference between the two, but it was not as simple and clear-cut as this. quote:Uh, definitely no. A very small fraction was able to have some leisure time. The overwhelming majority did backbreaking labor that would make you sweat just to watch it. They were a heck of a lot more in shape, by and large, than we are. I also intend to address SoT's questions of evidence, but I don't have time now. Perhaps in a day or two. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 15:55
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EDIT: *jedi hand-wave* This isn't the double post you're looking for. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 15:56: Message edited by: Kelandon ] -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
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written Thursday, February 15 2007 17:02
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quote:Most Ancient Greek city-states had a small navy atleast. Some had larger, better navies, while some had smaller navies, but considering where they lived the almost all had a navy. I just checked, and they were experienced rowers that rowed thr trireme. quote:Also, expanding on Kelandon's point, while the Spartans did beat the Athenians at war, the Athenians had a stronger navy. That is partially why we are including them in this discussion, along with the fact that we are including all Ancient Greeks. quote:History is the closest thing we have to a reliable source from the past. There is always the argument that history may be wrong, but with it being the closest thing we have to fact, that basically destroys the discussion. Also, the recordings of trireme speeds are all roughly the same. That means that unlike the Romans they recorded unexaggerated fact. quote:In ne of their largest wars the Athenians were crushed by the Spartans. The Athenians mosstly one when the navy became a large factor in the war. Also, I've never seen a middle-school textbook with anything about Ancient Greeks. Wow that was a long post. [ Thursday, February 15, 2007 17:03: Message edited by: Kyrek ] Posts: 626 | Registered: Monday, April 25 2005 07:00 |