Soldiers and Ghosts: A History of Battle in Classical Antiquity

This study of military changes across Greece and Rome is designed to appeal to the general reader. Soldiers and Ghosts seeks to explore why changes in warfare took place set against the backgrounf of a slow process of technological change. Lendon emphasises the role of discipline, heroism, patriotism, military obedience, loyalty, and recollection and emulation of a heroic past in the history of warfare and discusses how both Greeks and Romans built on the 'ghosts of tradition', the cultural traditions and heroes of the past. From Homer's Iliad , the origins of the phalanx, hoplite warfare, the Persian Wars, Alexander the Great, Hellenistic warfare, through to Roman warfare up until the 4th century AD, the book covers a wide period of history.